It's flash-bang opinion time

There's a lot going on in Taiwan, and I have thoughts

Happy Lunar New Year!

Sometimes, I avoid writing posts because, while I do have an opinion on this or that news item, it’s not particularly well-suited to a more verbose format. At these times, I really miss the old Twitter.

I’ve decided this time to do a series of “shorts”: a link to an article or video, a quick summary, and my opinion.

Let’s start with the movie Murder of the Century, supposedly about the murders of family members of democracy activist Lin Yi-hsiung on February 28, 1980. February 28, locally called “228”, is also an important day in Taiwanese history, and many believe it was intentionally chosen as the date of the murders.

Apparently the movie producers failed to contact Lin or gain the Lin family’s consent to make the movie; the actors were not apprised of this and are demanding a halt to production. Even weirder, the leaked script implies that another pro-democracy activist committed the murders. That, of course, makes no sense and although the murders have never been solved, is probably not what happened.

According to my Taiwanese teacher, the implied murderer is either Su Beng or You Si-kun. General gossip is that funding for the film is questionable, and may have come from China, the KMT, or some sort of funnel from China through the KMT (honestly I’m not even sure how the CCP and KMT differ at this point).

My opinion? No one is that stupid. This wasn’t a dumb mistake. You’d have to be too much of a hopeless moron to fail to do the most basic groundwork when creating what seems to be a well-funded film. I’m just a blogger and even I know that you simply would not do this blindly.

So, while I can’t prove it, I’d easily bet that China is ramping up its disinformation campaign. Not content with garbage-filled websites and misleading articles and posts in Line groups — among other things — they’re trying to discredit Taiwan’s pro-democracy forces through big-budget films. That, or the KMT. Honestly, both. Is it even a secret anymore that the KMT takes money from the CCP?

Next up, the Taiwanese legislature has pushed through a bill exempting the China Youth Corps from the Ill-Gotten Assets regulations. These were put in place years ago by the DPP to find all the money the KMT stole and hoarded from its time as the dictators of Taiwan and wealthiest political party in the world.

There’s a lot here, but I just have one thing to say: now we know where the KMT is hiding a bunch of ill-gotten assets. Thanks for pointing us to them, KMT.

Third, the US House of Representatives has passed the PROTECT Taiwan Act, which warns China of “consequences” if it threatens Taiwan’s security.

Frankly, good. I can’t stand Republicans, but good.

I’ve long been worried that the KMT’s general pro-China stance and the DPP’s general pro-US stance would start to be a problem for the US as Trump’s presidency grows, well, more and more demented, and I mean that literally. Quite unlike the attitude Taiwanese people seemed to once have of Trump — someone who was a bit of a quack but pro-Taiwan, so support for him was higher than you’d think or want — most people I talk to now think he is, at the very least, sick in the head. They don’t seem to care that much about Venezuela, and they think threats against Greenland are a bit of a joke, but there’s no longer any way to hide that the dude is just a whackjob.

It’s great that people are realizing this, though my main evidence is anecdotal. However, an unstable US with an unstable president (again, I mean that literally) might make China look like the more appealing choice to some fence-sitters. Certainly, I’ve heard people say that if the US is going to be so unreliable, then maybe the KMT has a point that Taiwan needs to make nice with China.

To be clear, this won’t work. China only wants to play at diplomacy with Taiwan insofar as it furthers their annexation goal, and will only ever use it to try and push Taiwan toward annexation. It will never be interested in Taiwan’s perspective or opinion on the matter. China simply does not care what Taiwan wants. Every “diplomatic” win is just another strategy by China to salami-slice Taiwan into a dependent or tributary state, leading to eventual absorption. This is usually done through economic agreements that the KMT insist will be good for Taiwan, but only ever seem to benefit China. There is no world in which diplomacy with this kind of government will lead to stability, security and peace.

But, not everyone thinks that deeply about it, and some people might glance the surface of the issue, read some disinformation, and think that better relations with China are more important than bolstering Taiwan’s relationship with an increasingly deranged US government. At least, it’s an easy way to attack the DPP’s friendliness towards whoever is in charge in the US.

The only spot of hope I see here is that Taiwanese mostly seem to care about whatever will protect Taiwan, not the bigger picture of what another country is doing (see: Taiwan-Israel relations, and doesn’t Taiwan buy Russian oil?). I don’t even blame Taiwan for this: under such an existential threat, they have to do whatever is necessary to protect themselves. Any other country would probably do the same. It’s time we stopped judging Taiwan so harshly for just trying to survive in an very turbulent world with a massive threat just off the coast. I hate President Pedophile, but I don’t blame Taiwan for trying to work with him.

Steps like the PROTECT act and lowering tariffs are a means to that end.

A few quick ones:

Taiwan reaffirms support for new nuclear technology

Frankly, good. I think it’s time we stop assuming the DPP is totally anti-nuclear (the KMT is quite pro-nuclear). Yes, they play up anti-nuclear sentiment because so many of their supporters oppose it, but we need reasonable policy that is not opposed to a technology per se, but is willing to look at any option that can be done safely. The key here, and what the KMT fails to understand, is “safely”. The KMT has utterly failed to gain public trust on nuclear issues because frankly, it hasn’t even tried. It doesn’t care what the public thinks. It doesn’t think public consent is necessary.

It is, though, and I do think that if approached correctly, nuclear is an option for Taiwan. Just not in the haphazard “we don’t need no environmental assessments!” way the KMT approaches it.

KMT-CCP Forum was not political, KMT says

Haha, LOL.

The CCP only ever wants to interact with Taiwan if they’re pushing a strategy aimed at eventual annexation. Tourism, business, disaster prevention? All past avenues they’ve used to try to force Taiwan down a path it doesn’t want to go down. Remember all those Chinese tourists in Taiwan? Remember how the businesses catering to them were “one dragon” (一條龍) businesses — owned start to finish by the same organization — with the profits mostly going to China? Remember economic agreements that bled Taiwan’s workforce, mostly creating jobs in China? Remember how, once upon a time, China tried to insist that international disaster aid to Taiwan must go through China?

Not political, my big fat white butt.