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• Trust Among Chinese Drops to Record Low
• Going Undercover, Evangelists Taking Jesus to Tibet
• Photo: Burma on the Left, China on the Right, by Ilmari Hyvönen
• Chinese Troops Prepare for Spillover From Myanmar Civil War
• Putting Tibet Back On The Map
• Dirty Business for China’s Internet Scrubbers
• General’s Son Detained in Connection with Gang Rape

Trust Among Chinese Drops to Record Low Posted: 23 Feb 2013 12:00 AM PST The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences' newly released Annual Report on Social Mentality suggests that social trust in China continues to fall. From He Dan at China Daily: The Blue Book of Social Mentality, the latest annual report on the social mentality of China, analyzed respondents' trust toward different people and organizations and drew a conclusion that trust in society is poor. The trust level was 59.7 points out of a full mark of 100 points. In 2010, the trust level was 62.9 points. [...] It showed that around 30 percent of the people polled trusted strangers on the street and about 24 percent trusted strangers online. While People's Daily attributes the distrust to "the lack of shared social values" among Chinese, a report from South China Morning Post suggests that the reason might lie in Chinese parenting: In most cases, a higher number of Chinese parents admitted to telling 'instrumental' lies which entice the child into doing something. The report, published in the International Journal of Psychology, found that in both countries [China and the U.S.] the practice of lying to one's children to encourage behavioural compliance was rife and most frequently took the form of falsely threatening to leave a child alone in public if he or she refused to follow the parent. [...] Cross-cultural differences were also seen: a larger proportion of the parents in China reported that they employed instrumental lie-telling to promote compliance, and a larger proportion approved of this practice, as compared to the parents in the US. The arrests of six fake monks at the sacred Buddhist mountain Wutaishan will do little to solve the problem. From Josh Chin at The Wall Street Journal: Some in China have argued that a revival of religion might help fill the moral vacuum that has been swirling at the center of Chinese society ever since the country shed its belief in communism to embrace market economics three decades ago. But with surveys showing trust eroding in China, news of a fake monk scheme at a sacred mountain suggests even religion isn't immune to the no-holds-barred hustler ethos that has come to dominate so much of the country. [...] The Temple for the God of Wealth and another temple called Foguo Zhongxin reportedly hired fake monks to trick tourists into donating money and buying expensive incense, Xinhua said, adding that the temples also fooled tourists into paying too much for ceremonies. [...] The companies in charge of managing Wutaishan and some of China's other sacred peaks have made headlines in recent years by announcing plans for initial public offerings on stock markets. Those announcements prompted Liu Wei, deputy director of China's State Administration for Religious affairs, to issue a press release in June saying the administration would object to the commercial exploitation of religious resources. See also One-Child Policy Accused of Breeding Mistrust, via CDT. © Mengyu Dong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Buddhism, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, monks, moral vacuum, parents, trust crisis, Wutai Shan Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Going Undercover, Evangelists Taking Jesus to Tibet Posted: 22 Feb 2013 11:50 PM PST At The Guardian, Jonathan Kaiman examines the activities of Christian missionaries in Tibet. These have prompted widespread distrust among the overwhelmingly Buddhist population, but appear to be tacitly accepted by the authorities. More than 10 people interviewed for this article said that Chinese authorities in Tibetan areas were selectively tolerant of missionaries for reasons that range from pragmatic to borderline sinister. One is that they are a boon to local economies – they open lucrative businesses and teach at local schools for next to nothing, supplementing their meagre salaries with donations from home. Authorities may also consider missionaries politically trustworthy, reluctant to undermine their spiritual missions by openly criticising regional policies. And lastly, the government may welcome them as a powerful counterforce to Tibetan Buddhism, with its electrifying political overtones. […] Most missionaries in Tibet belong to nondenominational organisations which believe that Jesus Christ will return to the earth only when people from every social, cultural and linguistic group have been exposed to his teachings. These groups view mass conversion as a high form of ecclesiastical service, and as such, their tactics can be covert and transactional. Some lure young Tibetans with the promise of English lessons or professional training and coax them into conversion after making sure of their loyalty. Various Tibetans in Xining expressed disgust with this tactic. One likened it to bribery. […] According to [Columbia University's Robert] Barnett, Tibetan distrust of missionaries is shorthand for a much broader context – "where the whole structure of Tibetan ideas, beliefs, and cultural values is being radically undermined, year after year, by the Chinese project, by modernity and globalisation in general". Another vulnerable aspect of Tibetan culture is its language, particularly as expressed in place names. A group of pro-Tibetan organizations in the West is attempting to preserve these names by campaigning for their inclusion in Google Maps. While some officials may believe that missionaries would not jeopardize their religious work with political meddling, others seem unconvinced. A set of instructions on how to deal with foreign proselytizing, leaked in December, urged "forceful measures" to prevent missionaries from "westernizing and dividing China." © Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Buddhism, Christianity, missionaries, religion, Robert Barnett, Tibet, tibetan buddhism Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Photo: Burma on the Left, China on the Right, by Ilmari Hyvönen Posted: 22 Feb 2013 10:46 PM PST Burma on the Left, China on the Right © Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Ilmari Hyvönen Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Chinese Troops Prepare for Spillover From Myanmar Civil War Posted: 22 Feb 2013 10:29 PM PST As international businesses circle an apparently reforming Myanmar, civil war continues to burn in the north of the country despite Chinese-hosted peace talks. Unsettled by stray shells hurtling over the border into Yunnan, China has started intense military training in the area in case any more serious spillover should occur. From Edward Wong at The New York Times: The training has been taking place in the hills of Yunnan Province. It borders Kachin State in northern Myanmar, where a civil war between an ethnic Kachin rebel army and the Burmese Army has been unfolding. The fighting intensified in late December, and Chinese officials and news organizations reported that shells had landed in China and that Kachin refugees had begun living in hotels and the homes of family and friends in Yunnan. […] The current round of fighting in Kachin State has centered on the town of Laiza, from which the Kachin army controls an autonomous area of the state. This winter, the Burmese Army has been pressing an offensive to capture Laiza or crucial military positions around it. The army has deployed fighter jets and heavy artillery, and residents have said civilians were killed. […] Chinese officials have expressed concern this winter over the violence, especially artillery shells falling within Yunnan; at least four have landed since Dec. 30. There are also worries about a potential flood of refugees. Human Rights Watch reported in June last year that at least 7-10,000 Kachin refugees had crossed the border in the previous twelve months, and had not received adequate aid or protection from China. Two months later, they were reportedly forced to return, though state media claimed that those who went back had done so of their own accord. The Wall Street Journal's Deborah Kan and south-east Asia bureau chief Patrick McDowell discussed the conflict and China's stake in it earlier this month, as the peace talks began: © Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Burma, civil war, human rights watch, kachin, military training, Myanmar, refugees, Yunnan Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Putting Tibet Back On The Map Posted: 22 Feb 2013 05:50 PM PST One of the central grievances behind recent unrest in Tibet is the marginalization of Tibetan language. While Tibetan is not among the 40% of China's minority languages already threatened with extinction, policies such as its relegation to secondary status in schools have fueled fears for its long-term survival. The final messages of at least two of the 100+ Tibetan self-immolators within China specifically express this anxiety. The preservation of Tibetan place names is particularly politically charged. References to locations in Sichuan or Qinghai rather than in Kham or Amdo are often fiercely contested, and the erosion of Tibetan toponyms has also taken place at a lower level. In one pre-Communist example, the town of Dartsedo (or Dajianlu 打箭炉, in the original Chinese rendering based on the Tibetan) was renamed Kangding 康定 in the early twentieth century. Adding insult to injury, this newer label is widely believed to commemorate the "pacification" or conquest of Kham. A new project by the Tibetan Youth Association in Europe, Students for a Free Tibet and the Tibetan Youth Congress aims to secure the future of Tibetan place names by adding them to Google Maps: Under the Chinese occupation many Tibetan towns and cultural landmarks not only were destroyed but also renamed with new Chinese names. To stop this ongoing attempt to systematically wipe out the Tibetan identity, language and tradition, we are starting a worldwide petition asking Google to put Tibet's heritage back on the map – by officially adding the traditional Tibetan names written in the Tibetan alphabet. So from February 13th 2013, exactly 100 years after Tibet's declaration of independence, we are collecting all the information about Tibetan landmarks on this map. Another valuable resource on Tibetan place names is the Places Portal at the Tibetan & Himalayan Library (via High Peaks Pure Earth's Dechen Pemba). © Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Google, maps, qinghai, Sichuan, Tibetan culture, Tibetan language Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Dirty Business for China’s Internet Scrubbers Posted: 22 Feb 2013 05:50 PM PST A recent Southern People Weekly article translated by CDT revealed the world of official espionage in China: officials bugging rivals to gather ammunition, and allies to assess their loyalty. A report at Caixin describes another weapon in the ambitious official's arsenal. Former Baidu employee Gu Dengda spun his knowledge of internal complaints procedures and network of tech company contacts into a 50 million yuan business. Yage Time Advertising Ltd. illegally scrubbed unfavorable web content for corporate clients including China Mobile, Pizza Hut, Yoshinoya and automotive joint venture FAW-Volkswagen. Some 60% of the firm's business, though, came from officials. Eventually, Yage established a content partnership with the Beijing city government's Qianlong web portal, where it published negative coverage of various companies before seeking payment for taking it down. Gu, along with at least nine others from the internet-scrubbing industry, is now awaiting trial for bribery, among other charges. From Wang Chen, Wang Shanshan, Ren Zhongyuan and Zhu Yishi at Caixin: As part of Gu's strategy, dozens of Yage staffers spent the workday surfing the Internet in search of negative news, comments and postings about government officials. Any official whose reputation seemed to be threatened would be contacted and offered Yage's services as soon as negative information surfaced online. High season for Yage's business with local government clients was usually just before the National People's Congress and China People's Political Consultative Conference held every March in Beijing. It's around conference time that officials typically come under attack from whistleblowers. It's also when these officials are often willing to pay a premium to see negative publicity vanish. […] Arrested with Gu was Hu Chunyu, the financial news channel chief at Qianlong, a website tied to state-run media including the Beijing Daily newspaper, the Beijing Radio Station and Beijing TV. The site is managed by the Propaganda Department at the Beijing Municipality's Communist Party Committee. A few years after its founding in 2000, Qianlong started outsourcing part of its news production to public relations companies. In 2009, Yage won a more than 100,000 yuan-a-year contract to supply business channel content. Yage also won the right to post and delete articles on that web page. […] "We think Qianlong is shameless," [a] source said. "But you really can't cross it. It's still one of the Beijing government's official propaganda portals." Four Baidu employees were fired in July last year for carrying out paid deletions, and three of the four were subsequently arrested. At the time, Marbridge Consulting's Mark Natkin told The Wall Street Journal that the problem was far more widespread: "There's no major Chinese Internet company that has been able to completely avoid this sort of thing. It's just very difficult to police everybody all the time." © Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Baidu, bribery, Internet crime, Internet entrepreneurs, National People's Congress, People's Political Consultative Conference, public relations, two sessions, whistle-blower Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

General’s Son Detained in Connection with Gang Rape Posted: 22 Feb 2013 11:42 AM PST Li Guanfeng (also known as Li Tianyi), the 17-year-old son of People's Liberation Army general and renowned singer Li Shuangjiang, has been arrested for involvement in a gang rape. In 2011, the younger Li was arrested after assaulting an elderly couple while illegally driving a BMW. The case generated anger online as netizens expressed resentment over the privileges enjoyed by the so-called "rich second-generation." From China Radio International: CCTV cited the Public Security Bureau of Beijing's Haidian District as saying that Li Guanfeng and four others were taken into police custody on Wednesday and held on suspicion of gang raping a woman on February 17. The woman reported to police on February 19 that she was taken to a hotel and gang raped on February 17 after drinking with Li and others in a bar in Haidian District. This isn't the first time that Li had a brush with the law. In September 2011, the 15-year-old was sent to a government correctional facility for a one-year confinement after he was found to have physically assaulted a couple and damaged their car in a dispute near a Beijing residential area. He was only released in September 2012. © Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: gang rape, li shuangjiang, li tianyi, second-generation rich Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

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