December 13, 2005
NAMING THE ENEMY:
Lawyer takes on China's 'unwinnable' cases (Joseph Kahn, DECEMBER 12, 2005, The New York Times)
One November morning, the Beijing Judicial Bureau convened a hearing on its decree that one of China's best-known law firms must shut down for a year because it failed to file a change of address form when it moved offices.
The same morning, Gao Zhisheng, the law firm's founder and star litigator, was 2,900 kilometers, or 1,800 miles, away in the remote western region of Xinjiang. He skipped what he called the "absurd and corrupt" hearing so he could rally members of an underground Christian church to sue China's secret police.
"I can't guarantee that you will win the lawsuit. In fact you will almost certainly lose," Gao told one church member who had been detained in a raid. "But I warn you that if you are too timid to confront their barbaric behavior, you will be completely defeated."
The advice could well summarize Gao's own fateful clash with the authorities. Bold, brusque and often roused to fiery indignation, Gao, 41, is one of a handful of self-proclaimed legal "rights defenders." He travels the country filing lawsuits over corruption, land seizures, police abuses and religious freedom. His opponent is usually the same: the ruling Communist Party.
China scholars condemn shootings (Louisa Lim, 12/13/05, BBC News)
A number of Chinese intellectuals have written an open letter condemning the shooting of protesters in the south. [...]The bold letter draws parallels with the violent suppression of protesters in Tiananmen Square in 1989.
The signed letter, posted on the internet, calls on the government to release a list of the names of those who were killed.
It also demands the launch of a special investigation and for journalists to be allowed to report freely on the killings in Dongzhou, near Shanwei.
The statement describes China as a society in crisis, with the rich grabbing what they can from the poor, leading to ever more confrontations.
This open letter is a bold move, especially given that it condemns China's political system and says that without democracy such conflicts cannot be solved peacefully.
The falcon has stopped listening to the falconer.
Posted by Orrin Judd at December 13, 2005 7:23 AM
Among the greatest crimes of the Chinese Communist regime is that it is "a government that teaches the people to be stupid." t
The old tradition encouraged commoners to think of the emperors as benevolent rulers who would right the wrongs of society if they only knew about them. In theory, the Communist Revolution was supposed to have swept away this political paternalism. In reality, the so-called Revolution simply put the Party despots in the place of the emperor.
Moroever, the despots have indoctrinated the Chinese in a narrowminded view of the world, so much so that even China's most brilliant minds often find it almost impossible to break free of the dehumanizing belief that the big brother state knows best and that anyone who fights the state is an enemy of the people.
In short, the Party-state in China has taught the people to be stupid and to be afraid to draw the ultimate conclusion that if the state's rulers are corrupt and drenched in blood, they no longer have the right to rule. Unfortunately, the brave Gao is fightining not only the Comunist Party, bu this state-indoctinated mentality of the slave as well.
Posted by: X at December 13, 2005 8:47 AMThe other side of seeing the emperor as a benevolent ruler, of course, is that once you see that the emperor has no clothes, you're likely to become totally disillusioned and react savagely. This is why some so many Chinese dynasties ended in bloodshed and what the Chinese regime dreads.
The only way out for the Communist Party is "peaceful evolution," which was the path Taiwan's old KMT chose. But the Communists stupidly chose to follow Deng Xiaoping's decision to hold on to total power instead.
Politically, Taiwan's people have broken free of the traditional subservience to despots. Will China's people be wise enough to learn from Taiwan rather than follow the false god of blind nationalism?
Posted by: X at December 13, 2005 10:35 AM