Whose Islands are they anyway?

 

 By Gregory K. Taylor

 

The battle over the South China Sea Islands has erupted again. It seems this happens every few years in order for one country to put another contending country on notice that there is still an unresolved issue of ownership. This action is usually taken by the country that feels its sovereignty has been most recently impinged. Since April of 2012 there has been a rekindling of these antediluvian disputes as to who has ownership to several islands claimed by the surrounding countries of Vietnam, Japan, the Philippines, China, and to a lesser degree Brunei and Malaysia.

The most recent flare up involves the countries of Japan, the Philippines, and China. Earlier this year, a group of Filipino fisherman decided to occupy an island in the Spratly archipelago that both China and the Philippines claim. This occupation was reputed to be for the exercise of commercial fishing rights, but everyone knew this was about sovereignty--and wars have been fought over less. The immediate stand off brought into question the strength of the alliance between the United States and the Philippines that date back to WWII.

Spratly Islands

The Philippines seemed to be gambling that the United States would come to its military aid if the Chinese pushed the issue forcefully. And the Chinese gamble would be that the United States was too preoccupied with its war on terror in two Middle Eastern countries to involve itself in a war with the likes and size of China.

Four months later, Japan staked its claim to another set of disputed Islands known as the Senkaku islands to the Japanese and the Daoyutai islands to the Chinese. This was accomplished by a dubious purchase from the Kurihara family who the Japanese refer to as the “private owners.” This outraged the Chinese government and with some perceptible irony the Taiwanese government as well. After all, the two Chinese governments proffer, for acceptance, identical claims to said islands. The question is would two wealthy economic powers risk a war over inconsequential islands whose mineral and oil capacity are speculative at best? Would they risk destabilizing the entire region over principle?

Senkaku Islands

History suggests it may well depend on who feels the most aggrieved. One only needs to look to the Falkland/Malvinas islands for an example. Claimed by the British from 1690 and the Argentines in the 1800s the islands lie 300 miles off the coast of Argentine and 8,000 miles from Britain. Possessing no intrinsic value with an inhospitable environment few believed these two contemporary societies would fight a war over a desolate piece of land. Surely, cooler heads would prevail and sort this interruption out diplomatically. Well, cooler heads did not prevail and the principle of sovereignty decided on war.

So, will Japan and China fight a battle over these islands? Will China and the Philippines go to war over principle. There is too much for everyone to lose. This isn't the 1982 Falkland/Malvinas crisis where most people saw no global or regional consequence for that war, but more of a curiosity and flexing of muscle. There is just too much money to lose for the world economy if Japan, China, and the Philippines choose war.  Accordingly, public protestations and sabre-rattling for home consumption while real back-channel negotiations are taking place will, for the foreseeable future, put this issue to bed and the east will be as it was before.

Gregory K. Taylor is currently in Taiwan

Guns, Guns, and More Guns

By Gregory K. Taylor

This looks like something out of the 2010 “Kick Ass” movie starring Nicholas Cage, or it could be the Bat Cave arsenal of Bruce Wayne better known as Batman. This scene is so common where the Super Hero flips a switch or presses a button and "Voila," the heretofore wall housing books of note has now in one revolution revealed a wall housing an armory of weapons. Where in America is this litany of guns on display for the public to buy? What city has the temerity to offer such an act of gratuitous firepower? Is this the reality of the NRA's vision of the Second Amendment--Guns, Guns, and more Guns for a country that can't get enough of a daily-body count in its major cities?

This looks like an FBI Armory

Before everyone gets up in arms (pun intended) and marches on city hall this is not a store in an American city, but a store in a suburb of Taipei, Taiwan called San Chong. San Chong has in the past had a slight reputation for gangsterism. This should be viewed in relative terms of Taiwan and not compared at all to the endless crime wave in America. Crime in Taiwan when it occurs, and it does, doesn't have the same social impact, repetitiveness, and fear as crime in America.

So, when a store with visible curbside viewing, that the Pakistani Taliban would envy, has a display of RPGs (Rocket Propelled Grenades), Grenades, Mini-Guns, .50 Caliber Rifles, Bazookas, Semi-Automatic hand guns, Semi-Automatic and Automatic assault rifles of every vintage—people hardly bat an eye and no additional advertising is necessary. The grab here is if these weapons were real and actually not exquisite replicas they would also be illegal in Taiwan because there is nothing close to a right to bear arms Second Amendment. To own a gun here is to go straight to Jail and not pass Go. There are no exceptions for long-barreled rifles or handguns for home defense.

The Salesman referred to these as "Toys."

Imagine the carnage in the wake of these replicas on the streets of America. Why the police shootings of kids alone, and not too intelligent adults, would sky rocket. We've seen over the years a sad number of accidental-intentional police shootings of juveniles carrying toy guns whose quality wasn't even close to the craftsmanship that these replicas exhibit. It is the fakeness, if you will, of these weapons that make them dangerous. Myriad suggestions and implementation of laws to make these replicas more visibly fake have been instituted in America. Taiwan had laws for the orange markings of replicas, but the irony was not lost on the authorities that if you can't display these replicas in any way in public then it was actually unnecessary to mark the replicas. 

So, again, why would anyone buy these replicas? If one is going to have, for all intents and purposes, what appears to be a deadly weapon, wouldn't one want it to be real?



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lYJ6Y_BrjY


Gregory K. Taylor is currently in Taiwan

One White Covers Three Uglies 一白遮三丑

 




By Gregory K. Taylor

 

The above title represents, with some variations in wording, such as, “White skin covers up one hundred uglinesses” an aphorism taught to Chinese girls as a warning to avoid the sunlight and its dreadful consequence of dark skin. Historically, dark skin has been designated as a negative attribute bestowed on the impoverished lower-class by the wealthy upper-class, and conversely, ashen skin has been designated as a positive attribute conferred by the upper-class onto itself; and by dint of their worldwide dominance the closer one's skin color is to the ashen quality the more social, economic and psychological the privileges .

                                                                         

Color and class are often interchangeable until they come into conflict and then color always trumps class. Therein lies the true significance of color and its geo-political importance. A current illustration of these conflicting assumptions can be seen in this year's Presidential campaign. Why would anyone vote for Mitt Romney who is from Appalachia? This is the whitest, poorest, uneducated section of the country—and has been since time immemorial. If they were    voting their class, thus, their interest, the obvious choice would be President Obama, but this hotbed of ignorance wouldn't think to vote for Obama. So, clearly in this example race trumps class. Tea-Party adherents can be lumped into this category with some notable crazy exceptions of Black members who think they are being accepted if they just hate themselves the loudest, thus, corroborating the above supposition.

The subconscious impact of this stratification is so pervasive, so ingrained, and sadly for the foreseeable future so immutable that the darker visage is consigned to the ash heap of unattractiveness, inferiority, and resides with the lower-classes never to be redeemed. The reasons for this are manifold, but the obvious one is to start a bidding war for entry into, if not, close proximity to the world's majority-ruling class—the white race.



Sun Visor

The world stage is full of performers convinced that hue-stratification is the answer to a prosperous future.  Notwithstanding the Dominican Republic and other Latin American countries that take ridiculous race designations, such as, Quadroon, Octoroon, Mulatto to an inexplicable level for social acceptability the Chinese seem to be the current trend-setters in the pursuit of the ultimate designation. White-skin adoration, in China and most of Asia with few exceptions, has been taken to a level one has to see to believe. Beach masks (known as "Face-Kinis), full-screen sunvisors, parasols the size of which would draw the envy of Mary Poppins, and skin-lightening creams have become the social mantra hummed by all. And TV commercials? Instead of a chicken in every pot and a car in every garage, white skin is the refrain peddled by Chinese Madison Avenue, reinforced with white mannequins, as the goal every little girl should attain.  If a Chinese woman wants a respectable, educated, successful Chinese husband she had better get that skin as pale as possible. To that extent, the gymnastics involved in avoiding the sun's rays would rate a perfect 10 on any Olympic judges score card.

Parasols



Ironically, if this was just a health issue and the intent was to avoid skin melanoma the above hypothesis would be in error, but the Chinese readily admit the pursuit of white skin is purely a matter of perceived beauty and social-status. 

There is also an accompanying social ineptness of innocent and not so innocent causes that the Chinese bring to this issue. The oneness or homogeneity of this society insulates itself from understanding the folly of its acts resulting in possible mob rule intimidation. So, when a half-Black/ half-Chinese girl, who is raised in China, and speaks only Chinese goes on a national television talent show and the responses are manifestations of disgust and hate (from far too many) followed by statements that she should never have been born reveals a corruptness in a society's reasoning and direction.  To be sure, had she been half-White and half-Chinese nary a complaint would be heard.

Gregory K. Taylor is currently in China