Sunshine Women’s Choir (陽光女子合唱團), a Taiwanese production that premiered in China yesterday, received a massive backlash for calling itself the “all-time box office champion for Chinese-language films from the China-Taiwan region” in its promotional post on Chinese social media.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Ngalim Tiunn (張雅琳) said that the production was taking taxpayers’ money while engaging in actions that are offensive to Taiwanese and undermining the subjectivity of Taiwanese culture.
This was not a baseless allegation.
The film, which boasted a cumulative box office of NT$740 million (US$23.2 million), reportedly received more than NT$18 million in government subsidies from the Ministry of Culture, as well as Taipei and Taoyuan city governments.
By claiming it broke an 18-year record for “Chinese-language films in the China-Taiwan region,” the film effectively proclaimed itself as a production from a “region” that is a part of China — echoing rhetoric employed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to negate Taiwan’s sovereignty.
Ironically, the film’s commercial success was built on support from Taiwanese audiences, who bought film tickets with their own money and had likely promoted the film among friends and family, as well as the government in Taiwan, which subsidized the film using public funds.
What triggered public anger was not only the use of the “China-Taiwan” label, but also the distortion of the plot, where the adoption of a child by lesbians was labeled as sisterhood to pass Chinese censorship.
Taiwan and China, sovereign countries that are in no way subordinate to each other, are governed according to different systems. Taiwanese have a right to be proud of the progressive values that Taiwan has embraced. It is offensive that Chinese authorities can gloss over values Taiwanese filmmakers wish to represent.
Does the film’s overseas commercial success have to come at the cost of the nation’s cultural identity?
The CCP gave a very clear answer.
China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) said “China-Taiwan region” is a standard narrative that fits the “one China” principle, adding that “Taiwan is an inseparable part of China.”
The label “China-Taiwan region” used in the film’s promotion materials reflects a “subjective fact,” which is “normal, reasonable and unblameable,” TAO spokesperson Zhang Han (張?) said.
The lucrative Chinese market is a significant draw — artists know this, and so does the CCP. Taiwanese films entering the Chinese market enjoy a huge market opportunity and realizing a win-win situation for the film industry across the Strait, Zhang said.
It is crystal clear that the Chinese market system is used to manipulate cultural narrative as part of the CCP’s “united front.”
Taiwanese films entering the Chinese market must go through two Chinese state-run distributors — China Film Group (中國電影集團) and Huaxia Film Distribution Co (華夏電影發行), Minister of Culture Li Yuan (李遠) said.
How Taiwanese films are promoted in Chinese is entirely controlled by the Chinese distributors, Mainland Affairs Council Deputy Minister Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said.
As the distributors are, by definition, state-controlled, it is certain that Taiwanese productions would be labeled as being from “China’s Taiwan region” when promoted in China, he said.
It works the same way as China’s state broadcaster CCTV insisting on using the phrase “China-Taiwan” during Olympic Games, even though the international community calls the nation “Chinese Taipei,” he said.
While the label “China-Taiwan” might sound “subjective,” “normal” and “reasonable,” as it seemingly refers to the “Greater China” region that includes China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, English readers should be aware of its illegitimate implication in the current political landscape.
The term “Greater China” has long been used by the CCP to serve its political agenda when it comes to commercial access to the Chinese market.
Erosion of a nation’s cultural identity is a gradual process similar to the proverbial frog boiling in a pot. Lack of awareness of the threat is like swimming in a pot of water that is slowly beginning to boil — failure to jump out results in being boiled to death. Undermining a nation’s cultural subjectivity over time could mean eliminating its independent personality — a fundamental sense of collective existence.
Awareness of who we are and where we come from is the prerequisite to telling our own story and being truly seen. By jumping out of the pot, we look beyond the Chinese market and position ourselves on the world stage where we can freely embrace universal values and diversity.
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