Hu does London, and I doubt it’ll sweeten him on democracy and freedom of speech and good stuff like that.

As he was swept through Canada Gate and into Buckingham Palace in a gilded carriage drawn by six white horses yesterday morning, the Chinese president, Hu Jintao, could have been forgiven for feeling a little confused. On one side of the Mall a crowd of a few hundred largely silent supporters waved the red flag of China and held out banners saying, “Welcome leader of the motherland”. Just metres away, on the other side of the Mall, a much more boisterous but similarly sized crowd chanted, “China, China, Out, Out” amid a blizzard of Tibetan flags in red, yellow and blue. (There was trouble during Jiang Zemin’s state visit in 1999 when police stopped protesters carrying the Tibetan flag, banned in China, but this time a lighter touch was applied.)

Article continues
Perhaps it was fitting that the president of China should be greeted by such a polarised response at the start of his first official visit to the UK, which lasts until tomorrow: the community of 400,000 or so people of Chinese and Tibetan origin living in Britain is nothing if not divided on the subject.

Over on the angry side of the road, Tseten Samdup, a Tibetan protester wearing a Free Tibet placard around his waist, said he had come to demand an end to the 55-year Chinese occupation of his country. “The Chinese government should start negotiations with Dalai Lama and free our political prisoners,” he said. Mr Tseten’s parents fled Tibet in 1959 as Chinese rule tightened. He grew up in a refugee camp in Nepal and then India. “I have never seen my country. But I have become aware of what’s been done to Tibet through my contact with Tibetans who have been imprisoned for over three decades.”

Read ze whole thing.

I ask, because every year it comes out with remarkable and at times wildly contradictory results when it comes to China. This year, the big news is that the Chinese are among the world’s most “unsatisfied” when it comes to sex.

When it comes to their sex lives, Chinese are among those who “can’t get no satisfaction.”

Chinese are among the groups that are the least happy with their sex lives, according to the 2005 Global Sex Survey results released Tuesday by Durex condom company.

Only 22 per cent of Chinese surveyed said they are satisfied with their sex life. On a global scale, 44 per cent of all adults claim to be happy with it

Sounds grim, no? But looking back on earlier Durex surveys, I have to wonder if their results might not be a bit, um, leaky.

The Chinese have hit the latest Durex Global Sex Survey by winning the title for having the most sexual partners each, claiming 19.5, far more than the world’s average 10.5.

Last year, in a similar Durex survey, Chinese women were found to be the sexiest in men’s eyes worldwide.

The year before that, Chinese people were labelled the most faithful lovers, with about 70 per cent saying they had only one sex partner. In Germany, France and the United States, only 11 per cent could say the same.

In two years, Chinese people have changed from being the most loyal lovers to the most amorous. Can this be right?

Condom-maker Durex will be the last to care.The media here have been gossiping about the subject ever since the findings were published in the Beijing Morning Post on Monday.

People have cast doubts on it and reporters have tried to dig out the truth. Experts have questioned it and Internet users copied and pasted the results around. Some people are calling for Durex to apologize, that the results are an insult.

The most partners last year…the least satisfied this year…the most faithful lovers two years ago… Maybe the Durex sex survey is nothing but an inflated publicity stunt? Like that funny guy they dress up as a huge Durex condom who walks all through Lan Kwai Fong. (Do they still do that?)

It’s been quite a while since I’ve visited the group blog We Observe the World (WOW), and I was surprised at what I saw there today: some truly intriguing, beautifully written posts from Joseph Bosco’s students at Beijing Foreign Studies University’s journalism department, not to mention a whole new look. It’s so encouraging to see Chinese bloggers go after controversial and highly charged topics and write about them with such conviction – and tolerance. Like what life is like for a gay friend at a Chinese university. Or reflections on the murder of a prostitute in Gansu province. And a post on the life of a lesbian athletics student at a Chinese sports school.

Joseph himself can point you to more good stuff.

In the comment thread above, Hong Xing actually “comes out” and explains how he and his fellow trolls operate. This comes as a result of an astute commenter (thanks, Kevin) spotting HX taking credit for writing an article written by fellow troll Math. HX explains how they work in concert to take over and manipulate threads and forums.

Let me clarify a few things.

There were basically three leftist writers active on China’s forums. Me, Math, and Ma Beiming. I am currently living in the USA, and so is Ma Beiming. Math currrently resides in Mainland (no one knows who he is, it is rumored that he is a math professor in Xiameng Universty). I teach electrical engineering in an American college, and I’m not exactly sure what Ma Beiming does.

That “Sunzhigang is perhaps a prostitute-seeker” article was originally written by me. Math carried that article and acknowledged me in many occasions. And that article got copied and spread on China’s internet, and people lost who the original author was.

Right now I write for Baidu.com and Strong Nation Forum in China under several pseudonyms, and so does Math. Ma Beiming basically is responsible for commentaries on overseas Chinese communities such as Chinese Readers Digest (http://www.creaders.net) and Literature City (http://www.wenxuecity.com).

I foresee more and more leftist righters arise in Mainland China and dominate the forums in the near future. The rightest and pro-west writers on Chinese forums are already losing their battles, as they could not find good words to retort and could not write eloquent posts. When I was at my peak 2 years ago, I write about 5 original posts per day and I have a very massive distribution network. Math was even more proliferate, and was able to sustain about 8 posts a day for weeks.
Posted by HongXing at November 8, 2005 08:37 PM

Well, at least we now know how these bottom-feeeders operate. It was easy right from the start for most of us to spot math and HX as vintage trolls, responding reflexively, ignoring contradicting facts and shouting hysterically to get attention. But what about in the Chinese forums? Do these guys stand out as trolls, or do they actually fool gullible readers? Can anyone be so dense or stupid as not to see what their game is?

Meanwhile, Hong Xing, I suspect this means your gig at Peking Duck is up. Now that we all know you’re a dedicated operative with a specific one-sided agenda, there wouldn’t be much sense in interacting with you. So you may want to consider going elsewhere (hint, hint!).

I feel a whole lot safer now that Protestant pastor Cai Zhuohua is in a Beijing prison, where he won’t be able to repeat his harmony-destroying, stability-threatening crime – publishing Bibles.

A prominent pastor in Beijing’s underground Protestant church was sentenced to three years in prison Tuesday for illegally printing and distributing Bibles and other religious books, in a case that has attracted attention from Christian groups in the United States and elsewhere.

The Beijing People’s Intermediate Court handed down the sentence immediately after convicting Cai Zhuohua, 34, of the crime of conducting “illegal business practices,” said his attorney, Zhang Xingshui. Two co-defendants were also convicted and sentenced to prison, he said.

The sentencing comes less than two weeks before President Bush is scheduled to visit China and underscores a sense among U.S. diplomats and human rights activists that the Chinese government has decided not to release a political prisoner as a symbolic gesture before the visit as it has done in advance of other visits by U.S. presidents….

Cai’s wife, Xiao Yunfei, and her brother, Xiao Gaowen, were also convicted in the case and received two-year and 18-month prison sentences, respectively. A fourth defendant, Cai’s sister-in-law, Hu Jinyun, was convicted of “concealing stolen goods,” a reference to funds earned through the alleged sale of the Bibles, but was spared punishment because she cooperated with police, lawyers said.

The four defendants were led handcuffed into the courtroom and stood silently as a judge announced their sentences, Zhang said. He said none of them were permitted to address the court during the 20-minute hearing, and he was unable to speak to Cai before police took him away.

The government is claiming this has absolutely nothing to do with religion; it’s only about “illegal business practices,” because Cai was profitting illegally by selling the Bibles. Sorry, but I don’t believe a word of it. If they are so concerned about illegal business practices, there are far more egregious examples I can point to on just about any block in Beijing. Do you really think Cai was printing and distributing Bibles to get rich?

And what about China Digital Times?

I’m hearing mixed things from emailers, and some have suggested I put up a mirror site. Do I need to go to this trouble or is it back to normal? Thanks.

Poor, poor George. The NY Times editorials are famously reserved and “prudent,” so it’s refreshing – and somewhat startling – to see them so willing to tell it like it is.

After President Bush’s disastrous visit to Latin America, it’s unnerving to realize that his presidency still has more than three years to run. An administration with no agenda and no competence would be hard enough to live with on the domestic front. But the rest of the world simply can’t afford an American government this bad for that long.

In Argentina, Mr. Bush, who prides himself on his ability to relate to world leaders face to face, could barely summon the energy to chat with the 33 other leaders there, almost all of whom would be considered friendly to the United States under normal circumstances. He and his delegation failed to get even a minimally face-saving outcome at the collapsed trade talks and allowed a loudmouthed opportunist like the president of Venezuela to steal the show.

It’s amazing to remember that when Mr. Bush first ran for president, he bragged about his understanding of Latin America, his ability to speak Spanish and his friendship with Mexico. But he also made fun of Al Gore for believing that nation-building was a job for the United States military.

Three agonizing, endless, dreary grinding years. I am so, so glad to be out of America during my country’s most abysmal episode ever.

If this turns out to be true, our glorious little war in Iraq is about to get a hell of a lot harder to justify.

Powerful new evidence emerged yesterday that the United States dropped massive quantities of white phosphorus on the Iraqi city of Fallujah during the attack on the city in November 2004, killing insurgents and civilians with the appalling burns that are the signature of this weapon.

Ever since the assault, which went unreported by any Western journalists, rumours have swirled that the Americans used chemical weapons on the city.

On 10 November last year, the Islam Online website wrote: “US troops are reportedly using chemical weapons and poisonous gas in its large-scale offensive on the Iraqi resistance bastion of Fallujah, a grim reminder of Saddam Hussein’s alleged gassing of the Kurds in 1988.”

The website quoted insurgent sources as saying: “The US occupation troops are gassing resistance fighters and confronting them with internationally banned chemical weapons.”

In December the US government formally denied the reports, describing them as “widespread myths”. “Some news accounts have claimed that US forces have used ‘outlawed’ phosphorus shells in Fallujah,” the USinfo website said. “Phosphorus shells are not outlawed. US forces have used them very sparingly in Fallujah, for illumination purposes.

“They were fired into the air to illuminate enemy positions at night, not at enemy fighters.”

But now new information has surfaced, including hideous photographs and videos and interviews with American soldiers who took part in the Fallujah attack, which provides graphic proof that phosphorus shells were widely deployed in the city as a weapon.

I thought the use of chemical weapons was the No. 1 reason for calling Saddam a madman. If this story is true…I don’t even want to think about it.

Update: Yes indeedy, we’ve got another bombshell on our hands. We sure know how to fight a good war of liberation and win hearts and minds.

And it’s about time.

THE Vatican has issued a stout defence of Charles Darwin, voicing strong criticism of Christian fundamentalists who reject his theory of evolution and interpret the biblical account of creation literally.

Cardinal Paul Poupard, head of the Pontifical Council for Culture, said the Genesis description of how God created the universe and Darwin’s theory of evolution were “perfectly compatible” if the Bible were read correctly.

His statement was a clear attack on creationist campaigners in the US, who see evolution and the Genesis account as mutually exclusive.

“The fundamentalists want to give a scientific meaning to words that had no scientific aim,” he said at a Vatican press conference. He said the real message in Genesis was that “the universe didn’t make itself and had a creator”.

This idea was part of theology, Cardinal Poupard emphasised, while the precise details of how creation and the development of the species came about belonged to a different realm – science. Cardinal Poupard said that it was important for Catholic believers to know how science saw things so as to “understand things better”.

His statements were interpreted in Italy as a rejection of the “intelligent design” view, which says the universe is so complex that some higher being must have designed every detail.

A lot of Americans (particularly in red states) are dumb enough as it is. We don’t need to make them dumber by spoon-feeding them drivel about “Intelligent Design” and some un-named, un-namable “creator.” Everything about ID is a canard, a slick re-packaging of Creationism and an attempt to wipe out our brain cells and critical thought processes.

To those of you who defend Commander Codpiece, please tell us, are you happy that he believes ID should be taught in science classes alongside evolution? Do you believe that elevates America in the eyes of the scientific community and of the world? As to that bullshit argument, “Well, we’re just sayin’, we should teach it along with evolutuion because, you know, it could be possible…” To that, all I can say is that there might be some truth in astrology as well but we don’t teach it at universities. The Fundies’ attacks on evolution are a blessing for their opponents, as there is simply no defending them without looking like a jackass. (Bush looked like a jackass before endorsing ID so he had nothing to lose.)