Remember, Remember the Forth of June

I think I have finally recovered from the congestive brain failure I got from the exam – for the last few days I had a complete brain dysfunction. Got my fingers crossed now.

Today is the 17^th commemoration of June Forth. The white candle assembly, as the tradition in goes, is still going on in Victoria Park in Hong Kong – does that ever occur to anyone that is kinda weird that a ceremony that symbolizes the strive for democracy, and possibly the largest among all Chinese communities around the world, happens in to take place every year in a central park named after the queen in a city that was once colonized?

Every year, a group of activists and ex-activists in 1989, some of which by now are even ex-politicians, come back together and hold this reunion, making sure that Chinese people will not forget about June Forth, the Tiananmen Massacre that happened in 1989. And every year these people will still urge the Chinese government to officially acknowledge the wrong decisions that were made in 1989, to ask for a formal readdress of the injustice committed by the government, to ask for the responsible officers, and even apologies or compensations for families of the victims. But these are tough goals, not just because the Chinese Government, as an authoritarian communist party, just would not tell you they had done something wrong (like a Chinese father), but also because the responsibilities for the decisions made back then might go back to one of the greatest leader in the People’s Republic, Dang Xao Peng. And we all know, no one can target and bash our leaders like that, not Deng, not Mao, no one – for if you did that publicly, the next thing would be a charge of treason.

Exactly because of this, this struggle for June Forth has also become a symbol for the democratic struggle in China, for all we know, there would never be a day of a official address of the injustice committed, unless our country is democratic. So ever since 1989, June Forth – or in fact, just the number 6-4 in Chinese – is the symbol of democracy. And every year, you will see articles in Hong Kong saying how we want and need to see a democratic government acknowledging the injustice back then. It’s lucky (and yes, I have to say it’s lucky) that in Hong Kong, because under common law the legal system is still “intact”, and public assembly of June Forth commemoration is still allowed, for any ceremony of the same scale in the Tiananmen Square will probably bring you indefinite imprisonment without a need for trial.

I have never been to any ceremony of such in Hong Kong. Not one year, not a single one. I might sound like I only talk the talk but never walk the walk when I say I want democracy in China. But there is a reason why I have never been to one single June Forth assembly: I don’t know how strong this link between June Forth and Democracy should be, therefore every year I will need to take one step back and think about the whole thing.

I was only 6 years old when massacre happened. It was only in Junior high and high school that I got to read more about June Forth and learnt about what happened from my Chinese History teacher (note: not that June Forth has ever been part of the curriculum, but my teacher told us about it). Of course, as a Chinese, I think the government owes us all a formal apology on this matter, but are we at the stage to ask for this? Some politicians in Hong Kong, aka the so-called democrats, had brought it up before when they got the chance to meet up with Beijing’s officials, but it never went further than some pissed off faces.

Speaking of Beijing’s attitude towards the June Forth, I think some interesting parallel could be drawn between this and other atrocities during the WWII such as those by Japan and Nazi Germany. The Germans (and German government today) has formally addressed what happened under Nazi, and, indeed, carried on from there to avoid such atrocity in future with legal and constitutional action. But why can’t the China government do the same? Well, besides things like an authoritarian government, the fact that Nazi regime went down after WWII but Beijing is still Beijing, maybe the Chinese paternalistic ideology plays a role too.

On the contrary, the Japan government has never really acknowledged what wrong they had done to various Asian countries, including China, with the imperialist actions during WWII. Just last year in the ASEAN + 3 meeting, our president Hu decided not to shake hands with Japan’s prime minister for Hu thought Japan had never really apologized for their wrongdoings, even though Japan thinks that such apologies have already been made. It’s just a matter of perspective, you might say, but the truth is that so long as the dominant party in Japan is the right wing, I don’t think any better apology or formal acknowledgement will be made, because this is the Right in Japan relies on for their people’s votes: ambitious imperialist-like conservatism that triggers sadness in every Asian who has gone through WWII.

Funny though, the same time Beijing does not accept Japan’s never-good-enough apology, Beijing would never apologizes to its people for our own wrongdoings – not June Forth, not Cultural Revolution. In fact, neither of these incidents has been given a formal “meaning” or definition to our history by our government. Up till now, it’s still extremely sensitive to mention these events in China, and forget about commenting on the ramifications of the devastation. If I were the Japan government, I wouldn’t be very convinced either when Beijing tells me my apology just wasn’t “good-enough”.

Of course, the issue seems to be different: atrocities during WWII was between countries, while things like June Forth could be accounted as a country’s own-issue, as if walls are built along borders of China and the accurate information will never be released. But political issues put aside, deep down, I think a sincere apology depends on just a few things: courage, retrospection, humility; the refusal to make such an apology then, shows you what one lacks. And if this applies to a man-to-man basis, then why can’t one apply this to a nation-to-nation level as well – after all both Confucius and Socrates thought running a government well is similar to a human being living well, mentally and physically.

I think most people has seen one of the most classic pictures of June Forth: a man with plastic bags on his hands stand right in front of the tank, back straight and arms spread. That picture has been taken to be a symbol of civil disobedience like the portrait of Che Guevara. But to me, just bearing the symbol, even putting it up on your t-shirt, is not enough. We need to think about what happened, why and where to carry on from here. For from what I have read about June Forth, it wasn’t like the students have done everything right either. I ain’t saying we don’t need to remember and educate the next generation about what happened, and ceremonies can certainly serve this purpose, but I think as time goes by, one should add new meanings to June Forth, and see how it’s applied to us in China today. I might sound way too logical to a point of coldness, but if we can’t even do this, we will never move on from the Massacre, never be able to push the democratic movement further, and June Forth will never be addressed officially in China. In fact, it will only be an event of civil disobedience in the History of the People’s Republic, but never a milestone; and it will eventually be forgotten, but never be borne by the future generations.