Pls pls read this powerful, insightful and moving essay by Prof. Xu Zhangrun that's masterfully translated by Geremie Barmé of @chinaheritage Xu forsaw the public sentiment that was building up and erupted following the death of Dr. Li Wenliang http://www.chinafile.com/reporting-opinion/viewpoint/viral-alarm-when-fury-overcomes-fear … Excerpts:
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The ancients observed that “it’s easier to dam a river than it is to silence the voice of the people.” Regardless of how good they are at controlling the Internet, they can’t keep all 1.4 billion mouths in China shut.
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The bureaucratic and governance system of China we see now is one that values the mediocre, the dilatory and the timid. The mess they have made in Hubei Province, and the grotesque posturing of the incompetents involved has highlighted a universal problem.
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Don’t you see that although everyone looks to The One for the nod of approval, The One himself is clueless and has no substantive understanding of rulership and governance, despite his undeniable talent for playing power politics.
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It is herein that we play a role. That’s right, we, We the People, for how can we let ourselves “survive no better than swine; fawn upon the power-holders like curs; and live in vile filth like maggots”?!
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As I write these words I reflect on my own situation which also dramatically changed in 2018. Writing as I do herein, I can now all too easily predict that I will be subjected to new punishments; indeed, this may well even be the last piece I write. But that is not for me to say.
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Confronted by this Great Virus,as all of us are right now,I feel as though a vast chasm has opened up before us all &I feel compelled to speak out yet again.There is no refuge from this viral reality and I cannot remain silent. To act in any other way would be to betray my nature
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In the end,it is about Freedom-that Transcendent Quality;well-spring &fulcrum of conscious action;that secular value proven to be the most divine aspiration of humankind;that innate sensibility that truly makes us human;that ineffable “suchness” that Chinese share with all others
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Prof. Xu's 2018 essay ‘Imminent Fears, Immediate Hopes’ 我們當下的恐懼與期待, written after China changed its constitution to allow lifetime presidency, was also translated by Geremie Barméhttp://chinaheritage.net/journal/imminent-fears-immediate-hopes-a-beijing-jeremiad/ …
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