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洛杉矶时报:华人共庆奥运花车 法轮功吃力不讨好(中英对照)

作者:David Pierson 李芬 张涤非(编译) · 2008-01-02

  庆祝2008年北京奥运会的奥运花车参与美国加州帕萨迪纳市的玫瑰游行,这项盛事得到全球华人的瞩目,特别受到美国华人的热烈支持,但个别别有用心的人一直企图阻挠奥运花车。《洛杉矶时报》12月30日报道指出,阻挠奥运花车事件的指使人是法轮功,但并未受到其他组织的支持。文章中称法轮功为精神邪教组织,同时认为法轮功在美国华人社区普遍失去同情心,并在当地成为一个边缘组织。

 

 

  【美国《洛杉矶时报》2007年12月30日,作者:David Pierson】庆祝2008年北京奥运会的奥运花车在美国加州帕萨迪纳市阿苏萨一个仓库内,等待参加元旦玫瑰花车游行。

 
  在接下来的数小时内,奥运花车将围绕在数以千计的康乃馨和玫瑰中,伴随着烟花,由124名京剧演唱家、杂技表演者、传统舞蹈家簇拥着,沿着科罗拉多大道一齐庆祝2008年新年到来。
 
  法轮功原想借助周二受全球关注的精美花车组成的玫瑰花车游行为由头,以抗议中国的人权记录。几个月来,他们不断组织新闻发布会和抗议活动,但却始终未能改变巡游计划,而且在加利福尼亚州南部广大华人社区并未得到丝毫支持或关注。
 
  从圣盖博山谷飞往北京、上海或广州仅花费12小时或稍长时间,因此该地拥有美国最大的华人社区。中美两国之间的商业活动关系已在迅速稳步前进。虽然此间有很多人都认为中国需要改善其对人权的态度,但他们更加重视促进经济以改善普通中国老百姓的生活。
 
  KAZN-AM (1300)电台热门华语脱口秀节目主持人Cat Chao在谈及奥运花车时说:“大多数中国人认为,奥运会远远比人权问题重要。况且中国人权已经改善很多。他们宁可看到中国改善例如环境污染这样的问题。”
 
  洛杉矶当地同源会主席翁晖(Philip Young)说,他打算出席观看玫瑰巡游。但他前往出席,是要向他那位随同Arcadia高中乐队参加巡游的儿子发出欢呼,而非欢迎或者鄙视北京奥运花车。
 
  “中国需要发展人权,但选择玫瑰游行作为人权论坛是不适当的。我真的很厌烦。”他补充:“作为一个华人,我对中国举办2008年奥运会感到非常骄傲,这是中国首次举办奥运会。经过二、三十年经济发展,仍然有部分人视中国为威胁,而不是机会。这是他们的悲哀。”
 
  阻挠奥运花车事件的指使人是法轮功,但并未受到其他组织的支持。甚至连当地很少错过任何一个机会谴责中国政府,支持台湾独立的个别人,都对这个巡游辩论持观望态度。一些台湾的激进分子原本计划在游行过程中分发传单。但经过与社区领袖的多次辩论,他们认定批评奥运花车过于冒险,因为她在当地华人中间拥有如此广泛的支持,而其中的一些人,是他们需要赖以支持的。
 
  “如果我们在公众面前站出来抗议这辆花车,将会引起洛杉矶华人的众怒。”当地一位不愿公开姓名的台湾激进分子领袖说:“他们认为,北京奥运会非常值得骄傲。我们不希望在洛杉矶华人之间发生战争。”
 
  一群不相干的活跃分子纠集在一起企图阻止奥运花车,但都失败了。帕萨迪纳市议会驳回人际关系委员会发出的对中国人权纪录的批评建议。
 
  经过数周的谈判,激进分子企图与帕萨迪纳警察达成协议,允许他们在玫瑰花车游行路线或者路线附近举行对抗奥运花车的活动,但未能如愿。
 
  这些活动分子承认,要想在美国华人社区产生广泛的支持不太可能。法轮功加州理工学院发言人李建中承认:“现在我看到越来越多的人来到这里(观看奥运花车)。”
 
  法轮功是一个精神邪教组织,在美国华人社区普遍失去同情心,并在当地成为一个边缘组织。
 
  陈颙(音),在加利福尼亚大学欧文分校教授历史和亚裔美国人研究课程,他认为法轮功到处可见“是因为他们有专门的成员,但并不拥有大批追随者。许多人认为,法轮功并不等同于人权。”
 
  Cat Chao说得更直接:“许多中国人认为,法轮功是邪门巫术!”
 
  支持“奥运花车”的帕萨迪纳市市长比尔·博加德先生(Bill Bogaard)希望通过奥运花车来促进中美双方的相互了解。
 
  “美中之间的关系是如此密切。日常生活中每一件物品都是中国制造,同时又建议彻底谴责中国和中国政府。这太难了。”他说:“我们每个人都承认中国是世界舞台上的表演者。”(完)
 
Los Angeles Times: Activists fail to stir opposition to China's float

The shell of the Rose Parade float celebrating the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games sits in a sprawling warehouse complex in Azusa.

In a matter of hours, it will be adorned with thousands of carnations and roses, outfitted with fireworks and accompanied by 124 costumed Beijing opera singers, acrobats, traditional dancers and plate spinners down Colorado Boulevard.
 
Critics of China's communist government hoped to use the elaborate float and its worldwide stage at the Rose Parade on Tuesday as a rallying point for protests about the nation's human rights record.

But despite months of news conferences and protests, China foes have done little to change the parade's plans and have generated little support -- or interest -- from Southern California's large Chinese American community.

The lukewarm response underscores the increasingly close relationship Southern California shares with China. There may be no other time in which China has commanded as much influence and interest as it does today.

The San Gabriel Valley is home to one of the largest Chinese American communities in the nation and a growing business class that has made Southern California the chief trading region with China in the United States. To many, the 12-hour or longer flight to Beijing, Shanghai or Guangzhou is more of a commute than a voyage.

Business ties between the two countries forge quickly, and though many here believe China needs to improve its approach to human rights, more attention is paid to fueling the economy to improve the lot of ordinary Chinese.

"We haven't talked about it," said Cat Chao, host of a popular Mandarin-language talk show on KAZN-AM (1300), about the Olympics float. "The majority of Chinese think the Olympics is bigger than human rights and that human rights are already improving. They'd rather see China improve on issues like pollution."

Philip Young, president of the local Chinese American Citizens Alliance, said he planned to attend the Rose Parade. But he'll be there to cheer his teenage son and daughter in the Arcadia High School marching band, not to applaud or dismiss the Beijing float.

"China needs to improve its human rights record like any country, but to pick the Rose Parade as the forum is inappropriate," Young said.

"I'm really turned off. As a Chinese American, I'm proud China is having the Olympics. It's their coming-out party. After 20, 30 years of economic improvement, it's sad that some still see China as a threat and not an opportunity," he said.

Even local supporters of independence for Taiwan -- who rarely miss a chance to condemn China's government -- have largely stayed out of the parade debate.

Some Taiwan activists will hand out fliers at the parade. But after much debate among community leaders, they decided it was too risky to criticize the float because it had such broad backing among local Chinese, some of whom they rely on for support.

"If we come out and protest this float in public, we may anger many Chinese people in L.A.," said a leading local Taiwanese activist who wanted to remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the internal debate. "They consider the Beijing Olympics a point of pride. We don't want a war between the Chinese and Taiwanese in L.A."

At the heart of the issue is a float celebrating China's first Olympic Games -- apropos, tournament officials say, because the upcoming parade's theme is "Passport to the World's Celebrations." Backers say China's government had no role in building the float, and that it was paid for by Pasadena-based label maker Avery Dennison Corp. and a coalition of Chinese American business people and philanthropists.

Many of the donors, including Avery Dennison, have significant business interests in China, but through representatives they have denied that those relationships played a role in their decision to fund the float.

A disparate group of activists banded together to block the float but failed. The Pasadena City Council dismissed the recommendations of its own human relations commission to issue critical remarks on China's human rights record.

And after weeks of negotiations, activists failed to reach an agreement with Pasadena police to allow an event on or near the parade route to counter the Olympics float.

Left with no other option, protesters have pledged to turn their backs on the float when it passes them along the parade route on New Year's Day.

The activists acknowledged that they have struggled to generate widespread support in the Chinese American community. But they believe their failure comes less from support of the float than out of fear.

"Most Chinese don't dare to speak out against the Chinese Communist Party," said John Li, president of the Caltech Falun Gong Club, one of the original critics of the float. "They worry their business [with China] can be influenced if America puts pressure on China's human rights record."

Li said he's tried to persuade fellow Chinese on the Caltech campus to join him, but he said the fear of government retribution drives them to silence.
"I ask them if they want their children to be persecuted for having different beliefs" when they return to China, Li said. "Our job is to wake them up. I feel more and more are waking up. For example, in the past the Chinese media kept silent reporting on human rights. But now I see more and more of them coming here."

Part of the problem may be who's delivering the message. Though the protesters represent a variety of interests -- including those for Tibetan independence and critics of China's hand in Myanmar, also known as Burma -- no group has had a more polarizing effect than the Falun Gong, which has been the chief instigator behind the opposition in Pasadena.

The group, which is loosely bonded by a belief in Chinese breathing exercises, is outlawed in China as a spiritual cult.

Adherents have been imprisoned and tortured by Chinese authorities who deem the group a threat to their ideological hegemony.

Despite evidence of their mistreatment, they have failed to generate lasting sympathy from the Chinese American community at large, where some label the Falun Gong as a fringe group.

"They're visible because they have devoted members, but they don't have a large following," said Yong Chen, who teaches history and Asian American studies at UC Irvine. "The perception among many people is that the Falun Gong is not equivalent to human rights."

Chao was more blunt. "A lot of Chinese think it's voodoo stuff," she said.

Adherents admit their toughest skeptics are fellow Chinese. But winning them over isn't necessarily crucial. Latching on to an event as widely viewed as the Rose Parade has already proved beneficial, they say.

"All the human rights activists know the first and most difficult step in stopping persecution is to get exposure," said Shizhong Chen, a Falun Gong practitioner heavily involved in the opposition campaign. "What happens in Pasadena adds to the exposure. Leading up to the Olympics, such opportunities will [arise] more and more . . . This serves as a kickoff event for human rights causes."

Reporters Without Borders recently unveiled a billboard on the corner of Arroyo Parkway and Del Mar Boulevard in Pasadena that depicts the Olympic interlocking rings made of handcuffs. Underneath, it reads "Beijing 2008."

At one point, a caravan of supporters protested outside the house of Pasadena Mayor Bill Bogaard, who has been accused of engineering the idea for a Beijing Olympics float and led the City Council's refusal to issue a resolution expressing concern over China's human rights record.

Since the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown on student demonstrators, human rights groups have accused China of mistreating those who oppose the ruling Communist Party. They charge Beijing with a litany of abuses, including imprisonment without proper trial, torture and the harvesting of organs from executed prisoners.

Earlier this year, Amnesty International released a report saying China had failed to live up to its promises to improve human rights in the lead-up to the Olympics by detaining activists, stifling domestic journalism and clearing the streets of Beijing of petty criminals and vagrants in preparation for the Summer Games.

But defenders of the float have argued that the entry represents the athletic spirit of the Olympic Games, not China's government.

Riding several entries behind the Olympic float in a 1911 Pope-Hartford touring car will be the mayor, who hopes the float will bring greater mutual understanding between the United States and China.

"Relations between the U.S. and China are so numerous and so substantial that people find it difficult to engage in daily life -- where every other product in your hand is made in China -- and at the same time suggest that there should be total condemnation of China and the Chinese government," he said.

"We all recognize that China is a player on the world scene."

(Los Angeles Times, December 30, 2007)

Original text from: http://www.latimes.comews/local/la-me-chinarose30dec30,0,4220803.story?page=1&coll=la-home-center

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