Just the opposite.  Xia Lin, the deputy editor-in-chief of Xinhua, the mouthpiece of the Communist Party of China, was giving a lecture entitled “Understanding Journalistic Protocols for Covering Breaking News” at the Tianjin Foreign Studies University in which he defended the practice of massaging the truth when it comes to news, citing the critical role of media to maintain societal stability.  The examples he gave were shocking, but only confirmed what most skeptical human beings believe: that their government lies to them on a daily basis.

All the news that's fit to print.

Lin recounted the “live broadcast” of the Shenzhou 5 landing, in which Chinese viewers saw astronaut Yang Liwei emerge from the space capsule smiling and flashing a victory symbol.  But actually when the capsule was opened Yang had blood all over his face due to a cut on his lip.  Workers wiped the blood off his face and shot the second reveal for the country to see.  Lin also mentioned the “July 5th incident” in Xinjiang when state media underreported Han deaths for fear of mob reprisal and, when the reprisal happened anyway, omitted mention of Uighur casualties.

The revelations are startling not because of the obvious fact that news in China is manufactured, but that its top officials are unrepentant about it.  In fact, they see careful management, or manipulation, of the truth as not only justified but integral to their job.  Reporting is not in the service of facts but rather facts serve reporting, and can be airbrushed and edited to benefit those in power.

Though this seems immoral and propagandistic, there are two cultural factors that contextualize the government’s mentality.   First is the Chinese preoccupation with face, and no one is more vain than the government.  Chinese leaders, from emperors to demagogues to its current politicians, have always taken pains to appear irreproachable and by now it has become a part of the fiction.  Every misstep is seen as potential ammunition for those who might want to challenge the incumbent power.  Thus, mistakes are admitted only posthumously, for fear of damaging the reputations or political fortunes of those still alive.

Second, the Chinese government is willing to sacrifice much for stability: ideals, lives, even fundamental tenets of their own party ideology.  If they are willing to abandon their own beliefs for stability, then why shouldn’t every branch of the government, including the media, the military, and the legal system, be used toward that end?

Recently, one can see their point.  In March, the state media reported the first of what has now become a rash of kindergarten stabbings.  Likewise, the reports of factory suicides in Shenzhen have led to nothing but more suicides and a belated pay increase.  If suppressing the news of that first stabbing could have saved the lives of children who died in subsequent attacks, wouldn’t we all think twice?  But denial of death is on some level a negation of life.  Not reporting the deaths of those children would mean they died for nothing and would be an affront to their memory and the grief of their families.  And yet, what is the point in honoring death when it only leads to more of the same?  Truth is lofty and eternal; lives are earthly and transient.  How does one weigh the two?

We can’t.  And maybe we don’t have to, because the news itself is not as important as how we act in response to it.  If we look for easy answers to tragedies, then those who died did so in vain.  If we settle for easy explanations—the killers were mentally ill; the young people who jumped from buildings were heartbroken—then we should not be surprised if these things continue to happen and have one to blame for their proliferation but ourselves.

The furor over the factory suicides have made amounted to some small victories—a pay increase at Foxconn and in Beijing—and has raised awareness of issues like poor factory conditions, the growing income gap, and the dark side of economic development.  However, the response to the epidemic of kindergarten stabbings has been and will continue to be characteristically simple.  The murderers responsible for the stabbings will be executed.  Their point of view will not be reported.  Their reasoning will be lost along with their lives and we will get no closer to knowing, let alone understanding, what would drive them to take the lives of defenseless children.  Even if we are reluctant to understand their reasons, aren’t they the most important piece of this puzzle?

The worst thing about edited news is not the deception or the misinformation—it is the lack of information.  Information that can help us prevent further incidents.  Information we can use to ensure long-term stability, instead of settling for short respites.  Instead of knowing less about these tragedies, we need to know more.  We need to know, truly, why these things happened, because only then can we ask the right questions, the hard questions.  And though we might not like the answers, at least they’d be honest.  People want the truth; the government just needs to believe that they can handle it.

—

Sources:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/04/world/asia/04china.html
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2010/06/xia-lin-夏林-xinhua-deputy-chief-editor-reveals-secret-details-of-old-news-stories/

Of course, after the wildly successful opening of Alice in Wonderland, rumors began flying about what Burton’s next project would be, the most pervasive rumor being that he was lined up to direct Maleficent, a live action film about the bad fairy in in the Disney classic, Sleeping Beauty. This rumor took root quickly because people have always been keen to label anything even vaguely gothic or darkly whimsical as Burton material, but it seemed to me extremely unlikely. Burton may no longer be my beloved director of dark and funny fairy tales but surely he had not fallen so far as to helm another of Disney’s schemes to squeeze every last penny out of their classic properties—and one that would so obviously be a caricature of his own aesthetic?

The importance of Tim Burton’s sense of humor when dealing with his antiheroes is consistently underestimated—Large Marge, Edward covered in Avon products, little children screaming their heads off as their Christmas presents begin to attack (you have to admit, those scenes are pretty hilarious in Nightmare). Burton’s humor, which consists largely of sight gags and one-liners, gives his characters dimension and humanity that all the eyeliner, striped clothing, and rattiest hair in the world could not achieve. His humor gives his work heart. It’s no mistake that Burton’s best film, Ed Wood, employs none of Burton’s visual trademarks (clichés, if we’re being cynical). It’s also probably his funniest film, though Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure is a pretty close second. Alice had very little of Burton’s humor; the jokes that were there were obvious, even cheap—the “Fudderwacken” was embarrassing. I don’t see how Maleficent could benefit from Burton’s sight gags and one liners. I don’t see how it could be funny without being camp, and quite frankly I don’t see how it can steer clear of being simply an imitation of Wicked. I don’t think the Disney company has a problem with reducing a film that was one of Walt Disney’s great artistic triumphs to camp, but I hope Burton does—I hope he finds it uninteresting. The only thing Maleficent could really benefit from that Burton has to offer is dark eye makeup and a color palate that’s heavy on black—all the pretty images and none of the heart.

Surely Mr. Burton knows better. This week’s Tim Burton Google Alert (yes, I have a Tim Burton Google Alert… old habits) included articles from The Guardian and The Telegraph about Tim Burton’s attachment to Maleficent. The Telegraph claimed Burton was “dancing around the project.” Other films Burton wasn’t sure about making? Planet of the Apes and Alice in Wonderland.

Did Burton sign some sort of Faustian contract with Disney, or did he take a few too many sips of the Kool-Aid? I had always anticipated that the end would be quick and quiet, that I would simply walk away from a new Burton film and know the spark was gone. He would still make movies, and I would still go see them, but it would never be like it was. Now I think I may have been wrong. Perhaps the darkest parts of Tim Burton’s career are yet to come.

“There is a real concern the face veil and issues like it will be used as an election tool.”

- Shaista Gohir, executive director at Muslim Women’s Network UK; Source: BBC

A French parliamentary committee has been convened to discuss the status of the Islamic face veil worn by women—an accessory which, according to President Nicolas Sarkozy is “not welcome” in France, and “contrary to the values of the Republic.”

I had my first encounter with a face-veil at age 16, greeting some African friends at Leeds-Bradford airport. A strapping Malawian man stood beside his burqa-clad wife and introduced themselves. Without thinking, I reached out and shook the lady’s hand, looking her in the eyes as I did. Then I recoiled slightly, and wondered if I’d made some colossal faux pas. However, nobody seemed to register this, and the group continued to chatter away quite happily. In fact, I engaged well with this mysterious woman in conversation, even though on parting I had yet to see any more than her eyes.

Potent symbols of religious conviction always make us wishy-washy liberals uncomfortable. It’s difficult not to stare when confronted with Jewish forelocks, Sikh turbans and Muslim burquas, particularly when they appear in an unconventional place. They represent a dogged stubbornness to conform, an immovable religious conviction and, in some eyes, the persecution and restriction of their wearers.

France banned “conspicuous” symbols of religious denominations (including large Catholic crosses) from its state schools in 2004, and some UK schools chose to legislate against specific religious clothing when given the right to self-determine their dress codes in 2007. Sarkozy is particularly fond of appeasing France’s growing far-Right by legislating against “inappropriate clothing.” Back in his days under Chirac he introduced a law against “racolage passif”—”passive soliciting”—making French women who displayed too much flesh or makeup in public subject to arrest under prostitution laws. Now the furor has been stirred up again, and, as usual, it’s that most maligned of religious paraphernalia, the burqa, which is under attack.

Why are we so afraid of this item of clothing? While 9/11 paranoia and the general trend of Islamophobia veiled as public-protection has a lot to do with it, politicians seem particularly keen to seize on the burqa as the ultimate symbol of Islamic repression.

Guys, it’s a piece of cloth. A symbolic one, sure, but so is the Turin Shroud, and nobody’s accused that of being repressive of modern thought. Maybe because atheists aren’t forced to wear it.

Islamic repression of women is not caused by the burqa. Like all inanimate objects, it is incapable of doing good or ill towards anyone when left to its own devices. The repression of women in Islam and in other cultures comes from millenia of misogynistic tradition throughout not only the Arab world, but also Africa, South America, Asia, and, yes, Europe and North America. We in the West are not exactly above reproach when it comes to dictating standards for the fairer sex—it’s just we use advertising instead of the Koran to convince women to conform to ideals of feminine propriety. Just as women were trussed up in whalebone corsets for five hundred years in Europe, modern women continue to squeeze themselves into uncomfortable and impractical clothing in order to get ahead in life. Is this any different than a women donning a burqa in order to be a wife and mother?

It is of course beyond doubt that the burqa is not adopted merely out of personal choice—innumerable factors, including (and probably most potently) cultural pressure are among the reasons women wear these voluminous garments. But the very notion that legislating against a garment can somehow alter cultural perceptions is palpably absurd. Women cast aside their corsets when given the right to vote and to involve themselves actively in political and social life outside the home. It wouldn’t have happened in reverse. The same story with the burqa: make education available to all Islamic women, reach out to the housebound housewives with initiatives, and above all, respect their cultural choices. Help Islamic women feel equal to everyone else and perhaps they’ll stop wearing the burqa of their own accord. If not, then you’ll know it’s their choice. Keeping Islamic girls and women out of public buildings and schools will only serve to further antagonize and reinforce what their most vitriolic clerics want the Islamic community at large to believe—that non-Muslims wish to destroy Islam.

“Bucks for Belchers” will simultaneously introduce and fund four interrelated policies:

• The government will provide significant tax deductions to coal-fired plants that install post-combustion capture retrofits. Retrofitting all of these plants will reduce CO₂ emissions from the coal power sector by 50 percent. The highly respected Electric Power Research Institute estimates that around 59 percent of the coal-fired plants in the US are suitable for these retrofits.
• The government will offer generous tax deductions for investments that increase the efficiency of the remaining 41 percent of coal-fired plants. Upgrades that enhance the steam quality in a plant will reduce its CO₂ emissions by 5 percent.
• The EPA New Source Requirements procedure should be streamlined for all plants that apply to the Program so that businesses are not penalized for trying to become more energy efficient.
• The Program will provide $20 billion in financing for demonstration projects that integrate American-made renewable energy technologies into the portfolios of existing electricity providers. The renewable energy brought on-line by these projects will be subsidized so that electricity from these sites does not cost consumers more than the electricity coming from entirely fossil fuel burning sites.

The cost of this program cannot deter action. According to a recent study, the government could create two million new jobs by investing $100 billion in programs that support renewable and efficient energy use. This $100 billion is less than one-fifth of the amount of revenue earned by listed companies on climate-change-related business last year. Moreover, government backing for the renewable energy sector in Germany has nurtured an industry that employs more than 200,000 people and has had revenues of more than €20 billion ($29 billion) from the erection and operation of plants last year. Renewable energy is going to propel the world economy for generations—and the United States can’t afford to remain woefully behind.

“Bucks for Belchers” has the potential to stimulate green energy investments in all 50 states and help the U.S. become the leading user and exporter of green energy technologies. In the three months after the “Cash for Clunkers” program was passed, 98 percent of the $3 billion dollars earmarked for rebates was approved for payment. Government and the private sector can do amazing things when they work together—and in the wake of the Copenhagen debacle, there has never been a better time to announce that the U.S. is ready, willing and able to lead once again.

Neither country has an ideal health care system, but that is where the similarities end.  According to the Associated Press, the Chinese government is injecting $124-billion over three years to shore up the health care system, focusing on:

- Improving health services, in part by building 2,000 county hospitals and 29,000 township hospitals and ensuring that each of the country’s nearly 700,000 villages has a clinic.

- Expanding state health insurance from 70 to 90 percent of the population, or an additional 200 million people — equivalent to two-thirds of the U.S. population.

- Reducing drug costs by controlling prices for medications deemed essential.

It is an ambitious goal, if not entirely feasible, but it throws into stark contrast the sluggishness with which American health care legislation is being debated.  (For anyone who has quit paying attention, the Senate and the House have both passed health care legislation but have yet to reconcile their respective bills.)  This is the inherent disadvantage of democracy, further complicated in America by political obscurantism and entrenched corporate interests.  Oligarchy can lead to terrible decisions, but at least it’s quick.   China’s problem has never been promising things, but rather keeping those promises.   From the same article:

The central government has laid out a broad strategy but left specifics to local officials. The result is a series of experiments. While learning by doing is fine, there appears to be little formal evaluation of these trials, which may make it difficult to pinpoint what works…

China is using the same strategy that they used to test special economic zones—promulgating a goal and working backwards to find the best strategy that can be applied to the whole country.  But even if the government ends up meeting just a quarter of its goal, it will have given more people health care than are without it in the United States.

Which begs the question: does democracy in the United States protect people’s rights or has the political system become so broken that it actually does the opposite?  The Communist Party is by no means an enlightened despot but its ability to effect widespread, relatively-fast change is undisputed.  Whether it’s investment in infrastructure after the financial crisis, mobilizing rescue crews after the Sichuan earthquake, or spurring research in green energy, its quick thinking and unilateral decision making in those cases has helped the lives of its citizens.

Its track record of implementation, however, has not been as strong.  Corruption at lower levels of government is still rampant and pollution plagues the country partly due to skirted regulations.  This is where America typically has the advantage.  Staggered levels of courts and watchdog groups usually ensure that unprovocative legislation is enforced.  But after this year’s bailouts, public confidence in whether interest groups actually follow or are held accountable by the law has been shaken.

So what does this say about the future?  Which country will prove to be more responsible toward its citizens?  Outlandish as it might seem, it is arguably easier for the Chinese government to ease their hold on power than it is for the American people to reclaim theirs from the hands of corporate/political/religious interests that dominate American government today.  What’s sad is that all of Washington’s human rights criticisms are in danger of becoming painfully hypocritical if China gives its citizens universal health care before America.  At the end of this first decade in the twenty-first century, in terms of giving all its people access to affordable medical care, China and America have more in common than they realize.

A 10-year-old Arkansas boy named Will Phillips has refused to stand up in class and recite the pledge of allegiance as he feels that gays are not allowed to get married and are not included as part of a nation that provides ”liberty and justice for all.”

- Fridae

My first instinct: well done, young sir! I commend your brave and principled political stand against the forces of evil. More people should be sticking up for the oppressed, especially in the so-called “Land of the Free.”

Then I read on. Gay family friends. Gay-friendly parents “allies of the gay community” who take their son along to gay pride parades. Plans to become a lawyer. “I don’t feel there’s currently liberty and justice for all,” says the ten year-old, words suspiciously scripted in tone. Ten years old. TEN YEARS OLD. Further reading (and an accompanying photograph) showed children of Will’s age and younger holding up signs for God Hates Fags, and the article spoke of their indoctrination by religious extremist parents into towing the bigots’ line. What are we supposed to think?

Liberal gay-friendly children take a stand. Yay!
Baptist gay-hating children take a stand. Boo. Hiss.

Suddenly a sickening double-standard became clear to me. I remember vaguely what it was like to be ten years old. Back then, Mummy and Daddy were gods—I’d agree with most of their viewpoints and espouse them to my friends. I even remember writing a protest letter to the local newspaper about the closure of a local arts centre (even concocting the whopping lie that my school supported my stand). I didn’t even know what the arts were back then. I was a Lego-loving, computer-addicted, Roald Dahl-reading shut-in. A politically savvy participant in democracy I was not, and my parents never attempted to cajole me into joining their political causes, despite my father being, then and now, an actively outspoken Communist activist.

“Yes, my son is 10,” says the mother of Will Phillips. “But he’s probably more aware of the meaning of the pledge than a lot of adults.” Perhaps. Or perhaps he has interpreted it in line with what his parents have told him. The pledge of allegiance does not mention marriage or the gay/straight dichotomy. Nowhere in the American constitution or the Bill of Rights are gay people mentioned as a distinct group from heterosexuals—quite simply because the distinction is an invention of 19th century anthropologists and remains hotly contested as regards to its applicability to sexually diverse being like humans.

The proud parent continues, “He’s not just doing it rote recitation. We raised him to be aware of what’s right, what’s wrong, and what’s fair.” And a fine job you did, too, Mrs. Phillips. He sounds just like you.

There is no distinction in merit between a ten year-old speaking out for gay rights, and a ten year-old volunteering for God Hates Fags. Both are tools being used by their parents to draw unnecessary legitimacy and sympathy for their causes. “Why, sure, Mary-Ellen, if a ten year-old girl can independently summon a hatred of them gays, we sure’s hell better had, too!” “My, Jocasta, if a ten year-old boy can refuse to recite the Pledge of Allegiance until gay marriage is legalised, then we should, too! After all, I often consult ten year-olds when forming my own political consciousness.”

Will Phillips is indoctrinated in exactly the same way as the children of the God Hates Fags crowd. Political “stands” by prepubescent children are completely devoid of any deeper political meaning. Why?

BECAUSE THEY’RE CHILDREN, FOR GOD’S SAKE. Sorry to sound like Anita Bryant, but won’t somebody think of the children?

Kids are unaccountable for crimes, including rape and murder. They are not expected to pay taxes, or to run for President. Kids can’t be indicted as war criminals, nor can they work for humanitarian agencies. Kids aren’t supposed to work, period. They’re not supposed to perform any function in a community other than that of being kids. They can’t own guns, get married, have sex, drink alcohol, teach class, enter the priesthood or drive cars. Why? Because, by law, kids under 12 ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR ACTIONS. So why, then, can we deem them responsible for their words?

There’s a reason kids don’t vote. Whether a child espouses liberal or fascistic morals depends almost entirely on their parents, and using a child as a mouthpiece or for any ideology is morally bankrupt. If we force our kids to support this or that, we remove their own right to freedom of thought. Speak Greek to a child from birth, they’ll grow up speaking Greek. Tell a child to wash his hands after using the toilet from birth, and blow me down if they don’t go and do exactly that. Tell a child to legalise gay marriage from birth, they’ll grow up wanting gay marriage legalised. Until we grow old enough to perceive our parents as human beings, we lack the critical faculties to distinguish between political causes and acknowledge the two sides to every story. Kids leave religions when they grow up. Kids switch political affiliations when they grow up. Some kids never change from echoing their parents views—a fact that is one of the biggest drawbacks of allowing the popular vote.  Many peoples’ politics are decided at birth, simply by the family they were born into. If we gave kids the vote we’d get the same result as if we didn’t, just with an increase in turnout.

The closing line of the above-cited article was its most damning. “Now there are countless parents who have been galvanized into action and want to ensure their kids learn to not see LGBT citizens as equal.” Is this any better than forcing kids to accept LGBT people as equal? In fact, isn’t forcing kids to believe ANYTHING an abuse of parental power? Can’t we allow them to decide for themselves? Isn’t it the job of adults to engender political change and provide an ethical and equitable world for their children? Or have we shirked this responsibility as well? Give the kids a break and let them enjoy their childhoods. Parents—from Communist, through liberal and all the way to neo-Nazi, fight your own battles and take your children off the front line. Equality begins by permitting people to form their own opinions, and to take as much time as they need—kids included.

[We] call upon game producers to consequently and creatively incorporate rules of international humanitarian law and human rights into their games.

- BBC News

Two Swiss human rights organizations have slammed a series of war-related strategy and FPS games for permitting violence against civilians, including torture and massacres. They added that those who “violate international humanitarian law end up as war criminals, not as winners.” I think Pol Pot and Stalin may beg to differ, but political semantics aside, the point of computer games is to simulate reality in an entertaining format.

In real war, atrocities are carried out by belligerents upon civilians and soldiery alike, with little regard for the rule of law or the Geneva Conventions. Punishment, if it comes at all, is forced on the losers by the victors, whose own troops are, in victory, largely absolved of any responsibility for crimes committed in the line of duty. In my view, the inclusion of civilian targets in war games forces a moral decision on the player to choose between indiscriminate total war and a restrained, humanitarian approach. This decision is the player’s to make—psychos may want to gun babies down, but most of us abhor the idea and go to great lengths to protect civilians in games that feature them. Games with intriguing “moral arcs” such as BioShock and Half-Life dish out later punishments for ruthlessness (though they may reward it early on) and provide both replay value and allow players to experience guilt and become morally conflicted about their actions.

Typically, outside observers unaccustomed to computer games and their mores feel at liberty to comment on their content, in the same way that Southern baptists slam Harry Potter books for encouraging Satanism without taking the time to read, or even research their plotlines and characters. Preposterous arguments for Mao-style censorship are somehow granted legitimacy by being preceded with the idiot’s coverall disclaimer, “Speaking as a mother/priest/Presbyterian/humanitarian aid worker.” I’m with Trey Parker and Matt Stone—either it’s all acceptable, or none of it is. There are no, and can be no half-measures or compromises when it comes to freedom of speech.

Far be it from me to deny peoples’ opinions, but I also retain sufficient critical faculties (and a fundamental human right) to dismiss viewpoints which are founded on a lack of understanding and a vested interest in garnering publicity and provoking a “reaction.” I similarly disregard computer games as computer games, and while they have influenced my behavior in the past by making me a social recluse in my teenage years, they’ve never induced me to shoot coworkers or commuters in the face with an AK-47, no matter how tired or cranky I am. Researchers, even those invested in their findings, have failed to come up with a link between entertainment and violence—while the connection between religious and political education and violence is well documented, yet censorship has thus far failed to extend into our churches, mosques or sitting rooms. Compared to these vast institutions, the gaming industry is very, very small potatoes.

I applaud the work of humanitarian agencies, and would have no qualms about sending them to deal with any of the current hideous genocides and systemic oppressions going on around the world. But for opinions on the merits of computer gaming, I’ll ask computer gamers, not Amnesty International.

I wonder if the censorship bureau understands this parable because one thing everyone in China should know by now is that if you ever come across a website that terminates your Internet connection, start digging.

Recently, many writers have been weighing in on the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, and the 20th anniversary of an event that’s received much less publicity. NPR has three interviews with writers from three very different generations: Jiang Rong, 63 (“I criticized China’s politics, but not directly. What I criticized was deeper, and that was acceptable to the authorities.”), Yu Hua, 49 (“[I use] absurdity to describe absurd times.”), and Guo Jingming, 25 (“I don’t know much about my parents’ generation, and I don’t want to know.”), who, for better or worse, are representative of their time and the events that have shaped them.

Currently, the fastest way to get your Amazon.com connection terminated is to click on the link to Zhao Ziyang’s memoir.  In all fairness, China has been surprisingly open about the things you can read on Amazon. But this apparently strikes a nerve, even though the government has formally and publicly dismissed the memoir:

“Our Party and government long ago reached a clear conclusion about the events in China of the late 1980s, the political disturbances then and all related issues,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu, speaking hesitantly, told a regular news briefing.

Ironically, by not offering a reasonable account of the events in June, the government is basically making Zhao’s take on events the only primary source from within the Party.  The memoir, however, is banned in every place in China except Hong Kong.  Look for it on counterfeit book carts starting next week.

In the past week, more and more sites, including Twitter, Flickr, Hotmail, have been blocked.  The Guardian has some guesses about why. The Washington Post has also been blocked, perhaps because of an op-ed by Dan Southerland, Beijing bureau chief for the Post in ’89, that gives his account of that night. The New York Times also has a passionate op-ed by Ha Jin about why he chose to live in America and write in English.  Excerpt:

To some Chinese, my choice of English is a kind of betrayal. But loyalty is a two-way street. I feel I have been betrayed by China, which has suppressed its people and made artistic freedom unavailable.

Both are worth a read but the crown goes to Ma Jian, author of Beijing Coma, who wrote one for The Guardian.  It is a condemnation, told though experience and stories from eyewitnesses. (Yes, I know some of these links will be blocked—use a proxy.)  Excerpt:

“It happened right here,” he told me, “just by these white railings. A tank charged down Changan Avenue, and sprayed tear gas into the air. There was a big crowd of us. We were coughing and choking. We rushed on to the pavement, and I was squashed back against these railings. A girl dropped to her knees. I was grasping the railings with one hand to stop myself falling and with the other I offered her a handkerchief and told her to use it as a mask. Just as I was leaning over to hand it to her, another tank roared up and careered into us. Thirteen people were crushed to death but I only lost my arm. The tank commander knew exactly what he was doing.”

In these few days leading up to the 20th anniversary we are bound to hear more voices speak out in the Western media about what transpired that night.  We’ll hear stories, calls for openness, attacks on the government’s response, appeals to the disinterested youth of today.  But the question that worries the Chinese government is, will any of it be in Mandarin?

June 3, 2009 – EDIT: More op-eds from the New York Times by Yu Hua, Yiyun Li, and Lijia Zhang.

I had a very frustrating conversation with a Chinese woman once. She was a bright, intelligent person, web-savvy (she was a computer programmer), and on her way to Redmond to work at Microsoft. We began talking about the news, and I may have said some disparaging things about the reliability of the Chinese media. What surprised me was the sudden vehemence of her reaction. She was quite offended by the insinuation that the Chinese media was not trustworthy, and countered by telling me that the Western media was just as biased and unreliable. “How do you know that what they say is true? So how can you say that what the Chinese media says is not true? Maybe it’s not always completely true, but the West is just as bad.”

I admit, my response was not the most reasoned or intelligent. I may have just spluttered a few denials of her counter-accusation (weak denials, as I immediately thought of Fox News), and could only feebly assert that I, as a foreigner, could reliably tell her that the news that she watched was not as truthful as the news that I watched. While indubitably true, it sounded inane and arrogant even to my own ears.

Censorship aside, what the Chinese media lacks most are independent points of view. The opinions heard on various talk shows, news outlets, and op-ed pieces are generally all from a fairly narrow set of viewpoints—the illusion of debate, in many ways. For example, is the Dalai Lama soul-crushingly evil, or merely a child-eating demon? Diversity of thought is not overtly encouraged here in China.

Unfortunately, the United States may be headed in the same direction. I don’t mean that the government will start censoring articles, but rather the diversity of viewpoints might be disappearing. The slashing of budgets and the elimination of many journalist positions is creating a problem that we may not even be aware of: homogenizing news.

As Oscar pointed out, local journalists serve a very important role on the ground in the painstaking process of breaking a hidden story. They provide important human interest articles on local events that would not be covered in a national newspaper. Local reporters are more in tune with their surroundings, and are better able to pick up on the subtle nuances of what they are hearing.

Most people would agree, the genius of democracy is in its tolerance of many different points of view. But when everyone is coming from the same general point of view, there isn’t going to be very much diversity. For example, if we only have one journalist on the ground in a certain area, then all the information that we get will be coming through his or her take on events. And as anyone who’s ever compared news reporting on events can tell you, the impression that you walk away with depends a great deal on how the person presents it. A “resounding defeat” in one person’s report may be a “heroic stand” in someone else’s.

I met the Desperate Italian a few months ago, who characterizes himself as “an Italian journalist who loves his country, yet can’t stand what his country has become.” He cites the complacent and insular (even racist) attitudes of many of his fellow Italians as one of things that he deplores. One of the most telling things about the attitude toward the world that his country holds is his job: he alone is in charge of reporting on… Asia. And he works for a major Italian newspaper. That staggered me when I heard it. How could one man be expected to cover events from all of Asia? How much information will simply slip right by his limited time and attention? And how much nuance will he be able to get reporting on local events when he doesn’t even live in the same country?

Is the United States heading in the same direction? The recent trend of news companies suggests that we are. Unless some way is found to turn around the news services, we will see a significant fall in the quality and quantity of journalism—and that may result in increasingly insular and isolationist attitudes on the part of the American people. The last thing that we need for the future of America is another isolationist period. As any traveler abroad can tell you, the worst thing about America is often American tourists. Without quality, nuanced news reporting for people to read, what can we really expect from the future?

The Google and Amazon Revolutions have been about making computers intelligent—that is, so they don’t treat everyone the same way.  The world’s best mathematicians and artificial intelligence researchers have been working around the clock on letting computers remember who the user is and what the user likes.  The information collected is then applied to try to predict what kind of things the user would like, based on past preferences.  The wide availability of email now means that we don’t even have to open a web browser in order to find all the information we want.  On Amazon or Netflix I’ve gotten plenty of very helpful recommendations; Google smart advertisements allow me to find what I need without even having to look for it.  The Blogosphere can tell me what the news actually means without my having to read it.  It’s the ultimate in cheap, easy information.

What does this mean for the news?  It means a complete revolution is necessary.  The old paradigm is well on its way to the grave.  Given the saturation of personalized information, broad-spectrum advertising no longer has as big an effect.  We don’t need to scan through a hundred ads when a quick search of our email contains all the information we’re looking for.  Both online and in print, advertisements are becoming a thing of the past—or at the very least, more expensive than they’re really worth, and definitely not enough to sustain large news organizations.  So how can we bring the lessons of the internet to journalism?

Central News Searchable Database
Why doesn’t the mainstream news take some pointers from the scientific world?  Peer-reviewed journal articles typically can’t be viewed for free by the ordinary citizen.  Instead, universities and organizations pay for subscriptions that allow users to search and download articles.  Recent articles typically required full subscription, whereas older articles could often be found for free—exactly the opposite of what The New York Times and The Washington Post do.

When I worked in a research lab, I used a wonderful tool called ScienceDirect.  It was a powerful search engine that remembered your past results and would recommend other articles (based on citations, in true scientific fashion).  Newspapers should combine their archives under a universal search engine that is available only to paid subscribers.  They should make it a powerful and customizable search engine to allow users to greatly refine their searches.  It should also contain various algorithms to predict articles of interest based on past preferences—certain columnists or articles containing multiple references to “China”, for example.  Currently, most of them only have user-selected preferences.  With all due respect to the users, they are often terrible at recognizing their own true biases.

People prefer to have a context to put things in.  Instead of publishing every day, many newspapers may have to convert themselves (in print fashion, at least) to a weekly newspaper. This will obviously save a great deal in terms of staff cost, and possibly improve the quality of articles (though certainly reduce the quantity).  The focus of news, like we’ve seen in television journalism, will change from simple reporting of the facts and events to interpretation of facts and events.  Articles will continue to be published in a more haphazard manner online, and the weekly print edition will contain the highlights of what’s been popular online, along with meta-reviews of the news.

Whatever the fix, action should be taken soon.  If there’s something that the financial crisis has taught us is that just because a company is a fixture doesn’t mean that its future is assured.  The New York Times and The Washington Post are just as vulnerable to collapse as any Wall Street company.  Gentlemen, it’s time to recognize that you have a quality product, and that the literate masses need to truly appreciate it.  And who appreciates something that’s totally free?