Ma Jian on 6/4

"The Chinese have made a faustian pact with the government, agreeing to forsake demands for political and intellectual freedom in exchange for more material comfort. They live prosperous lives in which any expression of pain is forbidden. When I talk to young Chinese about 1989, I am invariably accused of spreading false rumours and being a traitor to my nation; when I bring up the subject with my old friends, most of them laugh scornfully, as if those events are now irrelevant. But I know that behind this show of derision or apathy lies real fear. Everyone knows that attempts to break the Tiananmen taboo can still destroy a person's life and the lives of their families. The authorities, for their part, may have a monopoly of the nation's resources, but they can never fully control the nation's soul, and every day they live in terror that the intricate stack of lies they have constructed will collapse."

Full Article at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jun/02/tiananmen-square-protests-1989-china

Nothing left to blog..

My life as a student is almost over, the time that seemed in abundance at the beginning of this year has all but vanished before my eyes; I have submitted a half-ish draft-ish version of my dissertation, and have begun work on the last essay I shall submit for the scrutiny of RGU. The stark and sobering realisation, that a summer working full time at McDonalds now faces me, has dawned; this is an irritating thought, yet I must resign myself to the fact that although I am currently spending the majority of my time in the university library that there is no immediate and obvious financial reward for these efforts, and as the weeks pass - with driving lessons, tests, the need for savings and numerous tea and coffee breaks - I find myself increasingly skint.

Life as a full time student for the past 4 years has been comfortable, spending days in the library, taking coffee breaks whenever we please, having the freedom to take weeks or even months on a piece of work, there is little pressure for the student of today. Especially here at RGU; I can't speak for students of other universities, but here it seems that life is a great deal easier than elsewhere. When I was at college, I envisaged life at RGU to be tough and dare I say, intellectually demanding. At times, it has been: notable highlights include the Technology and Culture, and Media Semiotics modules. Notable low points include the now infamous RGU Fashion Show in 3rd year, and Public Relations and Marketing classes.

I really have no idea what path lays before me as I prepare to graduate from life as a student; there is no more shelter or elaborate pretense of progress provided by being a student. I've signed up for an online course in TEFL, which should keep me amused for a couple of months. But after that, its probably time to join the real world....'sigh'.

The Boy in the Stripped Pyjamas

I just watched this film, which I had never heard of before, but is aparently the cinematic adaptation of a well-known novel.

It is an emotional tale of a brutal Nazi, who moves his family into the German countryside, near the labour camp for which he is responsible, only for his 8 year old son to strike a bizarre kinship with a boy in the camp. It's a little like the Kite Runner from this point of view, where the two boys share a common childhood innocence, yet in circumstances that we are constantly reminded of.

Its a brutal and harrowing film, yet endearing and thought-provoking at times as well....
It was around at the similar time of other, more covered, World War 2 films Valkyrie, and Defiance.
It's been overlooked and probably under-rated because of this, I would recommend it to anyone who believes that often the most inspiring tales are born from the cruelest times....

The Philosophy of "Just".....

This morning, I had a class for Political Communication, to discuss the use of 'fear tactics' in political campaigns and in the media. We were asked 'what are we most afraid of?', as students who are on the verge of graduating from University after 4 years. Most people agreed that the biggest 'fear' facing them was the prospect of not getting a job. Given the economic environment at the moment, we can hardly move for someone telling us that unemployment is at an all time high, and that we're all doomed to a life of soup-kitchen sandwiches and dole cues. An example is given that a student who graduated with our degree last year is yet to find a job, despite consistent performance at university and having the 'nice guy' quality that always wins in a job interview. I'm pretty sure though, that say 3 or 4 years ago when the economy was at it's brightest, there were still a few graduates floating around in no-mans land a year or two after completing their degree, in fact I'm sure of it, I know a bunch of people who "couldn't find a job" or said that "there are no jobs" and ended up working flat out at bars, supermarkets, restaurants and so on. I really don't think the situation has changed much since then, if you're employable then you'll get employed; OK maybe you'll have to put more effort into making yourself more employable, but the principle remains the same.

The conversation drifted into a bit of a tangent there-after, when questioned as to why they wanted to "just get a job", consensus was that "a job" was really all that mattered, hence the "just". "Just" getting a job, so that we can "just" buy a house and a car, and "just" earn money. Why? Because "at the end of the day", paying the bills is what matters. It's hard to argue against this, because we all do need to survive, and paying bills helps. People always back-down when money comes into play, especially if the argument is with a single mother against a tv chef who is hell bent on persuading her not to "feed her starving children" with battery powered chickens. "But I'm a single mother, I don't have that much money" - "Oh, OK, fair enough".

It was suggested that adopting the philosophy of "just", was at the root of anti-social behavior and alcoholism in Britain. As people use "just" in their day to day life, they are driven positively insane at the weekends to the point of mindless violence and anger. This gets even worse when we go on holiday and smash up a small Greek island for a couple of weeks in summer. Britain is an achieving country, that is in small doubt, we've had a consistently strong economy, arguably due to the fact that we have one of the longest working days in Europe. Yet we have persistent social and cultural deficits, arguably due to the fact that we have one of the longest working days in Europe. The philosophy of "just" works in some domains, whilst leaves others in ruin.

Do something you love, something which you're passionate about, wealth doesn't have to mean money, love, family, friends and life happiness are true wealth.

1989

"it was true that the 1989 student movement was being manipulated by someone, wasn't it? The students had nothing but boiling emotions and superficial knowledge of politics. We started only the cleaning up of corruption and smuggling by officials, yet the slogan were somehow led through a transformation into ones "demanding democracy". There is huge difference in political implication between these two classes of demands. So what was democracy? What kind of democracy was practiced in the west? What kind of democracy would benefit China? Frankly, I (we) didn't know".

written by a former student who took part in the student protests in China in 1989, which eventually led to the now infamous incident at Tiananmen Square on June 4th.

Beyond perfection, is destruction.

Today's lesson: Fen Qing

'Fen qing' means literally "angry youth" in Chinese, and refers to a particular type of individual playing a particularly significant role in contemporary Chinese society. They are typically young men, often students, who appear to spend the majority of their time patrolling the Internet for potentially defamatory comments about their homeland. An important characteristic of a fenqing is the unquestionnable loyalty to and complete acceptance of what the Party says. They are most notibly active during times at which the country is on the defensive, the national media tend to launch an offensive on whichever country has pissed them off (last year's Tibet protests for instance, increasingly saw France on the recieving end of the fenqing's attacks).

Some of the current viewpoints of the fenqing:

- U.S. is a monolith. America is bad, bad and bad because Bush is bad.
- Anti-Japan and call for boycotting Japanese products while enjoying Japanese AV or cartoons.
- China’s stock market slumps because of the conspiracy of the imperialist western countries. The price of housing in China skyrocketed because of the hot money of the international speculators.
- Western countries led by the U.S. are trying to encircle and contain China.
- The Internet should be censured and any bad information, like the flies or mosquitoes outside the room, must be screened and filtered.
- CNN is evil because it lied, but it is fine for CCTV to modify the information to maintain the stability of the society.

This post from ThinkWierd goes into greater detail on this interesting phenomenon.