The Winter Olympics opening ceremony in Beijing set the stage for Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and Russian President Vladimir Putin to tout the successes of their authoritarian regimes. However, the censure against the Western nations’ boycotts could hardly triumph.
Amid China’s worsening human rights situation, the International Olympic Committee’s vaunted “spirit of solidarity” did not serve its intended purpose.
On the contrary, the price of “global unity” was to ignore, among others, China’s authoritarianism and its increasingly aggressive behavior against Taiwan. China sending military aircraft into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone one day after the opening ceremonies is a case in point.
Yet the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was not successful in whitewashing its deteriorating human rights record and its Orwellian high-tech controls on society during the COVID-19 pandemic; nor did the CCP’s hypocrisy register with academics in China.
Prior to the Olympics, Tsinghua University sociology professor Guo Yuhua (郭於華) and law professor Lao Dongyan (勞東燕) published articles on their WeChat social media accounts. However, the articles were deleted soon after drawing widespread attention.
Guo, whose book Life Cycle and Social Security: A Sociological Exploration into the Life Course of Laid-Off and Unemployed Workers won the Gordon White Prize from the international academic community, is one of the most prestigious academics in China.
In a Jan. 8 article titled “Xian, Xian, can the city keep long-term stability?” Guo cited numerous circumstances that revealed the problems of the CCP’s official COVID-19 prevention efforts and tightened controls: poor treatment and prevention; improper enforcement and control; loss of people’s livelihood; poor information and no criticism; simple and rude working methods; bureaucracy and formalism; incompetent and poor leadership; and systemic failure.
Guo said that prevention and control are meant to defeat the virus and protect lives, but China’s use of power by unscrupulous means to achieve those goals has destroyed lives and health, which is putting the cart before the horse.
She asked: Why would ordinary people risk their lives to flee the epidemic areas? What are they fleeing from? Is it the virus or something else that presents the most significant risk?
Guo said that the years preceding a disaster are peaceful and safe. Once disaster strikes, a system fails to function, revealing riddled holes. I am afraid that this is not only a “systemic failure,” but the reason for the system.
Likewise, Lao on Jan. 29 published a soul-searching article of nearly 7,000 words titled “Facing the Real World.” It is noteworthy that Lao was awarded the title of China’s Most Influential Young Scholar in Humanities and Social Sciences and one of the Top Ten Outstanding Young Jurists in the capital.
Lao dealt with three aspects of the pandemic: “Living in absurdity,” “Busy in confusion” and “Reflection in adaptation.”
She said that owing to the pandemic, Xian was isolated on Dec. 23 last year, causing a humanitarian crisis far greater than the epidemic itself. In the name of safety or stability, every measure is said to be for the people’s well-being. Sadly, everyone becomes like a screw, earnestly doing their best, but implementing rules from officials while turning a blind eye to people’s suffering, or even being the cause of that suffering.
In the eyes of a state machine, the abstract group is paramount, and specific members are worthless. The higher the people as a group are exalted, the more insignificant the individual members are. It is so absurd to see a world in which the two ideas can go hand in hand.
Today, what matters in social governance in China is not whether a problem has occurred, but whether a problem has become a public opinion event. Therefore, instead of solving the problem, authorities try to “solve” the person who raised the problem. Treating any influential event merely as a matter of public opinion, while the problem remains unresolved, turns a trivial matter into a disaster.
Lao said: “The confusion first manifests in social issues, and I have absolutely no idea where the boundaries of speech are. Therefore, I don’t know what I can write about. I’m also confused that I don’t know the point of such public writing, other than possibly causing trouble for myself. Equally, if the effort is meaningless, should we continue making effort? No wonder that ‘involution’ and ‘lying flat’ became the iconic keywords of the times.”
Guo and Lao are brave enough as intellectuals to confront contemporary issues. What is unsettling is that, as New York University professor emeritus Jerome Cohen said: “Lao will now suffer the fate of her former colleague, the excommunicated, shunned and impoverished professor Xu Zhangrun (許章潤), who is being quietly and informally, but severely, punished for his brilliant and courageous critiques of Xi’s repression.”
Judging by the true nature of the authoritarian Chinese political system, the CCP is determined to consolidate its hold on power, no matter how disastrously the pandemic situation deteriorates. Meanwhile, the CCP took advantage of the Olympics to camouflage human rights violations in Tibet, Xinjiang, southern Mongolia and Hong Kong.
Moreover, athletes and officials from several countries have protested against China’s behavior as a host country, highlighting unreasonable isolation regulations, inhumane requirements for quarantined athletes and unexplained media suppression. Complaints notwithstanding, the International Olympic Committee froze its conscience accordingly.
This year’s Winter Olympics by all appearances have been nothing more than a propaganda tool for Beijing, allowing it to renounce countries with universally recognized values. Perhaps from the beginning, the fate of the notorious Beijing Games was sealed, and so was that of the CCP.
Huang Yu-zhe is a student at National Chengchi University’s Graduate Institute of Law and Interdisciplinary Studies.
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