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[ZT] Try to be fair and balanced
这是在The Chronicle 上的一篇反驳Savitt的帖子：
Try to be fair and balanced
posted 4/30/08 @ 4:10 AM EST
I'm saddened by the quality of discussions here. But first let me express my disappointment about Mr. Savitt's writing, which as someone has pointed out ealier, seems to be a bit sub-par for a career journalist. At various points the article seems to be more of a self-promotional and condesending piece than one with a coherent and focused argument. But let me be a bit more specific with his specific points.
Mr. Savitt suggests in the essay that many Chinese students' emotions over the Tibet issue was a result of the government's patriotic or national humiliation education, and people who are against the pro-Tibet are just toeing the party line. This education certainly played a part, but as someone who had lived in China for a long time, he should know that even though a lot of people in China did not like the communists, the support for the government's stand over Tibet (or Taiwan, for that matter) when territorial integrity is concerned, is extremely high. Such supports are more of their inherent opinions than the result of government "education", because as mentioned, these people who support the government's Tibet or Taiwan policy (which most academics I've met believe constitutes a comfortable majority in China) do not necessarily like the communists. Also, the national humiliation education is hardly the invention of the communists after 1989. It already started when the Kuomintang (KMT, the ruling party in Taiwan) was in mainland China.
None of the above is to defend the hassles against a certain student. She has her freedom of speech, even if she insulted some people by openly writing the "free Tibet" slogan in front of them. And to target one's anger at a student is simply a cowardish act. But to say that her "classmates" were angry at the pro-Tibet crowd because they were toeing the party line, or because they have been drilled to do so since childhood is simply too journalistic. If anything, students from China are very apolitical and extremely inexperienced in political activities. This can be seen most evidently from the lack of organization and even chaos in the many pro-China demonstrations that have occured in recent weeks across the US, including Duke. This contrasts sharply with the acumen and experience of the pro-Tibet demonstrators (some of them seem to have the support of professional movement organizations), in both organizing events and communicating with the news media/articulating their opinions.
Mr. Savitt also argues that the Chinese government is actively inciting the vilificaiton of that student. As someone who aims to be a social scientist rather than a journalist, I try to avoid making arguments unless I have a rigorous logic or ample evidences. Mr. Savitt's sole evidence here is that CCTV captioned that student's photo with the line "the most hideous overseas student". As someone with rich expirience with media businesses, Mr. Savitt should know better that this is really a laughable (and hideous) effort on the part of CCTV to attract eyeballs (and possibly revenues) rather than the government's intentional vilification of a student. Yes CCTV is state owned, but it is also a profit maximizing media business. I have not seen the caption myself, but was told that it has seen been taken off the CCTV web, most likely because the Chinese government ordered it to do so. In general, I do not like the Chinese government very much, but I also try to base my blame on logic and evidences, rather than loose journalistic impressions.
Mr. Savitt also noted the many angry and abusive exchanges over a public mailing list. Many people have attributed this to the lack of respect of Chinese people for other people's freedom of speech. I think the reality is more nuanced. My sense is that those people who wrote angry emails and even those who cursed that student thought they were not trying to depriving someone of his or her freedom of speech; rather, they thought they were excercising their own freedom of speech. So what these people need to be educated about most is not that they should respect other people's freedom of speech (although they need that too), but rather the boundary of free speech, which they were not aware of and need serious education about.
As I said in the begining, I'm also saddened by the quality of discussions here. People seem to be more interested in venting out their emotions than engaging in cool-headed, fair and balanced discussion. I won't say I'm above emotion, but let me at least try to provide some perspectives here.
About the violence in Korea, resorting to physical attack is wrong (and silly), even if you have grievances. So, some people above should stop accusing the Koreans for the violence done by some Chinese people. On the other hand, some of the Korean friends above seem to be a little hasty in making their judgement about China or Chinese people in general over a few Chinese people's conduct in Korea, but then I should probably blame those few Chinese people rather than you for this. A side note about media coverage though: a few Chinese students were physically attacked and hurt in Japan by some Japanese rightwingers, but this did not seem to have generated any major media interest; some Chinese students attacking Koreans, however, was a major international story (for all I can tell, what happend in Korea was no more violent than what happened in Japan). The same thing actually happened in Tibet as well but I won't elaborate here. I don't blame anyone for this though. To me it seems to be a rational choice of readership- and profit maximizing media in pandering to the reading inclinations of the audience.
About the history of Tibet as someone brought about above. I think if you're really interested in Tibetan history, then you should read some serious history books rather than relying on (and forwarding) some readers' letters in a newspaper. Even brief articles such as the entry on Tibet in Wikipedia would provide so much more useful information than what you have put here.
And finally, to Korean friends who used to have good impressions on China but now don't, sorry. And to those Chinese Americans (or Chinese Canadians, for that matter) who are glad that their parents brought them out of China, congratulations. And to others who think every Chinese students desperately tries to stay in the country after graduating from school, I just want to point out the percentage of Chinese students returning to China is increasing every year (and that's why there is this popular phrase Haigui (sea turtle) in China, which means overseas returnees).
I don't represent anyone but myself, but let's all hope China, as well as the rest of the world, will be a better place tomorrow. |
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发表于 2008-5-7 08:34:36
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