Bevin Chu
January 13, 2007
Then
Now
The first law, The Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor, prohibited marriages and extra-marital intercourse between "Jews" (the name was now officially used in place of "non-Aryans") and "Germans" and also the employment of "German" females under forty-five in Jewish households. The second law, The Reich Citizenship Law, stripped Jews of their German citizenship and introduced a new distinction between "Reich citizens" and "nationals."
-- The Jewish Virtual Library, describing The Nuremberg Laws
The Taiwan independence movement, as I have long maintained, is no friend of liberty.
Actually, that's a gross understatement. The Taiwan independence movement, due to its atavistic political priorities, is a natural enemy of liberty.
Why?
Because it is impossible to have more than one highest priority, and in order to be a friend of liberty, individual liberty must be one's highest priority.
If individual liberty is not one's highest priority, then one is not a friend of liberty. One is a friend of something else. To identify oneself as a friend of liberty under such circumstances, is to misrepresent oneself. It is to lie.
To learn what someone's highest value is, one need only ascertain which values he is willing to dispense with.
Most conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats insist that they are defenders of liberty, and that individual liberty is their highest value.
They lie.
If someone insists that he values individual liberty, but is willing to sacrifice individual liberty to social order, then he is not a defender of individual liberty, but a defender of social order. Conservative Republicans are not defenders of individual liberty. They are defenders of social order.
If someone insists that he values individual liberty, but is willing to sacrifice individual liberty to economic equality, then he is not a defender of individual liberty, but a defender of economic equality. Liberal Democrats are not defenders of individual liberty. They are defenders of economic equality.
What are Taiwan independence advocates defenders of? What is their highest value?
Taiwan independence advocates and their Western apologists solemnly assure us that Taiwan independence advocates are "progressive democrats," and that their highest values are "freedom, democracy, and human rights."
Is anyone obtuse enough to take these Taiwan independence spin controllers at their word?
No one reading this column I hope.
If someone insists that he values individual liberty, but is willing to sacrifice liberty to ethnic identity, ethnic solidarity, even ethnic purity, then he values ethnic identity, ethnic solidarity, and ethnic purity more than he values individual liberty.
Taiwan independence advocates harp incessantly on the alleged need for "localization," "nativization," and "cultivating a Taiwanese consciousness."
When Taiwan independence advocates obsess about these matters, it means that what they are really preoccupied with, and what they really value, are not "freedom, democracy, and human rights," but ethnic identity, ethnic solidarity, even ethnic purity -- as defined by the Taiwan independence movement.
Taiwan independence advocates are not defenders of individual liberty. They are defenders of a "Taiwanese, not Chinese" ethnic identity, of "Taiwanese, not Chinese" ethnic solidarity, and as we shall see from the China Post news article that follows, "Taiwanese, not Chinese" ethnic purity.
Therefore, whenever Taiwan independence advocates' declared goal of championing "freedom, democracy, and human rights" conflicts with their actual goal of establishing an ethnically separate "Taiwanese, not Chinese" Republic of Taiwan, guess which goal gets sacrificed, without even batting an eyelash?
What the Taiwan independence movement wants more than anything else, is to indoctrinate a critical mass of Chinese people on Taiwan with their artificially concocted "Taiwanese, not Chinese" ethnic consciousness.
If and when they succeed in their ambitious social engineering project, they will demand political secession from China, not just for themselves, but for everyone else on Taiwan, regardless of whether everyone else on Taiwan wants secession from China or not.
Blaming outsiders not the answer
2007/1/8
The China Post
Following the long-awaited establishment of the National Immigration Agency (NIA), much attention has been focused on the vast number of foreign and mainland Chinese spouses who have immigrated to Taiwan.
Comment: I'm not sure just exactly who has long awaited the establishment of yet another government bureaucracy in charge of telling people what they can and cannot do, but I can assure you I haven't.
After all, what is "immigration" but a physical expression of the natural right of individual human beings to move about freely in the world into which they were born, without being harassed at gunpoint by local gangs known as governments?
Given this unsatisfactory state of affairs, I was gratified to see the China Post use the semantically accurate formulation, "foreign and mainland Chinese spouses," instead of the Taiwan independence movement's semantically misleading formulation, "foreign spouses, including Chinese spouses."
China Post: During a recent hearing at the Legislative Yuan, at which lawmakers grilled NIA chief Wu Cheng-chi, Wu pointed out that the total number of foreign spouses living in Taiwan has reached 380,000, including 240,000 mainland Chinese and another 130,000 coming from various other countries, mostly in Southeast Asia.
Recent statistics show that on average, one out of every five marriages in Taiwan is between a Taiwan resident and a foreign national. It is not surprising that this trend has alarmed many people here in Taiwan. While local people have always enjoyed the freedom to choose a foreign spouse, the sharply rising number of persons who choose to do so reflects major social and demographic changes in recent years.
Comment: The China Post notes correctly that "this trend has alarmed many people here in Taiwan." The China Post is of course referring to "ben tu" Hoklo Chauvinist advocates of Taiwan independence.
Contrast their mindset with that of China's great Han and Tang dynasties, arguably the world's first global economies. The willingness of China's Han and Tang dynasties to implement a form of proto-globalization was clearly historic, and possibly unprecedented.
China Post: However, a small number of political leaders have chosen to make foreign spouses into scapegoats in order to further their domestic political agendas.
During the recent legislative hearing, lawmakers with the pro-Taiwan independence Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) accused mainland Chinese spouses of seeking to form a voting bloc that would put a pro-Beijing government into power here.
According to TSU lawmaker Lo Chih-ming, approximately 110,000 mainland Chinese spouses of Taiwan nationals will receive national identification cards before March of 2008, the date of our next presidential election.
During the legislative session, Lo asked NIA chief Wu if these mainland Chinese spouses would be more likely to vote for the TSU, or for Ma Ying-jeou, the most likely presidential candidate of the opposition Kuomintang.
Comment: Is any comment even necessary? Lo Chih-ming, a Deep Green Taiwan independence fascist, didn't even bother to couch his concerns in euphemisms. He came right out and admitted what bothered him. I suppose that constitutes honesty of a sort, the same sort of honesty displayed by a David Duke or a Pauline Hanson.
China Post: While Wu has come under fire since taking the helm at the NIA, we believe he was correct to point out that the rather arduous and long process of obtaining national identification cards by mainland Chinese spouses effectively prevents them from turning into a "fifth column" that could influence local politics and elections.
In fact, it is extremely difficult for mainland Chinese spouses to obtain residency here, and many wait for years before they get the chance to settle down with their spouses in Taiwan.
Comment: I find it difficult even to read the responses of bureaucrats such as Wu. Such feeble responses implicitly affirm the morally reprehensible, not to mention patently false premises of the interrogator.
Anyone who would ask such a question in the first place, is unfit to be a leader within a civilized society. Anyone who would ask such a question does not deserve a response at all. At least not a polite response, and certainly not a timid, apologetic response.
That a racist demagogue such as Lo would feel justified asking such a question, and that a spineless flakcatcher such as Wu would feel obligated to respond so meekly, shows just how much Taiwan under Pan Green fascism resembles Germany under National Socialism.
No one is saying that "ben tu" Taiwanese fascism poses an international threat comparable to Nazism during the 1930s. That would be absurd. Militarily speaking, Pan Green fascist ruled Taiwan is not in the same league as Nazi Germany. If Nazi Germany was in the majors, then fascist Taiwan is in the minors, or maybe even the Little League.
The threat posed by Taiwanese fascism is indirect. Taiwanese fascism could easily be spark that sets off a US/Japanese neocolonialist war against China.
What political observers on Taiwan, including myself are saying, is that "ben tu" Taiwanese fascism exhibits the same basic traits as Nazism during the 1930s, the same racist premises, and the same racist policies.
China Post: Even when discussing general issues of cross-strait relations, we have long ago become tired of hearing local politicians place the blame for all of their woes at the doorstep of mainland Chinese, mostly women, who happen to be married to Taiwan nationals. Besides social and demographic issues confronting our society that has led local men to seek foreign wives in large numbers, there are other reasons why such a volume of local men have taken mainland Chinese wives. One good reason why so many local men have taken mainland Chinese wives is because hundreds of thousands of Taiwanese are living and working in mainland China in the first place.
Therefore, it is hardly a surprise that at least some of them would end up bringing back spouses from the mainland.
Comment: Exactly. What could be more natural? According to the Constitution of the Republic of China that is the basic law on Taiwan, the mainland region China is part of the Republic of China. Republic of China citizens on Taiwan who marry mainland Chinese are not marrying foreigners, but their fellow countrymen. Is there a problem?
China Post: Clearly, pro-independence leaders fear an influx of mainland Chinese into Taiwan society, since they are known not to support the political agenda of Taiwan independence.
Comment: Neither mainland Chinese nor Taiwan Chinese ought to support the agenda of the Taiwan independence movement, which has never involved anything so exalted as higher moral principles, but primitive tribal affiliation.
China Post: However, these politicians are effectively seeking to interfere with the freedom of local citizens to marry anyone they please, not least including citizens of mainland China and other countries.
We simply cannot eliminate the constitutionally protected right of local citizens to choose their wives and husbands merely to satisfy the political agenda of a small handful of politicians.
Comment: Hear! Hear! Am I mistaken, or did I actually hear a declaration of moral principles in addition to citation of legal principles?
Actually the China Post editors were much too polite: "effectively seeking to interfere with the freedom of local citizens to marry anyone they please?"
What they should have said is "These contemptible racists are resorting to state violence to prevent sovereign and independent human beings from making the most basic and important decisions of their lives -- whom to marry and have children with."
China Post: At the same time, it is patently unfair for politicians to blame society's woes on people who lack citizenship and therefore have no right to vote.
During the legislative hearing, Lo claimed that the government has to spend some NT$3 billion per year "taking care" of foreign spouses in Taiwan. Remarks like these make it appear as if our politicians regard foreign spouses as refugees, or maybe even less than human.
How much money has been spent by foreign governments providing welfare benefits to Taiwan nationals who have emigrated abroad in vast numbers over past decades?
And considering the fact that many foreign spouses work to support their households, how much money in tax revenues have foreign spouses brought to the government's coffers?
It is not completely unreasonable to assume that the amount of tax revenues generated from foreign spouses may equal or even exceed the NT$3 billion per year that is spent to "take care" of them.
Comment: Such pragmatic arguments involving profit and loss may be perfectly true, but should one have to make them in the first place? Any society in which individuals must justify the exercise of human rights as basic as the choice of one's own spouse, to government officials, on fiscal grounds, can hardly be considered a free society.
China Post: Inciting zealotry and blaming non-nationals who cannot vote in elections is not the right way to find an answer to the social changes that have prompted one of every five marriages to involve non-ROC citizens.
Comment: Inciting zealotry and blaming disenfranchised minorities may not be the way civilized societies respond to social change, but it most assuredly is the way of the Taiwan independence movement, which is no friend of liberty.
Individual liberty has allowed Chinese men on Taiwan to marry Chinese women from the Chinese mainland. The exercise of their fundamental human right to marry whomever they choose is throwing a monkey wrench into the Taiwanization/de-Sinicization social engineering project of the Taiwan independence movement. It is undermining the Taiwan independence movement's effort to create an artificial "Taiwanese, not Chinese" ethnic identity.
In short, Taiwan independence political priorities are fundamentally at odds with individual liberty, and individual liberty is fundamentally at odds with Taiwan independence political priorities.
As I have been saying for over a decade, the Taiwan independence movement, due to its atavistic political priorities, is a natural enemy of liberty. It always has, and always will be.
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