Three essays by Chinese celeb blogger/race-car driver/novelist Han Han have sparked a great deal of controversy, especially from Han Han's usual core support base - liberal 'culturati'. The pieces are pretty brief and well worth a read: On Revolution, On Democracy, On Wanting Freedom.
There's a good deal to think about in here so for now here are a handful of particularly pithy passages. There's some great commentary at ChinaGeeks and the latest Sinica podcast.
Today, the Chinese Communist Party has 80 million members. 300 million persons live in families which have members with party membership. The Party is no longer just a political party or a class. Therefore, many of the flaws of the Communist Party are also the flaws of the people...when the party organization reaches a certain size, it becomes the people itself.
I wish that those without money can become wealthy in a just society, and those who with money will not still feel that they are inferior to foreigners in spite of their money....Chinese medicine, gunpowder, silk and pandas cannot win us glory; the 100 LV bags of the county mayor's wife cannot win respect for our people. I wish the ruling party can march boldly ahead and become immortal in the history annals that they write themselves.
In a nation with a complex social structure, especially in the eastern world, the ultimate winner in a revolution must be a vicious, ruthless person...revolution may not be the best option for China. First of all, a revolution usually begins with a demand, which is most commonly anti-corruption. But this demand isn't going to go too far. "Freedom" or "justice" do not have any markets...if you ask people in the street whether they feel free, most of them will answer in the affirmative; if you ask them whether they want justice, they will typically say that injustice is usually something that happens to other persons and they are happy just as long as it doesn't happen to them.
Even if I agree with the idea of revolution and lead a sizeable uprising, the authorities can just cut off the Internet and mobile telephone signals. I don't think that the government even needs to send out their stability-maintenance forces. Those angry people who were trying to chat on QQ or play online games or watch serial dramas will wipe us out. You better not hope that you can make microblog posts to support me. You will begin to hate me if you cannot go microblogging for three days.
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