Comments on The China Beat: Taelspin: The Spirit of May Fourth

what "fenqing", it makes it sound like something m...

2008-05-21T05:22:00.000-07:00

what "fenqing", it makes it sound like something made in China only. It simply should be translated to "wingnuts", whose counterpart, in US, manufactuered a war can caused 1 million ppl die. They are what they are, nuts. Unfortunately they are well and alive in each and every country of this planet.

It's striking how so many of the same themes of th...

2008-05-11T19:48:00.000-07:00

It's striking how so many of the same themes of the May Fourth period have shown themselves, in various forms, in the current protests: solidarity with the Chinese diaspora (made especially clear because of the journey of the torch), anxiety that foreigners are ganging up against China, youth as the driving force of protests, panic that China's sovereignty will be violated, and frustration at the inability of the Chinese state to successfully resist foreign criticism.

The May Fourth period had plenty of dogmatism, but its strong "marketplace of ideas" showed that working through the above issues and anxieties independently is the only way Chinese civil society can truly be strengthened.

Juxtaposing the May Fourth movement with today's C...

2008-05-11T05:02:00.000-07:00

Juxtaposing the May Fourth movement with today's China is an interesting idea. A potent spirit that I enjoyed in this recount. Yet I would like to raise a couple of points.

The lack of a 'market place of ideas' suggested here, seems like an oversight of an existing industrious, self-critical intelligentsia. The blogosphere mentioned in this article is only the tip of the iceberg,vital research centres of this kind largely go unnoticed. Activity that Hu Shi and Li Dazhao surely would be proud of.

Furthermore, the market of ideas should, and is, not limited to formal research. Contemporary Chinese art, film, literature - contrary to the conceptual homogeneity implicated here - is the most critical, expressive and exuberant it has ever been.

As a starting point, one only needs to see any of China's sixth-generation films to see the spirit of May Fourth in good health.

i am a student from china mainland.thanks for this...

2008-05-10T23:39:00.000-07:00

i am a student from china mainland.
thanks for this great article!!!

The ability to think for oneself is, and was a Chi...

2008-05-10T06:29:00.000-07:00

The ability to think for oneself is, and was a Chinese culture. It was terminated in 1949 on mainland China for most Chinese. It is still flourishing elsewhere.

First, while the marketplace of ideas was introduc...

2008-05-09T23:08:00.000-07:00

First, while the marketplace of ideas was introduced to fight against feudalist tradition since the early 1900s, it was the humiliation at the Paris Conference triggering mass demonstration that gave rise to the very May Fourth style patriotism. It is mostly agreed that there are mainly two important May Fourth legacies, the cause of national salvation and the cause of enlightenment. It would be inadequate to only mention one of them when talking about May Fourth spirit or in commemoration of the movement.

Second, the past two decades have seen perhaps the most exciting marketplace of a great variety of ideas in nearly every field of humanities in China ever since 1919, and most of the youth today were coming of age taking full advantage of this booming cultural scene, idolizing more western stars and values than previous generations did, which has effectively neutralized the CCP propaganda.

Third, would it be fair to pick up several unfortunate incidents occurred during the pro-Chinese demonstration recently as a proof of the entire youth’s lack of tolerance to different ideas, while ignoring at the same time how vigorously different opinions have been debating on web forums inside China and overseas among the Chinese youth?

The improper behaviors and languages used in debating different opinions did not surprise me, nor did the fact that few Chinese students on Tiananman Square in 1989 knew the true meaning of democracy. Sophistication and subtlety in any public debate can only be possible in a more democratically mature and orderly civil society which China is definitely not there yet. Two decades ago, I was so taken back by the Taiwanese politicians who physically attacked each other in the heat of a political debate caught by the TV camera. they are certainly behaving more civilized now. It’s not merely a youth problem, but a societal one.

I was surprised though how recent upsurge of spontaneous Chinese patriotism (which many wasted no time to demonize) following western media’s biased reports on 3.14 riots vigorously echoed the patriotism of the May Fourth movement, as for last three decades, the enlightenment tradition of the May Fourth, in both public and academic discourses, has been much prioritized over the tradition of national salvation as a reaction to the overly political earlier years of the PRC.