Zhai Xiaobing with Ai Weiwei.

Even beyond China’s Great Firewall, Twitter is not always a safe haven for the country’s more outspoken critics. Just before the 18th Party Congress began, Zhai Xiaobing, a fund manager in Beijing, was arrested for a tweet deemed to “spread false terrorist information” (涉嫌散布虚假恐怖信息):

#剧透推 #慎入 死神来了6即将上映。大会堂突然倒塌，正在开会的2000多人只有7人幸免，事后却又一一离奇死亡。是上帝的游戏，还是死神的怒火，神秘数字18怎样开启地狱之门？11月8日全球院线震撼登场！

— 星河舰队 (@Stariver) November 5, 2012

#SpoilerTweet #Enter-at-your-own-peril “Final Destination 6” has arrived. In which the Great Hall of the People collapses all of a sudden. All 2,000+ people meeting there died except for 7 of them. But afterwards, the seven die one after another in bizarre ways. Is it a game of God, or the wrath of Death? How will 18, the mysterious number, unlock the gate of Hell? Premieres globally on November the 8th to bring you an earthshaking experience! (translated by Yaxue Cao)

Zhai has not been released since his November 7 detention. An online petition [zh] for his release, signed by prominent Chinese activists such as Ai Weiwei and Hu Jia, has collected 419 signatures as of this posting. “We hope the the Beijing police shows a sense of humor and do not create a big incident out of a small issue,” writes petition author Bei Feng (Wen Yunchao). “In particular, do not ruin the image of the new leadership soon after the 18th Party Congress.” Zhai’s is not the first Twitter-related arrest in China.

Zhai, whose Twitter handle is @Stariver, studied ancient (pre-Qin) literature at Peking University, and formerly worked in the media. His acerbic tweets make no excuses for the violence and corruption in China, while images of armed police in Lhasa streets and protests in Hong Kong against patriotic education mingle with cat and food photos. Yaxue Cao of Seeing Red in China writes, “In Twitter’s Chinese community, @Stariver is known for his cool and biting comments about current events in China that cut the froth and burst false ‘hopes.’ He is also known for the depth of his knowledge in classics.”

CDT Chinese has collected some of Zhai’s more urgent tweets, translated here by Mengyu Dong:

如果不是为了生物多样性的考虑，我相信上帝不会造出“中国人民的老朋友”这种畜牲。

— 星河舰队 (@Stariver) October 16, 2012

Stariver: If not in consideration of biodiversity, I believe God wouldn’t have created those beasts, the “old friends of the Chinese people.”

各级网警和小秘书团结协作，众志成城，投身救灾抢险工作，将受灾死亡人数牢牢控制在37人，用青春热血谱写了一曲忠诚的赞歌。 — 星河舰队 (@Stariver) July 25, 2012

Stariver: All levels of Internet policemen and little secretaries coordinated together, used their united will as strength and devoted to disaster relief work. They kept the number of victims to 37, and composed a faithful song of praise with their youth and ardor.

Noticing that the death toll was reported at 37 for multiple incidents across China this summer, netizens call this the “Law of 37” (死亡37定律). Zhai wrote this tweet soon after the Beijing flood.

人民日报的任务是把中国打扮成白富美，全球都不如它牛逼；环球时报的任务是把中国打扮成迫害狂，全球都是针对中国的阴谋陷害；新闻联播的任务是把中国打扮成班干部，德智体美劳全面发展，还能一帮一一对红。 — 星河舰队 (@Stariver) July 26, 2012

Stariver: The task of the People’s Daily is to dress up China as “white, rich, and beautiful,” the f**king best in the world; the task of the Global Times is to dress up China as a paranoid, as if the whole world is scheming against it; the task of Xinwen Lianbo is to dress up China as a class leader who is moral, intelligent, physically fit, tasteful and socially responsible, and can pair up with partners and help each other to develop.

文革暴力，是匪帮组织暴力对于底层民众的裹挟，是极端程序邪恶和实质邪恶对普遍人性黑暗面的强力激发，对此不了解，就是历史愚昧；民间暴力，是对匪帮利益勒索和国家机器暴力镇压的反抗，是在程序正义无可诉求之下的最后防线，对此的否定，就是现实无耻。 — 星河舰队 (@Stariver) July 28, 2012

Stariver: The violence of the Cultural Revolution was the coercion of the lowest in society by organized gangs, the brutal excitation of humanity’s dark side by essential and programmatic evil. Whoever does not understand this is ignorant of history. The violence among the people is revolt against extortion by gangs and the brutal oppression of the state apparatus, the final line of defense in a system where it is impossible to appeal for justice. Whoever denies this is truly shameless.

官场小说的流行源于受众对中国政治“宫廷模式”神秘感的追求，对政治黑帮斗争之“阴谋艺术”和官商经济权力寻租的崇拜。它唯一想要证明的，就是官场规则的合理性。

— 星河舰队 (@Stariver) June 19, 2012

Stariver: The popularity of novels about official circles originates from reader’s pursuit of the mystique of China’s “court” politics, the worship of the “art of conspiracy” in struggles among political gangs, as well as the worship of rent-seeking among politician and businessmen. The only thing it intends to prove is the rationality of officialdom’s rules.

RT @stariver要是有人一边端着碗吃屎，一边埋怨桌子没擦干净，你一定认为他是个傻逼。要是一个人一边无视当局的暴力，一边对民间行为表现出理中客的洁癖，他就是个吃屎还埋怨桌子不干净的傻逼。

— 那谁谁 (@na_sheishei) July 9, 2012

Stariver: If someone eats from a bowl of crap he is clutching, yet at the same time complains that the table is not clean, you’ll definitely figure him for a loon. If someone ignores the atrocity of state power, yet shows pathological concern for the cleanliness of the people’s conduct, then he is the loon who eats crap and complains about the dirtiness of the table.

Stariver: 9.18子曰：“吾未见好德如好色者也。”～孔丘局长说：我就没见过在小姐面前还能坚持原则的。#论语今译#   Stariver: (9.18) Confucius said: “I have not seen one who loves virtue as much as he loves beauty.” ~ Bureau Director Confucius said: I have not seen someone who can uphold his principles in the presence of a hooker. #ModernAnalects#

重庆打黑成果表明，在任何地方以任何方式惩治任何党员干部，都可以得到人民群众的拥护。 — 星河舰队 (@Stariver) March 19, 2012

Stariver: The outcome of the “beat black” in Chongqing shows that people support any punishment of any cadre, regardless of when, where, or how. –Chinese re-tweet robot

牛 RT @stariver: 烈士求民主，今世壮心犹可励；英杰为自由，后生远志必行之。 — Jian Alan Huang (@hnjhj) April 8, 2012

Stariver: The martyr pursues democracy; those ambitious among us today will still find him encouraging. The hero seeks liberty; those idealists of tomorrow must pursue it.

每次倒烟灰的时候，我都觉得是在倒自己的骨灰。

— 星河舰队 (@Stariver) December 24, 2011

Stariver: Every time I throw away cigarette ashes, it feels like I’m dumping the ashes of my own bones.

First tweet translated by Yaxue Cao. Excerpts from petition translated by Oiwan Lam of Global Voices.

© Anne.Henochowicz for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | 3 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 18th party congress, Ai Weiwei, beat black, Bei Feng, censorship, Chongqing, Confucius, Cultural Revolution, Global Times, Hu Jia, Internet censorship, Peking University, people's daily, Twitter, Wen Yunchao, Xinwen Lianbo
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In December 1843, The Economist relayed its first reported anecdotes about China: tales of foreigners being deceived by fake Chinese products. These included, according to one written account, “counterfeit hams” made of wood, coated in dirt and wrapped with an outer layer of hog’s skin: “The whole is so curiously painted and prepared, that a knife is necessary to detect the fraud.” Another foreigner, “M. Osbeck”, told of being duped by a blind flower-salesman on the street: “I learned from this instance that whosoever will deal with the Chinese must make use of his utmost circumspection; and even then must run the risk of being cheated ….”

The Economist established a permanent China bureau in Beijing in 1997 (the application was first made in 1994; the authorities were in no hurry to approve it). From that perch, the newspaper chronicled the historic transformation of the economy and China’s place in the world that has compelled so many news organisations, including ours, to expand our presence …. Both in print and here at Analects, we endeavour to convey a fuller picture of a China that has changed dramatically since we began paying attention in 1843—politically, socially, culturally and economically. Certainly, the story has developed beyond the narrow scope that the newspaper conceived in that first article about China, in October 1843:

…that our demand for their produce will stimulate increased industry, produce among them more wealth and more ability to consume our goods, is certain; and a large and regularly increasing trade with this extraordinary people may be experienced for many years to come, and in the course of time…arrive at an amount at present little thought of.

On the choice of ‘Analects’ for the new blog title, over suggestions such as ‘Confucius’, ‘Hundred Flowers’, ‘Bamboo’ and ‘Interesting Times’:

In the end it came back to Confucius, or at least to a word connected with him. The Analects is the title of a collection of his sayings, but our fondness for the name does not imply endorsement of his philosophy. Its appeal is as a word in English. Its origin is the ancient Greek analekta, meaning “things gathered up”. James Legge, a Scottish missionary whose 1861 translation of The Analects was the first in English, described the Chinese name of the work, Lunyu ( 論語, or 论语 in simplified characters), as meaning “digested conversations”. His use of the classical-sounding “analects” to render this idea reflected the learning that the West’s earliest China-scholars brought to the new field. “Analects” is now inextricably linked in English with the Confucian work, but the word itself means something very close to what our new blog is: gleanings, in this case from China.

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Post tags: Confucius, foreign media, history, The Economist
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Furious at the remarks, scores of protesters gathered outside the Liaison Office of the Central People’s Government, Beijing’s main representative office in Hong Kong. Several paraded pet dogs and banners denouncing the Beijing academic. ”We are not dogs,” the protesters shouted.

A survey of public opinion last month found feelings of kinship with the rest of China had declined since Britain pulled out in 1997. The number of respondents who said they viewed themselves as Hong Kongers was more than double the number who saw themselves as Chinese.

Professor Kong made his remarks after footage of a quarrel between mainlanders and Hong Kongers appeared on the internet last week. The video, which attracted widespread attention on the mainland, showed a Hong Kong passenger on the city’s subway system telling a noodle-munching mainlander in Cantonese that eating on the train is forbidden. A shouting match erupted and continued on the platform after someone pressed the emergency button. 

Leading Hong Kong politicians swiftly denounced the Beijing academic, who is well-known in China for his sharp tongue and hard-edged nationalist views.

Professor Kong’s comments coming amid increasing questions about Hong Kong and mainland relations, including fears in Hong Kong over a mainland baby boom on the territory. Time adds:

Hong Kong’s colonial past is one reason why many see such a rigid delineation between “us” and “them.” Large numbers of Hong Kong Chinese retain British or other foreign travel documents and take a balanced view of the colonial era — viewing it as a time of racial or social injustices, certainly, but also as source of many of the city’s defining advantages, including common law, a global outlook and media freedom. These have been contributing factors in a distinctive local culture that has long caused many Hong Kong people to quietly regard themselves as being far from ordinary Chinese. These days, however, the issue of identity is spilling into a more public forum.

A University of Hong Kong public-opinion poll that has been conducted every six months since 1997 measures the number of Hong Kong residents who identify as Hong Kong citizens, Chinese citizens or some combination of the two. In the latest survey, released in December, the number of respondents identifying themselves first and foremost as Hong Kong citizens was the highest in 10 years, while the number who saw themselves primarily as Chinese sunk to a 12-year low. The results hit a nerve: mainland officials called the poll unscientific, and state-run media lashed out at the survey’s main organizer, accusing him of working for the British to “incite Hong Kong people to deny they are Chinese.”

The area of greatest contention lies in the numbers of pregnant women from the mainland entering Hong Kong to give birth, which automatically grants the babies residency, as well as the free schooling and high-quality health care that goes along with it. In 2010, 37% of babies born in Hong Kong were to mainland families where neither parent was a Hong Kong resident. It has become alarmingly difficult for pregnant women, local or otherwise, to reserve hospital beds in the maternity ward, even after the number of mainland women allowed in Hong Kong hospitals was capped at 34,400 for this year.

A week ago, dozens of pregnant women marched in protest in the cold and rain. The women, along with hundreds more husbands and other supporters, were calling for a legislative change to overturn automatic right of abode through local birth. “If [mainland people] come here for the resources and welfare and are not contributing, then it’s a problem. It is out of control now,” said Zumi Fung, an expectant mother who was part of the protest. The Facebook group of 80,000 members that organized the demonstration has become a forum to vent vitriol at the mainland Chinese in Hong Kong, who are called by the derogatory term “locusts” and much worse.

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Post tags: Confucius, Hong Kong, Hong Kong relations, Kong Qingdao, mainland births
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An official with the Ministry of Culture’s press office who like many Chinese bureaucrats would give only his surname, Zhou, confirmed Thursday that the prize had been called off. Zhou said the ministry had nothing to do with establishing the prize or its cancellation.

“This was totally their own choice,” he said. “It had nothing to do with the Ministry of Culture.” […]

The first Confucius prize was awarded to former Taiwanese vice president Lien Chan, though Lien, unaware of the proceedings, did not show up to claim it. Instead the prize was given to a small girl who organizers declined to identify.

The prize was named after the philosopher and was intended to give the Chinese “viewpoint of peace,” organizers said last year. It came with a $15,000 (100,000 yuan) gift.

Shanghaiist’s account of the prize’s fate differs, however:

The Ministry of Culture has removed the Confucius Peace Prize away from its erstwhile organisers, the China Native Art Association’s Traditional Culture Protection Bureau, and ordered for it to be shut down, saying it had never been given official permission to run the awards ….

… Despite conflicting reports in the Chinese press, the show is still going on and the ceremony will continue to take place in December, insists Liu Haofeng, executive chairman of the Confucius Peace Prize. “It is just the removal of the previous organiser,” Mr Liu is quoted as saying to the AFP. Indeed, multiple organisations are now tripping over themselves to sponsor the event, added Liu, while declining to name them.

You can vote for your favourite nominee in Shanghaiist’s poll, where Vladimir Putin is currently vying for first place with Yuan “father of hybrid rice” Longping.

In another story quite unrelated to the noble institution of the Confucius Prize, authorities have cracked down on “award-related profiteering”, according to Xinhua:

The Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Commission for Discipline Inspection cut the total number of award titles from 148,400 to 4,218, forbidding event organizers from handing out awards with the words “China” or “National” in their name without approval from related authorities, according to an official from a national award assessment team.

The excessive number of awards and the shoddy practices used by event organizers to promote their award ceremonies have been effectively curbed under the government’s tight supervision and regulation, according to the official, who requested anonymity ….

In one prominent case, the China Federation of Patriotic Projects came under fire in July for promoting its “Backbone of the Republic” award. Each candidate for the award was required to pay a service fee of 9,800 yuan ($1,531) in order to qualify for the title, according to previous media reports.

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Post tags: awards, Confucius, Liu Xiaobo, Ministry of Culture, Nobel Peace Prize, Vladimir Putin
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One easy answer is that the revolution preceded the appearance of the Communist party by a full decade. Since the party’s preferred historical narrative casts it as the only begetter of China’s liberation and subsequent rise, this awkward complication is hard to overlook. The fact is that the 1911 revolution was a messy and virtually unplanned affair. Nor was it led by the next best thing to the unborn Communist party – Sun Yatsen, a tireless non-Communist revolutionary later adopted by the party as a semi-paternal figure: he happened to be away in the US on a fundraising trip. The revolution happened without him ….

A century later the Communist party’s rule has begun to resemble the system that 1911′s accidental revolutionaries overthrew: a large and privileged bureaucracy, hereditary privileges in the ruling elite, a mass of toiling workers and farmers – and, finally, the embrace of Confucius, the man the revolutionaries rejected 100 years ago, as someone with a lot to say about hierarchical government. In January a 31ft statue of the sage, bearing an uncanny resemblance to the artist Ai Weiwei, was erected outside the National Museum in Tiananmen Square, hitherto the preserve of revolutionary heroes. In April, without explanation, the statue disappeared.

Confucian influence, however, remains. The official doctrine today is not class struggle but harmony. In China’s parks and city squares ever larger numbers of people are coming together to sing the stirring songs of the Maoist era – the latest wave of nostalgic cultural revolution kitsch to be reinvented as a social trend. But in the party schools, theorists labour to refashion the Marxist theoretical canon to a task as painful and difficult – and finally pointless – as the legendary Confucian eight-legged essay, the gold standard examination that imperial bureaucrats had to pass.

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Post tags: Ai Weiwei, CCP, Confucianism, Confucius, history, Isabel Hilton, qing dynasty, Sun Yat-sen, Tiananmen Square
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Consequently, a passage in the Analects, one that I had never given much attention to, for the first time jumped off the page. A disciple, describing Confucius, said,

“He wouldn’t drink wine bought from a wine shop or eat dried meat bought in a market.” (Bk. 10.6)

To be sure I wasn’t reading into the passage what the Al Jazeera piece had earlier put in mind, I turned to the standard commentaries on the passage. They all agreed on its meaning, expressed best perhaps by Huang Kan of the 6th century:

“As for wine that one hasn’t prepared oneself, one can’t be sure that is pure and clean; as for meat that one hasn’t prepared oneself, one can’t know the animal from which it has come.”

… The moral is clear: be careful about the wine you buy in China and the beef you eat there. And read your Analects. Confucius is still relevant—sometimes.

At The Useless Tree, meanwhile, Sam Crane takes issue with the China Daily’s claim that China’s policy in the South China Sea embodies a Mohist approach:

Mozi said defensive strategies are more conducive than offensive for a country’s survival. He was strongly against unjust wars, which, he said, would only provoke fierce resistance and trigger moral condemnation from all quarters. The price of aggression would include not only material loss, but also the loss of prestige and reputation. This means the cost of offensive strategy far outweighs the gains.

Ironically, the article invokes these ideas in reference to the recent tensions in the South China Sea. While it is nice to see a PRC analyst saying that China does not seek hegemony, it must be remembered that the PRC claims, effectively, the entirety of the South China Sea, a position that antagonizes several other countries in the region.

That claim, in its explicit challenge to long-standing territorial claims of other states, is violation the the Mohist principles mentioned in the CD article. It is inherently offensive.

But I want to turn this in another direction: toward Taiwan.

If the PRC is really serious about embracing the Mohist aversion to offensive warfare, then consistency would demand that it renounce the use of force in its dealings with Taiwan. Such a renunciation is not forthcoming, as fas as I know.

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Post tags: Confucius, food safety, meat, South China Sea, Taiwan
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According to officials with the National Museum, the statue was always intended to be placed in the courtyard and, despite an official unveiling ceremony in January this year, was only “temporarily” placed by the north gate as they awaited completion of the sculpture garden.

This official explanation has met with some scepticism, however, with some suspecting political factors behind the scenes. From AFP:

Many were puzzled but some speculated there was a political motivation. “The statue of Confucius opposite Mao’s portrait — now that is a serious political problem,” one netizen said on the popular Sina.com microblog.

They “can’t count on Confucius, (they) still have to count on old Mao because you can’t control people through thought, only through guns,” another added ….

Some netizens expressed anger at the removal of the statue, which a security guard confirmed had taken place Wednesday evening. Calls to the national museum’s press office went unanswered.

“The Analects (teachings) of Confucius are in fact more like demands of morality from the rulers, so to move away his statue represents the bankruptcy of government morality. It just wastes ordinary people’s money,” one netizen said.

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Post tags: Confucianism, Confucius, Tiananmen Square
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In February Taiwan’s Ministry of Education said it planned to require Taiwan high school students to study what is known as the “four books”– the Analects of Confucius, the Doctrine of the Mean, the Great Learning, and Mencius– in order to combat widespread bullying, drug use and gang problems among Taiwanese youth ….

Student behavior has become an increasingly hot issue in Taiwan after a report came out last year that a principal at a middle school ignored a string of bullying incidents. The ministry also announced in February an anti-bullying campaign would be carried out in the island’s elementary and middle schools ….

The ministry’s effort to turn back the educational clock comes as authorities in mainland China are also seeking to revive interest in Confucius, partly to fill the moral vacuum left when the Communist Party decided to embrace late leader Deng Xiaoping’s exhortation that “to get rich is glorious.” Beijing installed a 31-foot bronze statue of the sage on the east side of Tiananmen Square in January and threw its weight behind an expensive (though widely panned) Confucius bio-pic starring Hong Kong’s Chow Yun-fat last year.

While some on the mainland have appeared to embrace the return to Confucian morality, critics say the effort is more a soft power play (government-backed Chinese language schools abroad are managed by an entity called the Confucius Institute), than a genuine effort to reform society.

Taiwan is also attempting to use education abroad as a soft power tool, according to a report in the Gambian Today newspaper:

The Republic of China on Taiwan has, through its embassy in The Gambia, issued Mandarin scholarships to Gambians who wish to study in Taiwan from six months to one year through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This was highlighted in a news release issued by the Embassy on Tuesday.

According to the release, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Taiwan established the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Huayu (Mandarin) Enrichment Scholarship (MOFA HES) Programme in 2010.

The scholarship aims to promote friendship between the people of Taiwan and her diplomatic allies as well as give the recipients a better understanding and appreciation of Taiwan’s rich culture.

This opportunity which would be henceforth offered each year will enable young people not below 18 years from The Gambia and elsewhere in the world, to learn about Chinese language at no cost.

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Post tags: Africa, Confucius, confucius institute, soft power, Taiwan
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A mammoth sculpture of the ancient philosopher Confucius was unveiled this week off one side of the vast plaza. It’s a jarring juxtaposition for a square the ruling Communist Party treats as politically hallowed ground: a mausoleum holding revolutionary leader Mao Zedong’s body sits in the middle and his giant portrait hangs at one end.

Placing the statue at China’s political heart is the authoritarian government’s most visible endorsement yet of the 2,500-year-old sage and, selectively, his teachings.

Confucius is enjoying a revival, in books and films, on TV and in classrooms. His message of harmonious social order and deference to authority is unthreatening to the party, while his emphasis on ethics resonates among Chinese coping with fast-paced social change on the back of torrid economic growth.

The government is increasingly marshaling his popularity to bolster national identity. “The rise of a big country requires a cultural foundation, and Chinese culture upholds the spirit of harmony,” said Wu Weishan, the sculptor, who has made more than 200 statues of the philosopher. “The essential thoughts of Confucius are love, kindness, wisdom and generosity. And peace and prosperity are what the people are striving for.”

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Post tags: Confucius, cultural heritage, Tiananmen Square
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Tan Changliu, chairman of the committee, made every attempt to steer the conversation away from that subject. In a page seemingly taken from the Harry Potter books, he tried to avoid referring to Mr. Liu by name, instead calling him the man “with the three-character name.”

Mr. Tan said the prize was meant to give “a Chinese perspective on peace.” When pressed on its relation to the Norwegian prize, he said that China had had a longer history with peace. He added, “Did the Nobel Peace Prize influence Confucius, or did Confucius influence the Nobel Peace Prize?”

The panel distributed a booklet that opened with a paragraph saying the 1.3-billion-strong nation of China “should have a greater voice on the issue of world peace” and that “Norway is only a small country with scarce land area and population.”

[...] Worn down by so many questions, Zhao Zhenjiang, one of the judges, went on a tirade against the United States and wondered aloud why Barack Obama had won the Nobel Peace Prize last year when he is staging military exercises with South Korea in the Yellow Sea.

See also, “What if they gave a Confucius Peace Prize and nobody came?” from Useless Tree, which points us to these two videos:

A parody created by Next Media Animation:

And a report from Al Jazeera’s Melissa Chan:

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Post tags: Confucius, Liu Xiaobo, nationalism, Nobel Peace Prize, peace
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Celebrating Confucius’ 2561st birthday in Beijing, by Jordan Pouille

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Post tags: Confucius
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Chinese philosopher Confucius spent most of his life in poverty. But his picture and sayings decorate lottery tickets being sold to luck chasers by a provincial government in Shandong… Chinese websites and newspapers have been circulating remarks that express the indignation of a large section of people, who feel the tickets amount to showing disrespect to the thinker, who has the status of a saint in China. Some said it amount to defaming Chinese culture as a lot of it is based on Confucianism.

Yin Chengli, an official at the lottery centre in Shandong has defended the move saying: “We just wanted to sell tickets while spreading Confucius’ ideas.” The criticism will not deter the lottery program, he said… An online poll by a web portal, Sina, showed that 52.7% opposed the move while 42.5% backing it on the ground that Confucius ideas can actually be promoted through these means.

Lottery authorities have said they will distribute 65 per cent of the ticket revenue as prize money and spend 20% on reconstruction work at the earthquake affected areas of Sichuan province.

© cschultz for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Confucius, lottery
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Forgetting about all the political factors and watching the movie just as a film, it is a losing film. What the film is preaching doesn’t leave any influence at all. When Confucius was on the screen talking about “rites” and “benevolence”, some guy to my side was having a ten-minute-long phone conversation. The war scenes in the film are like child’s play. The country of Lu cannot protect itself, but Confucius’s few disciples can drive back the enemy just by building a road block and firing arrows into the sky? Moreover, in the film, the dialogue between characters is not at all persuasive. It’s just like when you were small and your parents told you, “today’s work must be finished today”, but their words ultimately could not convince you. It is no longer an era where a “master” can say a few more lines and attract/trick people. From the movie, I found it very difficult to understand why Confucius’s team of workers continually followed him. In moments when the film was playing up the personalities of the characters, I had to endure ten minutes of the disciples continually yielding a bowl of horsemeat soup [to each other] to demonstrate their cohesiveness. [I had to endure] because I had already endured the story of Confucius’s disciple [of a later generation] Kong Rong giving up pears to his elders throughout my entire childhood.

… I want to say that the movie Confucius, whether it is from the perspective of cinematographic meaning, business profits, artistic merit, what it explores, its educational qualities, its historical accuracy, its entertainment value, its emotional resonance, etc., is completely unnecessary. It is a film that could be completely done without.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Confucius, Han Han, history
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First of all, as far as China is concerned, I think soft power and hard power are equally important. Secondly, we currently have hard power, but our soft power is very weak. In terms of manufacturing, we are a giant exporter, but in terms of culture, we are importers; we import 15 times more culture than we export. Third, we often talk about the great achievement of thousands-of-years-old Chinese culture, as if China today had no culture to speak of.

Put it this way, let’s look at the great “soft power armies” of other countries: France’s definitely wear Dior army uniforms, carry Louis Vuitton satchels, the army marches out with glittering Cartier emblems, and when they fire over a volley of red wine, China’s fashion industry definitely lines the streets to welcome them, as though they were looking upon excellent fashions. The most unwelcoming thing they might do is strip them and send the French home naked!

And if it’s America? There would be a column of Mickey Mouses, a column of Donald Ducks, and a column of Tom and Jerrys. There would be Transformers, Superman, Batman, and Spiderman; Chinese children under 16 would happily think it was a promotional activity for a toy store.

And then there’s the Chinese soft power army; if we go with what netizens want, then it’s a 2000-year-old rotten old man? If Confucius hadn’t once denounced the daughters of peasants, most Chinese wouldn’t know what “the Master” was talking about even if he spoke all day.

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Post tags: Confucius, Hung Huang, soft power, Zhang Ziyi
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And from CCTV’s description of the movie:

A film depicting the life of the ancient Chinese philosopher and educator Confucius has become a highly anticipated epic blockbuster. The movie wrapped up shooting in Beijing on Wednesday, and a ceremony was held to release the first trailer.

Renowned actor Chow Yun-Fat, who plays Confucius, and other leading actors, including Chen Jianbin and Zhou Xun, appeared at the ceremony. Chow said he took the role because Confucius is portrayed in the film as a man with much human interest.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Confucius, history, movies
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