The controversy that has surrounded the involvement of US professors in a campaign opposing media monopolization in the past week served as a reminder — inadvertently so for the principal target of the campaign — that while Chinese influence in the nation’s media is of major concern, reprehensible behavior at home is equally problematic.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) professor Noam Chomsky probably never knew that when he accepted an invitation by a young Taiwanese to have his picture taken with a placard opposing media monopolization in Taiwan, he would get sucked into the vortex of cross-strait politics.
Whether, as he claims, he was unaware of the China angle, is secondary. What matters is that the reaction by the Want Want China Times Group once again showed how vicious and totalitarian its outlets can get when the group or its chairman, Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明), face criticism.
The group is a repeat offender, orchestrating print media and the airwaves it controls to launch ad hominem abuse against whoever stands in its way. It spares no one, dedicating entire pages in its newspapers and hours on its news and TV talk shows crucifying media watchdogs, government employees, professors and young students. It bends the truth, fabricates information, mistranslates comments or uses them out of context, threatens lawsuits, insults and resorts to systematic character assassination.
It also unleashed vile minions, such as CtiTV Washington bureau chief John Zang (臧國華), to interview the MIT professor — the same Zang who, in early 2009, literally stalked former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) daughter, Chen Hsing-yu (陳幸妤), when she was in New York, forcing hotel management where she was staying to expel him and necessitating the intervention of umbrella-touting Taiwanese-Americans to protect her.
The above incidents alone — and they are rife — are sufficient to demonstrate that Tsai’s media empire will not engage in responsible journalism, a key component of any healthy democratic system. The group needs not even receive money from China through illegal adverts, or fail to report on China’s rampant human rights abuses (the China Times’ fate since Tsai acquired it), for it to act as a cancer in the nation’s media environment. Its despicable behavior alone makes it clear that a greater role for Tsai’s media empire will cause severe harm to the nation’s democratic fabric and the quality of its journalism.
This aspect of the group has not received the attention it deserves, but it should.
If approval of its acquisition of cable television channels and, as part of a consortium, of Next Media’s outlets in Taiwan is solely contingent on demonstrating that it does not receive money from China, or if the acquisitions are dealt with purely along financial lines, then chances are they will go through and Tsai will increase his control of the entire media spectrum. As such, greater emphasis should be placed on the inability of the outlets controlled by Tsai to act responsibly and to contribute to, rather than poison, the nation’s media.
Some could counter that the group’s behavior is defensible under freedom of speech and that it ultimately makes a contribution to pluralism. That argument misses the point: Freedom of speech is both a right and a responsibility, and its greatest value derives from the ability to strike a balance between those two imperatives.
A media empire that uses its immense power to launch sustained attacks on individuals whose only fault is to worry about the future of their nation is not, by any yardstick, a responsible media actor.
The Want Want China Times Group does not need China’s assistance to behave like an authoritarian bully. It already is one.
World leaders are preparing themselves for a second Donald Trump presidency. Some leaders know more or less where he stands: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy knows that a difficult negotiation process is about to be forced on his country, and the leaders of NATO countries would be well aware of being complacent about US military support with Trump in power. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would likely be feeling relief as the constraints placed on him by the US President Joe Biden administration would finally be released. However, for President William Lai (賴清德) the calculation is not simple. Trump has surrounded himself
US president-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday named US Representative Mike Waltz, a vocal supporter of arms sales to Taiwan who has called China an “existential threat,” as his national security advisor, and on Thursday named US Senator Marco Rubio, founding member of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China — a global, cross-party alliance to address the challenges that China poses to the rules-based order — as his secretary of state. Trump’s appointments, including US Representative Elise Stefanik as US ambassador to the UN, who has been a strong supporter of Taiwan in the US Congress, and Robert Lighthizer as US trade
Following the BRICS summit held in Kazan, Russia, last month, media outlets circulated familiar narratives about Russia and China’s plans to dethrone the US dollar and build a BRICS-led global order. Each summit brings renewed buzz about a BRICS cross-border payment system designed to replace the SWIFT payment system, allowing members to trade without using US dollars. Articles often highlight the appeal of this concept to BRICS members — bypassing sanctions, reducing US dollar dependence and escaping US influence. They say that, if widely adopted, the US dollar could lose its global currency status. However, none of these articles provide
On Friday last week, tens of thousands of young Chinese took part in a bike ride overnight from Henan Province’s Zhengzhou (鄭州) to the historical city of Kaifeng in search of breakfast. The night ride became a viral craze after four female university students in June chronicled their ride on social media from Zhengzhou in search of soup dumplings in Kaifeng. Propelled by the slogan “youth is priceless,” the number of nocturnal riders surged to about 100,000 on Friday last week. The main road connecting the two cities was crammed with cyclists as police tried to maintain order. That sparked
RSS