China’s despicable racism

Last week Charlottesville racial attacks created a buzz across the World. White Supremacists marched with torches chanting Nazi slogans down the lanes of University of Virginia. The next day morning representatives of Klu-Klux-Klan joined the protests ostentatiously displaying of racists symbols swastika and confederate flags. Soon counter racist groups too assembled. The protests turned violent when a white supremacy supporter mowed car into pedestrians, killing a woman and injuring 19 others. The attacks for once, brought to fore the dangers of outbreak of racism, that once triggered a World War. Even as debates of sudden outburst of racist protests began to dominate the western world, Middle Kingdom released a flagrantly racist video demeaning India.

Ever since the Doklam stand-off, Chinese saber-rattling has unsettled the delicate bilateral relations between the two countries. Through impetuous jingoistic remarks, the hyperventilating Chinese media has stirred up psychological warfare. Days before India’s 70 years of Independence Day celebrations, Chinese media Xinhua unleashed an unceremonious propaganda against India through a despicable racist video. The 3 min 20 sec video titled as “seven sins of India” vilified India showing a man wearing turban and a fake beard, mocking at the Indian Sikh community. The video available on the social media network has yet again exposed the ugly side of China. With India firmly committed to diplomatic peace negotiations as the plausible solution for the impasse, restive China began intimidating India with contemptible attacks. The detestable portrayal of India and the unrelenting media attacks instead of frustrating India has inadvertently exposed the darker side of China which was oft discussed in the intellectual and media circles. Strict media censoring of authoritarian Chinese regime had ensured that World was oblivious of its dictatorial overbearing towards the non-Han minorities in China. Though China claims to be a pluralistic society and that minorities never suffered discrimination, the real picture is strikingly different.

Interestingly, while China assiduously climbed the ladder of economic stability achieving two-digit growth for three decades, it recklessly failed to invest energies in building a harmonious society. Chronic social divide and rampant racial prejudices have been integral to Chinese society. Han ethnicity constitute 92% of China and the remaining eight percentage or roughly 120 million include the ethnic minorities like Tibetans, Uighurs, Kazakhs, Koreans, Mongols. Tibetans and Uighurs are the dominant community in Tibetan Autonomous Region and Xinjiang Autonomous Region which form nearly half of the Chinese land mass. Sadly, these two ethnic minorities have been the targets of Chinese oppression and racial discrimination.

Traditionally China wasn’t overtly racist but took immense pride in its Han ethnicity who were termed as “the yellow race”. By the end of 19^th century and beginning of 20^th Century, thousands of Chinese intellectuals educated in Japan, aside emulating certain western values were deeply impressed by their concept of “minzokushugi” which meant “racism” and “expressed nationalist vision of race”. Indeed, this was the first principle of the “The Three Principles of People” advocated by Sun Yat-Sen, the father of modern China who heralded the modern revolution in 1911. The equivalent of the Japanese term in Chinese “minzu zhuyi” is used to describe nationalism. By 1920, Sun started believing that “If Manchus, Mongols, Uighurs, Tibetans and Chinese Muslims were to be ‘races’ with moral and cultural destinies distinct from that of Chinese, it would be inevitable for them to seek homelands distinct from China”.  Overpowered by the predicaments of separate identities might hinder the goal of transforming China into a modern state, he thought “We must facilitate the dying out of all names of individual peoples inhabiting China, i.e Manchus, Tibetans etc”. This idea gained much ground and dramatically changed the perceptions of architects of modern China. Though China’s constitution has promised equality, it has failed to put proper mechanisms in place to enforce the vision which believed in “satisfying the demands and requirements of all races”.

As of now, Tibetans who constitute 5% of the total population are regarded as second-class citizens and are deprived of basic rights. China which is supposed to protect the rights of minorities ruthlessly suppressed them. China has even discouraged the use of Tibetan language and made learning of Chinese language mandatory from the High School Level. Tibet, a knowledge repository of the ancient Buddhist tradition and culture is now battling to protect its heritage from the Chinese onslaught. The Communist party which established its rule in 1949 in China annexed Tibet which had self-rule. China forced Tibet to sign the “17-point agreement for peaceful liberation of Tibet” in 1951 under duress. Ever since, the oppressions of Communist regime of China continued to wreak havoc in lives of Tibetans. Tibet accredited as an autonomous region was never allowed to function independently. In 1959 Dalai Lama sought Indian asylum and repudiated the agreement. But China evicted Tibetans from leadership positions and incarcerated leaders under the charges of stoking “local nationalism”. Most of the prisoners were tortured, deprived of medical treatment, proper diet and were forced to do hard labor. The deplorable conditions and inhuman treatment meted to Tibetans drew international attention. Amnesty International reports highlighted human-rights violations in Tibet. UN General Assembly passed several resolutions condemning China’s invasion of Tibet and human rights violations. But there was change in situation on ground. Since Tibetans had no access to good educational facilities Chinese Hans occupied high-profile jobs. Thus, even income disparities too widened. Tibetans were systemically discriminated. Soon Chinese moved to Tibetan regions altering the demography of the region. As per reports, by 1999, Tibet had 7 million Chinese migrants as opposed to 6 million Tibetans, making them a minority in their own country.

In 2008, series of immolations fueled massive protests across the plateau. To curtail brewing unrest, China fast-tracked development and intensified urbanization in the regions where China faced stiff resistance. But the benefits accrued by Tibetans through massive infrastructure projects in the plateau have been negligible. Simultaneously, China began racial profiling, intensified vigilance and surveillance in sensitive areas, imposed restrictions on the movements of people and confiscated their valid travel documents.

Aside Tibetans, China’s human rights abuses against Uighurs in the Xinjiang Autonomous Province found a critical mention in the Amnesty International. China occupied the erstwhile East Turkestan, home to one million Muslim Uighur of Turkic ethnicity in 1949 and renamed it as Xinjiang (meaning new province). Like Tibet, Xinjiang has been theatre for Chinese suppression wherein Uighurs face discrimination in employment, housing, education and suffer political marginalization. Even their religious freedom is curtailed, children in schools are forced fed during Ramadan. Due to severe restrictions on the religious, cultural and commercial activities of Uighurs, separatist movement began to gain momentum. In 2009, Uighurs launched massive attacks against government, the Urumqi riots lead to death of 200 people. Ever since, China began to treat Uighurs as a tribe of Taliban and forced countries to extradite Uighurs. Subsequently, Communist regime encouraged mass migration of ethnic Hans to the Xinjiang leading to reduction of native population to 45% from 90%. It began to crush the Uighur resistance with iron-hand. But again in 2012 Uighur groups launched attacks killing 24 people. Since then China adopted grid-style policing followed in Tibet. Convenience police stations were set up for monitoring activities of citizens within a radius of 300-400mts for 24-hour patrol. High definition security cameras were installed, community policing was encouraged and high-tech voice and face recognition software were used to track suspects. Unsurprisingly, China’s obsessive monitoring of the autonomous region skyrocketed the total internal budget for Xinjiang to over $25 billion in 2015. The scale of expenditure exemplifies China’s insecurities towards its minorities. To make matters worse, China has even banned Islamic names in Xinjiang province as a part of crackdown on alleged extremism. It is believed that China spends more on domestic security than national defense. The amounts spent on Tibetan and Xinjiang autonomous provinces is three times the national average (1). Intense racial profiling amplified mistrust between the minorities and the ethnic Han population.  But impudent China continues to justify its actions as “Han Chauvinism”.

Even now, China is indifferent to concerns of minorities with most of them living on the fringes of the society in poorest provinces. The authoritarian communist regime continues to censor and dictate the narratives. It blocks discussions on minorities in academic institutions, research centers, media or press. China never made any attempts to assimilate the minorities nor ameliorate their mistrusts.  Despite the strong undercurrents of racism, China choses to ignore it. While economic development has elevated China’s status in international community, its contemptuous racial discrimination may not portend well for its aspirations of replacing America. Above all, does it behoove a regional economic bulwark to coerce India into subjugation with a detestable racial video to pullout troops? With this mocking video China has not only touched a new low but invariably dismantled industriously built façade of soft diplomacy. This mendacious propaganda has given enough reason for India and others to delve the China’s ugly racism.

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