three meltdowns and one china syndrome

Tang Jie, a 28-year old Chinese graduate student and creator of the popular nationalist video above, discussed a broad range of topics in a recent New Yorker article, including the obvious prevalence of state censorship in his homeland. He noted, "[b]ecause we are in such a system, we are always asking ourselves whether we are brainwashed," he said. "We are always eager to get other information from different channels." Then he added, "But when you are in a so-called free system you never think about whether you are brainwashed."

The ramp up to China's momentous showcase of its, inter alia, grand power, wealth, and athletic prowess has brought with it a ton of English language press. The New Yorker, the very best in non-hockey, non-Chomsky reading, has looked at the rapid ascent in the development of China's boxers, while the Times has denuded China's clever solution to the troubling presence of the devastatingly poor that inhabit the cracks of Beijing's colossus: just build a wall over them!

I find much of what's written in the American mainstream on China to be a healthy cocktail of equal parts condescension and ethnocentricity, topped off with a splash of good old fashioned ignorance (and a dash of cointreau). Of course, Chinese rule in Tibet deserves a harsh rebuke and threatens the very existence of the Olympiad, whereas American occupation in Iraq, with a far greater civilian death-toll and an almost complete destruction of civil society, deserves criticism within the noble, intellectual culture only in so far as it costs American lives and affects the American economy.

I'm not a fan of Chinese nationalism in the same way I don't support nationalism of any kind, not to mention the entire idea of nation-states. The only person I've known with a rational justification of patriotism came from a Baltic Republic, a country whose very cultural existence was threatened by its lack of political independence. Maintaining cultural identity, linguistic diversity, religious freedom are all to be respected and valued. Being proud of your community, way to go, bro. But a bias in favor of one's own political leaders and rights over those of another peoples? A cloak for self-interest and alternative to compassion and understanding. Patriotism is the last refuge for scoundrels indeed.

It's hard for me to say if Tie Jang and his retinue lean a little closer to the "good" kind of civic pride or the "bad" kind of mindless jingoism that enables rulers and elites to exploit in the name of country. But China, as a non-industrialized and globally uninfluential player over the course of the most recent geopolitical periods, has not given its people too much to cheer about over the last 50 years, singing songs and prayers to Mao notwithstanding. As the Middle Kingdom makes its steady climb towards industrialization and wealth accumulation, the young intellectuals in those obscenely massive urban centers are shunning the glossy enchantment of the West that other countries in similar states of development so hopelessly imbibe (hello, India); rather, they are looking inward and to the past to forge a unique and more concretely Chinese identity, one that appears be accompanied by the manpower and the economic muscle to flex that identity around the world. What does all of this mean? The naive hope in this beaten down corner is that any buttress against US global domination and its very non-democratizing efforts around the world has to be a positive step. The more likely result, however, based on even a cursory examination of the history of world affairs is that it will be business as usual, the names of oppressors slightly changed, but the list of crimes and victims always as long.

i dont sleep til it's light

another brilliant skewering from anthony lane in last week's new yorker, this time serving up the documentary, "shine a light." one may argue it's not fair to beat up on the elderly, and possibly senile, but it's worthwhile for amusingly criticizing both the rolling stones and martin scorsese, from which we can synthesize a critique of the mainstream entertainment culture. here's a hint, it's about a lack of subtlety and an overabundance of close-ups and camera changes. i'd rather watch 100 year old turtles mate, eat and sleep, and i'd have to see fewer wrinkles.

under the volcano

malcolm lowry wrote a book called under the volcano around the middle of the last century. finishing the work, by accounts, was a painstakingly difficult process involving a great deal of back-and-forth and often contentious editing with his wife, and perhaps as an explanation, an even greater deal of alcohol (lowry was an alcoholic to the point of caricature - he was essentially physically incapacitated and resorted, at least on one occasion, to drinking aftershave when out of booze). despite these troubles, the book was ultimately completed and was widely praised; the los angeles times subsequently called it, "one of the ten most consequential works of fiction produced in [the twentieth] century." there were some pretty good books written in the last 100 years so, considering most people have never heard of this guy, that's a pretty interesting comment. part of the reason lowry isn't better known is that he was essentially unable to finish another work, including what would have been his magnus opus, october ferry to gabriola, despite working on it for years. though lowry wrote almost constantly, he spent as much time fighting with his wife and even more time drinking heavily. after a productive stint in british columbia, where he completed volcano, he moved around quite a bit in various abortive attempts to get clean. the new yorker, as always, does a brilliant job in discussing his life and raising some doubt as to the circumstances surrounding his death. a tragic figure to be sure, it's a shame he couldn't squeeze more out of his considerable talent. at least we'll always have under the volcano. here's an excerpt:

The water still trickling into the pool - God, how deadeningly slowly - filled the silence between them... There was something else; the Consul imagined he still heard the music of the ball, which must have long since ceased, so that this silence was prevaded as with a stale thudding of drums. Pariah: that meant drums too. Parian. It was doubtless the almost tactile absence of the music however, that made it so peculiar the trees should be apparently shaking to it, an illusion investing not only the garden but the plains beyond, the whole scene before his eyes, with horror, the horror of an intolerable unreality. This must be not unlike, he told himself, what some insane person suffers at those moments when, sitting benignly in the asylum ground, madness suddenly ceases to be a refuge and becomes incarnate in the shattering sky and all his surroundings in the presence of which reason, already struck dumb, can only bow the head. Does the madman find solace at such moments, as his thought like cannon-balls crash through his brain, in the equisite beauty of the madhouse garden or of the neighboring hills beyond the terrible chimney? Hardly, the Consul felt. As for this particular beauty he knew it dead as his marriage and as willfully slaughtered. The sun shining brilliantly now on all the world before him, its rays picking out the timberline of Popocatepetl as its summit like a gigantic surfacing whale shouldered out of the clouds again, all this could not lift his spirit. The sunlight could not share his burden of conscience, of sourceless sorrow. It did not know him.