20 Dec 2010 |
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![]() Her subsequent comments were perhaps less so. “Do you know the word 偏见 (pianjian)?” “No.” “It’s what happens to Asian people when they go to Britain. You know, when British people treat them badly.” In fact 偏见 means ‘prejudice’, and 歧视 (qishi) ‘discrimination’, is generally seen to represent racism. However, whether your talking racial prejudice or racial discrimination, 种族偏见 or 种族歧视, it amounts to more or less the same thing. These discoveries only came post-dictionary consultation, though, so they aren’t too relevant to the conversation. “Yes, there have been some problems in Britain. A lot of it’s to do with immigration, particularly illegal immigration.” “It is a very bad situation.” “Yes, but every country has problems with racism, including China.” “No, it doesn’t…” Obviously there was no point trying to argue that Britain doesn’t have a problem with racism. Abuse from the football terraces; a young black man in a nice car much more likely to be stopped for a police check than a young white man in a similar vehicle; Stephen Lawrence; post 9-11 persecution of Muslims; white-dominated upper echelons of business and government; playground jokes made at the expense of the kids wearing turbans and headscarves; reports of institutional racism in pretty much every kind of institution: the list goes on and on. Is China really innocent of all this, though? In the modern world, is it possible to identify a country unscarred by prejudice based on skin tone, be it manifested in direct abuse or narrow-minded thought? Of course not. But there was nothing to be gained in catechising a characters teacher on the issue, particularly when she has in the past betrayed a slight sensitivity to any criticism of the mother country. The UK’s problems are typical to any multiracial society, but China cannot be classified as one of these. Tensions between whites, blacks, Asians, Arabs, etc in Britain are the result of years of isolation (at times self-imposed) and mistrust. However, when a country has spent 30 years of its recent history virtually closed off to outside influence, its people’s response to different ethnic groups (not including domestic ones) will be very different. Anyone who has a passing interest in China and come across a copy of ‘Wild Swans’ at some point in their life, will know that the black sailors with whom Communist China had dealings were regarded with great suspicion by the rank and file. Black people were seen in coarse, tribal terms, uncivilised creatures that couldn’t control their sexual urges. Monkey! Monkey!Of course, through greater contact came deeper understanding but these simplistic prejudices remained well into the 1990s. I remember talking to a well-travelled African student in a Shanghai hostel in 1998, and hearing his stories of living and travelling in China over the previous few years. In some places, the locals screamed ‘Monkey! Monkey!’ when he and his friends walked down the street, not realising their foreign guests understood what was being said.This came as something of a shock to me. By 1998, the NBA had become so significantly rooted in Chinese culture that ‘Michael Jordan’ was the phrase most commonly uttered as my Trinidad-born teaching partner walked through the streets of Qingdao. Bearing in mind the esteem in which his ‘Royal Air-ness’ is held along the GMT +0800 axis, such comparisons amounted to a compliment of the highest order. While the monkey chants have disappeared, does a residual discrimination still lurk in the Chinese psyche? The answer is yes. Even among the educated classes, you can sometimes detect a secondary meaning secreted in a passing remark or an assumption based entirely on racial stereotype. Maybe we should blame the school textbooks. Last year, I took part in a television advertisement in Beijing promoting the Olympics (they send lackeys round the universities with camcorders searching for foreign students in need of a fast buck). Every effort was made to be as inclusive – the producers had clearly scoured the embassies in order to secure the broadest possible palette of skin tones. When it came to allocating the roles, though, those in charge were undermined by their stereotyped views. A Russian, an American and myself – three whites – were to be businessmen in a (ridiculous French period-style) boardroom, drinking to the business success a Chinese Olympics will bring. Meanwhile the black guys who had been recruited were dispatched with a camera crew to the nearest running track. PrejudicePrejudice based on stereotype is not merely a black and white issue in China. As I have mentioned before, each nationality to be seems pigeonholed into particular categories. Russians – violent, Germans – drinkers, British – drinkers and football hooligans, French – romantics, Americans – rich and arrogant, Japanese – evil, etc.No matter where you are from, no matter what generic characteristics have been attributed to your colour or nationality, you are a foreigner and will be treated as such. There is no gradual integration as happens with ex-pats across Europe, you are either in the club or you are out of it – and there is a clearly marked line drawn between the two groups. From this another kind of prejudice sprouts. When the infamous ‘Frenchman A’ tangled with the cab driver, See: You'll never get a cab in this town again, a host of Chinese witnesses were willing to submit false statements in the interests of screwing over the foreigner. Market traders across the country are well known for their zeal in extracting the highest price possible from overseas customers. My exchanges with shopkeepers often run along these lines:“This is the lowest price I can charge, any lower and I won’t make any money on the product. This is the Chinese person’s price.”“There is a Chinese person’s price?” “Yes.”
“And a foreigner’s price?” Rip-Off-The-Foreigner
Yes, an extortionate price in China would still be a bargain back home, and yes, western salaries are much higher than Chinese ones. Therefore moneyed up tourists and those living in China on western pay scale are able to spend freely. But some foreigners have to exist on Chinese salaries, while others have to exist on no salary at all. Once again it is an issue of stereotyping: all foreigners are seen to have money, they are rich enough not to count the cost of a little overcharging. It’s worth mentioning that the growing numbers of Chinese able to indulge in domestic tourism are also preyed upon by unscrupulous vendors, however they are unlikely to be so brazenly exploited. Anger and Resentment
But through artful representation and repetition of these facts, the historical injustices suffered by China were manifested as anger and resentment in its people’s minds. Look after number one became the order of the day. By fostering this sense of nationalism, the government could draw on a collective strength and ensure everyone was batting for the same team. Why look for the devil at home when someone has sign-posted Satan’s kingdom on another country’s shores? Fear
Most Chinese people – city dwellers not regularly driven into street-side skirmishes by unpleasant local liqueur – seem happy to moan about social injustices when appropriate. But they do this in the privacy of their own homes, not standing on a soapbox at Speaker’s Corner in Hyde Park. They care most about the issues directly facing them: how to pay the bills and how to make more money. If these domestic goals can be achieved with minimum fuss, then all is well – and, like a small business dodging VAT, they prefer to stay at arm’s length from the eye of the authorities. Prejudice on a domestic level
Like many countries, China also has problems with prejudice on a domestic level. This doesn’t just include the state-sanctioned mistreatment of assorted ethnic minorities, notably Tibet and Xinjiang. TV show exposes racism in China
Lou Jing is a Chinese girl who sings Shanghai opera and speaks fluent Mandarin, but when she competed to be China's next reality TV pop star, it was not her voice that was criticised - it was her black skin. Read more about this here or here. |
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