More on the “McDonald’s Incident”
Not quite the Marco Polo Bridge Incident you may be thinking, but some of New Zealand’s Chinese netizens might beg to differ. We are hearing a lot about how the world needs to start listening to China more. So what are Chinese netizens in New Zealand saying? Well, while there are sane voices out there, many of these people appear to have a screw loose. How much of this online anger is going to be dished out physically? Will young patriots really track down a pregnant street person and deal to her with iron bars?
The “McDonald’s Incident” saw saw a pregnant Maori or Polynesian woman (apparently some kind of street person) aggressively initiate an altercation with Chinese demonstrators. The altercation turned physical and the aggressors got the worst of it, with two Polynesian females being kicked and punched by a large group of Chinese (plus a European). The Polynesians were charged with assault. No Chinese were charged with anything, and by all accounts the police were extremely sympathetic. Many of the Chinese side feel they still have a score to settle though. Some feel the Polynesians must be punished to send out the message that China cannot be bullied. Others are worried that if the Polynesians are not punished Chinese demonstrators will react by becoming more violent.
The incident seems to be the only case of non-Chinese initiated violence from last Sunday’s demonstration, though some details are a bit controversial. Two accounts say the physical stuff was started by the Polynesians, but one account says a Chinese male ‘accidentally’ initiated physical contact.
The following is a complete (albeit rough) translation of the first thread on this incident from Sky Kiwi.
J2lane says:
What happened with the incident outside McDonalds? Was there any follow up?
I saw some of my compatriots crowded around the entrance to the
So did a fight happen? I took a quick look around when I was passing in the car. There were no police. I hope no Chinese people got in trouble. I heard that in
So can anyone tell me what happened? Share your experiences.
Joz27 says:
It was like this: My friend and I were walking towards the train station. As we passed McDonalds two Islanders swore at us. We ignored them because we really didn’t want to cause any trouble. They carried on cursing us though, and asking us to go back to
Clock+knife says:
Ah, so that’s what happened.
You are the most precious says:
A westerner came and helped fight? Pretty cool!
‘Yaojin’ says:
So provocative! You should have recorded them.
Venlley says:
These Maori have nothing in their heads besides violence!
End of April says:
Shit too! [in their heads]
Sallylove says:
You really put up with a lot without getting provoked! I admire you!
Polynesians are much lower class than Maori.
J2Lane says:
Just so long as nobody got hurt.
Good to see we taught those pigs a good lesson. At the time I was thinking, at what point should I jump out of my car and grab the metal rod I keep in the boot.
I’m going to go to Placemakers and buy a piece of steel pipe. I need to upgrade my weapon.
Lala Rat says:
Our flagpole was made out of a metal rod. . .
Actually during the rally we had to be careful not to wave the flag too hard in case the pole went flying.
It’s a shame I didn’t see the McDonalds incident. I could have been in there swinging my flag.
DongningbinBN says:
I support that westerner!
Lala Rat says:
Absolutely.
Seeing that westerner with Chinese flags painted on his face and waving a Chinese flag, it was even more moving than seeing ourselves doing the same.
Clock+knife says:
Next time I’ll be bringing a metal flagpole, and if certain people aren’t careful they will be getting their heads cracked.
KakaJ says
Myself and my friend are the two girls that the poster above mentioned nearly got into a fight with the Maoris. It was like this. . . One of the Maoris threw a paper cup at a car carrying a Chinese flag in
I still feel a bit scared when I think about it, because that Maori girl was so fat she was like three of me! But I’m so grateful for the way things happened, and grateful that we have strength in unity. I would also like to thank the Kiwi who rescued us, and the lovely Chinese who also helped.
I also want to thank all the Chinese who came over to help! Because of you people, I feel that in future I will never have anything to fear. I don’t need to fear Maoris. I don’t need to fear Kiwis. So long as we Chinese join together, wherever we go in the world, nobody will dare so much as look sideways at us!! We can walk the whole world without fear!!
‘Turtle coming for dinner’ says:
Pretty interesting! Ha ha!
‘Clear and Worldless Day’ says:
You shouldn’t have put up with any of that! You should have attacked them right at the start. You had them outnumbered.
You went and let them knock your glasses off and insult you. Man I’m angry. If it’s the last thing I ever do I want to smash these sons of bitches.
I wish I could turn the clock back. I totally missed the McDonalds incident because me and my friends were down at the
Zhangxiu0420 says:
So that’s how the incident started then? Looks like I smacked them for a good reason then!
Joz.27 says:
I really regret I didn’t smack them myself.
Crazy red leaf says:
You should have killed them.
Siyuan79 says:
I know that Kiwi. After it finished he rode the same bus as me back to the
While he was waiting for the bus he carefully folded up his Chinese flag and put it away. I was really touched. It was a shame my English wasn’t good enough to talk with him. On the bus he was excitedly telling all the other passengers about the rally.
Jenny_kim says:
Who is joz.27? I was a witness to what happened. I was the one who had their clothes grabbed by one of those Polynesian sons of bitches.
P.S. I am looking for the people who rescued us. Any of you who see us please contact me. You are all lovely!
Tiaopixiaogege says:
[Picture] Is this him? He was the first to run over.
Angel in Hell 1983 says:
What a shame! I always miss this sort of stuff.
‘Clear and Wordless Day’ says:
Agree with the above poster!
Cena says:
I missed it. We outnumbered them. What do we have to be afraid of? We should mess these sons of bitches up!
Waiting4u says:
That westerner looked so gentle. I would never have expected he was a tough guy.
Zhangxu0420 says:
[to joz.27] Were they the friends I saw outside the door of ‘Big World’ [Seems to be an internet café. I don’t know the location though.].
Zhangxu0420 says:
[to jenny_kim] Didn’t I jump in and help? Maybe I rescued you? As soon as I saw a girl getting her clothes grabbed I raced in and gave a kick to the back.
So who were the ones I bumped into outside ‘Big World’. They seemed pretty staunch.
Jenny_Kim says:
[to the previous poster] If you saw an incident on the other side of the road and were part of the group that rushed over then you did [rescue me]. At that time there were only a few Chinese on our side of the street. As for who was first into the fray I only remember the Kiwi, plus a Chinese man with very short hair.
Zhangxu0420 says:
[to the previous poster] No idea about that. I just know I got the first kick in.
Zhangxu0420 says:
Maybe you mean the second clash? Because my flag and that of the Kiwi got grabbed and ripped. Then we rushed back in. Then there was a third clash. Ha ha!
J2lane says:
Reading the above posts. . . fucking great!
I arrived late that day and hadn’t prepared. I was driving down
I didn’t have a flag with me because I was running late. I played some nationalistic music on my radio instead to give support.
Haven’t felt that great in ages!
La la Rat says:
Go look at page A1. There really has been some follow up to all this.
Joz.27 says:
[to zhangxu0420’s earlier post about the unclear ‘group’] Yes! It was them. [the group outside ‘Big World’]
up.n.go says:
[again to Zhangxu0420’s earlier post on the identity of the ‘group’] Yes that was us. We were people you saw outside the Internet café.
Below is another account of the incident from a later thread (which became one of the most discussed threads of the week), plus some selected posts from that thread.
Xiaofan says:
On April 27th there was an incident outside the entrance to McDonalds. I saw peoples talking about it here. I’m sorry to tell you all, but it still isn’t over.
I am one of the people who was involved. At the time there were a lot of witnesses, but the incident started with me.
[After the rally] we marched down to the McDonalds. At McDonalds we came across two big and aggressive female Polynesians (actually they might have been Maori, but since I can’t tell the difference I will call them Polynesians). The pair were constantly cursing me, saying ‘F’ this and that. I couldn’t stand listening to it so I began arguing with them. I didn’t use any offensive language though. They rushed up and made like they were going to spit at me. We backed off right up until the edge of the kerb, from where we could not back off any further. Then one of them snatched at my placard, scratching my hand and ruining the placard. My boyfriend was pushed by them, pushed again, and still didn’t react. We were thinking whatever happened we mustn’t react violently. Then they knocked the glasses off one of us. We picked the glasses up and said nothing. The whole time they carried on swearing at us.
Then people came running across from the other side of the road. First to arrive was a westerner who hit the Polynesians, then everybody started to join in. We were the people standing there saying “calm down, calm down”.
When the police arrived they spoke to us and we gave them a detailed account of what had happened. As everyone who was there knows, one of the Polynesian girls acted quite disgustingly, pulled up her clothes to reveal her stomach and saying she was pregnant. I told the police her and her friend had pushed us and broken our glasses. I couldn’t believe it when she lied to the police and said my boyfriend has pushed her in the stomach.
My boyfriend never pushed her. As for her getting beaten up by the crowd, well even if she was pregnant it wasn’t our problem. While the police were taking our statements they were very much on our side and said with disgust that this was racial discrimination.
After I got home the police called me to say that the Polynesians would be appearing in court on the 28th (i.e. the following day), but likely would not admit what they had done.
Sure enough, on Tuesday the court called me and said that they had been acquitted. [I’m not sure exactly how these things are done, but I assume she really means something like that they had appeared in court, pleaded not guilty (not quite sure what the charge was), and the case was adjourned for later]
They are to appear again on May 19, and if they don’t admit guilt on that occasion they will appear again on June 4. My boyfriend and I have decided that if matters are taken to a third court appearance we will go and face them in court.
The police recorded our material losses (the glasses), plus emotional damage (taking an emotional impact report). So far as emotional damage went I told the police that their behavior had damaged my impression of
Today (Thursday), my boyfriend was walking by himself on
I really feel this is dangerous. These people are often hanging around on
We not only want to claim damages, but also want to speak up on behalf of other Chinese. Although we didn’t want to personally sue her, the case has already gone before the courts. There is no going back now. We have no idea how to cancel a charge like this. Anyway, even if we did know how we wouldn’t want to cancel it. We can’t let these people know that Chinese are scared of them.
In a democratic country like
If they really feel so racially superior, and if they really feel invincible, then this incident is a great opportunity. I am going to make a real effort to let them know, this is not their backyard, there is no reason for them to behave like such animals, and most especially they should not behave this way towards Chinese!
We don’t really understand
We need your support. We hope someone who knows about the law can give us some help, maybe tell us what we should do next. Do we need more witnesses? Or maybe we should make more detailed statements on what happened, explain how we were emotionally hurt, and make sure they get punished? I am also worried that this could influence plans to immigrate to
Thank you everyone. April 27 was an amazing day. Whatever the flaws, I don’t believe anyone could have organized a better day. I’d definitely come again. [Chinese] unity does not just mean uniting for one event, it means uniting the whole world!
[NOTE: There are too many posts in this thread to translate all of them. The majority of responses were reasonable enough. The most common post was to suggest the original poster get some legal advice and not worry too much. Many voices suggested the incident demonstrated serious racism and the Polynesians needed to be suitably punished to avenge the honor of
[In response to a Guanny who wants to distribute photos of the pregnant woman so a group of Chinese can assault her.] If she gets let off without any punishment I am worried about two things, both at opposite ends of the spectrum:
The first is that nobody will feel like coming to future patriotic rallies because they will be worried about getting hit. Even if they come they won’t dare shout slogans.
The second is that some of us are going to take revenge despite her being pregnant and female (she is often in the city after all). There could even be serious injury. It would be really hard to control. Actually that day when we were marching on
Anyway, whatever happens later all we can do for now is keep an eye on the situation.
Xiaofan says:
Hi thanks so much for all your advices and support!
the pregnant woman we are sure she is pregnant, coz she showed us her tummy!!
but yea, Im agree with some of you, she s afraid of nothing, she was attacking others, swearing, and smoking~~SkyKiwi社区-Z#n7{0\)X/x.P6f
新西兰,新西兰娱乐,新西兰留学,新西兰咨询,新西兰生活*M6^1Y)`4d*L/w-~
Now we cant take anything back coz it already happened, and we are not able to cancel this case just like that easy, eventhough we assume we can cancel the case, next time they see us, it will be the same. They will justcontinue insulting us even use violence.
新西兰华人社区,留学生交流中心:v4i:P;W”X6{*k7H
we are university students and living in city, I think there are lots of chances to meet them.
if we win, they will hav to pay for it, if they win, they will be more unbridled.
either way, will not change how they treat us, because racism is racism.
*L(d1g’x4J-G7}.M7\
we will wait until 5月19日 see what happen
G-cool says:
Get their photos up on here. If the law doesn’t work we can think of using some other methods.
Apricot NZ says:
Put their photos up. I’ll organize for a group of people to hang out at McDonalds and beat them up if we see them.
Jacky Zeng says:
I don’t know what I should do to help the original poster. Does anyone have a clear photo of the face of the pregnant girl? I saw a blurry image among photos put up elsewhere. I think I know who she is and where she hangs out. But I still need a clear photo of her face to be certain. Maybe that will help the original poster.
Guanny says:
I have a clear picture. If the original poster gives me their e-mail I’ll send it.
So what to make of all the above? Well, it is what it is. All I have done is translate the voices of some of these angry young Chinese protesters. One or two people posted comments on the “McDonald’s Incident” below my earlier post on the April 27 demonstration. One commenter had even witnessed the tail end of the incident himself. His impression was a bit different to what is described above. I thought people might be interested in reading Chinese accounts of what occurred, as well as some of the associated online discussion.
Personally I find the first thread disturbing. An aggressive pregnant woman who picked a fight and clearly came off second best has netizens fantasizing about taking to her with iron bars? While the second thread was not as bad, it is a concern to see certain posters circulating information to help identify an pregnant woman that other posters are talking about seriously assaulting. Austin is one of the only voices suggesting that people are starting to go crazy.
The complete lack of empathy for non-Chinese is strange. The poster J2Lane says “at least nobody got hurt”, then immediately talks about getting a better weapon. The message seems to be that it only matters when Chinese people get hurt. Non-Chinese must be dealt to severely.
Overall, the desire of many posters to create an anti-Chinese racist bogey-woman out of this street person is weird. Why did so few of them dismiss her as an annoying piece of lowlife? How did she become the most talked about topic of the week following the demonstration on April 27?
Perhaps the CIA paid her to throw that paper cup?
UPDATE: There are many comments below accusing me of misleading people with an inaccurate translation. I already noted my translation was ‘rough’; I am not a professional translator. However, I do not accept that my translation was misleading or inaccurate. Anyone who can read Chinese can judge for themselves. The critics are making fools of themselves.
Complete screenshots from thread 1 (first translation above). The final two or three posts (the ones after j2lane’s last post) do not have associated screen shots - they had no very meaningful content anyway. You have to click on each image to magnify it and view the text:
Selected screenshots from thread 2 (second translation above - includes only selected posts, as explained already). The posts by Xiaofan are not included in the screen shots below (the first one was too long to fit into a screen shot, and for some reason I don’t have the second either). I originally skipped translation of the first line of Austin’s post. To be honest I didn’t quite get his point. In the first sentence he says that the people who rushed across the street to help did so despite not knowing each other or the person they were helping. He says they intervened to “fight for a good cause”, this last being a concept that he claims does not exist in New Zealand. It seemed too weird to bother with, and since I already said I was only selecting parts of the second thread I originally just left it off. I only mention it here to limit the ammunition available to those who are about to appear and accuse me of mistranslation:
May 5th, 2008 at 10:59 am
You translated all that? Sterling work.
One thing I have always liked about (mainland) Chinese culture is that it is (seemingly) not aggressive in the overtly physical sense.
One thing I don’t like is that Chinese will join a physical fight on the side of their fellow Chinese in any context i.e. numbers, weapons, who is the aggresor etc.
Worrying, I’ll have to check out this sky kiwi.
May 5th, 2008 at 1:21 pm
[…] by physically assaulting the Polynesians. Read translations of Chinese accounts of this incident here. Two of the three arrests made on the day were for this incident, and seem to have involved the […]
May 5th, 2008 at 2:51 pm
Great effort with the translations; not nice reading but an interesting insight; I don’t read what kiwi 12-13 yo kids are writing on Bebo or elsewhere, but it doesn’t seem much beyond this.
Site administrators do not place warnings about making threats of violence?
You mention that the site is monitored; would none of these post come under laws of NZ about threatening violence. Maybe some of these students need warned by the police and immigration.
I did not see the early stages of this incident, but did see a large number of red shirts scuffling with a couple of woman, and they were not large by Polynesian standards, bigger than your average Chinese girl, yes. The mindset of the day seemed to be to attack anyone who opposed their mentality. If these were just homeless street kids, you would think the Chinese would have the sense to ignore them, but from Skykiwi it does not seem that good sense is in abundance there.
May 5th, 2008 at 3:53 pm
Lorne Street, the site is very closely monitored but the moderation focuses on stuff that they feel tarnishes China. For example, if you criticize Chinese nationalism you get banned.
On the other hand, posts plotting unlawful actions in New Zealand are ignored. It isn’t that they are not noticed. Sometimes the moderators even move such posts to more appropriate forums so they will get more views. For example, a little while back somebody was seeking a hook-up for black market paua, and a ‘helpful’ moderator moved the post into the food forum.
I have yet to see moderators warn users about making violent threats or distributing photographs to help assailants identify their targets.
I did see a site administrator ask somebody to take down an avatar that showed a Chinese doing a flying kick on a South Korean during demonstrations in Seoul. I am not sure if the intention was to remove provocative images or protect China’s reputation (the image created a lot anti-China sentiment in Korea).
I have not noticed any of the more thuggish members getting disciplined by moderators, and there is also little or zero criticism from other users.
Interestingly, the user who was sorry to miss the opportunity to beat up a Maori/Polynesian girl due to having been protesting outside the LV store belongs to a group that used the slogans ‘Go China’ and ‘Free Maori’ to blank out the number plates of their car in photos posted online. I guess, of those two slogans, ‘Go China’ is the one that best represents his politics.
May 6th, 2008 at 7:49 pm
Asian Today article by Guanny Liu
“A scuffle occurred on Queen St among three female pro-independence protesters and two Chinese supporters. Punches were thrown on both sides and a Chinese man was pushed into a bank window. A crowd of Chinese supporters quickly gathered.”
“The scuffle ended abruptly when one of the protesters removed her sweatshirt and lifted her shirt, revealing a protruding abdomen.”
More stuff about the alleged words exchanged.
This article has more variations on what actually took place; but it does confirm my earlier idea that they were protesters and not Polynesian homeless lowlifes.
Note how the article portrays that the Chinese stopped when they realized she was pregnant; this didn’t seemed to be the case and a Maori guy who was there said he had to jump in to shield the woman from the attack and in doing so took many punches and kicks.
When reading the stuff on the Skykiwi thread above, I had the feeling that they had something to hide and were making up stories as they are aware that students were sent home from Australia for a similar attack.
May 6th, 2008 at 8:27 pm
Interesting to read that Lorne Street. I have not yet picked up a copy of Asian Today so have not seen the original article. Assuming what you say is correct I guess I have two initial thoughts:
- There seem to be inconsistencies between the accounts on Sky Kiwi and what is written above. The most obvious one is that Sky Kiwi describes a racist assault while this article describes a political disagreement degenerating into a fight. One of the two stories must be false.
- The writer seems likely to be ‘Guanny’ from Sky Kiwi. That would make her the same Guanny who has been distributing photographs of the pregnant woman, apparently with a view to facilitating some kind of revenge attack. From memory Guanny is a media studies or journalism student. If I am correct her impartiality and ethics are questionable.
May 7th, 2008 at 1:12 am
I picked up a copy of Asian Today and it is as Lorne Street says.
So now there seem to be four accounts of what happened outside McDonalds. Three accounts have Polynesians harassing Chinese demonstrators for no particular reason, though there seems to be a racial element. This situation then deteriorates into a physical fight (with a little controversy over who first initiated physical contact). The fourth account has Tibetan protesters coming to blows with Chinese demonstrators and getting arrested for having started a fight.
It seems almost impossible for both of these versions of events to be true. So which is true and which is false?
Given that the three accounts on Sky Kiwi are broadly similar, I would guess that the news story is false. Why does the news story specifically link this scuffle (with two non-Chinese arrests) to pro-Tibetan protesters, while netizens on Sky Kiwi discussed it only as a racist attack? Netizens on Sky Kiwi described individuals targeted in other scuffles occurring on April 27 as Tibetan splittists. However, ‘Tibetan splittist’ does not appear in any of the three Sky Kiwi accounts of the incident translated above.
The evidence linking this scuffle to pro-Tibetan protesters looks unconvincing. I would speculate the incident has been linked to pro-Tibet demonstrators by a journalist with an agenda. Presumably the object is to make the Tibetans look bad - i.e. behaving violently and getting arrested.
My speculations may be completely wrong. However, something about this situation does not add up.
May 7th, 2008 at 3:13 am
If you want to find out more about Chinese students in Korea, see this link
http://www.9999cn.org/blog/content.php?fid=DBXW&id=2718812
May 7th, 2008 at 3:49 am
Thanks RicoBoby. I already saw those photos.
I am not sure that the photos absolve the Chinese students from guilt. There may or may not have been planting of evidence to frame the Chinese students. I think the Koreans are saying those photos are of Koreans holding up objects the Chinese threw. The Korean claims may or may not be true. What is really needed is somebody who reads Korean to research the whole thing in detail.
At the end of the day though, arguing about who planted what becomes almost irrelevant when Seoul was subjected to scenes like this. Check link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQU3c2z9tuk
Sorry, but foreign nationals just should not behave like this in somebody else’s country.
May 7th, 2008 at 4:07 am
This is the european guy that involved in conflicts in front of McDonalds at 4.27. Chinese demo. Can not find the photos actually showing shoving…. I saw that before…
http://www.skykiwi.com/bbs/frame.php?frameon=yes&referer=http%3A//www.skykiwi.com/bbs/viewthread.php%3Ftid%3D841274%26extra%3Dpage%253D1
May 7th, 2008 at 4:37 am
I have already watched that one. I hope camera was invented 100years earlier to catch the invasion of eight european contries into China in 1840s.
Thanks for the prompt response.
May 7th, 2008 at 11:46 am
Here are some photos showing parts of the event showing two of the woman who were involved.
http://www.chinese.net.nz/bbs/thread-122573-1-1.html
Also visible in one photo is the Maori guy who said he stepped into sheild the pregnant woman from being beaten.
The pregnant woman would have been arrested because when the police arrived as she was hysterically pushing or swinging and thats all they witnessed.
May 7th, 2008 at 11:53 am
@RicoBoby
The comments above from Skykiwi seemed to be from pimply 12-13 yo; but maybe in your case this was grossly overestimated, more around 6-7.
1840 was just a few years ago; and it was so big in comparison to what every other country experienced, not!
May 7th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
Further follow up:
I now see that some photos out of of the sets on the McDonalds incident appeared on Sky Kiwi before and were labeled as involving a Maori ‘Tibetan separatist’ (the woman in the red hood). The previous time I saw those photos I did not make the connection to the McDonald’s Incident. There were no photos showing violence in the sets I saw on Sky Kiwi. I think (not certain) they were labeled ‘debating with a Tibetan separatist’ or some such.
That being the case then just maybe Guanny Liu does believe these people were Tibetan separatists. However, it still seems odd that the three Chinese accounts I translated above paint a totally different picture. Guanny Liu (assuming she is ‘Guanny’) has read these accounts, so why does her news story ignore that information.
May 7th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
@Lorne Street,
Thanks for the compliment, actually I looks younger too than your estimation. To a gold-fish memory, 200 years’ just too long.
May I kindly ask you one question, what’s the BIGGIST DEAL you think that’s happening or happened in this world?
Thanks for the link.
May 7th, 2008 at 9:54 pm
Hi Seamus.
Thanks for the translations. I only found it recently but I’ve been finding your commentary about these events to be really interesting reading. I hope it’s not representative of the community as a whole, but I was surprised by the comments about racially ranking people. (eg. Sallylove’s comment comparing Polynesian people with Maori.)
Cultural differences aside, I’ve often wondered if much of the tension could be avoided if there wasn’t a big language barrier between people. For the last week or so I’ve been trying to translate some of the Sky Kiwi forums using Google to get a bit more of an insight, but it obviously has its limitations.
Lorne commented about laws to do with threatening violence. Forum moderators anywhere will do whatever’s in their interests, which in most places tends to mimic whatever most of the posters want and I suppose that’s what’s happening here. But personally I’d be worried if the police weren’t already watching some of these posts. Assuming they are, I guess they’ve probably decided it’s all hot air like some other people here have suggested? Still, I wouldn’t like to be one of the people on the other end of those threats no matter how young or immature the person who wrote it was. Are they really as strong as they seem, or is it just a cultural translation thing?
May 7th, 2008 at 10:35 pm
Mike: You make some good points.
On the racial ranking: Racial ranking is a bit of a Chinese trait, but expressing such ideas openly is often more thoughtless than malicious. In fact, a Chinese visitor to this site commented elsewhere that he was embarrassed to see I had translated that comment, and suggested people on sites like Sky Kiwi should be aware locals might be reading.
On the language barrier: I don’t know if removing language barrier would make much difference myself. A lot of the time people really do disagree. They don’t just misunderstand each other.
On violent threats: You make a good point. I was almost going to add a disclaimer to my translation. Chinese contains lots of ‘violent’ language even when there is no real violent intent. Chinese street conflicts can also involve more ‘play violence’ (for want of a better term) than similar conflicts in the west. Having said that, when genuine violence begins it usually rapidly escalates to people requiring hospitalization (e.g. weapons, crowds continuing to attack unconscious individuals, and so on). Chinese also seem more prone than most to crowd behavior. So while the online discussion may be hot air, they are still indicative of what people are feeling, and it only takes a few extremist individuals for things to rapidly deteriorate.
May 8th, 2008 at 12:19 am
亏你还懂汉语，白活半辈子了
May 8th, 2008 at 12:27 am
You will be interested in this guy, æ??æ??ï¼?å?°æ¹¾ï¼?
http://youtube.com/watch?v=YrMto2jlDDQ
May 8th, 2008 at 12:30 am
Sorry for the stupid coding, This guy is Li Ao.
Hope you can find sth. interesting
May 8th, 2008 at 1:05 am
Li Ao is always entertaining. The problem with the guy is that at the end of the day it is only about Li Ao.
May 8th, 2008 at 5:41 pm
Hi Seamus. I guess you’re never going to change people’s attitudes or beliefs just by breaking a language barrier, but I do still think it has a lot to do with why groups sometimes get hostile towards each other. If you can’t communicate, how can you even know why someone’s offended by you, or that they’re offended at all? To me it seems that if people stay inside their own groups and don’t make much effort to communicate with those immediately around them, tension is almost guaranteed. (This goes in all directions — there are plenty of NZ natives who make no effort to communicate with Chinese-speaking people.)
I do think it’s polite to at least try to learn whatever languages are necessary to communicate with people in a country before you go there. You could correct me on this if you think differently, but to me it looks as if a lot of Chinese-speaking people who come to New Zealand fall straight into the existing Chinese-speaking community, and often never have much motivation to try and understand anyone else in the country they’ve moved to. I guess I can sympathise because it can be really stressful if language isn’t something you’re interested in.
And I know the same goes for a lot of New Zealanders who go overseas, especially with some of the tour operators that are around now where you can zoom through a foreign-speaking country in a matter of weeks and never have to speak to anyone other than an English-speaking tour guide and English-speaking hotel staff. I tried this through part of South America a year ago and I felt quite embarrassed a lot of the time being in a group of westerners who were noisily walking down the street talking in English in front of a lot of locals who’d have had no idea what they were talking about. It felt a bit inconsiderate, I guess.
May 9th, 2008 at 1:30 am
Great effort of the translation. Yes, communication is an important thing. I just have a question: When you read through the stuff posted on Sky Kiwi, why don’t you first post your opinions and questions on Sky Kiwi(the website) in Chinese and have a discussion there? I believe you are good at writing in Chinese, right? I would suggest that it is a good thing to listen to others first before you jump to a conclusion.
Some English speakers sometimes say the word “fuck” when they are angry. I trust this is only a way that they express their angry emotions and it does not really mean that they will commit sexual harrasement. I hope you would agree with me.
Thanks.
May 9th, 2008 at 2:34 am
Hi Blue. I did not post my opinions and questions on Sky Kiwi because I was banned from Sky Kiwi for posting unwelcome opinions and questions just over a month ago. You can read about that here:
http://bunnyhugs.org/2008/03/29/chinese-students-protest-%e2%80%98biased%e2%80%99-new-zealand-media-%e2%80%98unbiased%e2%80%99-online-chinese-media-bans-new-zealand-netzien-for-questioning-chinese-student-protest-irony-ensues/#more-733
And here:
http://bunnyhugs.org/2008/04/02/chinese-nationalist-protesters-and-chinese-online-media-in-new-zealand-the-saga-continuies/
I heard that since a day or two ago they have ‘unbanned’ me. However, I have not confirmed that yet.
I only half agree with you about the work ‘fuck’. Most languages have this, right? Chinese uses it almost exactly the same way English does. Therefore it is very easy for us to agree on how ‘fuck’ works in these languages. When you use the word ‘fuck’ to swear you are just indicating disrespect or strong emotion. There is no literal sexual meaning.
The violent talk in the conversation I translated is different. These are people talking about a real life fight, even exchanging photographs that might be used to plot real life revenge. The literal meaning is clearly violent. Chinese participants in the conversation (e.g. Austin) saw the same literal violent meaning that I did. I don’t think there is any major translation or cultural issue here. Of course, whether the posters would really do what they say they are going to do is a different matter. You would have to hope it is unlikely. The Internet is full of crazy stuff, and people tend to express themselves more extremely when they are hiding behind anonymity.
May 9th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
seamus, i would like to describe you as a ” pu ssy”. you only pick on the minority in auckland to make your comments on. however, as i said in your previous post, nz local culture is disgusting (stealing, cheating, lying) look at your sick white culture–raping and murdering teenages, have sex with own daughters and caged her for twenty yrs. don’t you think its disgusting? (you might feel its ok for your white culture, huh?) why don’t you pick on those maori, island, white(pig) nationalities? i think you guys have more problems.
May 12th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
nice translation, your Chinese is better than English I will say, thanks for your effort in misdirecting people. Nazi!
May 12th, 2008 at 10:48 pm
Lee, instead of making yourself look stupid by calling me names, how about pointing out where my translation could have ‘misdirected’ people?
May 15th, 2008 at 4:30 pm
“The complete lack of empathy for non-Chinese is strange. The poster J2Lane says “at least nobody got hurt”, then immediately talks about getting a better weapon. The message seems to be that it only matters when Chinese people get hurt. Non-Chinese must be dealt to severely.”
Well well, it seems that you finally catch a speck of mouse dung that spoiled a whole pot of porridge, good on you! Unfortunately, here are not only you can read Chinese, if you still can’t understand “misdirect people”, please check it out with someone who speaks better CHinese than you.
By the way, do you eat with that mouth?
May 15th, 2008 at 5:48 pm
Lee, I have now added screen shots covering most of the material I translated. Anyone who reads Chinese can now read for themselves (of course they could always find this material for themselves simply by looking on Sky Kiwi).
Do you want to point out problems in my translation? Where have I ‘misdirected people’?
The posts in the first thread I translated are clearly violent. They threaten violence and they relish in doing so. Moderating voices are absent.
As I already noted, the second thread is only a selective translation. As I already noted, I focused on the ‘revenge’ aspect. That said, I did not even translate every post threatening revenge. The second thread contains people threatening violence, and also more moderate voices that clearly taking those violent threats seriously. Meanwhile you have others (interestingly one of them possibly a journalist - i.e. the Guanny Liu who writes for Asian Today) distributing photos that are obviously likely to be used to line up an a pregnant woman for violent assault.
I find the level of violent aggression a bit disturbing. What do you think about it?