I saw subtle (and not-so-subtle) propaganda in the imagery. There were posters around Tienanmen Square that got very little face time. I was able to see them a bit longer in design magazines that I subscribe to. It would take a little longer to explain to those unfamiliar to Chinese culture, where image, color, and tone all have meaning. But if you are familiar with Communism, you can pick up on some of the nuances. One article I would recommend is Party Games from Print Magazine, which describes Beijing's carefully calculated iconography, incorporating both ancient meaning with governmental propaganda. The main icon, the Dancing Beijing logo, is one such icon. It is taken from the second Chinese character for the city, jing (below left), which is often used shorthand for 'capital'. Beijing itself means literally 'North Capital' (bei = North, jing = Capital). The Dancing Beijing logo is made to look like a chop, or block, which is a seal. Governments use them to stamp official documents. I personally own one that my grandmother used to sign her paintings. Every artist had a chop made specially to signify his or her work and to prevent counterfeits. They are highly prized and not duplicated. They are still used today, from business to government work.

Also, religion is still not tolerated in this 'progressive,' modernizing city. Churches are driven underground. Tibetan monks are imprisoned and tortured. Buddhists practice... hesitantly. To a degree. And all without question of the infallible government. Big Brother knows best.

You can buy anything you want in China, especially on the black market. Even the police and government officials. Corruption is everywhere. There is question about the age of the Chinese girl gymnasts, which government workers could have can easily altered certificates and official papers. But if try to buy fake Olympic merchandise? Nope. "The police say it will destroy the reputation of the Olympics," said one vendor from the Print article.

The good side to the Olympics were the athletes. Pure, unadulterated sport. No background or superimposed banners for Nike or Adidas or Budweiser. Yeah, you still have to sit through commercials. And the opening ceremonies were done in the spectacle and grandeur that I expected (constantly interrupted by the freeking commercials). Artistry, imagery, music, ancient instrumentation, illuminating light, technology never seen before, everything incorporating all senses. Plus the elements of wind, water, fire, wood, metal... Holistic, that everything is interconnected. And reminding the world -- and the Chinese -- of the power of the human. The sheer mass. The largeness. One of many -- so very many --and yet, just one of many. And more subtle propaganda woven in here and there. You wouldn't see it if you weren't familiar with the history or culture of China. Proud history. Thousands of years. Luxurious costuming and fantastic attention to detail -- jewels, posture, makeup, facial expression. Then we incorporate the new with old, strength with weakness, power with control, chaos with order, balancing opposites without clashing. Americans have a terrible time of doing this. We tend to forget our past or forget to set time aside, remembering that the dishes can wait for tomorrow -- we want to leave it behind and just live in the future. We forget about today. China accepts its past and brings it forward, incorporating it into today.

Now if it would let its people forward instead of letting the few rule the many under an iron fist.

Labels: business, China, human rights, Olympics, politics

That’s how 80-year-old Gao Yaojie responds to threats from the Chinese government. In 1996, the now-retired doctor became instrumental in exposing an AIDS scandal involving China's blood banks that officials still want to quash. But the powerful Communist bureaucracy that rules a nation of 1.3 billion people cannot silence one old lady who is a crusade.

The silence, however, is cracking wide open. Part of the reason is that China will be hosting the 2008 Olympics, which demands China embrace greater openness to international media. On Jan. 1, for example, new rules went into effect by which some journalists can travel into the provinces without prior government approval.

However, another reason the silence surrounding China's dismal record on AIDS is fading is because Gao has been recognized by the international community as a champion of AIDS patients who are victims of both bureaucracy and disease.

In a scramble for damage control, Chinese officials are simultaneously punishing and praising the grandmotherly dissident.

For example, last week policemen placed Gao under de facto house arrest, presumably to prevent her from making arrangements to accept an award in New York City next month. Yet, on Feb. 12, a high-ranking Communist official visited her home to grab a photo-op with Gao who was then lauded in the party’s newspaper.

What are officials so eager to cover up?

It began in April 1996 when a female patient with “no-name fever” entered the hospital in China’s central Henan province where Gao worked. The woman pleaded, "I don't want to die! My husband and my child can't live without me."

She died 10 days later. For over a week, the woman’s husband slept by her grave in an act of contrition: He had approved a blood transfusion years before through which Gao determined that the woman had contracted AIDS.

“I was astonished to find that the contaminated blood had come from a blood bank," Gao stated. "If a blood bank has been contaminated with HIV, there certainly must be more than just one victim!”

She was correct.

In the 1990s, "unofficial" blood banks flourished and Chinese peasants were encouraged to sell their blood in order to harvest the plasma. The "clinics," sometimes run by local politicians or the military, had to overcome the reluctance of many peasants to give blood. Thus, it became commonplace to re-infuse donors with plasma-stripped blood that was drawn from a general pool. That blood was not tested for AIDS.

No one knows how widespread the resulting problem is.

According to The Economist, “The United Nations estimates that at the end of 2005 there were 55,000 commercial blood and plasma donors infected with HIV in China….One Chinese AIDS expert, Zhang Ke, reported in 2004 that the figure for Henan province…could be more than 170,000. Dr Zhang estimated that a further 130,000 in Henan got the virus from transfusions in hospitals.”

Estimates on how many people have been infected through other vectors of disease (e.g. unprotected sex) do not seem to exist. One thing is clear, however. Although policies on blood donation and transfusions have been tightened, the spread of AIDS in China has taken on a life or death of its own.

The government seems more interested in preventing information than preventing the disease. Gao, who continues to print and circulate educational brochures at her own expense, is a source of chronic embarrassment for the government. She is also exposing the corruption of officials who misappropriate money and resources intended for the AIDS victims.

The accusations of corruption are accumulating.

For example, in 2005, the powerful Party member Wen Jiabao took a much-publicized inspection tour of AIDS prevention work. At Wenlou village, he promised patients that they would each receive 10 yuan (a Chinese dollar) or a total of 8,830 yuan in all. The allocated money vanished as did subsequent shipments of food to the area.

Gao tirelessly raises funds for AIDS victims but she has appealed for people not to donate money to the effort in Wenlou. "[G]o and tell your friends and readers not to donate money or material to Wenlou village," she has said. "This is just a PR project to deceive the public….This is a 'black hole'…There are quite a few more 'black holes' in Henan like this one."

No wonder the government wants to silence Gao… along with the growing ranks of anti-AIDS activists whom she has emboldened.

It is too late to quiet her now; the world is paying attention. Consider Li Xige, who was infected during a blood transfusion in childbirth and passed AIDS on to her now-deceased daughter. Last July, she traveled to petition the Beijing Municipal Health Bureau for assistance. Instead, she was arrested on the charge of "assembling crowds to attack state institutions."

Human rights organizations and the media immediately advocated on Li Xige’s behalf. According to Amnesty International: “Following her release on 10 August, she was placed under tight police surveillance and warned not to travel outside her home county…or talk to foreign media.”

Chinese attempts to cover up the AIDS epidemic and scandals have been so clumsy that they have merely created more interest.

Last November, I toured China in the company of various guides who clearly follow the official Communist line on political matters. On separate occasions, three different guides assured me that the AIDS situation was firmly under the government’s control. The interesting thing: I hadn’t asked them anything about AIDS. But, since they brought the subject up, I pursued it.

The path led directly to where they did not wish me to go: GaoYaojie.

Wendy McElroy is the editor of ifeminists.com and a research fellow for The Independent Institute in Oakland, Calif. She is the author and editor of many books and articles, including the new book, "Liberty for Women: Freedom and Feminism in the 21st Century" (Ivan R. Dee/Independent Institute, 2002). She lives with her husband in Canada.

Respond to the Writer

Labels: China, human rights, politics

February 01, 2007 08:27am

CHINA'S military is harvesting organs from unwilling live prison inmates, mostly Falungong practitioners, for transplants on a large scale - including to foreign recipients- according to a study.

The report's authors - Canada's former secretary of state for the Asia Pacific region David Kilgour and human rights lawyer David Matas - implicated dozens of hospitals and jails throughout China in July, after a two-month investigation.

Chinese officials denied those allegations.

Mr. Matas and Mr. Kilgour's second report, released today, includes interviews with organ recipients in 30 countries and Canadian hospital staff who cared for more than 100 patients who had undergone suspicious transplant surgeries in China.

"The involvement of the People's Liberation Army in these transplants is widespread,'' Mr. Kilgour said at a press conference.

Like many civilian hospitals in rural China, military hospitals turned to selling organs to make up for government funding cuts in the 1980s, the report said.

But military personnel could operate with much more secrecy, it said.

"Recipients often tell us that even when they receive transplants at civilian hospitals, those conducting the operation are military personnel,'' the report said.

Hospitals in Canada's biggest cities - Vancouver, Calgary and Toronto - confirmed "a substantial number'' of Canadians had travelled to China for dubious organ transplants, Mr. Kilgour said.

"We're in the three digits, up over 100 (from Canada each year), and the trend is accelerating,'' Mr. Matas said.

To curb what they called a "disgusting form of evil", the pair asked pharmaceutical firms to stop selling organ anti-rejection drugs to China.

They also asked countries to post travel advisories warning about China's alleged organ harvest, asked states to cease offering follow-up care for patients who had dubious organ transplants in China and asked foreign doctors to cut ties with their Chinese counterparts suspected of such practices.

The authors said states should enact legislation to ban citizens from traveling to China for organ transplants from unwilling donors, although they admitted that such cases would be difficult to prosecute.

Labels: China, human rights

Labels: China, human rights, politics