Commemorating 228
Posted by deneb7 on March 4, 2010
I just noticed my post from last year, and thought I’d update with some news from this year. I’d first like to start off with:
1. this article from a Chinese civil rights activist – relates what happened in TW with current issues in China. Here’s a quote:
Commenting on Taiwan, Wang Dan, a leader of the Chinese democracy movement and a prominent figure during the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989, said that freedom is never won easily, but always lost unknowingly.
2. Another article from the same source – discusses evolution of the subject of 228 (it was taboo for 48 years: 1947-1995).
3. UW event – ties in the US role in the event. Most notably, these quotes:
The US Consulate in Taipei reported back about these events, but was told by Washington to do nothing.
To imagine for Americans what the “228 Massacre” meant for Taiwanese, picture the British, after the Boston Tea Party, then rounding up all of whom we now view as the founding fathers and summarily executing them. The ramifications of this on democracy and human rights in America would have been profound, perhaps to the point of America still being under British rule.
4. search for hidden files – article detailing attempts to uncover truth about the incident
5. Liberty Times article – more about the missing files
6. China Times – President Ma’s speeches at Tainan and Taipei
7. Lin Family murder – mother and daughter killed on 2/28/1980 believed to be acting for KMT. There’s an unfortunate ambiguous translation – “common” should be replaced with “shared” in the article.
8. editorial on apologies – well reasoned article pointing out that Ma did not directly apologize for the events of 228, among other points.
Thoughts
#2: The timeline is eye-opening for me, because I didn’t realize this subject was considered taboo until 1995. Now I understand why so many of my peers (myself included) didn’t know about it until they went to college. It also makes me appreciate how emotional the older generation gets when the subject comes up.. I would be too if I wasn’t allowed to speak of a terrible tragedy for 48 years, and my children were completely ignorant and uninterested because of it.
#8 is a surprisingly balanced editorial – this guy knows his stuff. If I had to pick a subset of articles from this list, I’d take the first 3 plus this one.
Dracil said
First article sounds like a Christian version of Epoch Times articles. i.e. kinda biased and filled with typical Christian rhetoric (look at all the conversions we have! Yay Jesus!
). And they aren’t really correct about Google pulling out because of the censorship. They pulled out because they got hacked. Google’s still perfectly happy censoring DMCAed sites in the US and Nazi sites in Europe. Second article is mostly the same.
Third article, that analogy is interesting. I’m sure if the British thought it had been necessary they’d have done the same. Or put another way, they learned from the mistake the British made with the American colonies. So from a Machiavellian perspective, they actually picked the right choice.
The etaiwannews links felt kinda off. I think their usage of English is a little weird or something, and their site does not do a good job of differentiating op-ed pieces from reporting, esp. in the politics section. The Chinese version of the site seems better, and contains a lot more stuff, including stuff like ECFA. They also seemed a little too green, which http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan_News confirms.
deneb7 said
1. well it IS Christian. I’m not surprised about the Google ambiguity – people make the most of what they get.
2. is actually from a different perspective, so “mostly the same” would be inaccurate.
3. no, I doubt the British could have done it if they wanted to. the pacific is way too big for them to have that kind of control (despite their navy), plus the mass difference is the opposite. there are always other places for the colonists to run to. for them, leaving us alone was the smartest thing to do.
yeah well it’s tw based news.. I’d be surprised if it wasn’t biased. anyway, these were all the links I could find. you’re welcome to provide other reports in English.
Dracil said
2. I meant in terms of bias. 228 hand-in-hand rally was a civic duty? What?
3. Then the analogy fails. There’s no point in analogizing British rounding up American forefathers if it wasn’t an option. And they didn’t leave you alone. Revolutionary War.
deneb7 said
2. everything people write is biased, even “unbiased reporting” can be. That’s why I try to get as many sources as possible for comparison. And as I said, you’re welcome to provide other sources.
3. Sorry just read the quote again.. I was thinking of the situation in general (including the revolutionary war) rather than of the specific massacre.
I agree, the British definitely could have done it (though there’s a question of whether they would have done it, and in what manner), but somehow I doubt it was because they “learned from the mistake” the British made. I’d be very surprised if the KMT leaders had been familiar with US history.. Anyway, we digress..
The point of the analogy was to give people an idea of what it was like, and to get us to think about what it might have been like. (not whether they would have or how they would have done it – nor is it about whether it was “right” or “wrong”)
Dracil said
That’s true. And I think British nationalists would have preferred if it had happened because most of America (or at least the East) might still be British now.