not much ado about something

by jackie sheeler on August 13, 2008

a british journalist was arrested and roughed up, then had all his equipment confiscated, for the crime of trying to record a “Free Tibet” protest in what was supposed to be a no-protest zone near the olympics in beijing.

who are they kidding? the entire city is a no-protest zone. here’s what happens to people who try to follow the rules:

Ji Sizun came to Beijing from the southern province of Fujian and wanted to demonstrate in one of three protest zones Chinese officials have designated for the games, Human Rights Watch said in a statement.

Ji, 58, applied at the Deshengmenwai police station on Aug. 8, the day the Olympics began, and disappeared three days later, when he went back to check on his application, it said.

that’s from fox news which, though it remains much despised for its blatant republican partisanship and lopsided reporting, was the only US news organization that even bothered to mention the incident with the UK reporter. maybe it’s just too early in the morning for the rest of them.

or maybe there’s some none-too-subtle pro-chinese pressure from the US government muzzling the big corporate media outfits? what other explanation is there for the slavering blog on CNN entitled “subtle security in beijing” that describes tanks in the street outside the newsroom and forced drinking of liquid at checkpoints?

i wonder where ji sizun is, and whether he’ll ever see his friends and his family again. i wonder what might happen to a chinese journalist foolish enough to try and report on a mere eight people unrolling a Free Tibet banner on a bridge. i wonder why the west seems so invested in pretending that china is not a brutal totalitarian state.

i wonder if the olympics will yet end in a bloodbath, and whether all the reporters who see the violence will get out of there alive.