Blogs » Politics » China Activist Gets Hard Labor Without Trial

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• China Activist Gets Hard Labor Without Trial
• Yale-Peking University Program Cancelled
• Photo: Fish Vendors, by Mark Hobbs
• After Flood, Logic with Chinese Characteristics
• No updated official death toll, but a threatening notice to suppress online speech
• Public Anger Floods Beijing
• Reading Campaign: Ai Weiwei’s Blog
• Social Media a Boon for Environmentalism in China?
• Is Chinese Social Media Becoming an Unruly Fight Club?
• China, US Push Cybersecurity Policies
• Word of the Week: Believe It or Not, I Do
• Zhengzhou Street Market
• Beijing Mayor Resigns Ahead of Planned Promotion
• Sensitive Words: Beijing Mayor Resigns
• Language War in the Hong Kong Book Fair
• China Moving Soldiers to Disputed South China Sea Islands
• Young girl prostitutes herself to get revenge on her betraying boyfriend
• The Daily Twit – 7/25/12: More Rain Falls, and Beijing Gets New Leaders
• Female trainee reports rape attempt by driving instructor
• Chinese netizens mock Shou Shou for covering up her tight skirt

China Activist Gets Hard Labor Without Trial Posted: 25 Jul 2012 11:10 PM PDT Hunan activist Xiao Yong has been sentenced without trial to reform-through-labor after opposing government handling of fellow dissident Li Wangyang's death. He had already earned frequent flyer membership in China's police system by taking to the streets to call for political reform. From Yaxue Cao at Seeing Red in China: Xiao Yong has been an activist based in Guangzhou for the last few years. According to a friend of his with whom I spoke just a short while ago, he had traveled to many places in China to participate in rights struggles. While on trains, the friend said, he would engage travelers in conversations about freedoms and rights. And he had been frequently summoned by police to "hecha", or to be interrogated, warned and threatened. On March 30th this year, shortly after the Two Meetings (两会) in Beijing concluded where Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao once again spoke of the urgent need for political reform and called upon the people to push for it, Xiao Yong and a dozen or so others were on street in Guangzhou holding signs such as "No vote, no future", "Hu Jintao leads the way to disclose assets" and more. Six were detained on allegations of "illegally gathering, marching or demonstrating," including Xiao Yong. They were released after a month or so on probation. […] Xiao Yong made it clear in his calls that he wants to get legal assistance to challenge his case. But Xiao's demand for an attorney might not be met easily, as Pang Yong, a rights lawyer involved in the case, was also briefly detained. From AFP: "I can't say for sure that Xiao Yong was sentenced because of the Li Wangyang incident," lawyer Pang told AFP, "but it appears that this is the case." […] Xiao's family was hoping to hire Pang to bring a case against the police over apparent illegalities in the sentencing, the lawyer said, but police broke up a meeting at the family home on Saturday and briefly took him into custody. "The family wants to hire me, but they are getting too much pressure from the authorities, so we will have to wait to see if a lawsuit can be brought later," Pang said. Read more about Li Wangyang and civil society in China via CDT. © Mengyu Dong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: activists, civil society, dissidents, li wangyang, re-education through labor Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Yale-Peking University Program Cancelled Posted: 25 Jul 2012 10:53 PM PDT An exchange program between Yale and Peking University (Beida) is to be cancelled because of "lower than expected enrollment", to which dissent among Yale faculty may have contributed. From Gavan Gideon at Yale News: In a statement Yale released Wednesday afternoon, the University cited "lower than anticipated enrollments" as the reason for the program's cancellation. With only four students confirmed to participate in the program this fall, administrators decided that "the PKU-Yale experience would not be optimal for either students or faculty." "It is disappointing to all of us that after six years we could not attract a critical mass for this outstanding program," Edwards said in the statement. […] An email sent by a faculty member on the program's advisory committee alleged that the was "extremely expensive for Yale," and that its language component was "notoriously weak," making it difficult for Yale students to re-enter the Chinese language curriculum upon returning to New Haven. The program came under fire in December 2007 after ecology and evolutionary biology professor Stephen Stearns '67 sent a strongly worded email to his students at PKU criticizing the widespread plagiarism he witnessed among students and faculty while teaching two courses at the university. © Mengyu Dong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Chinese and American exchange students, education, Peking University, study abroad Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Photo: Fish Vendors, by Mark Hobbs Posted: 25 Jul 2012 10:37 PM PDT Fish Vendors © Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

After Flood, Logic with Chinese Characteristics Posted: 25 Jul 2012 08:47 PM PDT While netizens focus on the floods in Beijing, the state-run media has pointedly avoided the situation. The day after torrential rains crippled the capital, six newspapers ran the following headline from a speech by President Hu Jintao, as capturing in an image on Weibo: The Whole Party and the People of Every Nationality in the Country Unite with Speed and Force, Forging Valiantly Down the Mighty Path of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics 全党全国各族人民更加紧密地团结起来 沿着中国特色社会主义伟大道路奋勇前进 No mention of Beijing's floods in the Sunday edition of (from top left) People's Daily, Economic Daily, Guangming Daily, PLA Daily, China Youth Daily or People's Daily overseas edition. Independent media are struggling to get the story out. Tweeter @MissXQ reports that eight pages of flood coverage have been censored from Southern Weekend. Weibo is being scrubbed, too. On Monday, over 7.4 million posts contained the terms "Beijing" and "torrential rain" (暴雨). Today, that number has dwindled to 50,000 and change. From the comments captured beyond the Great Firewall, it's easy to see why the censors are so hard at work. There is great public anger of Beijing's ageing sewer system, lack of emergency preparedness, and dearth of real news: Whenever there's a major disaster, the first to fire officials is South Korea; the first to have officials resign is Japan; the first to give a speech is the U.S.; the first to have its prime minister resign is Italy; the first to admit responsibility is the Taliban; the first to arrest migrant workers, put its leaders on a pedestal, and beg for donations is—hey! I won't tell you even if you kill me! 一旦发生重大事故，第一时间炒掉官员的是韩国，第一时间官员辞职的是日本，第一时间出来演讲的是美国，第一时间总理辞职的是意大利，第一时间承诺对事件负责的是塔利班，第一时间抓临时工或农民工，领导高度重视，亲切慰问，随后号召捐款的是哪个，嘿，打死我也不说！ Another sardonic Weibo post: Is it logical for rain in a nation's capital to kill so many citizens? Is it logical not to apologize when so many compatriots have died? Is it logical for the most heavily taxed country not to have the money for sewers? Is it logical for the millionaires of the imperial court to beg for donations? Is it logical, given all that's happened, for the media to pour their energy into reporting on the shooting in the U.S.? Of course it's logical, because there are two types of logic: the logic of the world, and logic with Celestial Empire characteristics. 一 国之都下场雨死那么多同胞，符合逻辑么？死那么多同胞没人出来道歉，符合逻辑么？全球纳税最多没钱修下水道，符合逻辑么？三公消费数千亿却号召募捐，符合 逻辑么？国家出了那么大的事，新闻却集中火力讨论美国枪杀案，符合逻辑么？当然合逻辑，因为逻辑分两种，一种是普世逻辑，另一种是天朝特色逻辑。 Every country has its corruption, every ruling body its endemic failures. But state-run media flogging the Colorado shooting hasn't kept netizens from drawing comparisons to "China's Katrina": QuietYukiWorld: China Can't Fly Flag at Half Mast: On July 20, President Obama ordered all American flags flown at half mast for six days in mourning for the victims of the Colorado shooting. Some ask why China didn't fly its flags at half mast after so many people died in the high-speed train crash. The brutal truth is that if we did that, we would also have to do the same for the Tianjin fire. And what about all the mining accidents? If we did it for everything, the flag would never be f**king raised! 默晓晓yuki小宇宙：【中国不能降半旗】7月20日，美国总统奥巴马下令全美降半旗6天，向科罗拉多枪击案死难者致哀。有人问：动车事故死了那么多人，中 国政府为什么不降半旗？暴强回答是：动车事故降半旗，天津大火就要降半旗，矿难事故还降不降？都降的话~那国旗一年365天就别TM升了! Anonymous Weibo posts via CDT Chinese. Read more flood coverage here. © Anne.Henochowicz for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Beijing, beijing flood 2012, censorship, weibo Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

No updated official death toll, but a threatening notice to suppress online speech Posted: 25 Jul 2012 11:11 AM PDT Chinese netizens are waiting for the updated official number of people killed in the devastating Beijing rainstorm, as two days ago a Beijing official said they were still counting the number when responding to the public's questioning. But no, no news yet so far. There is only a release regarding 160,000 livestock killed and other damages (except for people dead) in the hard-hit Fangshan district in Southwestern Beijing on Sina Weibo. Some commented, maybe Beijing officials are still holding meetings and haven't made a decision yet on how many people have died. Meanwhile, netizens are hoping that some senior officials in the country's top leadership will step out to make apologies, or make any statements about the national disaster in public appearances. Sadly again, no! There was a threatening notice from the head of the Beijing security bureau however announcing to crack down "online rumors": "For those who make or disseminate the political rumors, or attack the party, party leaders or current political system, we will severely punish them if the circumstances are serious with bad influence and warn them publicly if the circumstances are minor. More online security report signs will be added to the websites, and a special online security report platform will be set up on the microblogging services, to provide netizens with an open space for communication and security report." Unfortunately, this open space has deleted lots of posts and photographs, closed commenting system, and banned users to post! But anyone was held accountable for the disaster? It seems yes. Beijing mayor Guo Jinlong and deputy mayor Ji Lin both resigned. Sorry, we are fooled again! In fact, earlier this month, Guo was already promoted to the city's top job as secretary of the Beijing Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, and Ji as deputy secretary. It was just as "power reshuffle". And they are heading to better positions.

Public Anger Floods Beijing Posted: 25 Jul 2012 05:42 PM PDT Last Saturday's downpour engulfed Beijing in a serious flood, and the water-logged capital's anxiety is surely mounting as more heavy rains are forecasted throughout the week. As the city deals with the aftermath of the largest rainstorm in 61 years, the Internet has proved to be a survey-ground for public reaction – while many netizens used Weibo to criticize the government's lack of preparation and inability to deal with the disaster, the online environment also proved a useful venue for those in need, and those willing to help. One major point of contention, expressed both in the physical and digital worlds, deals with doubt over the official death toll released on Monday, which remains at 37. An article in yesterday's China Daily emphasizes transparency in official government figures: The city suffered the worst rain in six decades over Saturday and Sunday and many people have questioned the official death toll. Wang Hui, director of the Information Office of Beijing Municipal Government, told a news conference they understood the importance of information transparency following the 2003 SARS cover up. She added that the death toll had not risen because some bodies are yet to be identified. According to their official micro blog early Tuesday evening, 1.9 million are affected by the rain, 77,325 have been relocated, and the government has allocated a 100 million yuan disaster relief fund. But it made no mention of casualty figures. China Daily reports from today keep the death toll at 37, but accounts from the ground have suggested that this number may be a serious underestimation. On Monday, The Wall Street Journal quoted locals expressing their disbelief: "The death toll is definitely higher [than 37]," said a man surnamed Li who was found standing by the side of the road in Shuangma Zhuang village next to a white sedan, its shape twisted by the waters. Mr. Li, who declined to provide his given name, said he was called to Shuangma Zhuang to identify the body of his older brother, who had been discovered inside the car when police pulled it out of the water on Monday afternoon. As Mr. Li pointed to where police had sawed through the metal to remove his brother's body, a friend standing nearby also cast doubt on the official number. "The government says 37 died. It's probably more like 370," he said.[...] A McClatchy article published yesterday has more on doubt surrounding official numbers, the government's tendency to distort data in the aftermath of disaster, and explains how modern communications technology has changed the nature of public discontent in China: It took just one glance at a jumble of cars mired in the brown waters covering the G4 expressway late on Monday afternoon to cast doubt on Chinese government estimates that only 37 had died in flash flooding over the weekend. "They must hide this," said one old man who was hustled away from a perch overlooking the scene by uniformed police yelling that photography in the area needed prior consent. With plainclothes security milling around the area, he and other onlookers didn't give their names. The man said that he'd already heard how many were killed in Fangshan, a district roughly 20 miles southwest of downtown Beijing, after heavy rains on Saturday night: "More than 300." Another point of frustration, easily seen in Weibo activity, involves Beijing's infrastructure and emergency preparedness – how could a modern city, one that "poured huge sums of money into the Olympics", be so overwhelmed by and infrastructurally ill-equipped to deal with the recent storm? These types of questions were found not only in web chatter, but also in a Global Times op-ed released just after the storm. A more recent Global Times piece reports on angry reactions to a government sponsored relief fundraiser [zh] that many distrust or see as a means to distract from the municipal government's inability to manage the flood: Su Meng, 25, a resident of Chaoyang district, said that charity donations are not a solution to disaster relief efforts, and the government would be better off considering some of the factors that led to the disaster instead. "It seems the government is using the fund to divert the public's attention from questioning its responsibility about the destruction," she said. [...]"I don't trust government-led charity drives because I'm not sure whether my donation will get to those who really need it," she said. Zhu Lijia, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Governance, said now is not the right time for Beijing government to launch the fund. "Thirty-seven people died in the flood disaster. The first priority for the government is to hold someone accountable for the deaths," said Zhu. An article from CNN quotes residents of Beijing's Fangshan district, the area hit hardest by the storm, on their outrage at officials' poor planning and insufficient response to the flood: "Our family of five lives off one income," said the 46-year-old farmer Wednesday. "Nobody cares about us because there's no official in this household." [...]One neighbor, Gao Liying, added that she feels even more shaken by the village officials' response when she told them the flood has ruined almost all her worldly possessions. "They actually said: 'If your house didn't collapse and nobody died, then you're not a victim,'" she said, raising her voice. "I asked: are you still human?" Villagers like Zhang and Gao blame local officials for their decision to cover a former waterway with concrete — thus turning it to a road and diminishing drainage capacity — and their failure to warn residents before the storm. "It was more than a natural disaster," Gao said. "The officials are responsible too." While the government continues to insist on the accuracy of their reporting and the methodical nature of their response, they also stress the "unprecedented" nature of the storm, a point that a Caixin English op-ed directly refutes: This is not the first time Beijing has had an "unprecedented" rainstorm. On June 23, 2011, Beijing was also inundated. It was also a day as dark as night and traffic ground to a standstill. However, just one year later, the government is again using the term. The city's underground sewage system is directly responsible for the flooding. Within of Beijing, it seems that the Forbidden City still has the best drainage. For a system built during the Ming and Qing dynasties, with extra work done after 1949, it works effectively despite its 600-year age. No matter how heavy the rain, there is no flooding in the Forbidden City. I wonder if one should celebrate the wisdom of our ancestors or be ashamed of our own stupidity? There was a wave of skepticism regarding the quality of Beijing's drainage system in 2011. The Beijing Drainage Group admitted that only the drainage systems of the eastern and western sections of the city moat, Tiananmen Square and the Olympic Park are up for the challenge of once-in-a-decade rainfalls, while most other areas can fend off only the regular storms occurring every one to three years. Li Chengpeng, a Chinese blogger known for his reflections on the disastrous Sichuan earthquake of 2008, posted his take on reactions to the flood, and what they say about civic awareness in China. While his blog was quickly deleted, chinaSmack has recorded and translated the post, along with a selection of comments. Also see Crazy Crab's illustrated take on the disaster, and the rest of CDT's coverage of the 2012 Beijing flood. © josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: beijing flood 2012, disaster relief, floods, Li Chengpeng, natural disasters, rainfall Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Reading Campaign: Ai Weiwei’s Blog Posted: 25 Jul 2012 05:25 PM PDT Seeing Red in China is kicking off a reading campaign the likes of which are not generally braved by blogs. We, and hopefully most of our readers, are very dedicated to the difficult task of making sense of China, and to that end we promote the reading of first-hand Chinese sources. We will write weekly posts about different books that will hopefully be interactive — not just reviews, but discussions. The following post is by new SRIC writer Hannah, who will kick off the campaign. We welcome all readers to write in comments and thoughts about the recommended selection beforehand, and we can incorporate those comments into the post (you can email your thoughts to Hannah@seeingredinchina.com). Otherwise, regular comments below are welcome as well. As always, the China-watch news and blogs are all aflutter about Ai Weiwei. His tax evasion appeal in Beijing's courts recently fell flat. His lawyer went missing the day before the trial. He suddenly appeared at a park in Beijing and punched a dude for talking smack about him on Twitter. His autobiographical documentary is due for release in the US in two weeks. In AWW fashion, SeeingRed is going to celebrate the failure of his appeal by kicking off a reading campaign. The book is Ai Weiwei's This Time, This Place, also unoriginally called Ai Weiwei's Blog in English, and 《此时此地》in Chinese. It is our hope to spark discussion, enhance peoples' awareness of current China events, and promote the reading of Chinese literature. If feedback is positive, we will continue to do communal reads of great Chinese books in the future. Why Ai? Ai is likely the most high-profile cultural icon in China today. He is a lifelong artist, most well-known for having designed the Bird's Nest Olympic Stadium in Beijing. He [was] a blogger, a critic of China's moribund legal and political systems. His brazen sense of humor gives a steadfast finger to the CCP, notably at his River Crab Feast. He Tweets as if each Tweet were his last dying words — often to the annoyance of his followers, who can't bear to part with him all the same. Ai has been in and out of detention for a year now, having been charged with tax evasion. The case is following its predictable depressing route, exposing the dark circus that is China's courts, and leaving all onlookers wondering how this cookie will crumble. His documentary, Never Sorry, will hit US theaters within the next few weeks. Before settling for a theatrical understanding of the man, I encourage everyone to grab his book and flip through his essays. We will select several chapters of his book Ai Weiwei's Blog and write about them weekly. I hope other people will read along and comment to create some discussion, so this won't be like a Chinese-style class lecture. Here is the English version available on Amazon (click image): And Here is the Chinese version. （中文版） First essays to read: "Chinese Contemporary Art in Transition and Dilemma" 中国当代艺术的困境与转机 and "Who are You?" 你是谁？, to be discussed in one week. If you can read Chinese, do it! Happy reading. Filed under: book review Tagged: Ai Weiwei, Beijing, China, Chinese art, Never Sorry, Twitter, Weiwei

Social Media a Boon for Environmentalism in China? Posted: 25 Jul 2012 02:12 PM PDT After recent protests in Shifang highlighted the increasingly important role of social media in "mass incidents" in China, Greenpeace's Monica Chan ponders what the web might mean for environmental activism. From The Diplomat: The protesters in Shifang were quick to present themselves as nothing but concerned citizens.Yet their awareness of just how to achieve this seems to indicate an encouraging shift in NIMBY [not in my back yard] protests from the past. For example, in covering the protests Reuters quoted Zeng Susen, who runs a small guest house and restaurant: "We don't oppose the government, but they must explain the risks involved in a project like this, and they didn't." "In Shifang and other recent environmental protests we're not only simply seeing demands that a project close down or move away, but calls for openness, transparency and participation," says Greenpeace East Asia's Head of Toxics campaigner Ma Tianjie. By opening up the dialogue, Ma believes that governments and citizens can move away from a zero-sum game where you either build the project, or not. This sophistication seems to indicate that China's children are growing up and banging on the door so that they can be brought to the decision-making table. "In other countries you can expect a detailed environmental impact report to be released well ahead of construction commencing. There might also be numerous hearings, with the community involved, and ideally given the power to veto. This is totally absent in China. By law only an abridged version of the impact assessment is required, and with so little information it's virtually irrelevant," says Ma. And here in lies a vital problem. While the era of social media assisted environmental protests may be highly effective in bringing together large numbers of people for a swift campaign with one clear demand, how will it manage to force China to make the kind of complicated, structural change that these protesters are quickly becoming savvy enough to realize is necessary? © Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: environmental protests, environmentalism, mass incidents, Shifang, social media Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Is Chinese Social Media Becoming an Unruly Fight Club? Posted: 25 Jul 2012 12:38 PM PDT To pick out three similar but unrelated incidents on Weibo and call them a trend is to risk forfeiting one's right to say anything about the social media site ever again, except some things so defy responsible behavior that they deserve to be on the receiving end themselves.  Beijing's Chaoyang Park, scene of recent public debates (www.sun-park.com) Roughly two weeks ago, Zhou Yan, a liberal journalist who works for Sichuan TV, challenged Wu Danhong, a professor at the China University of Political Science and Law, to a duel at Chaoyang Park in Beijing over statements by Wu suggesting the pollution levels at the controversial, and now-closed, molybdenum copper plant in Shifang, Sichuan, were not as high as the protestors in Shifang had claimed. Sina Weibo, China's Twitter, caught wind, and a handful of netizens showed up to cheer on their respective combatants. Even artist-dissident Ai Weiwei happened to stroll through the park in the midst of the fighting. When encouraged to join in, he politely declined. (Footage of the proceedings can be found here.) It isn't the first time Wu had found himself in such a situation. Last October, he and media personality Yao Bo agreed to settle their differences of opinion, as reflected in their Weibo posts, over a duel at a local gas station. Neither man showed up, leaving the netizens who did quite disappointed. For those keeping score, at least Wu saved a little face this first time, posting a picture of himself with an employee at the gas station shortly after the scheduled time of the fight to prove that he had indeed shown up. Not to be outdone, Yao posted a picture of himself holding a wooden sword at the same gas station. Freud must have something to say about this. Wu asserted in both fights that his purpose was to teach respect for the law (according to his supporters, through a public lecture). Whether or not Wu, a suspected "50-center" (Internet trolls on government payroll), is being disingenuous, the Global Times was not amused. Despite being ostensibly in Wu's ideological camp, the conservative newspaper had these harsh words for all parties involved: "Views can be provocative, but they should be presented in a rational way…The title 'intellectual' has now become a sarcastic term." Given that the most vocal intellectuals, especially if you count the opinion leaders on Weibo among their number, are liberal, it is no surprise that Global Times is all too happy to discredit them. Fair or not, though, the Fox News of China has a point. Intellectual discourse in China and the place of the public intellectual in Chinese society have ballooned on the backs of powerful new platforms, but the rush has not allowed for a smooth adjustment period. World political trends, or World of Warcraft? Either way, what a public intellectual may look like To be a modern Chinese intellectual is no longer a profession, it is an identity. In most media-saturated cultures, this is nothing new. To quote the late Christopher Hitchens, who knows something about this topic, "To be a public intellectual is in some sense something that you are, and not so much something that you do." For someone wholly devoted to ideas and their expression, life as performance art is an inevitable byproduct. What is different in the age of Weibo is that the performance can never really be turned off—not if an intellectual is earnest about being a part of the conversation, which is really his only required sustenance. With the ability to easily follow a Weibo user's history of posts, that user's persona becomes all the more complete and exacerbates an already tempting illusion of how valid comprehensive personal investment in the Internet can be. Growing pains are never fun to watch, but if the intellectual acquires any relief, it is that Weibo's demands apply equally to all, and he can seem like the reasonable, or at least not the worst, one. Earlier in June, Kai-fu Lee, founding president of Google China and prominent investor in Chinese start-ups, called out "Only You," a popular Chinese reality show in which job candidates are judged by twelve managers for potential job offers, for degrading its contestants. Shi Xiaoyan, a judge on the show, called for a duel with Lee at a Starbucks in Beijing. Not surprisingly, Shi showed up (and posted a picture of a Starbucks sign to prove it) but Lee chose to ignore her challenge. The fact that people would actually invite their cyber-antagonists to settle their differences physically is an indication of just how deep netizens' disconnect with reality, already revealed by the rumor-mongering on Weibo, runs. In America's Internet society, it is not uncommon for people to agree to meet in person after first meeting online, but such meetings are usually meant to solidify the relationship, not to drive an even deeper wedge into it. Ultimately, a cyber-relationship is really just that, and one wonders at the nature of an ecosystem in which members try to destroy something that is arguably nothing. In its efforts to crack down on Weibo posts, one can sense that the Chinese government is not just trying to suppress information but the origin of that information as well, as though the way to mute the id was to stop the expression of it. If a hypothetical Freud had no interest in chiming in before, all bets are off now. Public intellectuals in China may have more to learn from grandmaster Ip Man

China, US Push Cybersecurity Policies Posted: 25 Jul 2012 01:41 PM PDT After the State Council issued a new policy opinion on cybersecurity last week, and with the United States hoping to pass its own legislation on the issue, Adam Segal of the Council on Foreign Relations discusses the challenges both sides face in pursuing meaningful information security policy: Even with the compromise, the bill's future in the Senate and in the House is uncertain (uncertain may be kind—Jessica R. Herrera-Flanigan and Paul Rosenzweig think legislation is basically dead, and Senator McCain said on Monday that the bill "has zero chance of passing in the House or ever being signed into law"). Still it would be premature, if not misguided, to tout the State Council opinion as one more piece of evidence of China's ability to get things done. For one, the opinion is a grab bag of vague policy proposals, spanning tens of different policy arenas. Some will work out, some will be dropped. Moreover, these proposals are not always internally consistent. There is, for example, a strong government hand involved, but the opinion also "advocates for industry self-regulation." And politics are unavoidable in China too. As Jimmy Goodrich notes, after the introduction of the 2003 opinion different parts of the Chinese bureaucracy launched competing policy initiatives and waged fierce battles over their policy turf. The 2012 opinion highlights the leadership of the national leading small group for informationization and national coordinating small group for cyber and information security, but strong leadership is needed at the top and it is a real question if any of China's top leaders are focused on cybersecurity right now given the state of the economy and the fallout from the removal of Bo Xilai. There is no doubt the United States could be doing more at home, and another year passing without any legislation to address what the President calls "one of the most serious economic and national security challenges we face" does not look good. But developing smart information security policies is hard, even for China. Segal also caught up with The New Yorker's Evan Osnos, addressing the cyber issue in the overall scope of U.S.-China relations: Cyber is often mentioned as one of the leading potential flashpoints in the U.S.-China relationship. Where would you rank that risk compared to potential conflict in the South China Sea, Taiwan, or trade disputes? While strategic mistrust is high between the two sides, Cyber alone is unlikely to be a major flashpoint. Attacks designed to steal intellectual property and other trade secrets occur with such regularity and at such a pace and scope that General Alexander, head of U.S. Cyber Command, has called them "the greatest transfer of wealth in history"—yet the United States continues to engage China on a range of issues, from Iran and Syria to trade and the environment. Washington has raised the pressure on Beijing about cyber, publicly calling out Chinese hackers and addressing it in bilateral meetings, but clearly has not made it an issue that it is willing to go to the mat for. There is little doubt, however, that cyber will be part of any political, military, or economic conflict in the future, and that it has high a probability of making the situation more difficult to resolve. Web-site defacements were an annoyance in the standoff between China and the Philippines over the Scarborough Shoal/Huangyan Island, but more serious cyber attacks could have escalated the situation, making signalling much more complicated. This is why it is so important that the United States and China continue to talk about cyber and to develop points of contact and other communication mechanisms in case of crisis. © Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: cyberespionage, cybersecurity, State Council, u.s.-china relations Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Word of the Week: Believe It or Not, I Do Posted: 25 Jul 2012 12:00 PM PDT Editor's Note: The Word of the Week comes from China Digital Space's Grass-Mud Horse Lexicon, a glossary of terms created by Chinese netizens and frequently encountered in online political discussions. These are the words of China's online "resistance discourse," used to mock and subvert the official language around censorship and political correctness. If you are interested in participating in this project by submitting and/or translating terms, please contact the CDT editors at CDT [at] chinadigitaltimes [dot] net. 至于你们信不信，由你，我反正是信了 (Zhìyú nǐ xìn bú xìn, yóu nǐ, wǒ fǎnzhèng shì xìn le): Whether you believe it or not, it's up to you, but I do anyway. During a press conference held by the Railway Ministry on July 24, 2011, a reporter asked why the government had attempted to bury portions of the high-speed train that crashed in Wenzhou the day before. Ministry spokesman Wang Yongping gave the following response (as translated by ChinaGeeks): Why was the train car buried? Actually, when I got off the plane today, the comrade who picked me up from the airport said that he already saw this kind of news online. I was on the plane so I didn't have a good handle on things. I wanted to ask him, "Why would there be such a foolish question? Can an event that the whole world knows about really be buried?" He told me, "It's not being buried. Truthfully, this news cannot be buried." We have already tried though countless ways to broadcast this information to society. But about burying [the train car], [the people who picked me up from the airport] gave this explanation. Because the scene of the rescue was very complicated. Below was a quagmire. It was very hard to perform rescue operations. So they buried the head of the car underneath, covered it with dirt, mainly to facilitate rescue efforts. Right now, this is his explanation. Whether or not you believe it; either way, I believe it. Watch Wang make the statement that cost him his job here. What is remarkable is Wang's eagerness to engage in self-deception and accept such an absurd explanation. Whether the rest of us allow ourselves to be similarly fooled, Wang suggests, is our own problem. "Whether you believe it or not, it's up to you, but I do anyway" has become Chinternet meme. This statement has been translated literally from Chinese to English as "I negative positive believe," implying that Chinese citizens have no choice but to believe what the authorities claim—even if it makes no sense. Some online parodies of Wang's remarks: Housing prices must be raised until they reach reasonable levels. Whether you believe it or not, it's up to you, but I do anyway. 一定要把房价抬升到合理的价位，至于你们信不信，由你，我反正是信了！ The Railways Ministry claims that several hundred people were picked up by a UFO. Whether you believe it or not, it's up to you, but I do anyway. (There were doubts about the official number of those injured and killed, as it contradicted earlier news reports.) 铁道部称还有几百号人被UFO接走。至于你信不信，由你，反正我是信了 This crash was a drill! No one died! Whether you believe it or not, it's up to you, but I do anyway. 这次事故其实是一次演习！~并没有人员伤亡！~ 至于你信不信，由你，我反正是信了 © Anne.Henochowicz for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: chinternet, Chinternet meme, GMH Lexicon, grass-mud horse lexicon, high-speed rail crash, meme, wang yongping, wenzhou, word of the week Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Zhengzhou Street Market Posted: 25 Jul 2012 08:54 AM PDT The Yellow River flows through Henan Province, and this region is considered the cradle of Chinese civilization. Besides Luoyang, the province is home to a number of other ancient capitals of past dynasties. We were in Henan mainly to see the Shaolin Temple (which I plan to blog about later). Below are pictures I took while roaming a local street market in Zhengzhou, the provincial capital. Local street markets show a grittier side of China, one that is inhabited by the majority of the people today. Yes, there were little ones with slit pants roaming around which I have decided to not show. Mentally, the distance between what those creatures produced and what I ate were too short for comfort. One thing striking about the market is that the manufactured goods available are mostly made of plastic. Clothes sold here are of low thread count and poor quality. China is still dirt poor. Water use is frugal. Don't think for a moment that these Chinese don't want their streets to be tiled with marble. Don't think for a moment that they don't want the most fashionable cloths made from the most high-end materials. They are toiling away to crawl out of this poverty. For now, they make do the best they can with what they have. Just about everyone I talk to thinks China is growing, and it's only a matter of time before standards of living markedly improves. Street market in Zhengzhou Vegetable stand with fresh produce from local farmers driven into the city by small vans in the morning. Noodle vendor My lunch. I asked the vendor to use as little oil as possible. He thought I was a reporter, but I assured him I am only interested in showing how enticing his made-to-order noodle is! It was good. Various vegetables or meats on skewers in hot pot style. Some are spicy and some are not. I tried home-made tofu prepared with wood fire. The tofu also has a more coarse texture. Yum! Food stand. The market opens all night. Food stand. Fruit stand. These grapes came straight off the vine and have never been refrigerated. The freshness is difficult to describe. Fried tofu with pepper roasted over wooden coal.

Beijing Mayor Resigns Ahead of Planned Promotion Posted: 25 Jul 2012 08:49 AM PDT Beijing Mayor Guo Jinlong and Vice Mayor Ji Lin have resigned. Wang Anshun, a Beijing Vice-Party Chief, will take over as acting mayor. The announcement was made at the end of the recent session of the Standing Committee of the 13th Beijing Municipal People's Congress. Guo's resignation was expected due to the fact that he was promoted to the more powerful position of Beijing Party Chief earlier this month. However, due to public anger over the recent Beijing floods, the timing has raised questions about the reasons for the move. Press reports so far indicate that his promotion appears to be going ahead as planned. From CBS News: Mayor Guo Jinlong and one of his vice mayors resigned, state media reported Wednesday, in what is likely a routine reshuffling. The announcement came as more rain was forecast to hit Beijing and amid signs that the death toll from last weekend's storms could jump higher. Saturday's massive flooding was a major embarrassment for China's capital, which spent billions of dollars modernizing the city while apparently neglecting its drainage systems. State media, analysts and China's online community have piled on criticism of the city's handling of the crisis and its lack of preparedness. Saturday's heavy rain was unusual in normally dry Beijing. On Wednesday evening, more heavy rain fell on the capital as forecast by the Beijing Meteorological Bureau, which warned of possible flash flooding and mudslides in the capital's mountainous outskirts, including already hard-hit Fangshan. And Reuters reports on Guo's recent promotion: Guo Jinlong, 64, the city's mayor since 2008 and an ally of President Hu Jintao, replaces Liu Qi, 69, as Beijing party boss, in a decision announced at the end of the municipal party congress. "We are keenly aware of our difficult task and grave responsibility," Guo told reporters. "We must strive to deliver satisfactory results for all the people of Beijing." The appointment will allow Hu to retain some political influence after he leaves office. He must retire from running the party later this year and from the presidency in early 2013. [...] Guo is now expected to be a shoo-in to join the party's decision-making Politburo during the leadership change at the 18th national party congress later this year. For the Wall Street Journal's China Real Time, Russell Leigh Moses questions the timing of the move, given the floods, with more torrential rains expected this week: Guo was out front as the leading party official in seeing to the rescue and reconstruction efforts resulting from the flooding that brought scores of deaths and extensive damage to the city and its suburbs over the weekend. His earnest sympathy for victims, and willingness to share the recent bitterness by eating instant noodles just like everyone else involved in the rescue effort, received extensive media coverage in the aftermath of the tragedy. So why have him step down when the job is not nearly half-done, and more heavy rain is expected in the coming days? Is this some clever move by his supporters in the Party to shield him from further blame in the event many more bodies are waiting to be discovered in the debris or there is further disruption from flooding? Or is Guo going to be the local scapegoat, a sop to escalating outrage in the social media that Beijing authorities were unprepared for the scale of the flooding and might be holding back on the release of updated casualty figures? Or was it simply that July 25 was the day the party had marked for Guo and Ji to resign, and the decision was made to keep that date no matter the circumstances. News of the resignation has been censored on Sina Weibo search. © Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Sensitive Words: Beijing Mayor Resigns Posted: 25 Jul 2012 08:45 AM PDT As of July 25, the following search terms are blocked on Weibo (not including the "search for user" function): Guo Jinlong (right) resigned from his post as mayor of Beijing. Beijing Mayor Resigns: Guo Jinlong, mayor of Beijing since November 2007, resigned from his post today. Wang Anshun is now acting mayor. One of Guo's vice mayors, Ji Lin, also resigned. Guo Jinlong (郭金龙) Wang Anshun (王安顺) Beijing + resign (北京+辞职) Beijing + leave office (北京+下台) mayor + dismiss (市长+下课) mayor + leave office (市长+下台) mayor + resign (市长+辞职) govern-rot (正腐) imperial capital (帝都): retested   Other: Hu (胡): Family name of Hu Jintao HUzhu (HU主): as in HUChairman (HU主席) Note: All Chinese-language words are tested using simplified characters. The same terms in traditional characters occasionally return different results. CDT Chinese runs a project that crowd-sources filtered keywords on Sina Weibo search.  CDT independently tests the keywords before posting them, but some searches later become accessible again. We welcome readers to contribute to this project so that we can include the most up-to-date information. To add words, check out the form at the bottom of CDT Chinese's latest sensitive words post. © Anne.Henochowicz for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: beijing flood 2012, blocked words, filtered words, Guo Jinlong, Hu Jintao, sensitive words, sina weibo, Wang Anshun, weibo Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Language War in the Hong Kong Book Fair Posted: 25 Jul 2012 06:57 AM PDT A Cantonese-Mandarin language war broke out in a talk given by movie director Pang Ho-cheung for the 2012 Hong Kong Book Fair. To serve the big mainland Chinese market, the organizer arranged the talk to be in Mandarin. This provoked the anger of Hongkongers given they are the majority of the audience, and Pang himself is not fluent in Mandarin. Written by Andy Yee · comments (0) Share: Donate · facebook · twitter · reddit · StumbleUpon · delicious · Instapaper

China Moving Soldiers to Disputed South China Sea Islands Posted: 25 Jul 2012 06:54 AM PDT In today's New York Times, a detailed article notes that China's Central Military Commission has approved "the deployment of a garrison of soldiers from the People's Liberation Army to guard disputed islands claimed by China and Vietnam in the South China Sea." This development is only going to ratchet tensions up even higher from the already sky-high level in the wake of the failed ASEAN foreign ministers' meeting earlier this month. In a new CFR Expert Brief, I analyze the current state of tensions in the South China Sea, examine where the dispute is headed in the near term, and discuss how all sides can cool the situation before it spirals completely out of control. Read it here.

Young girl prostitutes herself to get revenge on her betraying boyfriend Posted: 24 Jul 2012 09:57 PM PDT A young girl turned herself into prostitution at the end after she found her boyfriend cheated on her, and she said it was to get revenge on him. At the police station, the journalist met this "going astray" girl, surnamed Li, 24 years old, from Yiyang city, Hunan province. She said she had a job as an office clerk in her hometown after graduating from the college. But later because she caught her boyfriend cheating on her, the heartbroken girl moved to Changsha, capital of Hunan, alone to work as a foot massage therapist there at a parlor, aiming to get her boyfriend "avenged". By working there for several weeks, Li found that the place was in fact an illegal brothel disguised as a massage parlor. The female therapists offered sex to their patrons and could earn up 60 percent of payment for each trade. Finally, driven by the quick cash and hatred over her boyfriend, the 24-year-old girl prostituted herself too. She was thus nabbed by local police and sentenced to administrative detention for 10 days.

The Daily Twit – 7/25/12: More Rain Falls, and Beijing Gets New Leaders Posted: 25 Jul 2012 04:53 AM PDT More rain is falling as I write this. Usually the second storm isn't as bad as everyone thinks, so I wouldn't be surprised if the overnight precipitation falls into the "normal" range this time. But you never know – let's hope everyone stays safe out there! Meanwhile, lots of folks are still talking about Round 1: Wall Street Journal: Lesson Learned? Beijing Defends its Flood Numbers — This is turning into the classic "official story" vs. "skeptical public speculation". The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. AFP: China censors coverage of deadly Beijing floods — Well, we knew that might be coming. McClatchy: Doubts about death toll from Beijing-area rain fuel new suspicions about China's leaders — Tom Lasseter talks to pissed-off Beijingers. New York Times: A Flood of Anger Follows Deadly Rains in Beijing — Self-explanatory, yeah? China Daily: Storm leads to record for insurance claims — I assume this is a relatively new way to assess natural disasters in China. The Useless Tree: The Mandate of Heaven and Communist Party Leadership Transitions — Sam Crane with another post indirectly related to the flooding about legitimacy and government performance. Perhaps related to our precipitation preparedness (or not, who really knows?), this was in the news today as well: Xinhua: Wang Anshun appointed acting mayor of Beijing Caijing: China Replaces Mayors of Capital City Some miscellany: Global Times: Law suit filed against New Oriental — This was inevitable. Reuters: China-Canada oil deal shows more U.S. drilling needed -Senator — Turns out I was right yesterday about how the Nexen-CNOOC deal would be spun by U.S. politicians. Here's my response. And last but certainly not least, ChinaGeek Charlie Custer with a surprise announcement: Why I'm Leaving China – The explanatory post makes a lot of sense, but all in all, it's a bummer. The good news, though, is that with the Intertubes, geography doesn't matter all that much these days. © Stan for China Hearsay, 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags:

Female trainee reports rape attempt by driving instructor Posted: 24 Jul 2012 08:45 PM PDT Recently, a program of Anhui Satellite TV Station has exposed that a female trainee was almost raped by a driving instructor from a training school where she was being trained to drive in Hefei city, Anhui province, after she was made drunk in a dinner. The 23-year-old girl, nicknamed Xiao Wing, told police that she and other trainees arranged a dinner together to thank their driving instructors a night after they had passed the first past of the road test. During the dinner, Xiao Qing drank some beer too with all others because of being happy over the success in the test, though she understood herself could not hold much liquor. After the dinner, one training instructor offered to take Xiao Qing home. She agreed and got on his car. But to Xiao Qing's surprise, the instructor took her all around for a while and then brought her to a movie theater. Finding difficult to refuse him, Xiao Qing followed the teacher into the theater. At the time, Xiao Qing already felt lightheaded under the influence of beer she drank while dining. When she realized she was sent to a hotel room, the instructor had locked up the door and attempted to rape her. By some struggling, the frightened girl ultimately managed to run away from the room, and called up her older sister who later helped report the case to the local police.

Chinese netizens mock Shou Shou for covering up her tight skirt Posted: 24 Jul 2012 06:47 PM PDT Shou Shou, or Zhai Ling, the lead of Shou Shou Gate, a popular sex video scandal that had taken Chinese entertainment circle by storm in 2010, recently appeared up at an auto show in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. But her tight skirt obviously made her uncomfortable that day, as it rode up while sitting on a chair. Her moves to keep adjusting the skirt and covering up the hem knowingly in front of cameras then prompted netizens to mock her. "Is it necessary for her to avoid exposure?" said a web user on a Chinese popular community website, Mop, hinting that the public have already seen her naked. The car model gained overnight fame in the beginning of 2010 after her four sex video clips were spread on the web like wildfire, showing her having sexual intercourse with a man, giving a blow job to the same man, and playing with a dildo to reach an orgasm. It was rumored that Shou Shou ex-boyfriend initially uploaded the video clips online as a revenge to destroy her, because she used him to successfully promote herself in the modeling circle and then dumped him.

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