Voices from around the world are calling for a boycott of February’s Beijing Winter Olympics over the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) human rights abuses. At the same time, large numbers of Chinese warplanes are routinely harassing Taiwan. Just as all this is happening, Taiwanese singer Jam Hsiao (蕭敬騰), known as the king of the Golden Melody Awards, was invited to sing Beijing Olympics theme songs and record a video to start the 100-day countdown to the Games.
Hsiao called himself a member of the Chinese audience, and the words “Taiwan, China” were placed in parentheses after his name on a China Central Television broadcast of the event that he posted on Sina Weibo. This means that he agrees that Taiwan belongs to China.
Hsiao’s actions are hurtful to Taiwan — the land where he was born and raised. He has become a model example of the CCP’s “united front” efforts against Taiwan. The CCP can use his actions to proclaim at home and abroad that “Taiwanese support the CCP’s ‘one country, two systems’ policy” and “Taiwan is part of China,” although we all know that neither of those things is true.
His actions not only jeopardize Taiwan’s sovereignty, but also threaten its people’s free and democratic way of life.
He only represents a minority of Taiwanese and his views do not reflect popular public opinion.
This is proved by opinion poll results announced by the Mainland Affairs Council showing that only 1.9 percent of Taiwanese support speedy unification with China and only 3.9 percent support its “one country, two systems” formula.
It has long been the case that many Taiwanese entertainers, for various reasons and in various settings, take to the stage to speak on the CCP’s behalf. Rather than letting them get away with it, the government should not hesitate to come up with a set of solutions to prevent the same kind of thing happening in the future.
Hong Kong’s illegitimate Legislative Council on Wednesday last week passed the Film Censorship (Amendment) Ordinance 2021, which empowers the Hong Kong government to prohibit “the exhibition or publication of any film that would be contrary to the interests of national security.”
The ordinance stipulates that anyone who shows a film that has not been approved would face a penalty of up to HK$1 million (US$128,487) or three years in prison.
Taiwan could consider enacting a similar law on the grounds of national security. The time has surely come to draw a red line for “red entertainers.”
Liu Ming-te holds a doctorate in political science from the Free University of Berlin.
Translated by Julian Clegg
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