Jackie Chan's China comments prompt backlash

[ray245]

AP

HONG KONG - Action star Jackie Chan 's comments wondering whether Chinese people "need to be controlled" have drawn sharp rebuke in his native Hong Kong and in Taiwan .

Chan told a business forum in the southern Chinese province of Hainan that a free society may not be beneficial for China 's authoritarian mainland.

"I'm not sure if it's good to have freedom or not," Chan said Saturday. "I'm gradually beginning to feel that we Chinese need to be controlled. If we're not being controlled, we'll just do what we want."

He went on to say that freedoms in Hong Kong and Taiwan made those societies "chaotic."

Chan's comments drew applause from a predominantly Chinese audience of business leaders, but did not sit well with lawmakers in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

"He's insulted the Chinese people. Chinese people aren't pets," Hong Kong pro-democracy legislator Leung Kwok-hung told The Associated Press. "Chinese society needs a democratic system to protect human rights and rule of law."

Another lawmaker, Albert Ho, called the comments "racist," adding: "People around the world are running their own countries. Why can't Chinese do the same?"

Former British colony Hong Kong enjoys Western-style civil liberties and some democratic elections under Chinese rule. Half of its 60-member legislature is elected, with the other half picked by special interest groups. But Hong Kong's leader is chosen by a panel stacked with Beijing loyalists.

In democratically self-ruled Taiwan, which split from mainland China during a civil war in 1949, legislator Huang Wei-che said Chan himself "has enjoyed freedom and democracy and has reaped the economic benefits of capitalism. But he has yet to grasp the true meaning of freedom and democracy."

Chan's comments were reported by news outlets in Hong Kong and Taiwan, but were ignored by the mainland Chinese press.

Although Chan was a fierce critic of the brutal crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing's Tiananmen Square in June 1989, which killed at least hundreds, he has not publicly criticized China's government in recent years and is immensely popular on the mainland.

He performed during the opening and closing ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics and took part in the Olympic torch relay .

Chan also is vice chairman of the China Film Association, a key industry group.

[Havok]

It's interesting that the comments back seem to indicate they feel that Chan said that the Chinese need to be controlled by people outside China, and not just by the Chinese government like I assumed. It sounds like he maybe likes communism and feels that democracy and capitalism leads to a poor society and one he personally doesn't like.

[Singular Intellect]

I'm honestly not seeing what's so offenseive about his comment, other than perhaps singling out a specific group of people, which implies more concern in their department than others.

Let's face it; a lot of people do need to be controlled and told what to do. There's a reason why we have laws about things like seatbelts, food safety and countless other subjects. It's because we can't trust the judgement of people in general.

[K. A. Pital]

They think it's offensive because Taiwan and Hong Kong are okay without a CPC autocracy. To be fair, they do have some valid claims. Why is autocracy necessarily better? We're talking about what's desireable, not about what's immediately feasible, right?

[ray245]

It's interesting that the comments back seem to indicate they feel that Chan said that the Chinese need to be controlled by people outside China, and not just by the Chinese government like I assumed. It sounds like he maybe likes communism and feels that democracy and capitalism leads to a poor society and one he personally doesn't like.

From what I understand, he is saying that Chinese as an ethnic group cannot have a democratic based government, simply because as a people, Chinese as a whole will always abuse the rights to freedom.

[Darth Wong]

I say that Canadians and Americans need paternalistic government all the time; it's not necessarily a racial comment. I actually mean it to apply to all humans, it's just that my political comments tend to be rooted in my own personal context, ie- North America.

[Darth Yoshi]

I don't see what the big deal is. People in general will take advantage of freedoms to do whatever the hell they want.

Another lawmaker, Albert Ho, called the comments "racist," adding: "People around the world are running their own countries. Why can't Chinese do the same?"

I'm honestly not seeing how Chan's comments were racist. Maybe the article simply isn't providing enough context, but all Chan seems to say is that an authoritarian gov't is good for China. Which there is, run by Chinese.

[apocolypse]

I'm honestly not seeing how Chan's comments were racist. Maybe the article simply isn't providing enough context, but all Chan seems to say is that an authoritarian gov't is good for China. Which there is, run by Chinese.

I don't think that the comment means the way it's interpreted here. From how I read it, is that everyone else is capable of running their own democratic countries (well, quite a few of them at least ) but that for some reason the Chinese just aren't as capable of it. The implication being racist in that the Chinese as a culture/people can't do what other cultures/peoples can.

[PainRack]

I can only find the chinese excerpt of Jackie speech translated here and not the full speech, but without that context, it appears that Jackie IS speaking something else that various Taiwan politicians are jumping on. The problem is that different news articles are reporting different variants of his excerpts. The most contingous reporting of his sentences is actually arranged in this manner. In Chinese "有自由好还是没有自由好，真的我现在已经混乱了、太自由了，就变成像香港现在这个样子很乱，而且变成台湾这个样子也很乱，我慢慢觉得，我们中国人是需要管的"
"Whether it is better to have freedom or not, I'm really confused.Too free, and we become as chaotic as Hongkong, and will become as chaotic as Taiwan, I'm slowly begining to feel, that we chinese need to be "controlled".
Arranged in this manner, the sentence actually takes on a slightly different meaning. Its not saying that Chinese can't handle freedom, and without freedom, China will become chaotic. Its saying that with too much freedom, China will become as chaotic as other countries such as Hong Kong or Taiwan, and thus, Chinese need to be controlled. Its still an speech supporting authorianism, but has a different contextual meaning. To put it in a more western orientated context, try using the word liberal to replace freedom. Its about Jackie Chan as a conservative, and about Jacke Chan supporting the current authorian government and doctrine over a more liberal approach.


In another extract of the speech, Jackie also says that when he's shopping overseas, he's able to purchase a lot of high quality Chinese goods, but that he's unable to acquire the same quality goods in China. A lot of Chinese youth are worshipping (the contextual word should be admire) the West,Japan,Korea, but just not worshipping China.

Given the whole context, I do believe that Jackie isn't arguing against democracy in so far as he's arguing against China/Hong Kong needs to become more liberal and that attempts to become more liberal is an attempt to model the west, and not "traditional" china.

[PainRack]

I'm honestly not seeing what's so offenseive about his comment, other than perhaps singling out a specific group of people, which implies more concern in their department than others.

Let's face it; a lot of people do need to be controlled and told what to do. There's a reason why we have laws about things like seatbelts, food safety and countless other subjects. It's because we can't trust the judgement of people in general.

Its offensive because its claiming that Taiwan and Hong Kong are in chaos.

[PainRack]

oops. I found a fuller extract of the second bit.

我在国外购物，买回来的很多东西都是“Made in China”(中国制造)，这些产品的质量都很好，但在国内买的一模一样的产品，质量却差了很多。我们国内许多年轻人都崇洋、崇日、崇韩，就是不崇中，比如他们总是模仿黑人“YO YO”地说话，我到国外和黑人拍戏也会模仿他们的说话方式，但不代表平时也要这样。我在国外常穿唐装，就是要告诉他们我是中国人。

来源 中国娱乐网(www.yule.com.cn) 原文：http://news.yule.com.cn/html/200904/42696.html
Its essentially saying that there is no reason to imitate others, and that its good to act chinese.

In the last extract I found on the same site, he talks about a seperate topic about his career success, and that he did it by "re-imagining" and creating new stuff and not blindly following others.