Nobody should need a personal "refugee fund" to feel safe in a developed democracy

Hey Taiwan residents - both foreign and local - do you have a refugee fund?

That is, personal savings or some other safety net that you are preparing in the event that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan forces you to leave?

I do. I don't want to leave, and would not do so unless I absolutely had to - we're not talking "the invasion is coming soon", we're talking "my house just got bombed, people are dying and I have nowhere to go." And I only mean that in the event that I am not a citizen: I don't owe my life to a country that won't even give me a passport. If I had obtained Taiwanese citizenship by that point, however, that's a different obligation and I would stay and fight.
The money I have set aside could be used as a down payment on property. If I don't need it, it will be part of my retirement fund. I could use it to pay off my student loans. There are a million other things I could do with it, but I may need it for this purpose and don't feel safe not having it available, so here we are. 

Of course I'm very privileged that I'd even be able to leave (a lot of locals would not be) and that the money is there, but here's the thing.

I should not need to set aside money specifically for my escape from a free and developed democracy due to a highly possible invasion by a hostile foreign power. Nobody should have to.

Not in a country that actively wants to exist in peace, and has no desire to start any wars with any other nation. 

I should not need to wonder, quite pragmatically, whether the rest of the world will tolerate a brutal dictatorship violently annexing the world's 22nd largest economy, one of the US's top trading partners, with a population comparable to that of Australia which is free, basically well-run and friendly to other nations. I should not need to consider whether my decision to stay or go - and the money I need to do that - may well hinge on whether that help comes. 

I'm reasonably sure all of my friends in Taiwan - local and foreign - can understand this.

I am not sure at all that my friends abroad do, though. I'm not sure especially if people I know in the US, Europe, Japan (all developed countries/regions, a group in which Taiwan also qualifies) and beyond are aware of what it's like to have a practical, non-insane notion that they might have 30 days' notice that their life and livelihood as they know it is about to be over. Where "getting out" and losing everything would be the better outcome, and how many more people (again, the population of Australia) might not even have that option.

So I still hear things like "oh but you don't want US help, it'd be just like Iraq or Syria, they'd wreck the place!" or "I don't want your city to become another Fallujah."

Do they understand that it is China who would turn Taipei into an East Asian Fallujah? 

And that their and their governments' wishy-washy response to Chinese threats against Taiwan are a part of why I need to have this fund at all? 

That they think they support peace, but in fact they'd leave us (foreign residents and Taiwanese both) to run or die in war? Do they understand what it would be like for Taiwan to be forcibly annexed by China? Do they understand that giving in and just surrendering to authoritarian rule - and the loss of very real and important freedom and human rights - is not an option? That there is no One Country, Two Systems?

Over the past few years I've come to realize that while at heart I want to be a dove, I can't. Sure, I agree that the US is a neo-imperialist murder machine. Fine. We suck. I won't even argue that we don't. We've done so much harm in the world.

But Taiwan is not Iraq. It's not Syria, it's not Iran or Afghanistan or Central America. It's just not. It's not even comparable. It has its own military and simply needs assistance (or the promise of it, to keep China from attempting an invasion). It has its own successful democratic government and rule of law (I mean...basically. Taiwan does okay.) There'd be no democracy-building or post-war occupation needed. It just needs friends. Big friends, who can tell the bully to back off.

So, y'know, I don't give a crap anymore about anyone's "but the US is evil!" I just don't. Y'all are not wrong, but it simply does not matter. China wants to wreck this country, not the US. China's the invader and (authoritarian) government-builder, not the US. China will turn their guns and bombs on Taiwanese, not the US.

And if you're not the one who has all those missiles pointed at them, you're not the one with lots of friends who could lose everything (including their lives), or lose everything yourself, and you're not the one actively building a refugee fund to escape an otherwise peaceful, developed and friendly country, then you can take all that "but the US is evil!" and shove it. This is a real world situation where we don't exactly have the luxury of choice in who stands by us. There isn't a "better option". There just...isn't.

Unless you think a friendly, open and vibrant democracy being swallowed by a massive dictatorship and losing all access to human rights is totally fine, or that having a refugee fund when living in said open democratic nation is normal.

It's not normal. My refugee fund should not have to exist. Please understand this. 

Let's all take a moment to savor Tsai Ing-wen's arch wit

Original photo from Wikimedia Commons, speech bubble is mine

Look, I know President Tsai (who, by the way, is now my official girl crush on account of her being still alive) has a reputation for being a dull public speaker. A frosty technocrat who doesn't engage with the people. A wonkish civil servant who hasn't convinced the public of her vision for Taiwan. And all of that is somewhat true - Tsai isn't a bad president, in fact, I'd say she's the best we've had since we entered the true democratic era in Taiwan. But she's not that good at "politics", if by "politics" you mean "standing in front of a crowd with a podium and doing politiciany stuff." I don't care, but clearly others do. What she is good at, however, is new media, and she deserves credit for that.

Let's not forget that this isn't only the first female president of Taiwan and one of the first women in Asia not preceded by a male family member, but the woman who wore pants at her inauguration to the top office of the government of a patriarchal society (almost all societies are patriarchal; Taiwan is on the liberal end for Asia but the conservative end for liberal democracies.)

She told us from Day One with her rockin' pants that she DGAF and will absolutely slay you if she feels like it, but it appears we're just now getting the message.

And you know what? She's great at it, and it's time we started appreciating that.

Because I can't go hang out with her and have a sleepover and drink wine and pet her cats and wear pajamas and do each other's nails while we talk about boys international politics and the future of Taiwan (who cares about boys?), I have put together this tribute post to the wittiest damn president Taiwan has ever had.

DJ...drop the beat!*

From Twitter

Let's start with the retort that spouted a thousand memes. Xi Jinping was all hot under the collar, being so shrill and outraged and full of hormones, like, Taiwan must and will be reunited with China blah blah blah 1992 Consensus blah blah blah One Country Two Systems blah blah blah I'll show mommy I'm a good ruler of China after all blah blah historic trend blah blah mommy blah blah. 

And Tsai was like, "...and the Taiwan Consensus is BYE FELICIA."

I mean, more presidential than that, but...same deal.


So then, some English teacher called her "Tsai Englishit" on a test for no reason. I suppose he thought it was funny. The question went like this:

President Tsai-englishit made some silly ____ in her speech.

 a.) amateurs  b.) disasters c.) parades  d.) comments 

Did Our Lady of Hot Tea get mad? No. Did she slam the teacher on Twitter with a tirade of incoherent and misspelled tweets? Of course not, she's not the President of the United States or anything like that. 

Did she take it in stride and release her own (much funnier) comeback that pointed out the civil liberties that allowed that English teacher to make his "joke" in the first place?

I don't know how to credit this because I shared it on Facebook ages ago. 

Of course she did. Because she is a (democratically elected) queen.

So now, we've got Big Uncle Dirk in Hong Kong meeting with local leaders and (apparently) CCP members - you know, like a traitor would do. Is Tsai incensed that he was invited so that Beijing could make it clear to Taiwan that if they'd only vote the way China wants them to, all this could be over (not that it's really clear what this is, as Chinese pressure hasn't impacted Taiwan nearly as much as the media says it has)?

Nope. Once again she made it clear with a quip that there are many messages China might hear (link in Mandarin), if they'd only actually talk to Taiwan:

她記得韓國瑜選舉時很在意中華民國，現在就是一個機會請告訴對方，中華民國台灣是一個主權獨立的國家，請中國停止打壓台灣的國際參與空間。 

She [Tsai] remembered that "Han Kuo-yu was very concerned about the Republic of China during the election, and now he has a chance. Please [Mayor Han], tell the other side that the Republic of China is an independent country, please request that China stop suppressing Taiwan's ability to participate in the international sphere." (translation mine)

I truly can't think of a better comeback than reminding Taiwan and the world that China is the enemy, but as long as they're talking to someone from Taiwan, they may as well hear the right message - and making it clear without saying a thing that Han certainly isn't someone who will deliver it.

And finally, we've got not so much a witticism as a quick 'n dirty truth bomb:

"In response to media questions regarding China's opposition to the delegation's transit stop in Hawaii, President Tsai stated that Beijing opposes everything, saying, "When you go see a friend, do you ask your neighbor's permission first?"" https://t.co/rMp4vUCWZW

— Pierre-Yves Baubry (@pybaubry) March 25, 2019

I mean, how much more perfect can you get than "oh but BEIJING is going to be MAD and OPPOSE that aren't you WORRIED about the reaction from BEIJING because it's the only thing the international MEDIA can TALK ABOUT because CHINA!!??"

Tsai: "Beijing opposes everything."

Hey, Mr. Xi. Is your English name Elvis? Because you just got a couple of burns. 


*Skip to 3:20 to see Tsai say exactly that

The ups and downs of International Women's Day in Taiwan

I've had a hard time writing this, because I don't want to sow further discord among feminist activists and various feminist groups in Taiwan, but...I just can't let it go.

I'm not too involved in Women's Day or Women's March Taiwan or any of those groups, in part because I have a hectic enough work schedule that I usually can't do groups (I never went to a single Indivisible Taiwan meeting because I was never free) and besides, it may surprise you to learn I'm just not a joiner. Beyond that, I sort of see feminism in Taiwan as something best led by Taiwanese women; I'm not really needed. If I'm free, I'll lend my support by attending public events, but I'm usually not free.

This year's women's march, dubbed WoMen (which means "we" in Mandarin) took place on a rainy Saturday (I wasn't able to attend due to work commitments). Looking at the news reports, you'd think everything ran smoothly and 80-100 marchers enjoyed talks, demonstrations and performances by a variety of women doing interesting things in the community. And that is what happened that day.

But it was sad watching the social media kerfuffle leading up to the Women's March when the original line-up for the march included a number of men, and was strongly criticized for de-centering women. The response was that feminism is still seen in Taiwan as something for women to fight for, that men don't need to or should not get involved - and that the "WoMen" event hoped to change this by showing a gender-diverse line-up.

Suffice it to say my days of feeling totally pumped and inspired by Women's Marches happening in Taiwan appear to be over.

I don't have screen shots or anything for this, as by the time I thought to gather them, the published line-up was taken down and - I am told anyway - changed. There was no further dialogue or communication about the event and its scheduled performances.

On one hand, I kind of agree with one critic that this was something of an "all lives matter" response - that the one day that centers women among all holidays shouldn't be used to showcase and praise male allies, but to showcase women, with men quite welcome to attend but not to take the spotlight.

I also do agree with the organizers, to an extent, that we need to do something about this particular problem in Taiwan specifically. It seems to me that they had good intentions, but bungled the approach. It absolutely is an issue, more so than in the West. I have certainly seen men show up to events to support women's equality in the US and act as allies. In Taiwan, I've heard a lot of ally-talk, and that's great, but not a lot of in-person support (the recent Vagina Monologues performance was a refreshing change; the audience was quite gender-diverse). What's more worrying, behind those words, there's not a lot of actual action taken by men to challenge the gender imbalance.

For instance, I have noted for some time that social movement activism in Taiwan is heavily skewed male (although women do participate). I know more than one woman who has given up on being involved, for a variety of reasons, or has a less-than-stellar opinion of people widely admired among Taiwanese progressives. I know that several social movement and progressive political leading voices are aware of the problem, but have not seen much attempt at all to address it.

Going back to the Women's March, however, I don't know that having a male-skewed line up was the way to address that issue. There must be a way to raise the number of male allies without having to center men at an event for women, and in any case, male performances at a women's event aren't going to draw in any man who wasn't already inclined towards allyship. There are surely ways to get the message out that gender equality isn't just something women fight for, but something we should all support, without handing the spotlight to men for an extended period on International Women's Day.

On the upside, despite these internal issues, by all accounts on the day in question people showed up, banded together and presented a united front for gender equality. That's something - it matters. I'd like to see more of that in Taiwanese politics (*cough* DPP *cough*).

But my disquiet runs deeper: on a surface level, it bothers me to see so few Taiwanese women involved in these public events. For sure, Taiwanese women did attend the march alongside many foreign women, but with only 80-100 participants, that number was clearly not large. From the media coverage, I didn't note any Southeast Asian female activist participation, although such women do exist. This still feels like an event mainly powered by the Western expat community and as such, I'm not sure how much it can really accomplish.

That said, looking at local groups, I find even more to raise my skepticism.

One of the collaborators on this event - and many other events - is Taipei Women's Rescue Foundation (TWRF). I will say now that they do do some good work. They arose from the Awakening Foundation, founded by former Vice President and current oddball Annette Lu (don't take that as an insult; I kind of like Lu, but I also think it's time for her to either get with the times or retire) and Lee Yuan-chen. Given Lu and Lee's differing backgrounds, Awakening and TWRF have no clear political orientation that I can suss out. That's great.

But...well, I've mentioned TWRF before, and in a not particularly flattering context. They are the people behind the comfort women museum. The museum focuses on Japanese colonial-era comfort women from Taiwan, and I agree their story is important.

However, it - and the KMT, who expends a great deal of energy keeping the comfort women issue in the public eye - has been criticized as taking political aim at Japan, in line with the desires of pro-China KMTers who want Taiwan to get closer to China and therefore drive a wedge between Taiwan and Japan's currently fairly close relationship. Comfort women aren't even the only wedge they use to try and accomplish this. All the while, many of those who claim to care about comfort women...don't actually.

How do I know? Because they only seem to care about Japanese-era comfort women (the still-living among them being quite old). The ROC had comfort women too, and being younger, more of them are still alive, but nobody seems interested in taking up their cause. Some of these women are currently fighting for the right to establish their own museum at the former municipal brothel, which is its own interesting story (the government quietly sold the building it was located in without informing them, and as far as I know their lawsuit to rectify this and stop the building from being demolished is still working its way through the courts).

So I have to ask why TWRF set up a comfort women museum for Japanese-era comfort women, but takes no interest whatsoever in ROC-era comfort women or their cause.

As such, I question their true motivations, and am skeptical of their current involvement in women's issues, and leaves me uncomfortable about my own support.

Suffice it to say that this post has no clear conclusion. It's messy and unclear, and I'm unclear about my own messy feelings on the matter.

All I can say is that Women's Day this year left me feeling frustrated and not particularly inspired.

That's all I really will say on the matter, because I actually do think those of us committed to similar causes need to show each other support, not tear each other down.