Xi Praises a Student Protest in China.

[Randy W]

from the NY Times

 

Xi Praises a Student Protest in China. From 100 Years Ago.

An exhibit room that showcases banners with protest slogans for the May Fourth student protest. Credit Yan Cong for The New York Times

 

The May 4, 1919, protest against Western colonialism had inflamed Chinese nationalism and helped spread a wave of ideas rejecting Chinese tradition and hierarchy. In a speech marking the centenary of the event, Mr. Xi extolled the patriotic image of May 4 while ignoring its anti-authority themes.

“History profoundly reveals that patriotism has flowed in the blood of the Chinese nation since ancient times,” Mr. Xi said in the Great Hall of the People, next to Tiananmen Square. “Those who are unpatriotic, who would even go so far as to cheat and betray the motherland, are a disgrace in the eyes of their own country and the whole world.”

“Chinese youth in the new era must obey the party and follow the party,” Mr. Xi said.

 

. . .

 

The May 4 protests in 1919 broke out after victorious Western powers at postwar peace talks in Paris decided to let Japan keep colonial territory in eastern China that Japan had seized from Germany, ignoring promises of national self-determination.

Many Chinese had hoped that the territory would be returned in recognition of China’s siding with the Allies in the war. Angered by their country’s inability to stand up to Western governments, students in the Chinese capital marched.

This year, millions of Chinese students are relearning the official lessons of 1919, stripped of any suggestion that they should ever take to the streets. In lectures and displays, they have been told that China will never again be bullied.

. . .

May 4 represented a time when Chinese people, especially students and scholars, “awoke” to their right and duty to speak out about the country’s political future, Professor Xu said by text message. “Commemorating May 4 today must still be founded in this ‘awakening,’” he said.

 

 

see also CFL topic May 4th Movement