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Blogs » Politics » China: Chinese Local Official Rapes “Nearly One Hundred” Young Girls Before Capture |
- China: Chinese Local Official Rapes “Nearly One Hundred” Young Girls Before Capture
- Tibet officials condemn latest self-immolation
- Former rail minister expelled from Party
- Chinese police storm into the era of social media
- CCP Casts Out Former Railway Minister
- Chinese Netizens Ignorant Of Their Country’s History, Image In Africa
- Tiananmen Father Hangs Himself in Protest
- Former Beijing Mayor Denies Charges
- Photo: Butchers, by Michael Steverson
- Beijing Condemns Latest Syrian Bloodshed
- Ai Weiwei: ‘Why Do They Still Have to Spy on Me?’
- Chinese Local Official Rapes “Nearly One Hundred” Young Girls Before Capture
- Today’s Viral Image: Defending The Tweets of Cancer Sufferer Little Lu
- Police Break Car Window to Administer Sobriety Test
- Is Internet Speed Retarding China’s Economic Growth?
- The Daily Twit (@chinahearsay Twitter feed) – 2012-05-28
- China’s Service Industry: Not for the Faint Hearted
- America remembers its veterans, why not China?
- Capital Punishment in China: Ditch the Moral Argument
- Bo Guagua graduates from Harvard
| China: Chinese Local Official Rapes “Nearly One Hundred” Young Girls Before Capture Posted: 28 May 2012 10:19 PM PDT David Wertime from the Tea Leaf Nation blogs about a serial rape crime committed by a local official in Henan province who had raped "nearly one hundred" young girls. So far the local police have identified a doze victims the youngest was born in 2001. Written by Oiwan Lam · comments (0) | |||||||||||||||
| Tibet officials condemn latest self-immolation Posted: 28 May 2012 08:05 PM PDT
Barkhor Bazaar in Lhasa, capital of Tibet Autonomous Region. Photo: Tibet.cn The latest attempted self-immolations in Tibet have once again demonstrated separatists' continued intention to separate the region from China, local officials said. Dargye, from Aba county in the Tibetan area of Sichuan Province, and Tobgye Tseten, from Xiahe county in a Tibetan community of Gansu Province, attempted self-immolations at 2:16 pm on Sunday on Barkhor Bazaar in the heart of Lhasa, the publicity department of Tibet's regional committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) said in a press release Monday. Tobgye Tseten died and Dargye survived with serious injuries, according to the statement, which added that Lhasa police have set up a special force to investigate the case. "The self-immolations might be timed to coincide with the Dalai Lama's 11day visit to Austria. The separatists would use this method to attract worldwide attention and help sensationalize the socalled suffering of Tibetans," Xiong Kunxin, an expert on Tibet at the Minzu University of China, told the Global Times Monday. Downtown Lhasa is particularly crowded these days as Tibetans celebrate the Saga Dawa, which falls on June 4 this year and marks the anniversary of Buddha's birth, enlightenment and death. An employee with the Lhasa tourism bureau Monday declined to tell the Global Times if the incident had affected local tourism. "They were a continuation of the self-immolations in other Tibetan areas and these acts were all aimed at separating Tibet from China," Hao Peng, secretary of the Commission for Political and Legal Affairs of the CPC Tibet Committee, said Monday. More than 20 Tibetans have died from self-immolations since March 2011, the majority of which took place in the Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Qinghai and Gansu provinces, said Qiangba Puncog, chairman of the Standing Committee of the People's Congress of the Tibet Autonomous Region. Tibet is developing well and the livelihoods of people are improving, said Hu Yan, a professor specializing in Tibet affairs with the Party School of the Central Committee of the CPC. "Some people don't want to see a prosperous Tibet and even incite unrest in Tibetan areas, but this won't affect the general stability and development of Tibet," he told the Global Times. Premier Wen Jiabao said in mid March that China is opposed to Tibetan clergy taking such radical moves to disturb and undermine social harmony. One day after the self-immolation, the Hindustan Times reported that India surprised China by asking to reopen its consulate in Lhasa, which was closed after the 1962 border conflict between the two countries. The demand came after a Chinese request to open a third consulate in India. "China is wary about opening up Tibet because of a series of self-immolations … Beijing's initial reaction was not so encouraging and it preferred a consulate somewhere else," the newspaper reported Monday. The relevant department of China's foreign ministry handling consulate matters could not be reached for comment, while the press officer of the Indian embassy in Beijing declined to comment on the report when reached by the Global Times. Xinhua contributed to this story Global Times
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| Former rail minister expelled from Party Posted: 28 May 2012 07:42 PM PDT
Liu Zhijun violated discipline and will face judicial investigation Liu Zhijun, former railway minister, was expelled from the Communist Party of China due to serious disciplinary violations, according to a decision by the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection announced on Monday. Liu, 59, was also blamed for fostering corruption throughout the railway system. The disciplinary watchdog said Liu had taken advantage of his position to help Ding Yuxin, board chairwoman of Beijing Boyou Investment Management Corp, make huge illicit gains. He was also charged with accepting a large number of bribes and leading a corrupt life. His illicit gains have been confiscated and he will be handed over to the judicial department for further investigation. His disciplinary violations may include criminal acts, the watchdog said. Lin Zhe, a professor at the Party School of the Central Committee of the CPC who specializes in fighting corruption, said Liu will probably face severe punishment. "Expelling Liu from the Party means his political life has ended," she said, adding such punishment for an official is very heavy. However, Lin added Liu's case will not be brought to court any time soon, "because the case is complicated", and more time is needed to investigate. No matter what achievements an official has made, no matter how high his position was, the authority will deal with corruption without fear or favor, Lin added. Li Chengyan, head of Peking University's clean government research center, said the case is being treated seriously. "Liu's punishment, after a one-year investigation, shows our government attaches great importance to the case." The announcement on Monday is the latest development in the investigation. Liu was appointed vice-minister of railways in 1996 and minister in 2003. He was removed from his post in February last year. At least eight senior officials at the Ministry of Railways have been sacked in the past two years and placed under investigation. They include, Zhang Shuguang, former deputy chief engineer at the ministry, Luo Jinbao, former board chairman of China Railway Container Transport Co and Su Shunhu, former deputy chief of the ministry's transport bureau. Zhang, Liu's close friend, and Luo have confirmed links to Liu's case. Other officials are "very likely" to be linked, according to a report by Caixin.com, a financial news website. Liu, as minister, called for "leapfrog development". This entailed building a high-speed rail network of 16,000 km by 2015. Investment, totaling trillions of yuan poured in, and funds were embezzled. In one particular case, at least 187 million yuan ($28 million) was misappropriated by individuals or companies involved in building the Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway, the National Audit Office said in a report in March last year. Ding, 57, board chairwoman of Beijing Boyou Investment Management Corp, from Shanxi province, is also called Ding Shumiao. Due to her close relationship with Liu, Ding's company won bids for high-speed railway projects in recent years, such as Wuhan to Guangzhou, Zhengzhou to Xi'an and Guangzhou to Shenzhen-Hong Kong, according to a report by Beijing News in January. The report also said that the assets of Ding's company soared from 474 million yuan in 2008 to 4.5 billion yuan in 2010. A Caixin magazine report in February last year also said Ding introduced a number of young actresses in a TV series, that she had invested in, to Liu. Ding was placed under investigation in January last year. After the bullet train crash in Wenzhou, Zhejiang province, on July 23 last year, which killed 40 passengers, the construction of high-speed rail was curtailed and bullet train speeds were reduced. A report by an investigation team, authorized by the State Council, said in December last year that Liu and the ministry's former deputy chief engineer Zhang Shuguang should take prime responsibility for the accident.
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| Chinese police storm into the era of social media Posted: 28 May 2012 08:15 PM PDT We've written a great deal in recent weeks and months about how Chinese of all stripes — from journalists and lawyers to academics and the curious hoi polloi — have used social media to share information and perspectives on human rights, international affairs, propaganda and public diplomacy. But while we emphasize the importance of microblogs as a popular and personal means of communication, we should not forget that they are also important tools for organizations and agencies — including those with a vested interest in controlling and spinning information. On May 24, People's Daily Online Public Opinion Monitoring Center released a list of China's top influential microblogs operated by public security offices at the provincial and sub-provincial level in China, determined on the basis of confirmed followers (认证粉丝数), follower activity levels (粉丝活跃率), original posts, average shares and comments and other criteria.
According to the center's study, the top public security microblog in China is "@GuangzhouPublicSecurity" (@广州公安), the official police Weibo in the city of Guangzhou in China's southern Guangdong province. Number two and three on the list are the official accounts of the Jinan and Harbin police, "@JinanPublicSecurity" (@济南公安) and "@PeacefulHarbin" (@平安哈尔滨).
What sort of information are these official microblogs sharing? The report from the People's Daily Online Public Opinion Monitoring Center cites one example from April this year in which Guangzhou police printed and distributed a deck of cards with 54 local most-wanteds, hoping members of the public would provide information. One of the suspects (The "King" card) surrendered to police in late May, after news of the deck was reported in local media. The story of the suspect's surrender, shared through the official microblog of the Guangzhou police, drew participation from close to 100,000 internet users, according to the Online Public Opinion Monitoring Center. Subsequent news shared via Weibo of the capture of the "Seven of Spades" in the Guangzhou deck attracted 333 shares and 108 comments. | |||||||||||||||
| CCP Casts Out Former Railway Minister Posted: 28 May 2012 07:34 PM PDT China's Communist Party has expelled former railway minister Liu Zhijun, who was removed from his post as minister more than a year ago amid allegations of corruption, according to a decision by the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection. From The China Daily:
Removal from the Communist Party "virtually guarantees a conviction," according to The Associated Press. The drama surrounding Liu's sudden ouster in February 2011 has since been overshadowed by the demise of former Chongqing party chief Bo Xilai, but today's news provides hints as to how the Bo case may play out. The Wall Street Journal reports:
© Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us | |||||||||||||||
| Chinese Netizens Ignorant Of Their Country’s History, Image In Africa Posted: 28 May 2012 06:45 PM PDT  Arresting 100 Chinese nationals is a sure way to inflame netizens Crackdowns on foreigners have spread to the Birthplace of Humanity. On May 24, China's Global Times reported that Nigerian police had detained nearly 100 Chinese citizens in the cities of Kano and Lagos. According to Nigerian authorities, this crackdown was aimed at all foreigners who were living or working in the country illegally, and not specifically targeted at the Chinese. But Chinese netizens on Sina Weibo, China's Twitter, clearly perceive it as retaliation for Beijing's own recent moves targeting foreigners. @刘承华 weaves everything together perfectly in one tweet: "China ousts a journalist from Al-Jazeera; the U.S. kicks out teachers from the Confucius Institute. Beijing cleans out illegal foreigners; Nigeria detains Chinese laborers. Now that China allows visa exemption for foreigners staying in China for less then 72 hours, the U.S. State Department reversed its directive regarding the Confucius Institute…What complicated connections!" And the dance continues. Eighty out of 100 Chinese citizens were released from Nigerian authority recently. Some are comforted by their compatriots' release. Most netizens, however, are still indignant at the government's compromising attitude. A popular post retweeted by many on Weibo summarizes China's diplomatic strategy with a parody of Sun Tzu's Art of War (孙子兵法): "When the enemy advances, we hold our grounds; when the enemy retreats, we hold our grounds; when the enemy is fatigued, we hold our grounds; when the enemy pitches their camp, we hold our grounds (敌进我忍，敌退我忍，敌疲我忍，敌驻我忍)"—in a word, the government has dealt lamely with its various disputes this year. China and Africa in history The increasing media coverage of Chinese in Africa corresponds with China's increasing economic engagement on the continent. Chinese migration in Africa started to soar since the mid 1990s. African trading communities have also existed in Southern Chinese cities such as Guangzhou since as far back as the year 2000. Today, Guangzhou locals would call districts concentrated by African merchants "chocolate city" (巧克力城). (Here's a good translation of a photo album on African traders in Guangzhou by the blog ChinaSmack.) In 2009, China overtook the U.S. to become Africa's biggest trading partner.  Zheng He, China's official voyager in the Ming Dynasty, went as far as East Africa and the Horn of Africa. Source: Wikimedia Commons. China and Africa actually go a long way back. Among all African countries, China has the longest and deepest ties with Mauritius. Some Chinese set sail to Mauritius during the 18th century, and their Sino-Mauritian descendants make up about 3% of Mauritius' total population today. Some Sino-Mauritians immigrated to the Seychelles in the late 19th century. Around the same time, Johannesburg also saw waves of Chinese as well as Taiwanese migrant workers. In the 1960s, Chinese engineers helped build infrastructures in Africa in the spirit of Socialist brotherhood. For example, the Tazara line, the railway linking Tanzanian port Dar es Salaam with Zambian town Kapiri Mposhi, was a project sponsored and executed by China in the early 1970s. Mutual perception after a new wave of emigration Along the new wave of Chinese emigration to Africa since the mid 1990s, talk of Africa starts circulating online again, some by mainstream news portals, some by individual "Africa hands" (非洲通) who claimed to base their writing on years of observation while working in Africa. As early as 2009, Liu Zhirong (刘植荣), then a Chinese staffer of a World Bank project in Ethiopia, wrote a blog entry, "Chinese in the Eyes of the African People." (For a partial English translation by Global Times, click here.) In this entry, Liu lists nine characteristics his African friends think typical of the Chinese. Most of these generalizations are far from positive. The last notes are made about the Chinese's lawlessness, faithlessness, and the general feeling that the Chinese are stirring up the African market and are stealing jobs from Africans—most netizens who have commented on the Nigerian detention, it seems, want to deny this fact. Such attitudes are perhaps a source of surprise for Chinese netizens, who normally see Africa as not just economically "backward." It might shock them to know that African workers are very keen on protecting their labor rights when Chinese companies ask them to work for more hours than local labor law stipulates. It might also shock them that while China's GDP is greater than any African nation, Liu reports in his blog entry that 32 African countries nonetheless have a higher minimum wage than China. But despite Liu's blog entries' popularity in 2009, netizens commenting on Nigerians' detention today seem oblivious of the facts above.  Liu Zhirong got famous in 2009 for his two blog entries about Chinese in Africa But even for Liu, sentiment mirroring that of most netizens still can be seen in his blog entry, "Why Africans Still Discriminate against Chinese." Liu complains that Africans are not particularly brotherly towards the Chinese, even though the government has given them ample aid. To explain this discrepancy, Liu argues, "It is mainly because we have not colonized Africa[Chinese])." Caucasians are treated nicely in Africa because they have shown their supremacy during their colonization. Chinese, however, don't get enough respect because they haven't been bossy enough—this, at least, seems to be the very undertone of Liu's blog entry. Comparing netizens' reactions today, Chinese's perception of Africans and African countries don't seem to have gone through any fundamental changes. Most Chinese workers in Africa are still not fluent in English (or French), though more educated Chinese youth are going discovering on the continent. So perhaps these educated youth will bring further understanding of Africa back to China, where extreme nationalism and racism, blatant or implicit, still reign. [Thanks to Yale student Ethan Rodriguez-Torrent for providing research guidelines.] Footnotes (? returns to text)
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| Tiananmen Father Hangs Himself in Protest Posted: 28 May 2012 07:06 PM PDT Ya Weilin, the 73-year-old father of a man shot in the head during the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown, hanged himself in Beijing last week in protest at the government's failure to recognise the issue. From the Associated Press:
From the South China Morning Post:
Two monks also attempted suicide protests in Lhasa on Sunday, setting fire to themselves outside the city's Jokhang Temple. One was killed, while the other survived. The self-immolations were the first to take place in the Tibetan capital. © Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us | |||||||||||||||
| Former Beijing Mayor Denies Charges Posted: 28 May 2012 06:34 PM PDT Chen Xitong, who served as mayor of Beijing during the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown before he was dismissed from his post in 1995 and then sentenced to jail on corruption charges in what many saw as the result of a power struggle with then President Jiang Zemin, has challenged the charges against him in a series of interviews to be published in Hong Kong. From Reuters, which reports that Chen's story is likely to attract parallels to the downfall of former Chongqing party chief Bo Xilai:
© Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us | |||||||||||||||
| Photo: Butchers, by Michael Steverson Posted: 28 May 2012 06:28 PM PDT  Butchers © Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us | |||||||||||||||
| Beijing Condemns Latest Syrian Bloodshed Posted: 28 May 2012 06:20 PM PDT Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin on Monday condemned the "cruel killings" in the Syrian town of Houla, where 108 people were killed on Friday, though he stopped short of echoing the United Nations Security Council in directly placing blame on the Syrian government. From Reuters:
In a contribution to CNN, Asher Kaufman of the University of Notre Dame writes that the violence in Syria has turned into an "asymmetric civil war" and claims that only China and Russia can end the bloodshed:
© Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us | |||||||||||||||
| Ai Weiwei: ‘Why Do They Still Have to Spy on Me?’ Posted: 28 May 2012 06:11 PM PDT The Globe and Mail's Mark MacKinnon talks to Ai Weiwei about pressure from the authorities, its effect on his art, and his ongoing state of heavily restricted freedom which, MacKinnon writes, "could only be possible in the China of 2012."
The authorities' support for Ai's art career appears to be a relatively recent development. According to Edward Wong's account in Saturday's New York Times, one of his interrogators last year questioned the artistic merit of his Zodiac Heads, expressing bewilderment at the high prices they had fetched. "Very few people know why art sells so high," Ai told him. "I don't even know." See more on the artist and his struggles via CDT, and a list of upcoming screenings of Alison Klayman's documentary, Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry. © Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us | |||||||||||||||
| Chinese Local Official Rapes “Nearly One Hundred” Young Girls Before Capture Posted: 28 May 2012 03:59 PM PDT  Li Xingong was commended multiple times for excellent performance He was a successful public official. Not only was he Vice-Secretary of the Communist Party Standing Committee of Yongcheng City, a county-level city in Henan Province, but he moonlighted as a teacher in the language and culture department of Yongcheng Vocational College. He had been commended multiple times as an "outstanding Party worker." But Li Xingong (李新功) also lived another life. In that life, he lured dozens of girls as young as 11 years old into his black, unmarked Chevrolet, where he would rape them. He promised payments to students at one of the city's middle schools who could help find him potential victims. Finally, on the evening of May 8, 2012, Li was caught in the act and arrested. According to a report by the Youth Times (Chinese), a police raid of Li's personal effects revealed a "large number" of condoms, lubricants and aphrodisiacs. On his personal computer were stored pornographic pictures as well as the the QQ numbers of many young girls. (QQ is a widely used chat service in China.) It is now suspected that Li Xingong may have neared 100 different victims before he was finally caught. China's netizens have spared no word in assailing Li Xingong and his crimes. On Sina Weibo, China's Twitter, they have demanded he be sentenced to death as soon as possible, with many calling for him to be subjected to a variety of corporal and capital punishments including castration, drawing and quartering, hanging, and a variety of other brutal measures used in imperial China. They are calling him a "beast" and "human scum." In the face of horrific facts, it is unsurprising to see an outpouring of anger and grief. But netizens are doubly perturbed by the reaction of local authorities to their fallen colleague: Silence, and an order for no one to speak or to accept interviews about the affair. The Youth Times reporter, using the pen name "Hot News Orange" (鲜橙热闻), wrote, "Before this reporter finished [his/her] story, [he/she] was advised by others that it would be 'best not to do interviews first…people will thank you.'" Making matters worse, local authorities either hid, or completely failed to understand, the extent of Li's crime. A press release by Yongcheng authorities just two days ago said that "According to investigation, Li Xingong is suspected of raping over ten girls." But according to the anonymous reporter, "A survey of victims' families lasting over ten days revealed the number of Li's victims far surpassed those recorded on his computer, most likely numbering close to 100." Police have explained that Li himself admitted to over ten.  How, netizens ask, could detection have taken this long? With estimates differing by an order of magnitude, netizens have made quite clear whom they trust more. In over 389,000 tweets on Weibo, netizens felt systemic problems were to blame for what amounted to a cover-up, or at least reflexive foot-dragging, from authorities predisposed to "shelter" one of their own. @我唔系Du仔 asked, "After this, how are we supposed to trust the official findings when they are released?" Observers are not simply angered by the crime, and the cover-up. Many are publicly wondering how Li could lead two lives that were so different for so long, not only without detection, but with repeated instance of Party commendation. To many, an unaccountable and fiercely protective Party organization lies at the root. Not only do netizens think the local Party is trying to protect Li, they feel that officials like him are an inevitable (if occasional) byproduct of the system around him. @见习医生85875239 wrote, "The cells in certain organizations have become diseased, and there are terminal symptoms." More tragic than the shattered trust in government is the broken lives of so many children who fell victim to an unchecked Li. Widely-followed microblogger Lian Peng (@连鹏), also enraged by the gag order issued by Yongcheng officials, asked them directly, "Do you have children?" @郑洪升 reminded users that Children's Day, when Chinese parents celebrate their (mostly) only children, is June 1, just days away. "Because of Li Xingong's brutality…a layer of shadow will cover Children's Day." Even if the local party does the unexpected and steps forward to take responsibility, it will no doubt take parents in Yongcheng many Junes before they feel at ease handing their precious ones over to local schools again. | |||||||||||||||
| Today’s Viral Image: Defending The Tweets of Cancer Sufferer Little Lu Posted: 28 May 2012 12:13 PM PDT "On the Internet," they used to say, "nobody knows if you're a dog." In modern Chinese social media, nobody knows if you're telling the truth either–or if you even exist.  Sometimes, things are actually as they seem online What is this image? At top, a China Central Television (CCTV) anchor discusses leukemia sufferer Lu Ruoqing (鲁若晴). Lu Ruoqing, or "little Lu," is the young woman's alias. Her plight has captured netizen imagination ever since, as Baidu Beat recently reported, Weibo user @作业本 asked netizens on May 19 to tweet in support of the "most beautiful cancer fighter" (最美抗癌女孩). Doubts later arose about Lu's existence when she was not found in the hospital she claimed to be visiting, until it was revealed that "Lu Ruoqing" was merely a pseudonym. Some had suspected a stealth hype campaign by Sina to get more netizen eyeballs on its Weibo platform. In particular, Fang Zhouzi (@方舟子), famed for ferreting out fraud and plagiarism, raised doubts about whether Lu's Sina Weibo account was in fact her own. His Weibo banner and picture lie beneath the screen capture above. The text accompanying this image throws a gauntlet at Fang's feet: "CCTV has formally reported on the Lu Ruoqing matter–a beautiful young girl enduring pain and suffering from her disease, who shared her story on Weibo out of a belief in the inherent goodness of human beings. There was no marketing team, no hype, no fundraising, all the Weibos were written by [Lu] herself while carrying her disease. But Fang Zhouzi forced her to prove her own innocence. Now, Mr. Fang has two choices: Sincerely apologize to Ms. Lu, or call out CCTV for fraud. I will support whichever choice Mr. Fang makes." [Chinese] Where did it come from? A well-known author with the pen name Wuman Lanjiang (@雾满拦江), originally Cui Jinsheng, posted this challenge on the morning of May 27. It is since been re-posted over 12,000 times, drawing a number of high profile Weibo users into the discussion. Why is it so popular?  A young woman dubbed Lu Ruoqing suffers, but not in silence This image, and its accompanying tweet, escalates a war of words between Fang and his doubters. Fang has written to defend himself, saying he never doubted the existence of Little Lu or her disease, but simply believes that other accounts on the Sina Weibo platform have "hyped" Lu's story. This appears to be a retreat from Fang's earlier position that Lu's own Weibo account looked like a fraud. For Chinese netizens, distinguishing truth from fiction continues to require constant vigilance.
Footnotes (? returns to text)
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| Police Break Car Window to Administer Sobriety Test Posted: 28 May 2012 09:58 AM PDT Ever wondered what would happen if you tried to resist a police sobriety test? Apparently, in Shenzhen, China, they'll break your window.
We assume the result was not favorable, which begs the question: What did the driver think was going to happen? Then again, the driver was likely not in a state conducive to lucid, rational thought. Or perhaps he knew all too well the new, beefed up penalties in China that have made drunk driving a criminal offense. The story quickly become one of the most popular topics on Sina Weibo, a Twitter-like microblog in China. Props for our men in blue Most netizens were supportive of the police action, perhaps mindful of the appalling death toll on Chinese roads, with 65,000 fatalities in 2010. @Promise2me tweets, "The police are so cool; this is the way it should be done," [1] and @林凯隆 writes, "They should have smashed [the window] right away! Waiting half an hour, they are too patient." [2] @-mao-mao- agrees, "I support the police's action. Half an hour of trying to convince this guy was patience enough. They were right to smash [the window], it's only glass that they smashed, not a person. Reasonable law enforcement! You have to show that type of person some action." [3]
But it was such a nice car… Not all netizens agree. @单眼挑眉吹口哨11 tweets, "Why did they smash the car? They have no right!" and @我的笑容与你有关 opines: "This is too much…how can the police act this way? Even though [the driver] was wrong, you can't just smash their window." [5] @江淮卖水哥 thinks the window-smashing cops may have been sneaking drinks in the back of the cruiser themselves: "The driver was drinking Maotai [a very expensive Chinese rice liquor], the traffic cops were drinking Er Guo Tou [a much cheaper rice liquor]. Head on collision results!" [6] @幸福的淘学 is not sure the police were right to break the window, but thinks the driver should sober up and take responsibility: "If you have the guts to drink, and the guts to drive your car out onto the road after you drink, then why did you suddenly become a turtle hiding in its shell [a Chinese euphemism for a coward] when the traffic police show up? I'm not sure if smashing the window to take the test was the right thing to do, but I just can't abide this kind of refusal to take responsibility for your own actions. Drunk driving is playing roulette with your own life. Wake up bro!" [7] With drunk driving responsible for over 3,500 traffic accidents and 1,220 deaths in 2011 (already a large decline from the year before thanks to tough new criminal sanctions), this writer for one hopes that more drunk drivers wake up soon to take responsibility for the wrecked lives strewn across their collective rear view mirrors….or, failing that, to the shattering sound of their window being smashed in by the police. Footnotes (? returns to text) | |||||||||||||||
| Is Internet Speed Retarding China’s Economic Growth? Posted: 28 May 2012 10:13 AM PDT The answer is, of course, yes, but the real question is by how much? I honestly do not believe we know the answer to that question. James Fallows noted this on his blog yesterday:
Not a new issue, and critics of China's Internet regulations use this to argue for liberalization. In other words, there is an economic argument to be made to push back against the content monitoring system. But how much is China's GDP suffering because of lower Net speeds? Is that comment about the Brits banning steam fair? First answer: I don't really know. I don't trust the stats I've seen on this, because what they usually do is reduce everything down to a man-hour calculation. That does tell us something, but not as much as we might think. And there are a lot of assumptions that must be made about Chinese web habits, what kinds of Net use actually matter when it comes to productivity, and whether domestic alternatives mitigate the problems with access to offshore sites. Second answer: I have a feeling that the conclusions on this issue are overstated to some degree. When coming from the media on an anecdotal basis (e.g. the Beijing Bureau Chief of Newspaper X writes an article about how slow YouTube is when she uses her VPN), I tend to discount the reports. Surfing habits of these folks bear almost no resemblance to your average Chinese Net user. Moreover, I don't really think anyone has figured out what lost man-hours due to Net use really mean anyway. Consider two horny men, Mr. Zhou in Beijing and Mr. Yamashita in Tokyo: Mr. Zhou spends two hours a day surfing ServileJapaneseChicks.com. Mr. Yamashita watches the same video clips of women in French maid costumes playing with farm animals, but due to higher Net speed, it only takes him 1.3 hours (I'm making up these numbers). But we're forgetting about human nature. Does Mr. Yamashita get back to work sooner or does he watch another .7 hour's worth of naughty vids? What do you think? And if Mr. Zhou's Net speed is really slow, does he go back to work or rather spend his time watching those torrent files he downloaded the day before? Just one example . . . My point is that it's too easy to say that China's Net speed is slow and therefore its economy is taking a significant hit.
© Stan for China Hearsay, 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us | |||||||||||||||
| The Daily Twit (@chinahearsay Twitter feed) – 2012-05-28 Posted: 27 May 2012 08:59 PM PDT
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| China’s Service Industry: Not for the Faint Hearted Posted: 28 May 2012 04:57 AM PDT Steve Dickinson has a great post on China Law Blog on foreign companies providing services to Chinese firms. The advice is solid, at least in cases when the service company has sufficient leverage and/or is strong enough financially to turn away business. Here's Steve's major point:
What I find amusing about the discussion is that this general problem is something faced by lawyers every day, and not only when they deal with Chinese companies. For my law student readers, let this be a warning: this is the kind of industry for which you are preparing yourself. With some exceptions, most clients do not value the work lawyers do, or at least they do not believe that the money lawyers charge is at all justifiable. Lawyers who do not come to terms with their clients upfront on fees are courting disaster and pretty much inviting a dispute when the project is over. And for those lawyers out there who deal with new client SMEs or companies of any size from certain countries (I will avoid making a list here) and do not insist on a retainer payment upfront, I wish you luck. Try to ask for your costs upfront; in some cases, that's the only payment you'll ever get. For those non-legal service companies that are running into trouble with receivables, you could do worse than asking a lawyer for advice before taking on that new China project. We've been there and unfortunately know all the pitfalls. By the way, we're going to be asking you for a retainer. © Stan for China Hearsay, 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us | |||||||||||||||
| America remembers its veterans, why not China? Posted: 28 May 2012 04:39 AM PDT WOLFEBORO, NH Today is Memorial Day in the US, which is not only the unofficial start of summer here in New England, but more importantly is a time for Americans to remember and show respect for the soldiers fighting for their country in all of its many wars. Yesterday, we walked to a little diner in the center of Wolfeboro for breakfast. There I saw some elderly veterans dressed up in suits covered with all of the medals they had earned in the service. Other people, even complete strangers, would stop at their table just to say "Hi" or to say "Thank you" to the old men for their contribution to the country. Later this morning, Wolfeboro will have a ceremony and parade for Memorial Day. Of course, local veteran groups played a key role in organizing the ceremonies and will walk in the front of the parade. I was talking about this with some local residents and during our conversation they mentioned that if Mitt Romney, the US presidential candidate, who has a summer home in Wolfeboro, wanted to walk in the parade he would need to walk in the back, with the other citizens and not necessarily be given some place of high honor. After all, they said, he's only a politician. As a foreigner who comes from a country where the government ignores certain wars, such as China's 1979 war with Vietnam, and history education is all about politics, I was amazed by people's voluntary gratitude and respect to veterans. When I was a student, our school organized student visits to Martyrs' Cemetery and to present wreaths. However, for us it was more like part of patriotic education, rather than a real commemoration. I don't think my teachers really cared all that much either. In Wolfeboro, the parade and the ceremony isn't organized by the government or a party, it's organized by local merchants and veterans' groups. In China, the government would never let something like this happen without wanting to take charge, and local officials would all jockey for position to march in the very front. Once in Beijing, I ran into a taxi driver who claimed to be a veteran of the 1979 China-Vietnam war. He talked about how his brigade went through all kinds of tough battles, humid weather, and dangerous ambushes in Vietnam. He said, "Many young people don't even know about our Vietnam War any more", he sighed. "We once sacrificed our lives for the country, but right now nobody cares. Now we are in our 50s, we just have to work fourteen hours to make ends meet." To be fair, veterans can face many tough challenges coming home to the United States as well, including dealing with injuries, or mental illness, or finding it difficult to get a job and readjust to civilian life. But in the United States, the media frequently does stories and features on veterans' issues, and puts pressure on the government (and society) to do more to help veterans returning from overseas conflicts. In China, the veterans of embarrassing wars are forgotten, with barely a mention ever in the media or by the leaders. Born in the early 80's, I never learned much about the Vietnam War. I kind of remember a song called "Xueran de fengcai"(血染的风采) commemorating the war heroes of the War with Vietnam. However since then, the war has barely been mentioned in public like it never happened. Of course, "Peaceful Rise" is the current government line. A war with a neighboring country which occurred over 30 years ago doesn't fit this theme. It is quite amazing to me that in China we spend all this time and energy constantly condemning the horrible Japanese invasion and the vicious American conspiracy against China. Our government operates a whole propaganda machine to make sure that this hatred will be passed to the younger generation. However, we don't have the time to show our respect to the soldiers who sacrificed for their country or the money to make sure that the veterans have decent lives. They are the true patriots. | |||||||||||||||
| Capital Punishment in China: Ditch the Moral Argument Posted: 28 May 2012 03:13 AM PDT
In China, some of the procedural challenges have been addressed by reforms in the past few years, including a mandatory review by the nation's Supreme People's Court. There are limits to major reform efforts, though, and strong public opinion supporting capital punishment is often used not only to beat back attempts at abolishing the death penalty entirely, but also to push back on new rules that would significantly reduce the number of capital cases. An Op/Ed today on this issue muddles the normative and procedural issues somewhat, and misses an opportunity in doing so. Here's the basic argument:
OK, granted, this Op/Ed is not a lengthy, well-reasoned argument. However, there's enough there to reveal the muddled approach. If the issue is public opinion and "rights," then we're talking about a normative discussion. Many of the NGOs that compile wonderful statistics and conduct detailed studies are making a mistake when they bring that data into a question of the morality of capital punishment. Who cares whether one or a thousand people are executed if the argument is that it is morally reprehensible? The numbers are irrelevant, unless perhaps the goal is to increase people's feelings of personal guilt. But when the discussion turns to "wrongful execution" and "fairness," that's another matter. Sure, there's obviously a moral problem with executing the wrong guy, but the fundamental criticism is one based in rule of law: the system isn't working the way it is supposed to. In this discussion, data is paramount. One or two procedural mistakes might be acceptable from an administrative point of view, for example, but when the number of mistakes reaches a certain level, the argument that a system is fundamentally flawed becomes much stronger. (I personally favor a zero-tolerance policy towards administrative failures when it comes to the death penalty, which is why I don't support it.) The advantage of this argument is that it completely sidesteps the normative question. It doesn't matter whether you think the death penalty is right or wrong. Everyone should support fairness and attempts to minimize wrongful execution. This can be used in support of significant reforms. For example, one can say that because of problems with local courts (e.g. corruption, lack of proper training), the SPC review process is necessary to ensure fairness in capital cases. This reform measure can be supported entirely on rule of law/procedural grounds without any invocation of fundamental rights, good and evil, or any other moral framework one wishes to drag into the discussion. Because the procedural argument attacks rules from a fairness perspective, it has a much greater chance of success when it comes to public support. For some reason, folks have a tendency to be defensive when you attack their personal ideas concerning moral philosophy. Who needs some holier-than-thou NGO telling someone that their moral compass is off kilter? That doesn't personally bother me in the least, but most people are more sensitive than yours truly. So, you want capital punishment? That's fine, as long as it's carried out properly. And by the way, once those reforms kick in, the number of cases will shrink dramatically. Everyone's happy short term: advocates for reform see a drop in executions, while folks who support the death penalty can sleep better at night knowing that fewer innocents are being executed. Yes, there will be many "law and order" types who will continue to push back against any reforms. But critics of capital punishment are never going to get much help from those folks. And besides, with a "fairness" argument, critics and reformers will at least be able to occupy the moral high ground, so to speak. © Stan for China Hearsay, 2012. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us | |||||||||||||||
| Bo Guagua graduates from Harvard Posted: 28 May 2012 12:20 AM PDT
Bo Guagua, son of former Chongqing chief Bo Xilai and lawyer Gu Kailai, graduated from Harvard yesterday without his parents by his side. From Reuters:
Bo Junior won't be returning to China anytime soon. According to the grapevine, he'll stay on in the United States to read law. Maybe he can do that at NYU? That way he can be fellow students with Chen Guangcheng. Shanghaiist | |||||||||||||||
Recently a driver of a tony BMW X5 in the prosperous southern Chinese city was stopped by traffic police during an anti-drunk driving sweep. Instead of rolling down his window and taking the sobriety test like a good citizen, the driver repeatedly refused police entreaties to take the test–or even to open his window. This went on for half an hour before the police decided enough was enough and proceeded to shatter the driver-side window and forcibly administered the breathalyzer test. 
@我心飞翔2784276197
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