Page 18 - The Giant Awakens - A Collection of Insights into Chinese Government Influence in Australia
P. 18
Human Dignity
and Its Enemies
JOHN Liu Xiaobo wrote eloquently wanted the world to heed in PEN Center representatives. highly visible foes can a self-
FITZGERALD and often about ‘simple his lifetime than claims such as Censorship may have limited Liu appointed single-party state
human dignity,’ just as he these, demonstrating the party’s Xiaobo’s impact within China claim a mandate to mobilise and
An enemy found it. And he found it in the hostile anti-foreign enemy but he is widely remembered represent the People in their
mentality darkest of places: in working mentality in the wake of his among people of Chinese never-ending struggles with a
designed to with the grieving mothers of death. descent in countries where the spectral enemy. Who needs a
suppress dissent young people killed in the 1989 press and social media allow Leninist vanguard party when
in China could, Beijing massacre, in occasional Liu’s primar y message for them to publish as they please. there is no enemy? The citizen
if Beijing got its glimpses of warmth between the West was this: An enemy Chinese overseas remember Liu who stands up and says “I have
way, undermine guards and prisoners amid the mentality long perfected by for many things, including a no enemies” undermines not
all societies that grinding routine of prison life. China’s Communist Party to naive attachment to principles just the party’s style of politics
value dignity and suppress China’s citizens has now at the price of his own liberty, but its raison d’être.
freedom, and Liu died eight years into gone global. Liu and other rights but above all for his signature
disarm the states an eleven-year jail term for activists are branded domestic statement “I have no enemies.” Today the Party is systematically
that protect them. speaking and writing about the enemies of the People not Liu Xiaobo was best known silencing independent thinkers,
value of human dignity and the because of anything they have for denying Beijing’s “enemy lawyers, writers, academics,
18 political and social conditions done themselves but because mentality” any traction in his journalists and newspapers that
required for it to flourish. It’s of their alleged association own life. draw attention to the party’s
true that he wasn’t a celebrated with foreign conspirators. The abuse of power, wealth and
figure in his own country, as liberal West is Beijing’s real and Shor tly after Liu’s death, privilege. It attacks them as
foreigners with close ties to only enemy. Today, Liu’s simple roaming freelance writer agents of hostile foreign forces
Beijing point out eagerly and message has been refracted and Wu Qiang explained that the and it parades many on TV
often. This could be because reinforced through Beijing’s meaning of Liu’s “I have no where they are compelled to
people in China do not care for grim and condescending reports enemies” statement lay in make abject public confessions
human dignity. Or it could be of his death. his “continued insistence on of conspiring with hostile forces
because human dignity cannot non-violent resistance and in the West.
be upheld or celebrated openly Those outside China who see political opposition, despite
in China without provoking the Liu Xiaobo’s personal struggle being sentenced to eleven All this is fabricated. In his
indignation of the Communist for dignity and freedom as a years in prison.” Liu’s signature lifetime Liu asked the West
Party and the fury of its public remote Chinese affair should statement made sense as “the not to yield to such nonsense.
security agents. listen up. Far from conspiring only way to preserve space for In death his message takes on
with knowing enemies in the political opposition in a highly greater urgency.
Either way, Liu’s ideas, his West, Liu Xiaobo was concerned authoritarian state.”
life’s work and his recent passing that the liberal West had not an Liu pointed out that China’s
have barely been noted in inkling of the enemy mentality Tr ue, but Liu’s statement wealth presents new and
China’s party-controlled media. that Communist officials were arguably does more than this. grievous threats to liberal
When they have reported it, cultivating and propagating For a Leninist state, the most democracy through the
the character of the coverage within China. An enemy infuriating citizens are those application of what Liu called
reinforces Liu Xiaobo’s message mentality designed to suppress who refuse to grant their “cheque-book diplomacy” and
to the West. dissent in China could, if Beijing self-proclaimed “enemies” economic leverage:
got its way, undermine all in authority the privilege of
Chines e rep or ts of L iu’s societies that value dignity and recognition. Human dignity International mainstream
death betray what he called an freedom, and disarm the states involves mutual recognition society must pay close
“enemy mentality.” They point to that protect them. of equality, Leninism mutual attention to this reality: in its
Western perfidy in awarding Liu “RIehaacvtei onnoseanmemoinegs”C h i n e s e recognition of hostility. The contest with the free world,
the Nobel Prize and to duplicity overs e as to ne ws of L iu’s politics of enmity that drives the authoritarian Communist
on Liu’s part in allowing the passing reinforce this message the Chinese government today Party of China is already
West to make him, in the words – including reactions among demands mutual recognition completely different from
of one critic, “a pawn in its game Chinese-Australian friends among opponents: fierce the traditional totalitarian
to undermine China,” designed and Independent Chinese denunciations on the one Soviet Communist Party…
“to tarnish China’s image on side, cowering admission of It is not hard to see that,
the world stage.” Nothing better guilt on the other. Only with with its bulging wallet,
illustrates the lesson Liu Xiaobo the CPC regime’s cheque-
2017 Vision Times Special Edition
and Its Enemies
JOHN Liu Xiaobo wrote eloquently wanted the world to heed in PEN Center representatives. highly visible foes can a self-
FITZGERALD and often about ‘simple his lifetime than claims such as Censorship may have limited Liu appointed single-party state
human dignity,’ just as he these, demonstrating the party’s Xiaobo’s impact within China claim a mandate to mobilise and
An enemy found it. And he found it in the hostile anti-foreign enemy but he is widely remembered represent the People in their
mentality darkest of places: in working mentality in the wake of his among people of Chinese never-ending struggles with a
designed to with the grieving mothers of death. descent in countries where the spectral enemy. Who needs a
suppress dissent young people killed in the 1989 press and social media allow Leninist vanguard party when
in China could, Beijing massacre, in occasional Liu’s primar y message for them to publish as they please. there is no enemy? The citizen
if Beijing got its glimpses of warmth between the West was this: An enemy Chinese overseas remember Liu who stands up and says “I have
way, undermine guards and prisoners amid the mentality long perfected by for many things, including a no enemies” undermines not
all societies that grinding routine of prison life. China’s Communist Party to naive attachment to principles just the party’s style of politics
value dignity and suppress China’s citizens has now at the price of his own liberty, but its raison d’être.
freedom, and Liu died eight years into gone global. Liu and other rights but above all for his signature
disarm the states an eleven-year jail term for activists are branded domestic statement “I have no enemies.” Today the Party is systematically
that protect them. speaking and writing about the enemies of the People not Liu Xiaobo was best known silencing independent thinkers,
value of human dignity and the because of anything they have for denying Beijing’s “enemy lawyers, writers, academics,
18 political and social conditions done themselves but because mentality” any traction in his journalists and newspapers that
required for it to flourish. It’s of their alleged association own life. draw attention to the party’s
true that he wasn’t a celebrated with foreign conspirators. The abuse of power, wealth and
figure in his own country, as liberal West is Beijing’s real and Shor tly after Liu’s death, privilege. It attacks them as
foreigners with close ties to only enemy. Today, Liu’s simple roaming freelance writer agents of hostile foreign forces
Beijing point out eagerly and message has been refracted and Wu Qiang explained that the and it parades many on TV
often. This could be because reinforced through Beijing’s meaning of Liu’s “I have no where they are compelled to
people in China do not care for grim and condescending reports enemies” statement lay in make abject public confessions
human dignity. Or it could be of his death. his “continued insistence on of conspiring with hostile forces
because human dignity cannot non-violent resistance and in the West.
be upheld or celebrated openly Those outside China who see political opposition, despite
in China without provoking the Liu Xiaobo’s personal struggle being sentenced to eleven All this is fabricated. In his
indignation of the Communist for dignity and freedom as a years in prison.” Liu’s signature lifetime Liu asked the West
Party and the fury of its public remote Chinese affair should statement made sense as “the not to yield to such nonsense.
security agents. listen up. Far from conspiring only way to preserve space for In death his message takes on
with knowing enemies in the political opposition in a highly greater urgency.
Either way, Liu’s ideas, his West, Liu Xiaobo was concerned authoritarian state.”
life’s work and his recent passing that the liberal West had not an Liu pointed out that China’s
have barely been noted in inkling of the enemy mentality Tr ue, but Liu’s statement wealth presents new and
China’s party-controlled media. that Communist officials were arguably does more than this. grievous threats to liberal
When they have reported it, cultivating and propagating For a Leninist state, the most democracy through the
the character of the coverage within China. An enemy infuriating citizens are those application of what Liu called
reinforces Liu Xiaobo’s message mentality designed to suppress who refuse to grant their “cheque-book diplomacy” and
to the West. dissent in China could, if Beijing self-proclaimed “enemies” economic leverage:
got its way, undermine all in authority the privilege of
Chines e rep or ts of L iu’s societies that value dignity and recognition. Human dignity International mainstream
death betray what he called an freedom, and disarm the states involves mutual recognition society must pay close
“enemy mentality.” They point to that protect them. of equality, Leninism mutual attention to this reality: in its
Western perfidy in awarding Liu “RIehaacvtei onnoseanmemoinegs”C h i n e s e recognition of hostility. The contest with the free world,
the Nobel Prize and to duplicity overs e as to ne ws of L iu’s politics of enmity that drives the authoritarian Communist
on Liu’s part in allowing the passing reinforce this message the Chinese government today Party of China is already
West to make him, in the words – including reactions among demands mutual recognition completely different from
of one critic, “a pawn in its game Chinese-Australian friends among opponents: fierce the traditional totalitarian
to undermine China,” designed and Independent Chinese denunciations on the one Soviet Communist Party…
“to tarnish China’s image on side, cowering admission of It is not hard to see that,
the world stage.” Nothing better guilt on the other. Only with with its bulging wallet,
illustrates the lesson Liu Xiaobo the CPC regime’s cheque-
2017 Vision Times Special Edition
