The left finally notices Taiwan - super late to the game

Come on, give Taiwan a chance.

A truly excellent piece of writing and overall backgrounder on Taiwan and why the Western left should care about it appeared in Dissent Magazine recently.

I'm elated. I have nothing bad to say about the piece. My only disappointment is that not enough mainstream Western lefties read Dissent, and its online access is blocked by a paywall (frankly, the reason for the former is certainly, in part, the latter). So a lot of people who should read this piece, won't.

Because you probably don't have access to read the full article, and I do (don't ask how, but I have my sorceress ways), I'm basically going to quote relevant bits here without going full-on copyright infringement, and hope that this will make the ideas therein a bit more accessible to those who so desperately need to hear them.

Here's how it starts: 


Imagine a small, peaceful, progressive island in Asia about the size of Mary- land. Ruled until the Cold War’s very end by a military dictatorship, it is now a robust democracy, although it endures incessant hostility from its giant neighbor. Its people treasure their hard-fought equality, free press, and vibrant civil society.


The rest of the introduction is free to read, so I'll be taking the rest from the parts that are not accessible to non-subscribers. In any case, this is the country I call home. And, with some exceptions, it basically lives up to this promise as well as any democratic nation can.


Boasting the world’s largest standing army and an expansionist outlook, the People’s Republic of China deems Taiwan a “renegade province” that must be “reunified” in due course. And because the Chinese claim the island as part of their territory, they go out of their way to block its international participation. Essentially, they have made befriending Taiwan a zero-sum game for anyone who dares to do so, and the rules are simple: Engage with us and we will reward you; engage with them and we will punish you. It is fierce dollar diplomacy Beijing insists on waging, and Taipei can’t win.


Exactly, and thank you to this writer for putting "renegade province" and "reunified" in the scare quotes they always needed. Why can't mainstream media outlets do that? It's simple, easy and more accurate than what they do print (which is similar copy without the quotation marks, implying the claims have merit.) That the West doesn't see the game China is playing here, or doesn't care and is willing to sacrifice 23.5 million people who currently live free is terrifying to me. If you say you have values, live up to them, damn it.


In a recent poll that asked whether unification is an option if China democratizes (itself a long shot), just 24 percent of respondents aged thirty-nine or below said yes, while 73 percent said no. Since 2009, according to another survey, a majority of the island’s population has consistently self-identified as taiwanese— not as Chinese, nor as both—a sign that they have long assumed their de facto independence.


Yup. This idea that "both sides of the Strait" think of themselves or identify as "Chinese" is basically complete trash-in-the-dumpster bollocks. It's not true and hasn't been true for some time. Why the rest of the world is willing to force an identity on Taiwan - "but they're officially the Republic of China so they think they are Chinese too!", which is an oversimplification that leads to a dead-wrong conclusion - is beyond me. Everyone else gets to identify as they wish with liberal support - why not Taiwanese?

Keep in mind that Taiwan cannot change its official name from the Republic of China because doing so would precipitate a war that nobody wants, especially not the Taiwanese who, above all else, want peace. It wasn't a country name chosen by the Taiwanese - it was decided by the Nationalist government in China, without ever asking any Taiwanese what they thought about it. In essence, it is colonial. So it's a bit of a jerk's game of Catch-22 to then say this attempt to maintain peace means they "are Chinese".


As a diverse, tolerant country with a leader who has shattered the ultimate glass ceiling for Asian women, there is every reason to expect that tai- wan’s most faithful allies in the U.S. are on the left. Except that is not the case at all: American progressives tend to view it as either a reactionary state or one of no importance.


I think I need to change my pants. 

This is so true it hurts, and what is worse, it's so painfully wrong. It calls to mind, forcefully, a "conversation" (more like an ignorant rant-fest on his part that I very much wanted to end) between a friend-of-a-friend on social media, in which he went on and on (and on and on), basically Dunning-Krugering himself into a tizzy about how it would be "better" and we should "hope" that Taiwan takes over China, because apparently this worked in Hong Kong (I don't think he's ever asked any Hong Kongers what they think about that, or read about how that's actually gone down, because that's not the answer I think many would give) and anyway, they're the same people with the same culture and history, so why not?

That 23.5 million people don't think they are the same people with the same culture and history, and who have already built the sort of democracy with a healthy respect for civil society that Western liberals can only wet dream about (just try occupying Congress in the United States - you'd be dead), didn't seem to factor in.


John Bolton, who would later become Trump’s national security advisor, electrified conservatives when he declared on Fox & Friends: “Nobody in Beijing gets to dictate who we talk to.”

But then came the partisan backlash. It just so perfectly fit the anti- trump narrative: a buffoon elected president who was already, before taking office, eroding well-established “norms” because he was either too reckless or too ignorant. “that’s how wars start,” tweeted Senator Chris Murphy. trump’s “flippant calls” were “threatening to create diplomatic crises,” Vanity Fair asserted in the same article that compared tsai with other controversial world leaders with whom trump had also spoken, like Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines and Nursultan Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan, as if she, too, was a notorious human rights abuser.

Somebody please get me a towel, because it's getting hot in here. 

Anyway, yeah, all this. Tsai is a moderate - if anything, too careful and too conservative - democratically-elected leader. Like all elected leaders, she is imperfect, but damn, she ain't Duterte. Likewise, Taiwan's democracy is imperfect. Some people who ought to be protected, aren't. But it ain't Turkey. 

This echoes what the rest of the world writes about Taiwan and China - as though Tsai were somehow the one "causing tensions", or her fairly mild "we won't take any crap from China but we won't make waves either" stance (exactly the right attitude to take when facing a bully) was some sort of "hardliner" rant.

But since Horrible Death Walrus John Bolton said it - despite the fact that this one (and only) time, he was right - the left flipped the hell out.

And I thought our side was better at evaluating the merit of the idea rather than dismissing it based on its source. Hmm. Maybe we're not as smart as I thought.

Absent from the mainstream media discourse were the views of ordinary taiwanese, most of whom do not remotely share trump’s politics but were delighted to learn of their country’s long overdue acceptance and validation on the international stage. One commentator called it “the happiest thing” for Taiwan since the Jimmy Carter years.


HOO BOY HOSE ME DOWN.

Seriously, we have been trying to tell the West this for years. Why is it that the views of China and the CCP are always given center stage in the media and general pundit commentariat, and nobody ever seems to ask what the Taiwanese think about all this?

The article goes on to reflect on some of the ideas of this piece, which you should also read. 


So, as late as the waning days of 1986, this was the scenario Washington faced: neither side could accept coexistence as they each claimed to be the sole, rightful owner of China and Taiwan combined. to keep gambling on Beijing—which first began with Richard Nixon’s famous visit in 1972 and formalized when Carter severed diplomatic ties in 1979 with Taipei—seemed sensible enough.
It was not at all imaginable that Taiwan would be the one to emerge as Asia’s beacon of freedom so soon while China would backslide.

Exactly. In 1979 the Western reaction to Taiwan made more sense - Taiwan was still a dictatorship, ruled by people not from Taiwan, who never asked the Taiwan if they wanted to be ruled. You know, like a colony.

And yeah, that dictatorship (which, again, was not Taiwanese) claimed to be the sole legitimate government of China. That sucks, but it's not Taiwan's fault and certainly doesn't reflect the views of the Taiwanese today. These guys did not even come from Taiwan and their dictatorship is over (though the party still, unfortunately, exists).

The idea that the legitimate government of China is currently in Taiwan is ludicrous, and almost all Taiwanese would agree with this. Those that don't tend to be in their 90s and were not born in Taiwan. And sure, maybe it's too bad that Grandpa lost the war, but things have changed.

So why doesn't the West get this too?  Because, like, hey libs. It's not 1979 anymore. The king is dead! Long live the democratically elected leader of one of the freest countries in Asia!

There's a bit more history there, but I'm getting a little quote-happy. Just be aware that it was the 90s, and the first George Bush's actions after Tiananmen Square, that led to neo-conservatives taking up the cause of Taiwan (called the "Blue Team" - though Taiwan isn't exactly 'blue' anymore, it was then). Of course, what neo-cons champion, those liberals - well, the ones who don't think or don't know better - reflexively hate. Cue Clinton's tepid views on Taiwan, which set the stage for a general liberal ignoring of a quickly democratizing and liberalizing nation.

Some more recent history for you:


Simultaneously in Washington, the Blue team became ever more influential with Congress, think tanks, and even the incoming president’s inner circle. But while George W. Bush and his neoconservative allies were keen to confront Beijing early in his first term, they soon found themselves need- ing crucial Chinese cooperation in North Korea and especially the Middle East after 9/11; this compelled Bush to speak out against taiwanese independence in December 2003. the “One China” policy hence survived as a cornerstone of American foreign policy. Obama’s “pivot to Asia” did not alter that either, as he kept Taiwan out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations, although the free-trade pact was itself designed to counterbalance China’s regional clout.

You may hate the TPP, but if its more noble goals were ever achievable, it was just stupid to leave Taiwan out. A sign of liberal shortsightedness.


Today in Ttrump’s America, the staunchest supporters of Taiwan have been the same band of Republican hawks, from heavyweights such as Bob Dole and the late John McCain to Senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, who are descendants of the Blue team. Because of this interconnection, the issue continues to be perceived as a right-wing cause with which progressives are reluctant to be associated.


Weeeeeelllll...here's where I begin to disagree. Pro-Taiwan lobbying groups and associations talk to Republicans and Lizard People like Ted Cruz because they have power now, and they'll take whatever help they can get (you may not like that, but it is a pragmatic approach. Yeah, it makes my skin crawl too. I know.)

But pro-Taiwan bills have recently had unanimous support, and Taiwan generally does have bipartisan support. As for why the left doesn't speak out for Taiwan as much as the right, I have no idea. I suspect it's because they're not as smart as they think they are, and as smart as I always wanted them to be that they don't see a natural ally in Asia staring them right in the face. A shame. Taiwan is super hawt and needn't be the nerdy virgin in this story, hoping to get the guy. 

The Guy

(from here - I've talked to them about permission to post their work generally - they are great and you should check them out)

The rejection of Chiang’s memory reflects an undeniable reality: the old assumption that both Taiwan and China long to unite as one nation-state but disagree on which regime has legitimacy is simply not accurate any- more. Beijing’s failure to uphold the promise of autonomy in Hong Kong and Macau only makes unification with Taiwan even more far-fetched. For Americans in this day and age to still defend Kissinger’s “One China” policy—a shameful, self-serving lie to please the Chinese—is to pretend otherwise; the passive strategy aims to do the bare minimum to maintain the status quo, a status quo that is inherently unjust.


If you take one thing away from my quote-fest here, liberals, let it be that. And this:


It is high time for the political left to rethink taiwan. Progressives’ silence—whether because they are oblivious to the island’s changing politi- cal landscape or disinclined to anger Beijing—does a grave disservice to the taiwanese people who have come such a long way.

I SCREAM THIS AT PEOPLE IN MY DREAMS.

But where the island struggles most has always been on the world stage. When the SARS epidemic was killing hundreds of victims in neigh- boring Hong Kong and China back in 2003, Taiwanese epidemiologists had to combat the disease alone after the WHO denied them access to samples and information. Few things have changed over the years. the International Olympic Committee returned a verdict this May that forced Team Taiwan to keep playing under the awkward “Chinese Taipei” designation in the forth- coming Tokyo 2020 Games. Even with the deck stacked against it, however, Taiwan has not stopped fighting for respect and recognition.

The island merits them; it has never exploited its diplomatic alienation to act out. Rather, it has proven time and again to be a responsible, if minor, power. At a time when many Western countries are turning inward, Tsai has called immigrants “an infusion of new strength and a force for cultural diversity.”
 

Well, I'd like to see all those nice words on immigration translate into a shot at dual nationality without having to fit into some Special Magic Foreigner box, but cool. Some laws have been relaxed, and I appreciate that. I think she means what she says, and I think the generally pan-green or anti-KMT/pro-Taiwan side finally believes this while fighting conservatives in their ranks.

In any case, when it comes to Taiwan, this is dead on. Taiwan has done nothing to make waves - if anything, it accepts more humiliation than it ought to (it shouldn't have to accept any) to keep the peace. It has been nothing but stable and calm in the face of an increasingly screamy, angry, irrational China.

And yet, Taiwan is painted as the bad guy - raising "tensions", full of "hardliners", who need to make "concessions" because what China thinks about Taiwan is apparently more important than what Taiwan thinks about itself.

Let's bring it home with a hit right to the liberal sweet spot: 

If the American left is serious about opposing a reactionary foreign pol- icy that preserves unequal power relations, it should speak up for Taiwan. Its enlightened views on gender, ethnicity, and class have translated into a social structure that’s reminiscent, in certain ways, of Northern Europe’s. Its capability and readiness to tackle the greatest challenges of our time, from terrorism to climate change, make it a well-deserved member of the international community. Its unlikely historical trajectory shows that bringing genuine progress to a part of the world where individual liberties are more often threatened than cherished is possible.


OH YEAH. 

Beware the phony expert: a Deutsche Welle dumpster fire

As a long-termer in Taiwan, it's a common disappointing occurrence to read an absolute horrorshow of an opinion piece about this country, thinking "well this is pretty crap, but it's probably by some nobody who just doesn't know what they're talking about", then get to the end only to find out that the writer is an accomplished scholar (though not in any field that has anything to do with Taiwan) and as such, people will actually take them seriously.

That's exactly what happened a few days ago in Deutsche Welle, when this mess was splattered across its website: Taiwan, China share common heritage, chequered history

You know something like this is going to be painful to read when even the title gets basic facts wrong: Taiwan and China do not share a common heritage in the way readers are intended to infer. The common trope is that Taiwanese and Chinese culture are 'the same'. They're not - Taiwanese culture certainly contains much Chinese influence, but it also contains heavy strains of indigenous, Japanese and Southeast Asian culture lacking in China - if 'Chinese' culture can be said to be one cohesive thing at all, which it isn't.

All in all, reading this thing was like listening to glass slowly crack and burst: you'd think for someone whose scholarship is specifically in the field of narratives and ideologies would have more to say about Taiwanese, rather than Chinese, narratives - and know a marginalized narrative when he sees one - but apparently not. 

With that in mind, let's dive in. I say we start with what's good about the piece. You know, to whet our appetites for the bloodbath to follow. 

Because one thing is certain: neither will Taiwan reclaim mainland China, nor will the People's Republic occupy and undermine Taiwan.

Let's leave aside "neither will Taiwan reclaim mainland China" - both that "mainland" is a made-up word by people in power to impose a certain narrative of what is mainland and what is territory off that mainland, and that Taiwan ever had China (it didn't - the ROC did, but Taiwan did not) - and look at the second half of that sentence. That's nice.

I mean, nice just like I suppose it's nice if you're trapped in the desert dying of dehydration and you find a muddy puddle and lick it just to get some water, only for it to give you bilharzia. But hey, you got some water! Nice!

Today Taiwan is a modern, open and tolerant democracy. It has nothing in common with the dictatorship that the Kuomintang had brought to the island when they arrived in 1949.

Yeah, okay, sure. Why couldn't you keep this thread going, Professor Görlach? Why'd you then have to take that former dictatorship's definition of what Taiwan is as the whole truth about Taiwan, despite the government itself being foreign (Taiwan was Japanese when the KMT arrived) and, at the time they consolidated themselves and their ideology about Taiwan, not representative of the Taiwanese people? You should know better. 

The island is, after all, one of Germany's and the European Union's most important trading partners. Taiwan, once again, exemplifies the success of the democratic model: political and economic freedoms go hand in hand and eventually lead to prosperity and harmony. Despite our friendship with China, Taiwan will thus remain a special ally among the Asian states.  

Cool story bro. So, how about some diplomatic support in the face of Chinese aggression up in here?

Also, not so sure about the harmony but the blue and green camps aren't exactly killing each other (anymore - one side used to routinely kill the other), so...fine.

Okay, that's enough. Time for blood. 

During my time in Taiwan, I realized that the young generation dissociates itself from that heritage. The Civil War, which ended in 1949, is far away. Hence, they consider themselves Taiwanese rather than Chinese.  

Wait...what?

You think the young generation doesn't identify as Chinese because the Chinese Civil War was a long time ago? Have you actually asked any young Taiwanese - or any non-KMT Taiwanese at all - why they identify as Taiwanese? If you did, what do you think they'd say?

I have asked, so I'll tell you what they've said to me: that it has nothing to do with any civil war in China or ROC ideology, and everything to do with the fact that Taiwanese history and culture are simply different from China's. From an island of indigenous tribes, to a history of colonization by European powers, Chinese powers and Japan (yes, Chinese presence on Taiwan was, and is, colonial), to a modern history that has sharply diverged from China's, Taiwanese history is its own unique thing. In terms of culture, this is harder to quantify, but Taiwan just feels like a place influenced by both Japan and China, and has an entirely different cultural feel from China despite the two cultures' similarities. It's like going to the US from Europe. Even the language (Mandarin) is a colonial one. Until the post-1949 language policies of the KMT began to have an effect, the native languages of Taiwan were numerous, and none of them Mandarin.

Is it so hard to believe that the Taiwanese identify as Taiwanese because the attempted brainwashing of those in power - so that they could stay in power - didn't work? That there's something real to it, and it is about remembering history rather than forgetting it?


Dealing with 'transitional justice'

As a German, I'm well acquainted with this gimmick: during the post-World War II period, both German states — the democratic West Germany and the communist East Germany — considered themselves to be legitimate representatives of the "one Germany."


And I'm well-acquainted with this gimmick: positioning the word "gimmick" very close to another term in scare quotes, to imply that you think the term is bullshit.

You wanna go ahead and own that? That you think things like letting families finally read the goodbye letters their long-dead relatives wrote before their (unlawful and unfair) executions is a "gimmick"? That opening records that were only sealed so the party responsible wouldn't have to face justice for what they'd done is a "gimmick"? That the historical narrative finally echoes what really happened - is that a "gimmick" too? That untold sums of money were confiscated, swindled or outright stolen from Taiwan and the Taiwanese by that same party, and only now does it seem they won't be able to keep their loot - is that a "gimmick" too?

All I can say is I'm happy your opinion doesn't mean anything in Taiwan.

The rest of the world should appeal to moderation on both sides of the conflict.

Ooooooohh, nice job implying very subtly that identifying as Taiwanese - which is something most Taiwanese naturally do and have done for decades (some for far longer) - is somehow not moderate, and therefore must be an extreme position.

I see through the ruse, but nice try. I commend you, sir, for your attempted chicanery.

I had just completed my tenure at a university in Cambridge on the US East Coast when I arrived at National Taiwan University to take up the position of visiting scholar. Most certainly, I arrived with an understanding of how complex and painful the aftermath of a civil war can be.

Sure, but remember, the only reason that civil war ever came to Taiwan's shores was because one side took it there. It had nothing at all to do with the millions of Taiwanese who, until just a few years previously, had been Japanese subjects. The warring ideologies of that war were so far removed from a local Taiwanese context that, to be frank, it feels like an accident of history that it ever became a part of the Taiwanese narrative at all. 

I reencountered much of this in Taiwan. The island state has its origins in the Chinese Civil War. In 1949, the defeated Kuomintang party of Chiang Kai-Shek retreated to the island. They remained convinced that they were still representing the real China that had become a republic under their leadership only a few decades ago.

So, before the 1940s, Taiwan didn't exist? Huh - I had thought Sun Yat-sen caused it to be raised from the ocean floor in 1911, but apparently it was several decades later, when Chiang Kai-shek took the magic tome, said the appropriate incantations to the gods, and made it so that Taiwan came into being where there had once been nothing but open sea. Ya learn something new every day!

(Yes, yes, I know he's talking about the "ROC on Taiwan" here, but he said "Taiwan". You may be surprised to learn that Taiwan did, in fact, exist as a unique entity long before the Chinese Civil War. Its entire history was colonial, but it did exist as a place one could refer to as itself rather than part of a larger whole.)

For the coming decades, the notion of reclaiming mainland China remained a crucial part of their rhetoric — despite the fact that their large neighbor was already on its way to becoming an economic superpower. The People's Republic of China on her part considers the island republic a renegade province.

Okay, so we get the KMT's view, but no sense of what actual Taiwanese thought about this whole thing or about China (remember, in those decades the KMT quite assiduously avoided identifying as Taiwanese. Many still don't.) So we get two perspectives from two Chinese regimes, and nothing at all about the perspectives of the vast majority of people in Taiwan who, until the KMT came, had had little to do with China besides having had a few distant ancestors come from there. 

Let's also keep in mind that the definition of what Taiwan is, according to Görlach, was created by a political party that is not currently in power, because the people of Taiwan decided they didn't like that narrative. How can anyone say that this is the story - of a common household torn asunder - that truly represents Taiwan?

For someone who has written so extensively on the importance of liberal democracy and how ideological narratives shape identity, it's interesting that Görlach does exactly what both China and the KMT want him to do by excluding the most marginalized narrative in this story, giving prominence to the stories woven at odd, tangential angles to the truth by those in power who are trying to keep (or expand) their power. 

As always, when the victors and the defeated interpret their history, conflicts arise. Only in 1992 did both parties finally agree to accept the notion of "one China," although differences in its conception persist.

Again, more of China and the KMT's view, nothing about what the Taiwanese think. Also, he reifies the 1992 Consensus just as so many hack journalists do. The 1992 Consensus is a fabrication: if differences in what "one China" mean persist, then that's not a consensus! In any case, we already know the term was basically a post-hoc fabrication meant to perpetuate a notion of what is and is not 'China' in the face of changing Taiwanese views on their own culture and history. 

Even if the 1992 Consensus were a real thing - and it's not - the parties that would have agreed to it were not democratically elected. This arguably matters more on the Taiwan side: how can Görlach imply, as he does here, that something that is claimed to have happened in 1992, with the Taiwan side represented by unelected officials sent by a government that had not yet fully democratized, should be taken as the position of "Taiwan", a country whose liberal democracy he himself praises? 

What could the experiences of both the United States of America and the Federal Republic of Germany mean for the conflict between the People's Republic of China and Taiwan? First and foremost, it signals that both sides should continue their work on the consensus of 1992 to pave the way for a better future. Neither side should be forced to lose face in this process. 

THAT IS ONLY TRUE IF THE 1992 CONSENSUS IS REAL WHICH IT IS NOT.

Seriously, for a professor I'm astounded at how little homework Görlach has done on the so-called 1992 Consensus.

Also, again, what's up with claiming the KMT narrative of Taiwan ultimately being Chinese, and not paying any attention at all to the more globally marginalized narrative of the vast majority of Taiwanese who feel differently? How is a better future only possible if we take the KMT and Chinese narratives as the only ones that matter, and ignore what the Taiwanese actually think about their own damn country, and acquiesce to the idea that Taiwan is, in fact, a part of China?

Is it really so easy to throw away all those years of writing about narrative, political policy, ideology and liberal democracy and say that because the KMT wants to hold on to power, and China is super aggressive, that this whole other idea that Taiwan is not a part of China, and never really has been for any length of time that matters can just be ignored?

Is it so easy to discount the voices of the 20-million-plus people who have been saying emphatically for years that their ancestors may have come from China, but that they are Taiwanese?
Is it so easy to throw out the idea that a just world - and Görlach seems concerned with justice - would offer a solution that allows for both Taiwanese independence and peace, which most Taiwanese (and I would gather most Chinese) want?

Görlach talks about losing face (aww, we have a budding wannabe Confucius on our hands - adorable) - but the ultimate loss of face is Taiwan being told that it is Chinese, because some people in power decided to create an agreement from thin air that it was so. 

The People's Republic of China won the Civil War. It is in China's interest to interpret the outcome of the war in its own words. In this regard, the country is not acting exceptionally. That provides context, but does not excuse Beijing's behavior. The Chinese leadership under President Xi Jinping has not shown any intention of restoring the wisdom and harmony between the two unequal siblings. Should that happen in the future, the People's Republic of China will have achieved its goal of becoming a distinguished and responsible actor on the international stage. 

Let's leave aside that the Communists and Nationalists - one-party leaders of the PRC and ROC, respectively - were the ones engaged in this war, not any actual Taiwanese (the descendants of those ROC soldiers who came to Taiwan are Taiwanese, but the soldiers themselves mostly fought this war in China.) This is a Chinese war, not a Taiwanese one, but whatever.

I wanted to like this paragraph, because he's calling on Xi and the entire People's Republic of China to basically stop being such massive assholes, and that's great. But...the only way one can think of Taiwan and China as siblings is if you've already swallowed the notion that Taiwan and China are, in fact, siblings. And that means taking China's, and the KMT's, narratives about Taiwan at face value, never once questioning the perspectives pushed by those in power to try and define (and by defining, control) that which they wish to rule, and never even considering that another, more democratic, more ethically correct, more modern and liberal perspective - Mr. Esteemed Liberal European Professor Sir - even exists, let alone interrogating it.

Or even just asking the people who live that other perspective daily why they think the way they do. That would be enough, but he didn't even do that.

I'll do it for him - I talk to a lot of young Taiwanese. I often ask them about their views on history, or even just how things work in their country (it's actually something I have to do in my line of work).

While I've gotten a few young Taiwanese who do identify as Chinese, not even once, over talking to hundreds if not thousands of young Taiwanese adults, has anyone ever taken my question about their "country" to mean "China". It is always - every single time - taken to mean "Taiwan".

It has literally never happened. Truly, not once. And I doubt it ever will, regardless of what some unelected powerful dudes say they said in 1992.

So on what planet do you, Alexander Görlach, think that it would be natural, preferable or right for the Taiwanese - not the KMT, not that ROC government that came from China and whose status on Taiwan is, by international law, undetermined - but the Taiwanese, to think of themselves and their beautiful island as a part of China?

This is all the more disheartening because Görlach seems from his curriculum vitae and academic interests to be someone who ought to see through the smokescreens put up by people in power to try and keep that power: that is, he should be someone most qualified to look beyond what China says about Taiwan's 'Chinese' heritage, and see it for the attempt at a territorial annexation claim that it is. He should be able to look at the KMT's similar attempts to paint Taiwan as 'Chinese' as well, and see that for what it is too: an attempt by those in power to control the narrative for everyone else, and to keep marginalized voices firmly on the sidelines. He should know enough about critical Han studies to know that any attempt by those two sides to paint 23.5 million people whose minds they do not control and whose history they can no longer revise as 'Han', and therefore as ultimately members of a greater 'China' in which there is a 'mainland' and an 'island' (Taiwan), are simply attempts, again, at power trying to grab more power, and set the narrative for everyone else based on what benefits them.

But he doesn't. He sounds like just another Chinese shill, and that disappoints me. He could have done better, but didn't. He's one of the smart ones, but this op-ed is so painfully, out-of-tune dumb, it hurts the ears.

Görlach may be a great academic in his field, but it's painfully clear from reading this conflagration of bad ideas that he doesn't know the first thing about Taiwan, and cannot be said to be anything of an expert on Taiwanese affairs.

Oh, and don't look at the captions in the slideshow below. I don't even have the energy to deal with those.

Of peanuts and monkeys

This is perhaps the third time I've written about this in a week, but I just have more to say.

I've been thinking about a few issues I'd like to [try to] tie together: reactions to my post about how long-termers in Taiwan aren't here for the money but are aware they're being undervalued, the general state of English-language media in Taiwan, and English as a second official language in Taiwan.

When I wrote about long-termers and low pay here, most reactions were supportive. The negative ones landed into two groups: those who think NT$66,000/month is fair, or even good, pay for a job that requires several years' experience, high level skills and (unfairly) a Master's from abroad, and those who said the pay wasn't important because the job would be good for someone who would be in Taiwan for a few years and would likely just want to beef up their resume.

So, let me toss some word salad about why both groups are wrong before I move on.

In terms of fair pay, the fact that pay is too low in pretty much every other sector doesn't make $66k for this sort of job acceptable. If you can make just as much money (or more) as a Dancing English Clown at a cram school, a job that requires no qualifications, experience, education, training, professional development, skills, talent, work ethic or consistent sobriety, why would you seek to improve yourself so that you might qualify for a higher-level job, especially one that states right in the ad that you'll be doing consistent overtime in a stressful environment?

And why would you want to take all of that education, experience and skill to make just about enough money to drink at Bar 7 and live in a shared flat or rooftop cesspit with paper walls, if you have any hope of saving meaningfully? Because after you pay your student loans on that foreign Master's degree and save NT$30k each month, that's about what you can afford, if you have no dependents. If you've gotten a postgraduate degree, learned Mandarin and acquired translation skills and experience, you are probably not 24 anymore, and would rather live like an adult.

Others say that this job is aimed at young Taiwanese Americans spending some time here but not planning to stay, or for those looking for a springboard to gain experience. This also misses the point: first, this isn't a newbie job. This could have been an excellent post for an early-mid-career bilingual professional writer, editor or translator, who might well have stayed on for years improving not only their own work, but elevating the English-language output of MoFA as a whole. It could have been a boon to both some lucky long-termer and to MoFA, who would get excellent work in turn.

That is, if it had been positioned that way: as a good but demanding job with a great salary, rather than as a short-term lark for an ABC kid with a Master's who's in Taiwan.

This whole idea of getting some experience in Taiwan and then leaving actually bothers me quite a bit: there are those of us who wish to stay, and as I've written three times now, we try to contribute and give back to Taiwan in gratitude for what Taiwan has given us. Although I won't spend paragraphs bashing them, I have less respect for those who come, take what they can get from Taiwan, and then leave. It strikes me as a little selfish. I have a more profound appreciation for those who want a fair shake from Taiwan, but also want to give back to this country in a sustained way. And yet, one of those grab-and-go types will probably get this job. MoFA will have a revolving door of people who never really develop themselves and get merely passable work, and Taiwan won't benefit.

Which leads to my next point - if the national government is serious about sweeping initiatives like making English a second official language in Taiwan, it's going to have to shake up its whole attitude toward a lot of things. It can't have a MoFA attitude towards English education, asking for everything and offering nothing.

The government needs to think about employing the right people (which it can attract with the right offers), taking seriously the idea that teaching, writing, editing and translating in English are professional careers that people do over a lifetime and seeking out those people, and basically getting quality by paying for quality in terms of remuneration, benefits and work environment. There are those of us who want to stay, who can do good work, but who aren't going to be attracted by what's currently on offer. We're here and we don't want to go anywhere - if the government is serious about bilingualism, internationalism and multiculturalism, it needs to provide more enticing reasons to stay, and stop creating jobs aimed at grab-and-goers.

And it needs to take those people seriously when they point out the flaws in the status quo vis-a-vis English education in Taiwan: from a poorly-regulated cram school industry to, as a friend pointed out, the fact that students who only learn English in public schools generally don't come out having learned any English, to the way the exam system, through extreme negative washback, hinders the whole process. It needs to hire people who can then develop something better, and that's where long-termers looking to contribute to Taiwan come in. We - not just me, I'm nobody, but we - can actually do this alongside and in support roles to talented, passionate and qualified locals, but only if the will is there. We can't take a grab-and-go attitude.

This isn't true only for the government, but for the education system as a whole: from buxibans to universities, if you want talented educators who can actually help Taiwan achieve English as a second language, you need to not only give those who are already working toward this end a better environment in which to succeed, but to offer jobs that entice talented professionals, not a revolving door of Chads and Braydens who aren't implementing even so-so curricula well, and will go back to Idaho in a few years anyway without seriously considering whether they actually contributed to Taiwan.

Oh yeah, and if you are serious about multiculturalism, how about treating the many Southeast Asians who come here for work with a little more kindness and respect? Even just better working conditions and pay, not being all racist towards them, and not raping or enslaving them would be a good start.

This bleeds over into English-language media as well. Why is Taiwan News, which is essentially a gossip rag peddling the same sensationalist articles translated over from Chinese-language gossip rags, now the most recognized English "news" source in Taiwan? How'd we hit the bottom of that barrel?

Because there aren't very many jobs for talented journalists in Taiwan, either. By all accounts, the Taipei Times made a go of it once, but are now so under-resourced that even if there were talk of updating its website and media strategy for the 2010s and beyond, the resources just aren't there to make it happen. It was (is?) the English-language paper that both the expats and the Taiwan advocate Beltway crowd read, and probably never would have been a huge money-maker given its smallish target audience, but it could have sopped up the market that Taiwan News is currently engaging.

Great people have worked at the Taipei Times - and some have even worked at the China Post (believe it or not) - but they all leave. Few people build a career and stick with it, because the jobs on offer just aren't that great. We all know about the one guy who wrote a whole book on it (though you'll need a nacho bowl for all the shoulder-chips it comes with), but I've heard this from many sources. Low pay, long hours, hardly any time off (typical Taiwanese annual leave, which means not much at all), difficult environment. No wonder the best journalists they hire, if they can attract them, cut their teeth and then leave. The state of English-language news reporting suffers for it.

A friend pointed out that this has real-world consequences: she was talking about racism in Taiwanese society specifically towards Black foreigners (which is absolutely a thing), but it also has international consequences. If Taiwan News is the best we can are willing to do, and Taipei Times is offering peanuts and putting out thin content, what news about Taiwan from local sources is reaching the pro-Taiwan influencers abroad? What effect does this have on Taiwan advocacy internationally? What effect does it have on reporting on Taiwan from outside sources? Would that improve - because the state of it is pretty damn bad - if local news put out better, thicker, more compelling stories in English (and Chinese, but this post is about the foreign community)?

Could they perhaps accomplish that if they offered better jobs to committed long-termers looking to make a difference?

The long-termers will stick around - most of us, anyway.  We'll continue to fight for Taiwan in whatever way we can, and carve out niches for ourselves. I do the work I do (I have no single employer, by design) because I can get some satisfaction that way, and make sufficient money. If Taiwan wants us to come out of our little self-carved niches and join the fight for real, there have to be opportunities for us to build real careers in important and useful places, which offer adult remuneration and conditions for real skills.

If Taiwan engages the long-termers who are looking to contribute more meaningfully (and the locals too), the country will be better for it. Media, education, the government.

But if this work continues to toss peanuts our way, we aren't going to pick them up.

Call Taiwan a "country" in public media. Yes, it really is that simple.

Years ago, I donated to Freedom To Marry, and ended up on their e-mail list. As with all such fundraising emails, I generally delete them without reading (my apologies also to Planned Parenthood, Amnesty International and Animal Welfare League of Arlington). But, I received one today with the subject line "Taiwan", which caught my eye.

Inside, I noticed this:







For the first time, I was happy I hadn't bothered to unsubscribe from such lists - if I had, I might not have noticed that Freedom To Marry called Taiwan a "country".

No fanfare, no convoluted wording, no kowtowing, no apologies, no explanation needed, just a country. No trumpets heralding the arrival of new terminology. No considering the feelings of some other country that does not rule this country, as though their opinion means anything at all regarding Taiwan's status as a country.

It is self-governed (and reasonably successfully so, despite some, uh, setbacks and issues), has its own contiguous territory, military, currency, immigration and visa process, postal service...you know, like countries do.

Because it is a country, they called it a country.  As rational people would. Simple, effective, accurate.

This is how it should be. Not even a question. It shows how badly the media has twisted itself into knots over some other country's baby-whining about the status of this country. They try to cover it up by saying it's "neutral", "dispassionate", "straight reporting of facts without inserting political stances" when they show such cowardice in avoiding using the word "country" to describe a country, instead employing seemingly-neutral but actually offensive, pro-CCP terms like "territory" and "island" (yes, even "island") to describe Taiwan. Taiwan is not merely a territory - it has everything other countries do - and "island" is a cop-out to appease some other country's opinion of Taiwan rather than denote Taiwan's reality.

It makes sense, too. Despite marriage equality being a somewhat bipartisan issue in Taiwan (there are supporters and opponents on both sides, although the pan-greens and especially the Third Force appear to be a bit more in favor), and despite liberals in the West being kind of hopeless when it comes to understanding Taiwan, the two sides seem to have adopted oppositional "cross-strait" language on the issue. No, really: the anti-gay folks often reach for some version of "it doesn't fit with Chinese culture". The pro-equality advocates point out that this is yet one more issue which shows how different China and Taiwan are. So it makes sense that those of us fighting for recognition of the reality of LGBT+ people will tend to also use accurate, reality-based terms when referring to nations. Reality begets reality.

All that aside, it really is that simple. Just call Taiwan a country. That's all.

You don't have to do anything else, except write "country" instead of some nonsense Beijing-approved word. (Oh, you could also stop using "Mainland", "renegade province" and "separated in 1949", but frankly, using the word "country" basically clarifies all of these terms as untruthful and not descriptive of reality, so it would be natural to toss those out, too.)

The international media might want to take the box of bullshit China is forcing on the world and report as though there might be some value in it, but we can smell it for what it is. Every time we get a breath of fresh air, like Freedom To Marry just referring to Taiwan as what it is, it becomes clearer that you're just helping Beijing pass off some turds in a box.

I mean, come on, international media. We already knew you were a bunch of CCP-appeasers who regularly get up off your knees to make excuses for the way you write about Taiwan, but that others can get it right with so little fanfare really just shows how cowardly you are in starker relief.

So, who cut ties with whom (and why)?

I know, I was going to continue my previous post, but this came along, and I can't resist.

I generally avoid commenting on which checkbook ally has cut ties with Taiwan on any given day, because it's always the same story, and never a very interesting one. These allies not helpful in any way that matters to Taiwan - are they going to stand with us if China invades? (No.) Are these countries our biggest trading partners? (No.) Does Taiwan stop being a de facto independent state if it has no diplomatic allies? (No.)

But even more problematically, they recognize Taiwan in a sort of "what is the real China" decades-out-of-date death dance in which they're only recognizing Taiwan as the legitimate sole government of China. Which it isn't.

So, generally speaking - whatever.

But El Salvador is an interesting case. Why?

El Salvador hadn't abandoned Taiwan yet. It asked Taiwan for "an astronomical sum" of financial aid, and Taiwan cut ties with El Salvador. 

Of course, that's not the whole story. I'm sure there was a competing offer from China. I don't know what that offer might have been, but friend of mine pointed out that there was a delegation from El Salvador in Beijing not long before this happened. "It was known" that this was where things were going. So, Taiwan took the only step available to it.

And it did so for good reasons (the headline sucks - we'll get to that later): El Salvador wanted money for a port project that Taiwanese engineers deemed infeasible (and which Chinese companies were, from what I hear, bidding for), Taiwan is worried about developing countries' debts to China, and apparently the ruling party wanted funding from Taiwan to help it win elections, which is a story so slimy you could break a leg trying to navigate it. And, of course, Taiwan just doesn't want to play dollar diplomacy any more.

Beijing or no Beijing, these are actually very good reasons to say goodbye to one's allies. And Taiwan at least tried to at least seem as though it made the call. 

In that light, assuming the story coming out of Taiwan about this "astronomical sum" is true, this looks a lot more like blackmail than diplomacy. I applaud Taiwan for not playing that game.

That's the real story here - people have asked, every time we lose another ally, whether it really matters. The government has just given its answer: it doesn't. It knows that if Taiwan is going to defend itself against China, it won't be because a few, as one person put it, "statelets" recognize Taiwan. It will be defended if it can keep up the morale of its own people to be willing to "stand on a hill with a gun" and fight for it, bullet by bullet. It would also help if the international community saw it as worth defending regardless of who recognizes it.

So let's look at some of the, um, "journalism" this particular severance has generated.

First, we have the one - one! - article that at least gets the subject and object right: "Taiwan Cuts Ties With El Salvador", though of course (being Focus Taiwan) it doesn't tell the whole story. It can't. 

Then, we have a piece by Lily Kuo (reporting from Beijing - couldn't they have handed the whole piece to the guy who is actually in Taiwan?) with the headline:

 "Taiwan Further Isolated As El Salvador Switches Allegiance To China"

...leading everyone who didn't read the article (that is, almost everyone) with the impression that the same old narrative was playing out, and Taiwan was sitting around with its thumb up its butt looking on stupidly as yet another friend ran away.

If you read the article - which I did - it does note fairly early on how things actually took place:


Taiwan’s foreign minister, Joseph Wu, said on Monday that Taipei had terminated bilateral ties with El Salvador and was recalling all staff from the country.

According to Wu, El Salvador had been asking Taiwan to provide an “astronomical sum” in financial aid for a port project that Wu said would leave both countries in debt. Meanwhile, Taiwan had received reports that El Salvador was considering establishing ties with Beijing in exchange for investment and aid.


This is solid. So why was the headline so misleading? Which unqualified editor thought such a headline was acceptable?

Unfortunately, the piece also includes this (stupid) gem:


Relations between China and Taiwan have reached a low under Tsai, who belongs to the Democratic Progressive party, which advocates independence for the island. Since her election, Beijing has ramped up efforts to poach Taiwan’s allies. Now, just 17 countries recognise Taiwan, after Burkina Faso and the Dominican Republic cut ties and recognised Beijing instead earlier this year.


Let's see, in this steaming turd heap of a paragraph, we have:

1.) An assumption that the problem with relations with China is Tsai, not China. Tsai hasn't done anything to foster tensions with China. China is doing everything possible to create tensions to hurt Tsai. No wonder her popularity is sinking - she's not perfect on the domestic policy front, but with garbage like this, people think she's riling up China, too - when her dealings with China are actually one of the strongest points in favor of her administration. People want a president who will stand up to China when it matters, but who will not rock the Chinese economic boat. For Taiwan, that is not possible, and China is playing that card hard.

2.) An implication that "advocating independence for the island" is somehow a bad thing, or that this, not Chinese bullying, is the real thorn in the side of Taiwan-China relations

3.) No redux of the actual story behind Taiwan's decision (which doesn't look good for Taiwan, but would at least interesting related information about what China was up to and the steps Taiwan took to deal with it more proactively. All we have are some "reports" mentioned above, and then a lot of information about previous diplomatic switches that, while useful to the non-expert, are tangential.)

These parts are a bit better: 


The latest diplomatic switch leaves Taiwan further isolated on the international stage as Beijing continues to put pressure on the self-governed island that operates under its own government, currency, and military. Beijing claims Taiwan is an inseparable part of China and will not maintain ties with any country that has formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan....

China has also pressured companies to take sides. This year China’s aviation authority demanded foreign airlines, including American Airlines, Air Canada, Lufthansa, British Airways, and Qantas to change any descriptions of Taiwan as a non-Chinese territory.


Sure, there is a lack of explanation of China's role in Taiwan's decision, leaving us with the previous half a sentence about some "reports" to lead readers to understand how the story goes from "Taiwan cuts ties" to "Beijing is trying to isolate Taiwan".

But, I will say that I appreciate that it moves away from the old "separated in 1949" nonsense; that's an improvement. It talks about Beijing as the main antagonist. Good.

Yet, as with most pieces, it goes on to talk about what Beijing wants, without talking about what Taiwan wants, only mentioning (above) that the ruling party "advocates independence for the island" - nothing about why the Taiwanese would vote in such a party (could it be that...they want independence too? Who woulda thought? Nobody outside Taiwan apparently, because they're reading such shoddy news reports.)

Nothing about why the DPP might advocate for independence to begin with. Nothing about why unification with China might be seen as a bad idea in Taiwan. Nothing about how all of these allies recognize Taiwan as "China", not as "Taiwan", and are not necessarily important allies. So, of course the rest of the world has a skewed view of what's actually going on here.

I won't bother digging into the trash heaps of the other articles, but here are some headlines just to show you how skewed the story the West is hearing really is:

El Salvador Breaks Ties With Taiwan To Favor Beijing (wrong subject/object order, guys)

El Salvador, Taiwan Break Ties As China Isolates Island Foe (Taiwan isn't a foe of China - China is a bully to Taiwan. In any case, why is Beijing treated as a lead actor in this story?) - with the same headline in the Washington Post, which includes some useful information alongside the same old 1949 nonsense, and a paragraph about Xi Jinping's ambitions that are only tangentially related to the real story.

Taiwan loses third diplomatic ally this year as El Salvador breaks ties (again with the subjects and objects. You could have told this story in a way that acknowledges Taiwan's proactive choice, while still noting that it was forced into that choice, rather than pretend it sat by passively.)

Channel News Asia starts with an okay headline (Taiwan Says Breaks Ties With El Salvador), only to dive deep into the trash pile in the actual article.

Internationally, outside Asia, only the Wall Street Journal gets it right:

Taiwan Cuts Diplomatic Ties With El Salvador

So now, thanks to poor reporting, we have the rest of the world thinking Taiwan is passively letting itself be eaten away, when in fact, Taiwan is trying to flip the table on this tired story. It's doing so in a weak way, playing a weak hand, but it's trying nonetheless. It matters that despite being pushed into this corner, Taiwan is trying to at least seem more proactive about it, but nobody is listening.

Even when Taiwan tries to change the narrative others have forced on it - however imperfectly - it gets pushed down. Why bother trying to take control of your own story when nobody is paying attention anyway?

Your periodic reminder that Forbes sucks just as hard as Reuters

Here I am again with yet another installment of "fuck this fucking nonsense", where I take some FUCKING NONSENSE and tell it to fuck off.

Here is today's fucking nonsense, courtesy of Forbes. For your consideration:

The title sets the scene for the whole thing, and it's a scene reminiscent of what happened that one time after I ate fish and chips two days in a row: 

China's Efforts To Increase Pressure On Old Foe Taiwan Are Backfiring

TAIWAN IS NOT CHINA'S "OLD FOE", MORON!

The Republic of China perhaps is, but "Taiwan" is not, and although Taiwan is (unfairly) governed by the (colonialist) Republic of China, anyone with any grasp of the nuances of the political realities of the region knows that there is a clear semantic difference between what we mean when we say "Taiwan" and what we mean when we say "the ROC". The ROC is a lost regime on life support that was foisted, uninvited, on the Taiwanese people. Taiwan is an island and a point of identification in terms of politics, culture, history and land. "Taiwan" (and the Taiwanese people) would like nothing more than to co-exist peacefully with China, enjoying warm relations and the benefits thereof, have its sovereignty respected and maybe not have a few thousand missiles pointed right up its ass THANK YOU VERY MUCH.

Wanting to co-exist with your big fat jerk neighbor does not make you an "old foe". It makes them a bully and you a victim. Foes wish each other harm. Taiwan does not wish China harm (though China does wish Taiwan harm - so this whole fight is really quite one-sided, and the "foe" is not Taiwan).

And no, I don't know how to change the weird spacing on this part. 

China intentionally pulled back on group tourism to Taiwan last year by about 18%, resulting in a squeeze for those in the tour bus and hotel industry.


Okay first of all, this is the weirdest start to an article ever, it reads like something halfway through a paragaph? Whatever, it's got far worse problems than that.

No mention at all of why China pulled back on group tourism (to try to force Taiwan to make concessions relating to its sovereignty, i.e. to force them to accept the [fucking nonsense] 1992 consensus WHICH IS NOT A REAL THING). No mention of the general reaction to this in Taiwan which was positive, not negative. No mention that tourism overall has not suffered, really, as the drop in Chinese group tours was made up for - and then some, I think? - by tourists from other countries. No mention of the fact that these Chinese tour groups are not only not that profitable for Taiwanese businesses due to the low costs insisted upon by the China-based operators, but also that most of them aren't even really Taiwanese businesses at all, as many of the facilities in Taiwan are ultimately managed by tour operators from China, not Taiwan.

What does it say as well about China's tourism strategy in Taiwan that their cuts in group tours mainly affected tour companies in China, which have links to that same government? (Please tell me I don't have to answer that question for you).

Oh yeah, and tourism isn't a very big contributor to the Taiwanese economy. The effect, insofar as there was one at all, simply wasn't that big.

Basically, this is just hoisted from a skank tank of nonsense and plopped at your feet with none of the unpacking necessary to report the story accurately. Bad journalism, in effect.


Beijing probably thought the same about its easing off permits for students to study at Taiwan’s 152 tuition-thirsty universities. The number of non-degree students dropped from 34,114 last year to 32,648 now and some reports say enrollment in degree courses is about to fall. 

This is actually true as far as I'm aware, but the mention of it only glosses over - merely implies rather than explicitly reporting - that China is trying to force Taiwan to make policy in accordance with China's wishes rather than those of the people of Taiwan. Basically, to cede some amount of sovereignty, even in an abstract way.


These measures, combined with other more obvious pressure moves against Taiwan such as sending an aircraft carrier around the island, have hurt.


Who was hurt?

China has claimed Taiwan as part of its turf since the Chinese civil war of the 1940s. It insists the two sides eventually reunify.


"Reunify"? The People's Republic has never owned Taiwan. You cannot "reunify" what was never unified to begin with. You cannot even "unify" when one side is not interested in unification. You can only annex.

Use the correct word. We won't stop making fun of you until you do. It is misleading and inaccurate.

It lost momentum toward that goal in May 2016, when Tsai Ing-wen took office as Taiwan president without agreeing to Beijing’s dialogue condition that both sides belong to a single entity known as China.

It is debatable whether it had that momentum to begin with, but let's not even get into the question of whether support for Ma Ying-jiu's "economic but not political ties/no independence, no unification" was a concrete step toward what China wants, or whether it was a large group of voters being intentionally misled by Ma's campaign promises toward a goal they had never actually agreed with.

That aside, no, what momentum that may have existed was lost in March 2014 when the country woke up to what a lying sack of turds Ma Ying-jiu and his cronies were.

This has been going on a lot longer than Tsai's inauguration. There is no investigation here of the true roots of post-2014 political discourse in Taiwan, not even a one-sentence summary of why, exactly, Tsai was elected in the first place and why, exactly, she could not give in on this 1992 Consensus nonsense. 


Formal talks went on hold.


IF YOU USE THE PASSIVE VOICE IT MEANS YOU ARE AVOIDING SAYING WHO PUT THE TALKS ON HOLD and maybe you think you can trick us into assuming Taiwan put them on hold, but YOU CAN'T because guess what, WE'RE NOT STUPID.

Who put the talks on hold, Ralphie? WHO?

Just say it.

For fuck's sake, say it. Say China's name. SAY IT.


And Beijing got mad.

So what?

And if it matters [it doesn't], why'd they get mad? Why can't you just say "they got mad that Taiwan, which is a fully self-ruled liberal democracy, didn't like its big fat jerk neighbor telling it what to do"? Or something more polite for your readers, whatever, but something? Why is it automatically a big problem when China "gets mad" (oooHHHHOooHHHhoohhhh) but not a problem when a democratic country's sovereignty is openly and repeatedly threatened?

Like...really?

As I've said before, China wants to be not only a global leader, but the preeminent global leader. China also doesn't care about the sovereignty of fully functioning nations, and cares little for human rights, international law, democracy or freedom of any kind.

How is this totally okay, and even something to be concerned about when they get mad, instead of being called out for what it actually is, which is fucking terrifying?
How is this okay to not even question?China’s economic sanctions have rattled tour operators to the point of street protests in September.


This happened, sure, but you are not a very good journalist, let alone much of an investigative journalist if you don't ask yourself why, exactly, they were protesting when tourism has not dropped. What other motives could there be, considering that many tour operators are China-owned rather than Taiwan-owned and that many of the China-owned operators have ties to the Chinese government, and the services provided were often negotiated at such low rates that any Taiwanese businesses involved didn't make much money?

Considering all that, why, exactly, were they protesting again?

Even if we assume the protestors were sincere (which I do not - I think the motivations are far shadier than that), at some point, certain decisions that are good for the whole are going to have some effects on tiny slivers of industry or society that some people might not be happy about. So? The tour operators had a right to protest (sincere or not, and I think I've been clear that I don't think they were), but that doesn't mean it's a problem if the government doesn't necessarily make any changes.

I hate saying that, because I hate it when my side protests and nothing changes, but realistically, it's just got to be this way, even if sometimes that affects my side badly.

Officials in Beijing probably imagine that if Taiwanese feel a pinch as China withdraws tourists, students and other elements of its $11.2 trillion economy from Taiwan’s much smaller market...


Again, the tourist withdrawal didn't actually affect the Taiwanese economy much, if at all. There were enough tourists from elsewhere to make up the shortfall. I have my theories as to why that is not generally reported. The statement, as is, is not accurate. 


...the public will push Tsai to restart dialogue. Or voters will replace Tsai’s party with one that favors a stronger political relationship with China.


How can Tsai "restart dialogue" when Tsai wasn't the one who shut it down to begin with? Why not say "the public will push Tsai to give in to China's demands so that China will re-start dialogue"? That would be the accurate way of reporting this. Why be misleading when you could be accurate?

Oh, right...

Anyway.

Are you so afraid of saying "the public will push Tsai to concede to the 1992 Consensus to a degree acceptable to China, which would preclude any chance of Taiwanese de jure independence?" Because you know that's what that means.Some people are pressuring their president, and non-government surveys show an erosion of public confidence in her leadership. “If [Tsai] cannot back up her stance one step or two steps, things will get even worse,” says Liu Yih-jiun, public affairs professor at Fo Guang University in Taiwan. “I think President Tsai is in deep trouble.”

Fo Guang University? Okaaay.

Anyway, this implies that public confidence may be eroding because Tsai needs to be nicer to China. I would argue the opposite is true: that public confidence is eroding because she's not stepping up and making tough but important decisions as a leader. She comes across as wishy-washy, and that's the problem. Backing up even more (where would she back up to, even? What does this mean? Why is it taken at face value?) would make her appear even weaker. Why is Jennings reporting this douchelord's opinion as indicative of public opinion generally by putting his blather next to poll results when one is not necessarily the belief that drives the other?

And can I just say how ridiculous it is to constantly imply that Taiwan is the one that needs to cede more to China, when China is the aggressor, and Taiwan has a lot more to lose - and that no matter what Taiwan offers, China will always, always want more?

Why, again, is this not investigated, questioned, discussed, critiqued or even reported accurately?

And who, besides this, err, guy and some KMT blowhards who never really cared about Taiwan to begin with, is pressuring Tsai to be nicer to China?

Seriously - who cares what this Foguangshan guy thinks? I'm not even interested in remembering his name, that's how irrelevant his opinion is. Why include it, unless you want to inaccurately portray Taiwanese public opinion?

Still, there is some good to be found in this article, such as this paragraph which I cannot find fault with:


Still, Taiwan shows resiliency. Last year’s $528 billion GDP should grow at least 1.7% this year, the International Monetary Fund says. A rise of around 2% would be roughly consistent with growth over the past three years. The island’s all-important semiconductor industry is expected to grow 3.5% this year, the Taipei-based Marketing Intelligence & Consulting Institute forecasts, and its PC sector is expanding because of contract orders. As travelers from China hang back, arrivals from Southeast Asia, South Asia, Australia and New Zealand went up about 29% over the half year ending in March. University enrollment from around the world went up 4.6% from October through March as numbers from China tapered.


But then it's bookended with this:


Taiwan’s next telltale elections – a slew of local ones – are set for 2018. It’s hard to know now whether voters will show discontent then toward their president. 


Seems okay, but you'll note that above, Jennings implied heavily that that discontent was driven by a desire for Tsai to soften on China, when that is not necessarily the case (and I'd argue the opposite could well be true: a lot of her supporters, or at least people who voted for her, are unhappy because she is not taking a stronger stand on China). Such an implication, then, is inaccurate and misleading. 

I'll leave you with this:

“What seems unarguable is that blame for whatever pain people in Taiwan feel as a result of all of these roadblocks imposed by Beijing is importantly being directed toward the mainland,” says Alan Romberg, director of the East Asia program at U.S. think tank The Stimson Center.

Here is the problem. I don't know if the journalists did it to the think-tankers or the think-tankers did it to the journalists or we all got butt-reamed by pro-China views in academia and government that trickled down like slime down a neglected gutter, but senior people, respected experts, people whose opinions shape policy and, to some extent, reporting, still refer to China as "the mainland", rather than by its actual name: China. 

As long as we continue to act as though China is some sort of "mainland" to Taiwan, which implicitly links the two through language choices meant to imply a connection where there isn't one, we cede ground to China.

If experts are still calling it "the mainland", we're already losing ground, and people who don't know better (like, say, the writer of this article) will get pulled under and report inaccurately. Readers will be misinformed, and China will gain another inch.

I don't really care about Alan Whoozits, director of the East Asia blah blah blah, because he doesn't appear to be very good at his job. But when we let this go unquestioned, this is what we are allowing to happen.