REACTION TO DISSIDENT LIU XIAOBO'S ONLINE ARTICLE

C O N F I D E N T I A L BEIJING 005704

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/05/2025
TAGS: PREL SOCI CH
SUBJECT: REACTION TO DISSIDENT LIU XIAOBO'S ONLINE ARTICLE
CRITICIZING RACISM TOWARD SECRETARY RICE ON CHINESE
WEBSITES

Classified By: Acting Deputy Chief of Mission Daniel Morris. Reasons 1
.4 (b/d)


1. (C) Post has been monitoring Chinese websites and
checking with contacts to track the reaction in China
to an online article by dissident Liu Xiaobo
criticizing racist comments toward Secretary Rice
expressed by some netizens on Chinese websites at the
time of the Secretary's March visit. Liu, a 1989-era
activist who lives in Beijing but who is banned from
publishing domestically, published his article on
March 21 on the overseas online magazine Democratic
China. He estimates that on popular website Sina.com
some 70 out of 600 postings on the visit included
racist comments, while only 5 took an anti-racist
position. Liu's online article attracted the
attention of Hong Kong's South China Morning Post,
which mentioned Liu in an April 1 feature story
stating that "reaction to US Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice's Beijing visit suggests judgments
based on race and sex are an entrenched part of
mainland life." Note: Western media representatives
are on a China-focused listserve on which the Liu
article is available but so far have not, with the
exception of the South China Morning Post, written any
articles on it of which we are aware. End Note.


2. (C) The Dean of Tsinghua University's Department
of Sociology Li Qiang told Poloff on April 5 that he
had not read Liu's article and doubted that it would
be widely disseminated because Liu is a politically
sensitive figure in China. He expressed the view,
however, that Liu's thesis about widespread racism in
China is correct. Comparing U.S. society to Chinese
society, Li observed that China has never gone through
a Civil Rights Movement and most Chinese have never
pondered their own views toward other races. He noted
that the Internet is a magnet for extremist views on
race and cited the recent abundance of ethnic slurs
against Japanese on the Internet as a manifestation of
the type of hatred that can be found on cyber chat
rooms. On highly charged issues such as Taiwan and
Japan, nationalistic and chauvinistic Chinese will
seek out like-minded people on the Internet and
express themselves. Li noted that web monitors
generally delete these hostile messages before there
is wide distribution because there is concern about
such discussion causing turmoil.


3. (C) Comment: The racist comments on which Liu
reported do not reflect official Chinese Government
views and the Chinese we have spoken to who have read
the article have expressed deep embarrassment about
its contents. There are, however, a significant
number of individuals in China who use chatrooms and
websites to express racist and anti-foreign, including
anti-American, views. Part of the blame for this lies
in the way in which Chinese citizens are educated to
think about themselves and their country. The
educational system, while emphasizing the historical
harm that foreign racism has done to the Chinese
people, tends not to highlight the idea that Chinese
people might need to examine their own attitudes
toward race.


RANDT

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