Terrorists squirreled away in mountain hideouts, the Uyghur chairman spouting fire and brimstone at the podium, a teenaged, female mujahideen attempting to start a blaze as intense as her own fanatic fervor in an airplane lavatory, a fragmented Uyghur diaspora desperate for a means to bring about momentous change – Xinjiang, from its history to its current events to its very geography is a place of extremes, and when you get caught in the whirlwind it becomes a little too easy to forget and overlook some of the more discrete activities whirring in the background that may, in the end, bring about more change than the sensational headliners. It is with that sort of understanding that The New Dominion has occasionally in the past focused on the thoughts and comments scattered throughout the web, in English, Uyghur, and Chinese, of “people on the ground,” or as the Chinese put it, the 老百姓, the hundred old names. Sometimes we’re tempted away (justifiably!) by really hard-hitting stuff which came in batches before, during, and right after the Olympics, but recently an extremely intriguing article has been brought to my attention which hopefully will put things a little more into perspective as the Olympic Heat gets subsumed by the coming winter. It starts simply, with a notice posted on a hotel wall in Beijing, which was photographed and posted online.
Urgent Notice
To all inns and bathhouses of the administrative district:
In compliance with a request from the local PSB substation, starting today, investigations will be carried out on the lodging circumstances of all individuals of “Tibetan” and “Uyghur” ethnicity residing at inns and bathhouses of the Haidian District. Reinforce inspection and verification of any lodger matching the description above and report all cases to the local dispatch station.
Furthermore: every inn and bathhouse, when registering travelers, must double-check and accurately fill out the registration form.
All who receive Tibetan or Uyghur individuals for lodging must immediately report to the local dispatch station.
Officer to Contact: Wu Hu Cell Phone: 13801093916
Huayuan Dispatch Station On-Call Phone Numbers: 62014692 62032656
Minority individuals from “sensitive” regions being monitored in hotels is not something new – as far back as July, before the Olympics, there was a news report by Globe and Mail about how the unfortunate parties to a forced, mass Uyghur exodus from Beijing were invariably denied access to an inn or hotel after pulling out their ID cards identifying them as Uyghurs. And while the link above with the photograph of the notice was published on the 3rd of October, it’s unclear whether or not the picture itself was taken recently or long ago. Nonetheless, standing on its own the picture does at least constitute a form of evidence for this type of ethnic discrimination a tad more concrete than word of mouth.
But the notice does remind us that one often overlooked aspect of “being a Uyghur in the PRC” is the civil rights component. I identify this in contrast to aspects that gain greater coverage on media outlets, things like terrorism and separatism, or, the “humanitarian crisis” which I feel overlaps with civil rights issues but are usually more egregious yet more targeted violations of minority rights – for example, religious restrictions during Ramadan, or forced deportation of young Uyghur girls to Eastern industrial areas for labor. While these crises are absolutely worth knowing and analyzing, it’s also worth recalling that sometimes its the smaller troubles with a wider range that trigger greater consequences – the uncalled for nuisances that are capable of affecting all Uyghurs, regardless of whether or not they are man or woman, religious or secular, rich or poor, young or old. Something inexplicably, illogically, and absolutely tied to something as inconsequential as the way you look or a character on your ID card. Like these hotel restrictions.
I can’t help but consider the a similar situation that I became familiar with as a child of the US – namely, the American Civil Rights movement. Just for all you internet critics out there, I underline similar and do not say analagous, because they are not. But I think that on a generalized level there are some comparisons that can be made. For example, while during that time there were frequent and brazen acts of terrorism perpetuated against blacks in the South, most notably and gruesomely vigilante lynching, it was an act of resistance against a far more mundane yet more ubiquitous injustice that today represents the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement – Rosa Parks refusing to sit at the back of the bus.
Rosa Parks also reminds us that offenses against an individual’s civil rights does not a Civil Rights Movement make. It takes two other things: one, an understanding by the minority community of what these violations are, how they operate, and where they come from, and, two, a willingness to speak and act out against those violations.
And so I was a little surprised and intrigued that in the link posted above, the one publishing the photograph of the police notice, there also were some reactions and commentary written in Mandarin by other Uyghur members of the Uighur Biz online community. I say surprised because Uighur Biz is a site based in China, written in Mandarin, and, like all sites in China, has registered an ICP license with the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. Despite this, community members have voiced some insightful, penetrating, and surprisingly frank comments on the discriminatory hotel policy, its implications, and its origins, to which I turn to in an article that will be posted shortly.
Comments 19
This is a typical de jure discrimination. The way the US constitutional law handles such problem is that if a statute or regulation is discriminatory on the face, the proponent of such rule must prove that some other reasonable purpose substantially outweighs the harm of discrimination. Of course, arguments like “Many Uyghurs and Tibetans are terrorists” can’t possibly be reasonable enough to survive this line of strict scrutiny.
Posted 21 Oct 2008 at 9:27 am ¶You are very right that both the understanding of the civil rights violation and the willingness to speak up are crucial. Before encouraging people to speak up, it is necessary to encourage them to identify violations. Yet, people take lots of violations for granted. For example, most of the employers require their employees tested for Hepatitis status (one out of ten Chinese is Hepatitis B positive) regardless of the nature of the job. One of my friends told me, after coming back from a job fair, that the recruiter of a prominent electronic wholesale company stated, in front of hundreds of job seekers, that those who are Hepatitis B positive should not even bother to drop their resumes. The position was for salesperson, which involves neither blood transfusion nor unprotected sex with either the coworkers or clients. The fact that the recruiter was able to make such statement in public infers that the discrimination is not only widespread but also widely accepted. Similarly, if a hotel dares to publish this rule, it infers that it had no fear that public opinion, media or even the law will bring any adverse effect to its business.
During my research i have come across Uyghurs who unanimousley complained about discrimination in the job market against them in Xinjiang. All of them said that at job fairs the employers openly write and say no Uyghurs wanted. Can anyone comment on this or put up some evidence of it?
Posted 21 Oct 2008 at 4:48 pm ¶Thanks
@Ralphie:
I don’t think we should look at this case primarily as a legal issue, because even though morally — and politically — it’s clearly a kind of discrimination and therefore unequivocally wrong, requiring hotels to report a certain category of guests doesn’t constitute an infringement by itself — after all, government do usually claim the right to know where its citizens reside (I live in West Europe, so do my parents, and when they came visit me last week, they had to fill out a registration form for temporary residence for the single night in the hotel, just like everybody else).
If a person targeted by this campaign wants to challenge it in court (which would be obviously pointless in China, but let’s — for the sake of the argument — move the case to a Western country with a functioning legal system), he has to argue how his rights are violated by merely being reported as a hotel guest. It’s basically impossible.
Posted 22 Oct 2008 at 7:46 am ¶BTW, China’s Ministry of Public Security has published its “Second List of Recognized East Turkistan Terrorists” today (the first list was published in 2003, so this is a big deal), with details of their alleged crimes:
http://www.stnn.cc/china/200810/t20081021_883016.html
Posted 22 Oct 2008 at 7:55 am ¶@ Swan
I saw such job advertisements with my own eyes on the main street of Ghulja in 2004. Many of the small Chinese-run shops selling clothing etc. were advertising for employees with signs that had a big “Hanzu” right in the middle.
Posted 22 Oct 2008 at 9:54 am ¶wgj, please look into the equal protection clause of the US constitution, you can find lots of cases analogous to the situation at hand. Another cause of action is the violation of right to privacy. It is not, as you said, impossible, at least not in the US. Please find any constitutional law professor or law student in West Europe and ask them if it’s possible for legal action there. Actually, for any country trying to join the EU, it has to amend its laws to meet the EU standard. Issues like discrimination is clearly covered. For example, Bulgaria did not join EU until it repealed its discriminatory laws against gays and lesbians.
Posted 22 Oct 2008 at 10:57 am ¶If the government argues that it’s necessary for hotels to know the whereabouts of their guests, then the rule should apply to everyone regardless of race and religion. Filling out forms at hotel is the normal practice around the world. You even said yourself, your parents had to fill out registration form just like “everybody” else. Your parents weren’t asked to fill the form because of their race or religion.
@ wgj,
For the correct native Uyghur names of those alleged “terrorists”, please look at this site (in Uyghur):
http://bbs.salkin.cn/read.php?tid-42236.html
Posted 23 Oct 2008 at 2:15 am ¶@Raphie:
If the police has the right to know the whereabout of all guests, then the particular right of privacy you’re talking about doesn’t exist. A right you don’t have cannot be violated.
In the US for example, the TSA has the right to perform security checks on all flight passengers. And if some TSA agents choose to mainly focuses on a particular group of passengers, that’s just within their discretion. And even though complaints of racial profiling are raised all the time, no one has been able to successfully sue in court — nor is it likely that anyone would in the future, as long as the legal framework itself doesn’t change.
Posted 23 Oct 2008 at 2:52 am ¶@Swan, David:
Nobody should be surprised that most Han small businesses don’t want to employ Uyghurs — after all, most Uyghurs don’t want to employ Hans, either.
Last time I was in Turfan, I stayed in a small Hotel ran by an Uyghur family and saw someone working there who looked like a Han. When I expressed my surprise to my Uyghur friend accompanying me, he told me he knew this guy, and the guy is not a Han, not even a half Han, but a full Uyghur (who just happened to look somewhat like a Han). He also said he didn’t know of any Han working in any Uyghur small business.
People feel more comfortable working with people they’re familiar with, that’s just basic human nature. If you look at the black politicians in the US, most of them have a staff in which the vast majority is black (obviously, Obama is an exception, though I’d like to look at his old staff back then when he was a state senator).
Posted 23 Oct 2008 at 3:08 am ¶wgj, again, there have already been successful class action suits against agencies such as USCIS for its discriminatory immigration enforcement against student visa holders from Middle Eastern Countries. USCIS in several circuits has made settlements with the plaintiffs on several occasions.
Posted 23 Oct 2008 at 4:20 pm ¶Also, you still can’t see the difference? For normal guests, they only have to register with the hotel; for Uyghurs and other minorities, after they register with the hotel, the latter will report them to the police. This is not the situation where the police wants to know the whereabouts of “all” the guests; the police only wants to know the whereabouts of guests from a certain racial group.
Besides, the mere fact that there are similar violations in the US doesn’t make the Chinese government’s action justified. The mere fact that Hitler murdered millions of people doesn’t make any other murder less wrong.
Lastly, if you really believe that China would truly be a rising power, you would want China to do at least better than the US, instead of using problems in the US to excuse China’s problem. And if you really love to compare, it’s a losing battle. Racial profile is not “national secret” in the US. Even if, let’s assume as you said that no case has been won, the media can talk about it, Hollywood can put it in its comedies, Jon Stewart and Steve Colbert can joke about it every night. Can any of these be done in China right now?
Wgh, again your comments are completely irrelevant because of one distinction you are omitting (or willfully ignoring). This is a question of what is sanctioned by the state and what isn’t. Your TSA analogy falls flat because despite scandals concerning racial profiling in the US, on paper such profiling is illegal and if workers on an individual or small group level decide to pursue this policy on their own is in defiance of both state policy and the equal rights reasoning behind the policy. If no one is able to successfully sue in court it’s not because of the legal framework, it’s because an individual or group of individuals pursuing a private policy doesn’t leave a paper trial and so because our legal system is based on evidence it becomes the responsibility of the plaintiff to prove that the TSA is consistently selecting people for inspection on the basis of color or race – and if the plaintiff is an individual traveler, the scope of his personal experience is not enough to constitute proof of a trend. Further more, I find it funny that you mention that there are “unsuccessful” attempts at suing – the fact that people actually can sue and are doing so repeatedly is another thing that makes these cliche “But in America!” analogies incompatible.
Other than establishing a tendency for you to categorize people on appearance (made me laugh – looks like a Han but is a Uyghur- kapowie! – kind of like “I can’t believe it’s not butter”) your “birds of a feather” argument really does nothing else. Again, it’s a question of stated policy. Sure, you can find black businesses with all black employees in the US. But again, some of these are products of an invisible preference (on behalf of a black boss) as opposed to an official policy creating this racial composition. Even if a black employer refused a well-qualified white applicant, this employer would have to be able to cite reasons – employment history, experience, whatever – for the decision rather than coming out and saying “He’s white.” Even if that is the reason. More often than not, an organization with a visible racial bias in its composition probably has legitimate reasons for being that way – if you’re going to cite a state senator’s staff being mostly black, it would probably be because that senator’s consticuency is mostly black, as opposed to some super simplistic “blacks prefer blacks” argument you’d like to go with. And again, the “But in America!” argument rings hollow because in these situations as well people have sued and are suing, black or white, and some people are winning. The issue is not the existence of the problem – China and America both have social issues, neither is perfect – rather, the issues concern the nature, scale, and solvability of the problem.
In China both with the shops David saw and this announcement on the PSB office wall we are seeing an official statement of policy, on paper. There’s a vast difference between rogue TSA agents pursuing a personal agenda in opposition to the stated policies and a Beijing police department publicly announcing an edict passed down from a higher authority that people are to be monitored entirely on their ethnicity rather than their behaviorial history – but perhaps it’s more convenient for you to ignore that distinction. There’s also a vast gap between some American boss surreptitiously hiring only people of his own race and a Han Chinese pasting a huge “UYGHURS NEED NOT APPLY” sign on his front door. You’re comparing apples and oranges. On one hand, you have the United States which naturally, unambiguously still is dealing with vast racial problems, but, has nonetheless adapted a legal framework that for the most part forces day-to-day discrimination in obscure corners where evidence is hard to come by – for example, a TSA agent choosing on his own discretion to stop a man with a beard, or a white employer choosing a white man over a black man and citing a “better resume” to cover his choice. On the other hand, you have China, where, in spite of constitutional and national level laws against discrimination, one of the country’s most important executive organs, the Police Force, openly formulates and disseminates a policy which unfairly (and illegally) assigns special attention to a group of people solely on their ethnic background and nothing else (and this will be fleshed out in a translated example in a coming post). A country’s legal body reflects its culture. When a country’s police force, in its capital, publicly, on paper, through policy, validates the concept that Tibetans and Uyghurs are somehow more threatening and deserving of more scrutiny solely for being Tibetan or Uyghur, this inevitably is a reflection of prevailing mainstream attitudes. I challenge you or anyone to go to Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou, and Chengdu, and ask a 100 Han Chinese in each city what they think of Uyghurs and I guarantee you I’ll be validated. And so you’re wrong, the problem is an intertwined legal and moral issue and has to be viewed from both standpoints simultaneously.
And Ralphie has already eloquently delivered my last intended point. “But in the West!” arguments are just dumb. Often, like in this conversation, they’re not even analogous or relevant, and even if they somehow are analogous, they’re logically vacuous and morally bankrupt. We’re quite aware that there are moral an social problems in the West – we can actually read about them in our newspapers and fight against them – even if sometimes it’s in vain – in our courts. You see these kind of arguments everywhere on the web in various forms by people with, hm, shall we say, “hurt feelings” – I think that’s the set phrase. But quantity doesn’t constitute quality.
Posted 23 Oct 2008 at 5:43 pm ¶Guys, why do you think you need to argue with me about China’s complete and horrendous lack of a functioning legal system that even rudimentarily effectively enforces its laws? Have I not written pretty much just that myself in one of my comments above?
Nevertheless, the point of my argument remains — particularly because you haven’t offer any direct rebuttal:
1. One doesn’t have the legal right (the political and moral side of the argument I’ve already conceded right from the start) to not let the police know about your hotel stay.
2. If you don’t have a right, it cannot be violated.
Please tell me if you object 1 or 2 or both, and why.
And for the third time, just for emphasis, since it has obviously escaped your attention before: I have no disagreement with you whatsoever on the political or moral merit of the case.
As to your objection that there is a different between a racist boss who finds excuses not to hire certain people and another racist boss who openly advertise that certain people would not be hired: You’re right, there’s a significant legal difference. But morally, they’re not so difference at all, and that’s what I’m trying to say: The racial discrimination between Uyghurs and Hans go both ways.
Posted 24 Oct 2008 at 5:04 pm ¶What I see here and in other places with what I’ll loosely dub the “别太CNN” mindset is restructuring an issue so as to dampen or remove certain elements and draw attention from the crux of the matter. If you’re stating your position unequivocally here it has been red herring from the start. No one is disputing the right for the police to know who hotel lodgers are. As a foreigner residing in China I’m fully aware that every time I check into a hotel I undergo a registration process that alerts the local dispatch station of my presence. For all I know, Chinese citizens of every nationality may undergo this process. Police monitoring hotel guests is not what is under dispute, it is the rationale for the level of scrutiny a particular guests have. I do not feel my “civil rights” are violated when I register at a hotel because I am not a Chinese citizen, the process is transparent (that is, I am aware of what is happening), legally documented, and not out of hand.
For this police notice, we are seeing something applied unequally between Chinese citizens who should enjoy equal rights – Han or Tibetan or Uyghur, they are all Chinese citizens. No rationale is given – it can only be assumed. The process is surreptitious – note that the notice is directed towards the hotel staff and not the customers, and the very fact that this notice was reported with such a scandalous air demonstrates that this coming to light was just the fortunate coincidence of some hotel being careless with the notice and a concerned lodger taking a picture of it. A Uyghur guest at hotels in this region would go through the normal, legal registration process and be able to find the relevant laws mandating these registrations on all Chinese citizens but would be entirely unaware that after he goes to his room his information is being specially sent to the police station and especially being set aside (presumably with the locations of other Uyghurs and Tibetans in the area) solely based on his ethnic identity – not on a justifiable reason like being an foreigner (and thus the nation’s security apparati are unaware of that individual’s history abroad and put the safety of its citizens over the privacy of a foreigner) or having a criminal history (in which case a person’s actions have brought upon himself that extra attention). UNLESS, of course, Uyghurs and Tibetans share a collective criminal history, and if that is the logic, it’s unsurprising since we’ve seen it elsewhere.
To draw from your own words, “If a person targeted by this campaign wants to challenge it in court, he has to argue how his rights are violated by merely being reported as a hotel guest.” But as has been mentioned before this observation is oriented in completely the wrong direction. To be relevant, the sentence should be, “If a person targeted by this campaign wants to challenge it in court, he has to argue how his rights are violated by being particularly being scrutinized only on the basis of being a Uyghur or Tibetan.” Which would be easy. Point to this notice. But as you astutely noted this mental exercise would have to be done in a Western court, because evidence often doesn’t go far in Chinese ones.
So to reiterate, the right of the police to keep tabs on hotel guests is not being disputed here, no one is saying that every PRC citizen should have the right, in a vacuum, to deny this information to the PSB. What is being questioned here is the rational behind an unbalanced execution of this police prerogative. To bring up your TSA analogy once more, the right of the TSA to inspect people is not called to question by people bringing up lawsuits, its the legal rational (or lack thereof) behind an unbalanced execution of this security right. If these lawsuits are failing its not because some sacred right of security agencies is being challenged by the civilian riff-raff, its because in these situations evidence is hard to accumulate in order to establish a trend. That, of course, is not the problem with this Uyghur/Tibet issue since the damn policy is posted on the freaking wall. The problem of course lies elsewhere, in part, a systemic flaw in Chinese legal culture that sees law as more a tool for stabilizing harmony (i.e. protecting the current system) than as a defense of the people, and so “legal precedent” and rationale isn’t as important. But that underscores that there is an important legal component to this problem.
I know that at least you’re claiming you have no disagreement with me about the political or moral aspect of this problem, however, I am insisting that the legal side is very much intertwined with the political and moral side of this issue and isn’t floating a million miles away in a vacuum – something that I hope to illustrate through the observations made by Uyghurs on seeing this notice in a post that will come up in the next few days. And so because I think a legal understanding is inextricably mixed with the moral and political understanding of the issue, there is a disagreement.
You say morally, there’s no difference at all between the racist boss in America and China, but again I insist on a more nuanced understanding of the example. There’s no difference on an individual level, between one racist boss in China and one in America. But this is a social issue and needs to be seen on a societal scale. That a racist boss in the US, in order to be racist, has to jump through these legal hoops, whereas a racist boss can be a racist in China, creates a significant moral difference on a societal level, though they may be the same on an individual one. That there is a rigid, enforced legal framework in America means that the “racist boss” phenomenon in America has less space to exist and there is a feedback loop between law and culture which has created genuine changes of mindset between today and the segregated 50s. In China, without the legal framework, the open discrimination remains the same, or even grows – an accepted and integral part of Xinjiang culture. Morally, there is a difference, if you bother to zoom out. Furthermore, you failed to acknowledge my point that there are more factors than “racial preference” at work when determining the racial composition of any given business. Uyghurs in Xinjiang are poor. They compose the majority of the underclass here. A hole-in-the-wall Uyghur restaurant with only Uyghur employees is not morally equivalent to a successful Han Chinese restaurant or business putting a big “No Uyghurs” sign on its front door. Just like a black state senator whose staff is mostly black because the district he represents is mostly black, a Uyghur restaurant only has Uyghurs less because of some racial discrimination and more likely because only Uyghurs will want to work there. A Uyghur doesn’t need to put a “No Han” sign on his restuarant even if he felt that way. A “No Uyghur” sign on a booming Han business is different, because a qualified Uyghur who wanted to work there to move up just a little bit in life couldn’t do so if he wanted. There is an unambiguous imbalance of opportunities between Uyghurs and Han today. This needs to be taken account when analyzing racial issues.
Posted 24 Oct 2008 at 7:31 pm ¶Oh and just FYI I learned through a friend that a Uyghur acquaintance of his owns an English training school and employs only Uyghurs – apparently this boss is getting a lot of flack from the government for this. So if your concerned that in Turpan Uyghur restaurants hiring only Uyghurs is unfair, rest assured that in some situations like this English school the government is valiantly mobilizing to combat discrimination. Now whether or not English learning centers with all Han teachers are getting pestered…
Posted 24 Oct 2008 at 7:34 pm ¶wgj, you misunderstand how the law, specially the constitution, functions. Even though the Chinese constitution is universally considered bogus, it arguably has the similar structure and purpose as other constitutions, namely setting out the basic rights of the citizens as well as restrictions and duties of the government. Constitutions are not specific laws; they are broad enough to be the basis of all the other laws. There won’t be languages such as “Article 3, the right to be treated the same as other hotel guests; Article 4, the right to go to Beijing for the Olympics…” But there are languages in the Chinese constitution that clearly show the basis of legal rights such as “every citizen is equal before the court; citizens have the right to privacy; the government can only make laws that do not violate the constitution.” Again, it is totally another story as to whether the Chinese constitution is just a piece of paper or not. But you can’t say that the rights simply don’t exist.
Posted 24 Oct 2008 at 7:45 pm ¶You need to distinguish between a lack of right and a right that has been long violated. The mere fact that you are not allowed to do so doesn’t mean you actually don’t have the right. For example, if you go to the street in China and protest against the Chinese president, you will be arrested. The possible charge might be disruption of public peace. But this doesn’t mean that you actually don’t have the legal right. It is a situation where your constitutional right has been violated. The mere fact that almost nobody protested against the government without being arrested in the history of the Communist government rule doesn’t mean the right to protest actually doesn’t exist.
The right to privacy doesn’t mean the right to not let police know your whereabouts. It means the police cannot track your whereabouts without legitimate reason; it means the information of your whereabouts should always be protected unless there is some legitimate reason.
Your logic is the exact opposite to how the world functions. If the legal system adopts your line of analysis, namely there is no such right because the law doesn’t specially cover this situation, then the law itself is a joke because it simply cannot possibly cover every human situation. The law applies principles, not languages. If citizens don’t have rights unless they are specially listed, then I guarantee you, you might find it illegal for you to simply step out of your door, because I bet there is no law specially stating that citizens have the right to step out of their doors. Nor there is a law saying, when they step out of their door, they have the right to choose which foot first.
WOW thanks for all those comments they make interesting read. The jobs you guys are talking about are all in the private sector, any idea what happens in government jobs. I mean for example teaching jobs or in hospitals do they also say openly no Uyghurs apply.
Posted 25 Oct 2008 at 1:07 am ¶it discriminates them for ‘caution’/'care’.
but it didn’t say “no uighur” though.
i.e. uighurs can check in the hotel, but they will scrutinize them and probably notify the police.
so your title isn’t right.
Posted 26 Oct 2008 at 9:09 pm ¶Hotels were denying Uyghurs from lodging at their inns during and around the Olympics. Outright refusing them from staying. Probably because of this rule; because hotel owners would rather avoid the inconvenience of reporting the guests.
Posted 27 Oct 2008 at 1:02 am ¶Am enjoying this site which I only began visiting recently! Many thanks for hosting it and opening such news items up to (heated!) discussion.
Two things strike me about some of the comments above:
*** The legalistic arguments might lead one to overlook the reality on the ground for a real-life Uighur. Having lived in China for over 20 years, it strikes me that the key thing here is that posting such a sign would likely 1) Act as a signal to dissuade some Uighurs from even asking for a room, and 2) Embolden some hotel staff to mention the policy in such a way as to discourage a Uighur from checking into the hotel. In my opinion, 1-2 probably have more impact on a typical Uighur’s daily life than the greater or less “legality” of the practice of reporting their presence to the police.
*** In general, one should try to overcome the impulse to compare what goes on in China and the US, particularly in the domain of human rights and interactions between different ethnic groups. They are radically different societies with hugely different histories, and I generally find the comparisons wanting. Perhaps more importantly, some Chinese feel very emotional when their society is criticized by foreigners, and it should not be forgotten that China is in a race to catch up with, and overtake, the US in many domains. This is a bit of a national past-time, if not simply an outright “America-complex.” Few Chinese, even those who don’t seem very patriotic, are willing to hear their country compared unfavorably with the US. Inevitably, such conversations often degenerate into a shouting match about China vs. America, an approach unlikely to shed light on sensitive matters such as how Uighurs are treated within the PRC, etc.
Posted 01 Dec 2008 at 9:30 pm ¶Trackbacks & Pingbacks 6
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[...] Urgent Notice – To all inns and bathhouses of the administrative district: 20/10/08 In compliance with a request from the local PSB substation, starting today, investigations will be carried out on the lodging circumstances of all individuals of “Tibetan” and “Uyghur” ethnicity residing at inns and bathhouses of the Haidian District. Reinforce inspection and verification of any lodger matching the description above and report all cases to the local dispatch station. Furthermore: every inn and bathhouse, when registering travelers, must double-check and accurately fill out the registration form. All who receive Tibetan or Uyghur individuals for lodging must immediately report to the local dispatch station. Officer to Contact: Wu Hu Cell Phone: 13801093916; Huayuan Dispatch Station On-Call Phone Numbers: 62014692 62032656 Minority individuals from “sensitive” regions being monitored in hotels is not something new – as far back as July, before the Olympics, there was a news report by Globe and Mail about how the unfortunate parties to a forced, mass Uyghur exodus from Beijing were invariably denied access to an inn or hotel after pulling out their ID cards identifying them as Uyghurs. See: http://www.thenewdominion.net/395/the-uyghur-civil-rights-movement-no-uyghurs-in-our-hotel/ [...]
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