I have no mouth and I have to scream

one

For those who are concerned about Chinese society, 2022 is an extremely "depressing" year. And in the past few days, my mood has been especially low. Lanzhou, which is under the control of the epidemic, has just experienced another tragedy. A three-year-old boy is in critical condition due to a sudden gas leak. After his father found out that he was in danger, he tried every means to ask for help. First, I asked the community for help, and the community asked to call 120, but 120 was not available for a long time, and it was delayed after being connected. The father tried to stop the car with his child to ask for help, but was blocked by community workers. Obviously the hospital is close at hand, but because of all these prevarications and obstacles, it was delayed for several hours. In the end, the child missed the prime time for rescue and lost his life.

Since the outbreak of the epidemic in the spring of 2020, such tragedies have happened many times in China. But this time, I was deeply moved. The child was only three years old when he left, and the epidemic has lasted for three years. There is a saying circulating on the Internet: "Three years of the epidemic is a child's life." It is cold and piercing, but it is extremely true.

I gradually recalled the Shanghai epidemic a few months ago. During that time, Omicron had just been introduced to China and began to explode on a large scale in Shanghai. Perhaps many people still vaguely remember the tragic scene during the closure of Shanghai. In one of the stories , a patient with sudden asthma, because the community was blocked and had no way to ask for help, the family also encountered the predicament of waiting for a long time after calling 120. At that time, an ambulance happened to pass by, but the paramedics in the car were faced with a patient in a more critical condition. Watching the desperate cry for help from the desperate family members of the patient and the frosty first responders in the video, I was shocked. In the sleepless night, I curled up in the corner of the bed, typed out a thousand words with my mobile phone, and reflected on the evil of human nature that was condoned and encouraged by the evil of the system. I posted those words in the circle of friends, which was also the first time I tried to express my complete views on social issues frankly in the circle of acquaintances.

Since then, the Shanghai epidemic has continued, and it did not tend to ease until three months later. We also spent three months in such a combination of depression, helplessness and grief and anger. The reason why I pay so much attention to Shanghai is, on the one hand, because many of my relatives, including the whole family of my daughter-in-law, live in Shanghai. The more important reason is because this is the first time that China has experienced such a large-scale lockdown since the outbreak of the Wuhan epidemic in 2020. I have seen the troubled and chaotic cities that are usually prosperous, and have seen the rampage of public power. How to turn the world into hell, and how many ordinary people, in order to maintain their only remaining freedom and dignity, are bruised and bruised in the confrontation with the system.

It is also at that moment that the epidemic situation in countries around the world is gradually easing, and people are returning to normal life little by little. On the other hand, in China, the focus of public opinion at that time was still on "whether we should insist on dynamic clearing". Supporters of the current policy often stigmatize the idea of relaxing extreme lockdowns and adopting more scientific and humane prevention and control methods as "flattening the ground", and slamming them heavily; while opponents use the term "epidemic prevention enthusiasts". The class's joking name retorted. Around some iconic figures, such as Shanghai's famous doctor Zhang Wenhong, the conflict between opinions often becomes more intense. One group of people regard him as an opinion leader and the spokesperson of professional authority, while the other group is named "For Overseas." Forces handed knives", "traitors" and other ridiculous Cultural Revolution-style hats.

However, even such arguments did not last long. Because not long after, people waited for the powerful words from the central government: insist on fighting against the mentality of "lying flat", and stick to the general policy of "dynamic clearing". As a result, all discussions on epidemic prevention policies have become "arbitrary discussions of state affairs" overnight. And those voices who opposed the extreme blockade suddenly became the object of struggle that needed to be "revolutionary", and were replaced by bright red 404s one by one. Dr. Zhang Wenhong also seemed to have evaporated from the world, and his traces on the Internet were swept away, leaving no traces.

Nevertheless, as Wang Xiaobo said in "The Problem of the Courier in Khwarazm," killing the courier did not prevent bad news from happening. A series of tragedies and farces continue to be staged one after another on this hot land. After Shanghai, the "zero" boom has outpaced the spread of the virus, spreading across the country's cities and villages, streets and alleys.

two

When I look back at the rough text I wrote on that indignant night eight months ago, I can't help but feel breathless for a while. What makes people feel sad is not just that tragedy is happening; it is also because the tragedy at that moment is so similar to the tragedy at this moment. It is also a static city under lockdown, it is also an ordinary person deprived of freedom of life, it is also faced with relatives who are in urgent need of help in an emergency, and it is also suffering from the failure of the social assistance system, and it is also cold-blooded by policy executors. Animals generally refuse, also watching life die in despair.

What is even more frightening is that anyone who pays a little attention to the reality of Chinese society will easily understand that the tragedy is not the "past tense" that occurs sporadically, but the "present tense" that constantly occurs in every inch of the country. Of all these stories, only a few "lucky" escaped the clutches of public scrutiny and gained wider attention; many more did not even have a chance of surviving an extra minute in cyberspace.

I don't know if there will be a day when people will collect the names of those who lost their lives due to extreme lockdowns, record them carefully, and gather them into a monument composed of names, just like the Jews count the victims of the Holocaust. I just think of Takeshi Kitano's often-recited quote about the Great Earthquake in Japan:

"The catastrophe is not about the death of 20,000 people, but about the death of one person. It happened 20,000 times."

Milan Kundera quoted Nietzsche's concept of "eternal return" in his book: "Think about what we have experienced, think about them repeating as yesterday, and even repeating itself endlessly" He said that it is The non-existence of "Eternal Return" "constitutes the fundamental point on which the world rests, because in this world everything is forgiven in advance, everything is ridiculously allowed".

Allow me to "use" Nietzsche here. In my opinion, the current social reality in China is exactly the terrifying manifestation of "Eternal Catastrophe Return". The calamity that Wuhan has survived, Xi'an will do again; the tragedy that happened in Xi'an will be repeated in Shanghai. What Shanghai has experienced has been experienced thousands of times in Yanbian, Chengdu, Guiyang, Zhengzhou, Lhasa, Hohhot, Urumqi, Lanzhou, and other towns and villages that are hard to list. It's like a series of bloody farces directed by a vicious screenwriter with the same script. The endless return of eternal calamity, just like the tenure of the great leader, the road ahead is endless.

On the night of the Lanzhou 3-year-old boy incident, when angry residents gathered at the gate of the community and "asked an explanation" from the blockade officers and the government, they were greeted by three troop carriers full of special police. Holding riot shields and wearing white protective suits, the "people's guards" were lined up with loud slogans, shouting to the crowd: Stand back! Back off!

"Everything is forgiven in advance", even those who do not deserve to be forgiven; "everything is ridiculously allowed", even those that should not be allowed.

three

Looking at the circle of friends, my "friends" who are abroad or in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen still have the same harmonious scene of singing and dancing, as if everything is peaceful and the years are peaceful. I felt a nameless karmic fire in my chest, and I didn't know where to vent it. I never like to shout empty slogans online, and I never take the initiative to participate in offline protests. I consider myself just a cowardly and ordinary ordinary person. I often hold a false optimism, thinking that as an ordinary person with limited energy, the work of enlightenment should start with the two or three people who are closest to me. That's why I'm always spreading my values and expressing opinions in my network of acquaintances. But will this approach really change? I couldn't help but fall into self-doubt.

With this self-doubt, I recalled the absurd scene from a few days ago. The 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China has just ended, and as Xi Jinping officially ends re-election restrictions and begins an unprecedented third term, China is further in danger of returning to totalitarianism and even the Cultural Revolution. Along with disappointment and anxiety about the future, I found a widely-reposted text on the Internet. It was a quote from Camus during World War II in 1940:

"This year, it will be futile to hope for happiness. Building happiness through work is the key. Don't hope for anything, but do something. Don't wait for someone else to build your destiny from start to finish, especially when it's still in your hands. In our hands. The Evening Republican will not wish you happiness this year, knowing that you are going through a traumatic physical and mental trauma. But it requires you to maintain the necessary strength and awake to work to maintain your own serenity and dignity. "

I silently forwarded this sentence to the circle of friends. An old classmate followed by retweeting the official news about the appearance of the new Politburo Standing Committee members, accompanied by a long paragraph of enthusiastic praise, and at the end he wrote: "We must work hard and be brave. Okay, work hard to create a brighter tomorrow!" He and I, between the two paragraphs of text displayed side by side, there seems to be an invisible wall that separates two parallel worlds. Looking at the neat, sonorous comparison sentences on the screen, I was speechless. Flawless clichés. The most perfect interpretation of kitsch in The Unbearable Lightness of Life.

I always remind myself not to judge others with a superior attitude. Not everyone is as lucky as I am to take advantage of life. I try to put myself in the shoes of those who are silent, and more than those who applaud the system. I understand very well how involuntary and insincere those friends in China are. The constant fear brought about by autocracy has penetrated into the bones of every Chinese, and now it has become more and more unscrupulous, so that it is a crime to even applaud not enthusiastically. But I couldn't help but feel indignant. My anger was not directed against my classmate, nor against any individual. My anger lies in a colossal absurdity embodied in our lives.

This absurdity reminds me of the car accident that shocked the whole country not long ago in Guizhou. In Guiyang during the lockdown of the epidemic, a car was forcibly transported to residents in other places, driving on a dangerous mountain road late at night, and unfortunately fell off a cliff. What a bleak metaphor for our present situation: a group of innocent people, forced to navigate a dangerous path in the dark, with unknown goals and uncertain futures. Everyone is hoping that the driver who is in a troubled mental state will have the last bit of rationality, and not to bring the whole car into the abyss of doom.

And the greatest sadness is not even our situation, but the reaction of those "passengers" at this moment. There was no resistance, not even anger. There's only terrifying silence, self-deception to pretend it's none of your business, even ignorant excitement. We often use "fake sleep" to satirize those who refuse to admit reality and pretend to be confused. But I wonder, pessimistically, is this just kidding myself? Is there a possibility that those self-evident "truths" and "truths" that we tacitly accept may only exist in our own cognitive system; while for most people, those "truths" and "truths" never actually exist? exist?

I read a Soviet joke earlier: It talks about the three qualities of "sincerity", "intelligence" and "party spirit", each of which can only possess two. I joked with people that if I changed the content of the joke a little bit and replaced "Party spirit" with "optimistic", it would describe exactly what I think about the Chinese people at the moment: people with "sincere" and "optimism" may be Those with "optimism" and "intelligence" may just be deceiving others and deceiving themselves. For those who are still rational and passionate, it is very difficult to continue to face the devastated social reality with an optimistic attitude.

I also found myself caught in a sad absurdity: I couldn't stay out of the way, watch the fire from the sidelines, and immerse myself in the quiet life like some friends living overseas; I couldn't learn to be numb like some friends still living in China. , learn to forget, learn to dance with the system in shackles, and learn to turn a blind eye to the suffering around you.

The absurdity of this world has turned my life into absurdity. As a "last generation" lucky enough to enjoy the dividends of reform and opening up, I can't find the answer to how to face a disillusioned future and how to rebuild faith in life.

Four

Looking at the articles I forwarded one after another, most of them have now been quickly deleted by the censorship machine, leaving no trace. Only one big red exclamation mark after another is left on the empty interface, like one digital tombstone after another. I am reminded of the opening paragraph of Mr. Yang Jisheng's masterpiece "Tombstone":

"Tombstones are frozen memories. Human memory is the ladder on which a country and a nation can progress, and a signpost for the advancement of human voyages. We must not only remember the good, but also the evil, not only the light, but also the light. Darkness. Under the totalitarian system, those in power conceal evil and promote goodness, and they cover up wrongdoing, forcibly erasing people's memory of man-made disasters, darkness, and evil. Therefore, Chinese people often suffer from historical amnesia, which is the amnesia caused by power coercion. The tombstone I erected is precisely to remind people of man-made disasters, darkness and evil, and to stay away from man-made disasters, darkness and evil in the future.”

Compared with the history of a country, an individual's life is like a meteor, fleeting. If you look at the history of the People's Republic of China, you will also see that the "return of eternal catastrophe" has and is happening. From the land reform to the Great Leap Forward, from the anti-rightist movement to the Cultural Revolution, and now to the "Great Clearing Up Movement", the totalitarian system is good at changing all kinds of fancy words and dressing up the same atrocities. Everything we are going through now is just a small moment in this endless cycle of reincarnation.

I don't know when the "Eternal Return" that took place in this land will come to an end. I don't even know what else I can do. My generous statement was very few in the circle of friends, as if I was shouting at the empty valley. I imagined a scene where we were looking for light in the dark night, carefully watching the silhouette of our companions beside us. With fear, we deliberately kept a safe distance from each other. Our feeble temperature could not even bring comfort to other travelers. This is our destiny and our sorrow.

However, I also developed an inexplicable belief: all stubbornness and persistence have their own meaning in the dark. Faced with the absurdity of life, I have no choice. You can only use your own way to record this living history, record our voices of sorrow and anger, and the traces we left on the road to finding light. No matter how crude the words, how shallow the reasoning - writing is my struggle, proof that we exist. As the title of Harlan Jay Ellison's famous science fiction novel : I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream.