Demolition

You very often hear about decisions by the Chinese government displacing people, their homes and businesses for the sake of modernisation. Destructions of huge areas of traditional housing called Hutongs during the revamp of Beijing in run up to the Olympics and the flooding of whole towns when the Three Gorges Dam was built. Quite often people are given very little warning and whether or not they receive compensation is a bit hit and miss.

You hear about these stories, you know they happen and you know that it is unfair, but it’s very different when it happens to someone you know.

Outside the foreign student dormitory here in Nanjing there are a couple of shops lined outside ready for our custom selling all manner of goods; alcohol, cigarettes, soft drinks, instant noodles etc. We have spent long summer nights sitting outside their shabby shops drinking, playing cards, teaching them rude words in English. A fond memory of mine was watching the World Cup last year huddled around tiny TV screens when all of a sudden every Chinese person knew the name of each player on every European team.

Today one of these shops was ripped down. They are renovating the whole area around the foreign student dorms, ripping out railings and painting bricks onto newly painted maroon walls. One teacher proudly told us that it was being redesigned to look like Europe. My French friend and I rolled our eyes.

The owners of the shop were told yesterday that they had ten days to move out. They were then told at noon today that their shop was going to be ripped out this evening. All their goods were dragged out onto the street by four o’clock for the demolition at around 6. Mounds of corrugated iron and brick now lay where the little shop once stood.

What is frustrating is that we can do nothing about it. No petition to sign, no MP to call, no channels what-so-ever to give these people some kind of a voice. “没办法,” Mei ban fa, "there is no way," as the owners have told us. There is no point in trying because we all know nothing can be done.

We are now trying to host a little party on the steps outside the student dorm to try and help them get rid of their stock before they are inevitably moved on. I’m going to break out my long neglected ukulele and hopefully make an evening of it. These people have made it that much easier for many of us to partake in binge drinking and satisfy our early morning urges for instant noodles for years. This is the least we can do.

If you’re reading this and are in Nanjing, I hope to see you there. If you are not, appreciate the fact you are protected from this happening to you.

Idiocy on the Internet

The last few months has seen the Internet praised beyond belief. Corrupt and repressive regimes throughout the Middle-East challenged and toppled through the wonders of Facebook and Twitter - two sites which seem to be compared to the left and right hand of justice as of late. It was pointed out by a Tunisian woman on BBC's The World Tonight on Radio 4 that these were simply the catalyst. It was the Al Jazeera television news network that gave these Facebook groups legitimacy, these tweets a wider audience. The woman quite rightly pointed out,

"Nearly everyone has a TV in Tunisia, much fewer people have Facebook."

I don't want to take away from the ongoing success these mediums are having, but without mainstream media validating the online happenings, it is possible the movement that is still sweeping the middle east would have not had the impact it has had; restricted to those who use and have access to these technologies.

New media, the voice of the individual is talked up a lot nowadays. It is even suggested that independent by the twitter generation will overtake mainstream media, the BBCs and the CNNs, in the future.

In my opinion, those claims are cods-wallop.

Yes, any television show even remotely concerned with keeping up with the times has to have a "tweet us" section, but it is still these traditional form of media that validate what is said online, otherwise Twitter just lives up to its name.

A case in point is the death of Michael Jackson. People were tweeting about the fact he had died way before anyone had announced it. It was famously broken by the celebrity and entertainment blog, TMZ, but even then the mainstream news knew that it was their job to wait until a official announcement. If a blog breaks news, you have to take it with a pinch of salt.

I believe this is the future of the traditional media providers; the calm voice, telling everyone to shut up until official people speak.

I've been thinking about this because at 10 o'clock this morning I received a text that told me a nuclear reactor had blown up in Japan and I was going to get showered with radioactive rain within the next 48 hours. I proceeded to forward the text onto anyone I knew warning them to stay indoors, wear a mackintosh and rub iodine on their thyroids.

Texts sent, I began to question what I had just done; sending the whole city of Nanjing into blind panic because of one text. I got online, checked BBC, and lo and behold we were fine. No acid rain, no nuclear explosion, just a bit of leakage and people being paranoid of nuclear energy in America. There was even a government statement from the Philippine government warning about the exact text I had just received that was circulating through the Asian expat community.

Quickly send another text apologising for the panic I had caused.

The fact is community based media is all well and good when it comes to commentary and gossip but when it comes to hard facts and investigative journalism, Twitter, Blogger and even shows like mine on YouTube are way behind the professionals.

The Problem with YouTube Interviews

An interview has recently become available on YouTube in collaboration with Aljazeera with the UK Prime Minister, David Cameron where people around the world are encouraged to send in questions through video or text that are then put to the PM.



Some of you die-harders will remember that I once took part in a similar project when good, old Gordon was the top man. Back then I probably partook in the feature without really thinking about it, it was a chance to partake in the ultimate democracy, for the head of the country to be held accountable directly to the people. Part of my own personal vanity was also knocking around at the back of my brain, "the PM is going to know who you are!" Admittedly, I did kind of like it when he said my name in his sultry, Scottish tones. I can't be the only one with a slight man-crush on big G, right?



However, in retrospect and after being reminded of the whole thing by this recent Aljazeera-YT collaboration, I now feel the whole concept of a YouTube based interview falls flat on it's face.

I remember my frustration when Gordon Brown answered my question but did what politicians often do; sidestep the issue and talked about something that suited him better.

With no-one to follow up the question, to hold the interviewee accountable for his answer, the politician is just going to be able to be, well, a politician. And all the while saying they have held up the beacon of democracy while taking part in a what is nothing compared to a good grilling on BBC Question Time.

The Aljazeera-YT interview took one step further and provided a ghost interviewer who would occasionally rephrase questions if David got confused. Unfortunately, the reporter would rarely follow up the answers of the PM apart from reminding him of parts of the question he forgets to answer or when talking about Isreal. The PM was often allowed to freely dismiss and 'reject' questions.

Another problem is that of the people asking the questions. They clearly have concerns about the government's policy that they are trying to get heard, questions about public service cuts and the selling of arms in the Middle-East, but they are so easily dismissed by the PM as rubbish because of the way the question was phrased, because they weren't allowed to clarify or because they didn't back their point up with statistics.

This format of using YouTube as a platform of interviews and connecting those in power to those who put them there is symbolically important and has great potential. However, that potential is not being harnessed at the moment. The interviewees need to be grilled and held accountable, better journalism is needed here. I also think live video links would be a better way for those asking the questions to get a satisfactory answer out of their representatives.

My criticisms should not take away from the fantastic potential of these kinds of projects. Symbolically it is a wonderful advocate for democracy. I still feel, however, that the art of the YouTube interview still has some room for improvement.

Big Society Multiculturalism

A BBC headline tells us that Cameron denounces state multiculturalism as a failure, following, no doubt, the recent comments that Britain has become a safe haven for terrorists.

No doubt liberals everywhere will be waving their hands around calling foul play, that will be calling for a celebration of our British, multicultural liberalism and a stop to the Conservatives’ attack on immigration. I don’t blame them, I would be one of them, IF Cameron had said that, but when you look at the content of his words rather than the attention grabbing headline that the Beeb went with then you will discover that wasn’t the focus of his statement.

In what I consider to be a questionable choice of words, the Prime Minister is in fact saying that integration of communities has failed, which in turn has not succeeded in providing,

“ … a vision of society to which they feel they want to belong.”

He also says that in British society,

“We have even tolerated these segregated communities behaving in ways that run counter to our values.”

On both these points, and it pains me to say this about Cameron, I largely agree with him.

In the fear of offending or excluding our multicultural, multi-ethnic and multi-religious communities, Britain has failed to define itself as a culture and a society in the past half a century or so. It is this inability of giving young people who can no longer identify with the concept of fighting for Queen and empire in the Second World War a firm national identity that has created a society of segregated, angry youths that see blowing themselves up on public transport as an option.

Reading that back that is probably one of the most right-wing things I have ever said. Let me explain.

There is evidence that those that turn to violence, whether they be BNP supporters, Islamic extremists or IRA activists rarely or never come into significant contact with their relative opposite groups. I am a believer that anger towards another community, religion or social group can always be neutralized if you get those groups to interact. They don’t need to become bezzie-mates, but if you humanise the other side the animosity can be greatly diffused.

This is where David Camerons favourite made-up cultural phenomenon, The Big Society, can come in.

Locally or nationally based independent bodies can be used to bring different communities together; not only those of different religion or colour, but of other different backgrounds like class and region. This is where things like community groups like YMCAs, Mosques, schools and even sports teams and leagues can help to build bridges.

There is one problem with this and that is the fact that these organizations need funding. Right now, the communities that can really make a difference in what the media so often call ‘Broken Britain’ are having the cash at their disposal savagely slashed.

I used to work at the Waiyin Society in Manchester that mainly work with women from the Chinese immigrant community in teaching them English, getting them qualifications and providing an area for them to socialise and ultimately helping them to integrate into British culture better. They also worked with immigrants from other backgrounds, as well as having a very active youth department which gave youths a place to hang out other than out on the street. I saw all the fantastic good that this and other organisations have the potential to do, but have also seen them have to cut back massively since the recession hit in 2008.

Cameron should be commended in having the courage to bring up a sensitive issue that has been tip-toed around for too long. He is, however, key in the destruction of the resource that would be one of the most effective ways of breaking down the social barriers and the segregation that he condemns so harshly. The Big Society is all very well and good, but it don’t come for free, not because people can’t be bothered, but because they can’t afford to.

BEDiD 16: Chinese Democracy

Finally! I'm online again. Not even half way through my BEDiD project and a Chinese person just HAS to get awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, BBC is blocked, my VPN is blocked and chances of managing to actually Blog Every Day in December are thwarted. Damn you Liu Xiaobo!

Throughout British media and Western media in general, there was a common theme through most of the commentary of the award, 'this is the start of the beginning,' that the awarding of this prize is that start of the democratic train that will ride through the Red East. I'm sorry to burst the bubble of The Guardian's China column, but democracy as we know it in the west is far from heading anywhere near China's direction.

On a side note; don't you think it's quite ironic that the most left leaning paper we have in the West is probably the most anti-Chinese one?

The problem with the West's desire for China to become democratic is simple, but quite large; the average person on the street does not want it.

When you speak to Chinese they will say that yes, they want a freer press, uncensored internet (the fact they can't get on Facebook, especially for those who have been abroad is a particular soft spot) and an end to corruption, but democracy is very often not on the list.

Even in the Tian'anmen Square protests of 1989, when scores of young students descended on the largest public square in the world, the protests were mainly for an improvement in student teaching conditions and less corruption. Western media decided, however, to focus on the minority that were asking for democratisation.

The fact is, and I think I tend to agree with this, democracy in China would not work. The country is too vast, has too many problems (including poverty and workers' rights) and would probably end up breaking up in the event of democratization. China would not have enjoyed the vast economic development it has had in the past 20 years if it had had to endure a change of government every 5 years. It would thus not have lifted the millions of people out of poverty that it has. Communism in China, though it had a shaky start, has ultimately done a lot of good for the country.

We should also remember that, though the Nobel Peace Prize is invariably given to fantastic and deserving people, which person is chosen is very often politically motivated. Obama last year, selected after a laughably short time in office, is a good example, "Oh, you're not George Bush any more, here, have a medal!"

It does annoy me sometimes when Western media goes on about how Chinese democracy is only a couple of decades away when they have never lived here or bothered to talk to the people who make up with vast land. It also annoys me when I can't write my blog. So basically, I'm ticked off at both sides right now.

BEDiD 9: My Reading Teacher

This is a strange time of year in Nanjing. Everyone is getting ready for exams, the majority are gearing up for going home for Christmas where those of us who are going to be left over are frantically trying to figure out who else is staying and what the hell we are going to do in a city where there is only one Christmas tree.

The teachers start to get all funny too. This is a much shorter semester than usual for them, they would usually be teaching until new years if they were teaching Chinese students, and some of them misjudging the amounts of classes they had to do, adding or taking away a class or two just before the exams.

Those that decide to cut the classes short fill up the spare time with whatever they can think of, films, class discussions, in class karaoke sessions or, like my reading teacher the other day, long anecdotes about their lives.

Our class had an hour long of what felt like an outpour, as if she had wanted to tell people about her life for such a long time. She told us about her studies, how she got into her job, but one of the most shocking things she told us was that, even though she is a Chinese language teacher, she hates reading.

She said it had never been something fun for her, it was always something she had felt she had had to do so as to get to the next level, the Gaokao exam at the end of high school, her bachelors exams, then her masters. And she said she didn't like it, that the job she was doing wasn't the one she really wanted, even though she did describe it as, "还可以，" which essentially means 'not bad'.

She went on to say she thought we must be really hard working and love to study because western students are here by choice, not because they have been pushed into it. She said we were very lucky, and we are.

I teach a kid who is 10 years of age and never has an evening off. He does karate, piano, English and extra maths classes every night of the week. Is this because he wants to and is interested in it? No, he does it because that is what he and his parents feel he should have to do to get a foot up int he world.

It puts into perspective some figures that put Shanghai schools as the best in the world, with Singapore, Hong Kong and South Korea hot on their tails.

Yes, these kids are excelling in reading, writing and science, but how many of them are having their learning experiences ruined by society demanding so much of them. Without the freedom that so many of us take for granted in the West to have your own interests and follow your own ambitions, how many of them will end up like my reading teacher?

There is a very important vote in parliament today. It will pass. It is wrong. There will be riots.

BEDiD 8: Ecuadorian Amazon

It's been a long day today. Had some iffy family news and was revising for exams all day. Was productive, but didn't have a lot of time to consider a blog, so today will be a bit of a cop out.

I want to link you to a story where the Ecuadorian government has managed to get the international community to compensate them for laying aside oil field located in the amazon rainforest. They have asked for what they estimate to be half the yearly profits per anum if they were to capitalise on the oil fields US$3.6billion. Germany, Spain, France, Sweden and Switzerland, are some countries that have stepped forward to provide the compensation. The plan has two main benefits; leaving the oil for future generations and protecting ons of the most intact parts of the Amazon in Ecuador. In principle it sounds like a fantastic idea, but do you think it is a practice that will catch on in other regions? Have a read here and feel free to tell me your thoughts.

Proper blogs coming soon, but you know I enjoy hearing your thoughts.