Beijing Students Told to Calm Down
There are indications that the government, or at least university officials, are beginning to get worried about anti-Western backlash that has erupted around China following the now-infamous Jack Cafferty comments. Cup of Cha has learned that university students at Beijing Youdian (北京邮电) were told to that they needed to find constructive ways to express their anger. They have been strongly discouraged from carrying out further demonstrations against Western targets including the French and the Western media. Officials also stepped in to stop protests planned by young people around the Beijing in recent days. Although there have been no confirmations of additional instances, Cup of Cha has heard similar rumors (always a dangerous thing) coming of some of the other prominent institutions around the city.
In the past nationalistic movements have boiled out of control, such as the anti-Japanese mini-riots during the 2004 Asia Cup. While the government initially tolerated the protests that year, the incidents quickly became an embarrassment and officials appeared afraid that they might not be able to control the angry crowds. The next year China saw similar problems on the same front, on an even greater scale. In 2005 they grew over several weeks and quickly flamed out of control.
While the Chinese Government has proven particularly adept at turning a potentially disastrous Olympic torch run into a major plus with its domestic audience, things have again begun to spiral in recent days. Outside of the French Embassy, Chinese groups have protested, presumably because the French did not do enough to protect Jin Jing during the Paris festivities (although Nicolas Sarkozy is now trying to right the ship). However, the same mobs that were so outraged by the treatment of a wheelchair-bound Chinese citizen seemed not to understand that protests outside of a school filled with middle schoolers was not going to play much better in the press. Here’s part of the BBC report:
“Oppose Tibet independence, support the Olympics,” read one placard [outside of a Carrefour branch]; “Say no to French goods,” said another.
Some placards went further, depicting Nazi swastikas on the French flag.
Many protesters also bore images of the disabled Chinese athlete Jin Jing, who shot to prominence in China after fending off anti-Beijing protesters in Paris.
In Beijing, protests were reported at a Carrefour, and outside the French embassy and a French school, though police were said to have dispersed the crowds rapidly.
This has been the classic dilemma for the Chinese Government: at what point does it become dangerous to rouse nationalistic sentiment? On the one hand, it is a useful tool to deflect attention away from real problems. I can remember in 2004 the television broadcast hours of documentaries chronicling Japanese atrocities during the SARS epidemic, which seemed more than a little fishy. Yet at a certain point it is not convenient to have thousands of angry people riled up when the government in power has a tenuous hold on legitimacy.
Perhaps Chinese officials are afraid that this year’s protests are reaching the point where they are doing more harm than good.
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Matthew Stinson responds:
Posted: April 22nd, 2008 at 10:42 pm →
I wonder if they’ll start to tell students that if they go to protest, it’ll be marked on their records and result in future punishment. They did that in 2005 and it shut down several of the student-backed protest crowds.
Over the weekend the government reportedly also started pruning away many “extreme” Internet postings, but I don’t see how they can stop QQ messages (I just received one that said “Carrefour Die, France Go to Die!”) or text messages.
cathy w responds:
Posted: April 23rd, 2008 at 2:18 am →
The Chinese officials needed to be more rational, their use of propaganda words have turned on people’s nationalistic mood, which is a very dangerous sentiment if it has gone extreme. I hope this won’t turn the country’s open policy backward.
carhy w responds:
Posted: April 23rd, 2008 at 9:39 am →
I don’t agree with boycotting French goods. Every low priced item is made in China, this only hurts Chinese workers and factories, and it is just a symbolic thing no substance. This reminds me of WW2, boycotting Japanese goods, it’s an old tactics, and isn’t the best way to shw national pride. Should just try to do better, every single person, start respecting the fellow Chinese, no matter their backgrounds, rich or poor, because this issue with international community goes way beyond Tibet, this has to do with China’s human rights records, the way the gov’t treats its own people, and monitor their freedom to express displeasure with the gov’t through the internet and through the press.
nanheyangrouchuan responds:
Posted: April 23rd, 2008 at 1:33 pm →
And now the CCP risks showing weakness in front of the foreign powers. Chinese nationalism is definitely a double edged sword.
cathy w responds:
Posted: April 23rd, 2008 at 3:05 pm →
The CCP risks showing weakness in front of foreign powers? That’s your opinion, this stupid aged old “loosing face” thing, the way the CCP can do now to help cool people down before it goes out of control is to try to not let the protests escalate into riots(they better not do crack downs), the protesters have to remain rational, that is the very important thing. Nationalism is double edged because extreme nationalism from a mass population would only make the country become less open to the outside world. Remember The Cultural Revolution?
cathy w responds:
Posted: April 23rd, 2008 at 3:14 pm →
Chinese gov’t can really learn from Hong Kong governing system. People there can express freely for and against the gov’t, on radio stations and in the press, on blogs, without being labeled “traitors” or be arrested by police. Why would China have difficulties containing protesters? Because people never had any outlets to vent out their dissatisfactions with the gov’t. Now even the protests are not against the gov’t, because of the lack of ways the society has to deal with this, things can easily get out of control.
cathy w responds:
Posted: April 23rd, 2008 at 3:27 pm →
The CCP if they don’t want to be seen as weak in front of foreign powers, stop arresting their own citizens for voicing dissatisfaction for the gov’t, stop violating human rights of their own citizens. Have guts to really clean up rampant corruption.