For this American in Beijing, these past few days have been pretty intense, but not for the reason that the American media would have us think. I have, to date, had likttle reason to be concerened about my safety. I marched with the some 100,000 protestors to the American Embassy in Bejing on Sunday morning, which was in the process of being thoroughly trashed by stones, sidewalk tiles, and anything and everything that one could get one's hands on to destroy an embassy. Numerous attempts weere made to burn the American flag that hangs outside the US embassy. The soldiers would let the students get a long bamboo pole and inch it toward the flag, but when it got too close, then the soldiers would stop the action. What is noteworthy, in view of the considerable propaganda that the American media has spread about American'[s safety in China at the moment, is that during this march and during student discussion groups at Peking Unviersity, where considerable anger has been vented toward the American bombing of this embassy, I have not encountered a single hostile or threatening kind of behavior from Chinese people. So what makes the experience intense? It is intense because, in a country where the belief in many things American (liberal economics, layoffs, stock markets,...), for the first time in my now year and 3 month stay in Beijing, the issue of American imperialism is being heatedly discussed, and what it takes to defeat imperialism. It is interesting to listen now to students who have been trained by their professors to believe in the ideology of neoliberalism, now try to recocile that with an anti-imperialist position. The discussion and debates, some of which Henry has discussed or made mention of in recent posts, that spring forth can be quite interesting. At times, when asked by students what i think, when i begin to refute some of the myths of neo-liberal economics and its central arm, i.e. WTO, it reminds me of discussions with American students. The main difference is when they come back with neo liberal idoeolgy and I counter with Marx, they don't look like they have never heard a Marxist argument before. They just have a hard time beieveing that markets cannot be fair. I generally just listen to the debates, unless i'm asked my opinion. It is , after all, a debate that must take place more among Chinese themselves. I'm pleased to note that it toesn't look lke it will go away any too soon...
Steve