The Death of Liu Xiaobo as a Human Spiritual Event / Teng Biao

one,

When I knew Liu Xiaobo's name, he was already identified by the CCP as the man behind the "counter-revolutionary riot" in 1989. When I first understood his words and thoughts, it turned out to be only a few words from official propaganda materials. The "counter-revolutionary riot" was later called "turmoil", then "political disturbance", and later it became a sensitive term. "Liu Xiaobo" has become a restricted area. His body has disappeared within the iron wall again and again, and his words have been blocked from the red wall. His ideology and fighting spirit have broken through the cage with difficulty, inspiring a small group of rebels who are ignorant of current affairs.

As a post-70s generation who grew up in a mountain valley, I had no chance to appreciate the shocking world of this "dark horse in the literary world" in the 1980s. It was the first time I saw Liu Xiaobo, who stuttered, in the documentary "Tiananmen" that was quietly circulated among the mainland people in 1996. At the beginning of that year, he had just come out of more than half a year's imprisonment, and before the end of the year, he was sentenced to three years of reeducation through labor.

When he expired in 1999, China already had the Internet and the Great Firewall. Liu Xiaobo is, of course, one of the last names the authorities want people to retrieve. Not many people are willing to associate with him, and those who know him affectionately call him Liu Koaba. This is probably the inevitable lonely fate of the resisters under the autocratic system: the body is imprisoned and devastated, speech is forbidden to spread, daily life is harassed, and the cynic people are also shunned.

One day in 2004, I met Liu Xiaobo for the first time at a dinner party. At that time, the civil “rights protection movement” was just emerging. He was very concerned about the rights protection movement and wrote many articles commenting on rights protection events and rights protection figures. His sharp comments can be seen in the New Youth Learning Case, Taishi Village, Chen Guangcheng, Heizhuanyao, Yang Jia case, and almost every important hot case. From then on until he was imprisoned in late 2008, we drank, chatted, and participated in pro-democracy activities together. I also introduced human rights lawyers Gao Zhisheng and Li Heping to Liu Xiaobo, Zhang Zuhua and others. The line between "rights defenders" and "democracy activists" had slowly started to fade at that time. I was kidnapped and detained for the first time in March 2008. He also specially wrote an article "The Crazy of Dark Powers - Feeling Teng Biao's Kidnapping", denouncing the authorities' wanton violation of human rights.

Liu Xiaobo showed me the draft of Charter 08, and I gave him my advice in person. The version I read at the time had 20 "basic propositions". I said too much and the key points were not prominent. 10 were enough. The later officially announced version has 19 articles. With freedom and human rights as the core and the establishment of democratic constitutional government as the goal, Charter 08 reflects the basic consensus of the Chinese civil movement on the future direction of Chinese politics. It is a historical political text issued by the Chinese people. The 08 Charter Movement was a concentrated demonstration of the civil power accumulated by the democratic movement and rights protection movement since the late 1970s, and pushed the civil liberalization movement after 1989 to a new height.

The Beijing No. 1 Intermediate People's Court's criminal judgment against Liu Xiaobo mentioned my name, and I specially published a "Testimony on My Testimony", which mentioned: "I have proposed amendments, such as removing environmental protection and social security. etc., reduce the number of entries, and focus on human rights, the rule of law and political structure. I mean, it makes no sense for you to arrest Xiaobo but not me. He is not the only one involved in the drafting; I am also willing to bear the legal responsibility related to Charter 08. ... If Liu Xiaobo commits a crime, I am an "accomplice". As the first co-signers of Charter 08, if you find Charter 08 guilty, I demand the same responsibility. If signing and disseminating Charter 08 constitutes incitement to subvert state power , I also signed, and I have spread, and will continue to spread. I ask to share the suffering of Mr. Liu Xiaobo, because it is tantamount to sharing his glory. Standing in your dock, living in your prison, not mine shame."

Because of the signing of Charter 08, I was suspended from the China University of Political Science and Law where I teach. But Liu Xiaobo was sentenced to 11 years in prison and paid a huge price, but before July 2017, no one knew - including Liu Xiaobo himself - that the price he paid for this was his life.

two,

Why is Liu Xiaobo important? Among freedom fighters and democracy protesters in China, Liu Xiaobo is irreplaceable:

Mature and profound thinking. He is a dark horse in the literary world with a doctorate in literature and art. He is also a scholar, writer, poet, and teacher. He is familiar with literature and art, aesthetics, and cultural criticism. He has become a dissident, a pro-democracy activist, a political critic, a human rights activist, and a prisoner of conscience. In and out of prison, he reads and writes very diligently, enriching his knowledge reserve and theoretical weapons, and gradually grinding himself into a mature thinker. It can be seen from his articles that he is not limited to moral sermons, ethical judgments and aesthetic analysis, but absorbs and applies knowledge from political science, philosophy, law, history, economics, sociology, psychology and other disciplines. Embody it in infectious words full of his personal characteristics. His articles are sharp, rational, steady and infiltrated with deep human concern, and have become his most important weapon of resistance. He has a deep understanding of democracy, nationalism, liberalism, human nature, and human rights, and is full of self-critical and introspective spirit. All of these are rare and important qualities.

Totally anti-authoritarian. Unlike many free intellectuals, his criticism of autocracy and totalitarianism is thorough, not only at the theoretical level, but also in terms of politics, human nature, aesthetics, practice, etc., subverting autocracy in an all-round way. No illusions, no discounts, no fear of losing a platform, no job, no jail time. And some people failed to completely break with the CCP’s autocratic regime because of their level of understanding, and some people, because of their interests, or because of fear, had to conduct self-censorship to some extent.

Great courage and long-term persistence. He used to be weak and compromised, but after reflection, he did not back down. Repeated house arrests, disappearances, house raids, forced labor camps, sentencing, and prolonged harassment, isolation, and misunderstandings did not make him give up his struggle. The more he fights, the more courageous he is. There are no sensitive meetings he dares to organize or participate in, and there are no topics or characters he dares to comment on. General secretary, one-party system, corruption, Tiananmen Square, prisoners of conscience, Falun Gong, Tibet, Xinjiang, nationalism, he has written straight and mercilessly to expose and criticize the dark forces, and he is eager to pay attention to the weak and the victims. . Some protesters retreated and went into exile due to various reasons, some gave up because of fear and despair, and some even turned to dictatorship because of inducements, but Liu Xiaobo has always persevered.

Extensive network. He became famous all over the country at a young age, participated in the 1989 Democracy Movement, founded the Independent Chinese PEN Club, and during the protests one after another, Liu Xiaobo accumulated extensive contacts both inside and outside the system. He has become an important bridge and node, connecting reformers within the party, free intellectuals, independent writers, political prisoners, family members of massacre victims, democracy activists, human rights lawyers, petitioners, grassroots NGOs, entrepreneurs, university professors, Young students, etc. Although Liu Xiaobo was not the chief author of Charter 08, he was sentenced to 11 years in prison. The most important reason is that he initiated this charter demanding the establishment of the "Federal Republic of China" without the authorities knowing it, and recruited 303 famous people across the country. Intellectuals, democrats and human rights activists as initiators. This cannot but cause great panic among the CCP authorities.

Widely recognized internationally. Since 1990, Liu Xiaobo has won numerous international human rights awards and has attracted the attention of the media, human rights organizations and some Western governments. After winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010, he has received more reports, attention and respect from all over the world. His biography and anthology have been translated into multiple languages, making him the most famous Chinese democracy fighter.

Extensive experience, outstanding action and leadership. During his long-term struggle and prison life, Liu Xiaobo gained rich experience in struggle, and he has also been tempered from a poet and critic to a leader of the democratic movement with outstanding action.

Some Chinese democrats and political opponents may fit two or three or four or five of the six points above, but it is hard to think of anyone other than Liu Xiaobo who fits all of the above. In this sense, Liu Xiaobo is almost irreplaceable. His death by persecution is a great loss to the cause of freedom and democracy in China. Kind-hearted people once expected that Liu Xiaobo, who was released from prison for 11 years, would play an important role in China's political transformation, but Liu Xiaobo did not wait for that day; more precisely, the CCP fearfully and deliberately prevented Liu Xiaobo from Wait until that day.

three,

Like the fall of the Berlin Wall, 9/11, Tibetan self-immolation, Syrian refugees, etc., in my opinion, Liu Xiaobo's death is one of the most important spiritual events in world history after 1989.

After the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989, before the blood of the CCP dried up, various Western democracies threw olive branches to the CCP one after another, and couldn’t wait to greet the dictator and executioner with flowers and red carpets. Trade and human rights were decoupled, and the CCP was allowed to enter the WTO, allowed to host the Olympic Games, World Expos, and was elected to the UN Human Rights Council again and again. The CCP has become the world’s second largest economy, playing an increasingly arrogant and provocative role in the world, and even wants to replace the United States and the West as the global leader on some important issues.

The West looks down on the CCP, dare not promote China's democratization, and even dare not severely criticize the Chinese government on human rights issues. Academics, research institutes, media, publishing houses, and business organizations have resorted to self-censorship, either to maintain relations with China or to enter the Chinese market. Some companies even cooperate with the CCP to do evil, helping the CCP develop censorship software, or submit customer information to the CCP’s national security. The West's long-term policy of appeasement against the CCP's autocratic regime has caused some negative consequences, causing damage and threats to the values of Western liberal democracy; however, few observers and politicians in the West have paid enough attention to the seriousness of this issue.

China is the largest authoritarian state in the world, and Liu Xiaobo, the first Chinese citizen to win the Nobel Peace Prize, has clearly become an important symbol. For such a saint-like victim, a hero who promotes the cause of human freedom and democracy, although the international community has paid a lot of attention and solidarity to him, it is far from enough; and the CCP has turned a deaf ear to these solidarity and concerns, and even sneered, and intensified it. Liu Xia, Liu Xiaobo's wife, has been under house arrest for a long time. The international community watched as Liu Xiaobo was sentenced to heavy sentences, imprisoned, and liver cancer, and he was still unable to be free until the moment he died. He was the only Nobel Peace Prize winner to die in captivity. [The first Nobel Prize winner in prison was the Nazi-era German journalist Carl von Ossietzky, who died free. ] Even after Liu Xiaobo's death, the ashes were forcibly scattered into the sea, and he died without a place to be buried; even after Liu Xiaobo's death, the CCP authorities continued to keep Liu Xia under house arrest and disappearance.

Liu Xiaobo's death was a "pre-publicized murder" that was broadcast live around the world. Western democracies did not have a strong will to help Liu Xiaobo get his freedom. Even at the time of Liu Xiaobo's death, Western leaders were still hanging out with the CCP leaders, signing one order after another; There is no real pressure; people all over the world can only watch Liu Xiaobo being tortured and killed, Liu Xia being disappeared, and more prisoners of conscience being arrested, imprisoned, and tortured in the CCP's arrogance and domineering. . The death of Liu Xiaobo is also a great symbol of suffering, a symbol of the great ridicule of the rising CCP’s autocratic regime to human justice and conscience, a symbol of the evil consequences of the Western policy of appeasement against China and a greater threat to the future. In this sense, people will increasingly realize that Liu Xiaobo's death was a shocking event in the history of the human spirit after the end of the Cold War.