Atsuna: De-politicization and Injustice

Atsuna: De-politicization and Injustice

Translated by Karen L., written by Atsuna (written in February 2013)
Original: https://atsunablog.wordpress.com/2013/02/25/%E5%8E%BB%E6%94%BF%E6%B2%BB%E5%8C%96%E8%88%87%E5%8E%BB%E6%AD%A3%E7%BE%A9%E5%8C%96/ 

(A primary 2 student was asked if she knows what "vote" means in a documentary)

One may have noticed the recent presence of “the Sounds of Silence” in Hong Kong community. They insist that “politicisation” is not a positive attribute of any place. In their point of view, politicians are to be divisive and the post-90s citizens are too inexperienced to handle things right. To them, conflicts, regardless of any nature, will only sew discord within the city. Frowned at each sight of aggressive protestors, they seriously believe that the one and only survival way-out left for Hong Kong is “de-politicization”.

These people are not entirely formed by groups of paid Internet ghostwriters employed by the establishment camp. Many of them are made blind as a result of comfortable lives. Without realising that politics is accounted for one after another leap forward for the city, the naïveté in them allows the spread of an unascertainable belief of which Hongkongers’ political apathy contributes to the undivided attention on economics and the subsequent prosperity.

In 1949, a good number of funds and talents entered, and thus favoured Hong Kong due to the fall of China. The cold war after that drew the iron curtain that separated China from the western world, while Hong Kong connecting to both sides managed to create an economic legend with entrepôt dominance. As to the welfare system in Hong Kong, basically, it is established to prevent another wave of Hong Kong 1967 Leftist riots and to placate the widespread anger among the population. Before the deadline of 1997’s Handover, the game plan for the British Hong Kong Government was to add more bargaining chips in the political negotiations with the Chinese Communist Party.¹ Suddenly, repudiated the autocracy they used to practice, the government suggested to put parliamentary democracy into execution. Had it not been stymied by the Chinese Communist Party, we would have known at first hand the benefits brought by “politicisation”: ordinary men can vote to protect themselves from dignitaries’ corruption.

Over a long period of time, the governments in charge have hypnotised Hongkongers into believing that their meaning of life is supposed to devote as politically apathetic economic animal. Subconsciously, this misleading move has rationalised the fully negative image of politics. The word “Politicisation”, similar to the slang “Kong gals”, is thought to carry only derogatory connotations. Skipping further exploration to that common idea, many gullible people fall for such casuistry. Condemning CY Leung for his unauthorized building works, to them, is “politicisation”; uploading pictures of mainland Chinese’s wrongdoings in Hong Kong society and criticizing those behaviours, to them, are applications of “politicization”; realizing the so-called integration between Hong Kong and Mainland China to be an annexation, to them, is again “politicization”... By taking a deeper thought to that, one will notice that the people with the notion to “de-politicize” turn out to take an unfathomable liking to “politicisation”. To achieve whatever purpose, an unfailing  explanation to the man-made flux of mislabeling on every opposition is the advantage attached to the surefire moral-high-ground position — one does not have to bother one’s head about making persuasive counter-arguments.

Being well aware of the above advantages, mainland China is probably the most successful representative to deploy omnipresent “de-politicization" — zero freedom to talk about politics within the country. What is more, in this world of “de-politicization", any action carrying the faintest trait of politicisation is to be oppressed by the authority. People requesting the government to implement the constitution is regarded an incitement to subvert state power; people demanding that those infant formula companies make reasonable compensation, it is public nuisance; people making petitions in an attempt to overthrow forced eviction end up in labour camps... The specifically designed search engines adoptable in the country even filter out “Communist Party” because it is too sensitive a word for its people. Such extreme is destined for an opposite extreme. Thanks to that, there’s a whole new world of politicisation born where political trickeries are so common even to kids who are far from reaching mental maturity.

(A primary 2 student said she had no idea what is democracy in a documentary)

A documentary called Please Vote for Me² talks about an election of class monitor among some primary 2 students in Wuhan, China. It begins with a boy saying his grounds to stand for election. He says, “A class monitor represents power. The class has to stand and sit under the command of the class monitor.” At this young age, this boy has come into contact with “pork barrel” promising his classmates seats in the class association for a vote. Plus, he instigates others to “mobilise the masses” and to sabotage the talent show on the spot so other candidates wouldn’t gain advantages. There are no lengths to which this child will not go to gain power and influence. Adept politicking and aberrant enthusiasm in power, unquestionably, are nothing common to children in ordinary countries.

At the beginning of the documentary, another competitor refuses his police-officer parents’ offer to “help him do something” for more votes. To us, it seems to be an odd enough offer. And this boy does appear to have a backbone like ramrod at that time and he says, “I don’t want to control them. Let them think. They can vote for whoever they want.” But then, he suffers from a competitor’s politicking and decides to take his parents’ suggestion. Free “guanxi” trip on the railway for the whole class and distributing pre-mid-Autumn-festival presents in front of everyone before the vote bribe his way to a win.

In the end of it, interestingly, the teacher concludes with this: Be it victory or loss, every one of you has learned a "precious" lesson...  The teacher also mentions that this lesson is going to play a huge role in their growth path. The camera captured a fairly dramatic final scene: the losing candidates are required to shake hands with the winning candidate and to say a few words of blessing to him; the class is filled with claps; on the wall of that very classroom, there hangs a Chinese banner that reads "embrace integrity and bravery; be diligent and a constant thinker". I assume that those kids truly benefited a great deal. After all, now that the kids know mere politicking is far from being effective, the prudential policy to cope with villains is to be one of them — suppressing the masses — and to confuse people by giving them advantages at certain times. An unpleasant surprise is that to them, the foul measures to meet purposes can still be divided into "better" and "worse".

An almost universally accepted opinion of politics is that it is a disgust, which politicians brazenly enjoy vested interests through demagogueries. Precisely because of it, the need to eliminate the possibility of black-box operations shall not be ignored. Those sayings which advocate creating "a better world" by "de-politicization" are ridiculous lies indeed.

Yim Man-wa, an activist, was charged with an assault on a police officer (Translator’s note: On 2012’s Hong Kong 1 July demonstration, the protestors had waited for hours before they can start. Some participants demanded the police to retract the blockages at Causeway Road so as to make way for protestors. Yim hunkered and crossed the cordon line. Some police officers were there carrying her away and she bet one of them.) and had to serve her sentence in a rehabilitation centre.

Originally it was a perfectly normal school event to visit these centres as it serves as an alert so that the students are aware of the consequences if they go astray. But I wonder that if defending for a good cause continued to be looked down, these centres would eventually deteriorate into some coward factories from where the visitors would get the idea to not come forward against injustice.

The authority’s repression of dissent in modern Hong Kong has aggravated without scruple, and yet commoners should carry on the mission impossible to avoid being too “politicised”? Isn’t it an obvious means to force people to return to the “motherland”?

In the name of “de-politicization” again and again, the authority lowers the value of justice. A society where early education is about to follow the opposite direction of justice and to learn by heart all those dark unspoken rules is never a society with justice. Just as communism to mainland China, justice may seem to be theoretically acceptable, but underneath, if you talk about the true application of it, the people there will laugh their hands off. So, back to “de-politicisation”, what is it? The most powerful trick of the authority.

^{1. Chris Patten, a former governor of Hong Kong, suggested the 1994 Hong Kong electoral reform in an attempt to make it a more direct-election-like form. The plan is that 9 functional constituencies would be added to the Legislative Council and the employees in those industries would be entitled to vote. Beijing banned the suggestion and the primary unit of the current functional constituencies is a company. In other words, only a few employers have the right to vote in this aspect.↩}

^{2. The Full movie of Please Vote for me with English subtitles is available in Youtube:
     1/5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pZsCg-1fQ8
     2/5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVqZz4CIDys
     3/5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ku6SVaRKx4
     4/5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTSM71a6_M8
     5/5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giJNbTXYpE0 ↩}

[Undergrad/HKUSU] Meet the Poet Who Breaks through the Crevasse: Nicholas Wong

Meet the Poet Who Breaks through the Crevasse: Nicholas Wong

Written by Rainbow Wong (Undergrad, HKUSU, August 2016)

Nicholas Wong (photo by Donald Yiu)

Born and raised in Hong Kong, “Asia’s World City” dubbed by the local tourism board, the Lambda Literary Award winner, Nicholas Wong Yu-bon, feels that there are certain “off-ness” in his identities. He writes poems in English, his second language, and is gay in a city that does not even have anti-discrimination laws that include sexual orientation. Nevertheless, this is no obstacle to his creativity—if anything, it has opened up a world of myriad possibilities for him.

The purple book cover of Crevasse features a hole full of cross-shaped bacteria revealed by a paper crack. Inspired by a poem about gloryholes and crucifixions, he designed it with an artist from Los Angeles, as he told Time Out Hong Kong earlier. “The title Crevasse suggests a crack that opens up an originally intact surface to reveal what possibly exists beneath it,” Wong explained the name of his latest poetry collection, which earned him the US-based awards, also known as the “Lammys”, in the gay poetry category. Now in their 28th year, the awards recognize and celebrate L.G.B.T. books from a variety of genres published in the U.S. each year.  The award ceremony this year was held in early June at New York University. 

The hidden gem of English poetry

In brutal honesty, the local poetry scene has not been remarkably exuberant and it seemingly applies even more so for poetry written in the English language, which might be more challenging to read for many locals. But English poetry greatly enchants Wong: He likes the reading and writing of the genre, and is drawn to “the in-between-ness, the ambiguity, the clarity that is always defined by opacity”, as he said. As an English major at HKU, he grew used to writing many texts for each course and enjoyed doing it. But his interest in writing poetry really sparked off in his third year, when he was enrolled in a whole-year creative writing course taught by Shirley Lim, which explored the craft of poetry and short stories. It was not without difficulty, though. As he said, “The challenges, back then, were the literary vacuum, by which I meant I hadn't had the chance to read a lot of poetry—classical and contemporary. I believe that reading the right poems is the key to writing drafts that are worth keeping.  This said, the course let me know I was, to say the least, interested in creative writing, or creating per se.”

He then went on to complete a master’s degree in comparative literature at HKU. His fondest memories are the simplest ones. “I liked simply sitting in a classroom and listening to professor talk about interesting ideas that ultimately changed one's perspective in seeing things. They're sharing their lifetime wisdom and research with you in two hours. It's actually a good deal, from the economic point of view,” he said.

Against all odds

Wong also took the City University’s MFA in Creative Writing in 2010, an Asian-themed, low-residency program of which many local English writers were alumni. Unfortunately, the program was axed in the Summer of 2015 amid protests from current students, graduates and authors worldwide. Wong was among those who signed the letter against the university's decision. "That MFA program was different from any of the regular ones that run courses by semester. Therefore, it had to be funded by a different financial model. However, the management wasn't very flexible in creating a new funding model to keep the program. Their reluctance could be a shortsightedness, or a complicated administrative decision. It's ironic to close the program when the university advocated a truly global body of studentship. I have never been in a program more global than MFA," he said.

“Literature grows in Hong Kong. There are more and more quality readers and daring writers, both for the Chinese and English literary scenes. But it's almost true to say literature is marginalized because the people making important policies are not very good readers or writers themselves.” But despite all the challenges, “The more marginalized an artist, the more creative energy he has,”as Wong quoted singer-songwriter Anthony Wong Yiu-ming.

Poring over his poems, many may sense a dash of social sensitivity between the lines. Writers should make use of their discomfort as inspiration, Wong believes. "To me, politics is related to one's existence and positioning in a community," he said. "I do believe that good writings should transgress and subvert."

'Just another relationship'

Avid film watchers would be familiar with the delicate yet turbulent romance of two young souls in Wong Kar-wai's Happy Together (1997). It is something quite different from other local films of its time because of the straightforward depiction of a gay romance. Wong likes the film a lot, as he explained, “It doesn't bother explaining the homosexuality of the two protagonists. It's just another relationship. We need more films and TV dramas like this to counter the misrepresentation of queerness in Hong Kong or Asian popular culture.”

In his other interviews, he has been emphasizing that "gay poetry" is there only for the ease of categorization by the press, bookstores and the like. After all, labelling is perhaps dispensable, if the focus is on a poet's work and not his identity.

There are quite a few queer poets whom Wong admires, from across the world, including Cyril Wong (Singapore), Jee Leong-koh (Singapore), C. Dale Young (America), Timothy Liu (America), Danez Smith (America), Ocean Vuong (America), D. A. Powell (America) and Kazim Ali (America).

The collection

When asked about Crevasse, Wong said, “There are poems that are deeply personal, whereas there are some pieces that depart from the personal and try to explore the personal with the social. The worst assumption of reading poetry or any literature is that everything on the page is autobiographical.  This reading is very reductive. In fact, can we ever tell if incidents in the poem have happened? Why bother? Poetry should start with what is known and push itself towards exploring the unknown."

Although Wong does not have a favorite poem in the collection and interestingly, avoids reading the entire collection, there is a poem which holds a special place in his heart. “There is a poem called ‘Side Effects of Leukaemia’, and it's written for a dear friend who passed. He's been supportive of my dream,” he said.

We have hand-picked two poems from Crevasse with which many might resonate according to life in Hong Kong. "Postcolonial Zoology" explores the intricacies of race and colonization, while "Neighbor" looks into the intersections between one's private and public life.

Postcolonial Zoology

1997, Hong Kong

It is not the pedigreed corgis they left

at the handover, but the effigy of the Queen

on toothed stamps being self-important

in dusted albums. We bolted to banks to trade

for new coins. We went to the West, away

from communist coxswains, but were whittled

to sculptures called “second-tier citizens,”

second to terriers. Our being could start

a chapter in zoology: we are inedible

bilingual centaurs spreading swine flu

at the turn of the century, we are comrades

of a blue whale found ashore due to sonic

confusion, caribous on a cruise to Malibu.

Even what we remembered migrated to corners

invisible in brain scans. In Mandarin Oriental,

India, a TV host devoured British scones

and circumscribed cucumber sandwiches

on his sun porch that looked over to rice fields.

A butler next to him. He called the experience

authentic. So were the bees buzzing in air,

sick of their queen too lazy to move.

Words from the poet:

"I once watched a travel show on Discovery Channel late at night, and was bothered by how the white male host enjoyed being served by colored resort staff. Well, from an economic point of view, there seemed to be nothing wrong there. He paid for the service. He got it. Yet, the semiotics of the scenes is deeply troubling."

Neighbor

Every death is a local event every local

avoids. The way we zigzag our way

by the gate to avoid this spot the skull

has crushed then opened like a generous

guava.  e way we think the chalked

outline of the victim, a man, hardly

synopsizes the outlined body we carry

thus know of. The way a tent is zipped

to eclipse his plunge from public talks

because he has taken another he too personally,

privately—the myth of love bisects these he’s,

who wet their love for myths with well-meant selves.

Tomorrow, the street will reek of bleach,

will gray as if intolerant of red, and stories

of the spot be untold by bold tire tracks.

A wreath by the curb

tilts, an umbrella, unclaimed, waits

for better weather to disclose its ribs.

Words from the poet:

"People jumped from buildings to kill themselves in Hong Kong. There's a certain haunting quality in walking on the road, where the night before, someone's head might have been crushed like 'an open guava'. I don't mean haunting in the spectral sense, but how tragedies and deaths can be quickly 'sanitized' for a regular, normal life to resume its pace."