AIDS in China

Imagine yourself a normal farmer living your days pretty much as your father and your grandfather had lived it. Your world consists of essentially your home, your crops and field, your family, and those villagers that you called friends.

Then one day, at the urge of local village officials, you were told to sell your plasma. You weren't sure what procedures are involved, but since life for a rural farmer is hardly poetry, you scrap whatever money opportunity you can find. And hey, village officials and the doctors said it's O.K., so it must be alright, right?

Later, much later, you were told, along with dozens, if not hundreds of your fellow villagers, that you were infected with HIV. No officials came to explain or take responsibility for your affliction; no one, except a few doctors came to the village for treatment. You were forced to stay in the village, forbidden any communication with outsiders, and your existence, along with those of your infected villagers, were seem as an annoyance, an eyesore to that giant capitalist machine we call "China". And soon, you feared, you will die and be forgotten, like those neglected fields not far off in the distance.

......

Read this article last week:
http://www.economist.com/world/asia/displaystory.cfm?story_id=E1_RVVQSSR&login=Y
(if the site asks for login, use "chhpotter@yahoo.com" for username and "chien" for password.)

I've always held a contempt for the Chinese government, or for that matter, a contempt for any government that refuse to admit to its mistakes and chose oppression over communication, secrecy over transparency. I am proud to be a Chinese (for the cultural heritage in my veins), just as I'm proud to be a Taiwanese (for the beautiful land upon which I was born and raised). 我對中國，有著一種泅於血中，深切厚重的情感。但透過這篇報導，我看見這個我懷有深重情感的土地，卻是一個踐踏我所有價值認同的國度。A passage in 龍映台's 《請用文明說服我》came painfully to mind:

"它，把真理當謊言，把謊言當真理，而且把這樣的顛倒制度化。
它，把獨立的知識分子當奴才使用，把奴性的知識分子當家僕使用，把奴才當─啊，它把鞭子、戒尺和鑰匙，交到奴才的手裏。
它面對西方是一個臉孔，面對日本是另一個臉孔，面對台灣是一個臉孔，面對自己，又是一個臉孔。
它面對別人的歷史持一個標準，它面對自己的歷史時─錯了，它根本不面對。它選擇背對自己的歷史。
它擁抱神話，創造假象，恐懼真相。他最怕的，顯然是它自己。"
．．．．

As a part-time economist, I can say without any attempt at exaggeration that China's economic growth for the last 2 decades is one of the most impressive transformations in modern civilization. But no country is respectable until it treats its people with respect, for a country should exist for no other reason than to serve the welfare of its people. Lastly, to again quote Prof. Lung,

"請用文明說服我，我願意誠懇傾聽。＂