November 2021 – Heaven's Other Mandate

Rudd must register his connections with Asia Society Policy Institute, but Paterson’s membership of IPAC is deemed not to be foreign influence.

In his latest of a set of self-congratulatory videos posted on YouTube (deliberately not linked), serial China basher James Paterson highlights a mini-speech that Scott Morrison delivered on his phoney campaign for re-election. Morrison cites the complaints made by the Chinese Embassy about a speech given by Paterson to the European Parliament. In that speech, Paterson attempts to rally white nations to adopt the hysteria that he champions – that of attempting to suppress free speech by those who might complain about Australia’s absurd anti-China posture, such as the Chinese embassy.

There are layers of irony and moronacy in both Paterson’s and Morrison’s speeches that might not be obvious to a casual viewer.

The first is Morrison’s use of ‘irony’. Believing himself to be terribly clever, but actually confirming moronacy, Morrison labels the complaints by the Embassy as ‘ironic’, supposedly because Embassy complaints are considered ‘foreign interference’ and it was that topic that was supposedly the intent of the complaint.

If one genuinely understands irony, one would know that irony only works if the outcome of a statement is the opposite of its intention. The complaint made by the Embassy was not about either foreign interference nor free speech, but a reflection on how whipping up anti-China sentiment will not help the China – Australia relationship, as any relationship requires mutual respect, an element totally lacking in both Paterson’s and Morrison’s attitudes to China. To paraphrase, “Countries that respect one another don’t talk about one another like this. They don’t accuse each other of ‘beating their wife’.”

The Embassy was doing what embassies have always done – registering disapproval. If this is foreign interference then, ironically, one must consider every complaint made by an Australian embassy to a foreign country as ‘foreign interference’. So Morrison must explain how this particular complaint is so different from those made by every country in every country.

Morrison and Paterson are either unable, unwilling or simply too dishonest to clarify why this complaint should have a label of ‘foreign interference’.

The other ironic point is that Morrison defends against what he sees as an attack on free speech by… criticising the free expression by the Embassy of their concerns.

‘Free speech’ advocates such as Morrison and Paterson are, in fact, pushing the most restrictive constraints on free expression that this nation has known. In an attempt to silence past Prime Ministers, the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme requires any person who might be giving a speech on behalf of or to a foreign entity to register this.

Reminiscent of the worst of McCarthyism, although cloaked in plausible deniability, the intent is to ‘expose’ influence where there is none. Rudd’s presidency of the American not-for-profit thinktank, the Asia Society Policy Institute, and his consultancy work, are among the real target. Any membership of any transnational organisation can be seen as ‘foreign influence’.

And, in a stunning ironic performance, Paterson, in his witch hunt against the University of Queensland regarding the Drew Pavlou suspension, directly castigated the University for not acting against an adjunct professor (the Consul General) for public comments he (the Consul General) made and grilled the University representatives at length (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-iezdK_32ok&t=1200s) on the reasons for not removing him. So much for free speech. Free speech is granted to those who agree with you, but disciplinary action is appropriate for those who make contrary statements.

As yet another example of true irony, Paterson’s membership of IPAC, The Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, an association of legislators, has not been registered as ‘foreign influence’ (https://transparency.ag.gov.au/Registrants -> “James Paterson” -> zero entries), despite the significant influence it has on Australian legislators, such as Paterson and Hastie. IPAC is directly funded by instruments of foreign governments, namely:

The National Endowment for Democracy
The Taiwan Foundation for Democracy

and George Soros through the

The Open Society Foundations

IPAC is a ‘white people’s’ club, with representation from most of the prominent former colonial states and has values to match.

But, of course, the legislation was never about transparency or accountability, but was concocted to enable witch hunts against China and Chinese people.

So, to clarify:

Morrison and Paterson object to the free speech from the Chinese Embassy complaining about Paterson’s speech.
The Embassy was reflecting on the relationship between Australia and China and how it is not helped by people like Paterson. It had nothing to do with challenging free speech, which continues without interruption.
Free speech continues without interruption, not threatened in any way by a complaint from the Chinese Embassy. The suggestion that it is threatened is gratuitous fear mongering.
In breath-taking hypocrisy, Paterson supposedly champions free speech while demanding disciplinary action against those exercising free speech.
Certain kinds of foreign influence, such as that by IPAC in regards to Paterson, are off limits to this legislation.
The legislation imposes McCarthyist constraints on the free speech of those who are most vocal in attempting to balance the opinions on China, such a Kevin Rudd.

In this edition, I will take a detour from the new report called “The architecture of repression” by Xu @xu_xiuzhong, Leibold @jleibold and Daria Impiombato.

Today, I return to Michael Clarke, whose scholarly work underpins much of the reports and articles regarding China and Xinjiang. Of particular interest is Clarke’s “Widening the net: China’s anti-terror laws and human rights in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region“. The central thesis of this paper, written in 2010, is that China has sacrificed human rights for security in relation to terrorism. Throughout the paper, general references to global initiatives related to terrorism do not use the ironic indicators of single quotes. For example, he writes

Domestically, the ‘war on terror’ has permitted China to not only deploy significant repressive force, in political, legal and police/military terms, to confront the perceived threat to Xinjiang’s security posed by Uyghur terrorism but also to establish the political and legal framework through which to confront any future challenges to state power.

Note the acknowledgement of Uyghur terrorism – indicated by the simple unironic adjective. Quite ‘accidentally’, on many occasions, Clarke affirms that terrorism may in fact be just that. However, in a most confused way, as Clarke begins to talk about China’s response, he uses (on 14 instances – there are many other instances of usage in phrases or other forms) the ironic ‘terrorism’, indicating scepticism.

Indeed, by the end of the paper, a reasonable reader would conclude that Clarke does not believe any terrorism at all had occurred and that Beijing had simply adopted a repressive mode, seemingly towards nearly everything.

Notably absent from Clarke’s assessment is a comparative analysis of counter-terrorist modes and counter-terror theory, probably due to the fact that this is certainly not his area of expertise and he speaks with no more authority than a CNN journalist. In particular, he is silent on the insidious influence of Salafist extremism that spread throughout Central and South East Asia. This silence, in view of his historical expertise, is unforgivable, and puts a large question mark on what he might be intending with this paper.

Also absent is any attempt to ascertain what Uyghur people might actually think of the policy. Like so many of the white men who speak on behalf of those in developing countries, ignoring their agencies, Clarke is happy to posit, without evidence, some kind of universal Uyghur identity that conveniently supports separatism, Salafist extremism and violent independence movements. In this paternalistic endeavour, Clarke joins fellow academics purporting to speak on behalf of Uyghurs.

Of course, Clarke’s thesis was demonstrated, in the subsequent terror attacks in Xinjiang, to be completely misguided.

My suggestion to Michael is that he “pull is head in” and stick to subject matter over which he has some control and knowledge and avoid the trend in academia to signal one’s liberal views by China bashing.