“The 228 Incident did not just deprive a generation of elites of their lives; what it deprived Taiwan of were all the beautiful possibilities that those people might have brought if they had lived.”
These words originated from the “I Am a Student, I Oppose Want Want China Times, Youth Alliance Against Media Behemoths” at a press conference on February 27, $2014$, aiming to rename the “228 Peace Park” to the “228 Taiwan Victims Park.” The speaker claimed to be quoting Chou Wan-yao, a historian of the Republic of China.
Later, many people adopted this beautifully packaged rhetoric, filled with wonderful imagination, to shift all the blame for “Taiwan’s numerous current problems in politics, economy, education, language, art, and culture” onto the countless “beautiful possibilities” supposedly destroyed by the Republic of China government when it killed Taiwanese people on February 28, $1947$.
Look, another piece of shit has been released by a brain infected by a virus~~~
And it’s a ridiculous piece of shit…
It is utterly laughable that some people who constantly use terms like ‘servile’ and ‘intellectual scum’ are now so highly reverent of those Japanese Occupation Era elites whom they have never met.
Even more ridiculous is that many Taiwanese people barely know any of the elites cultivated during the Japanese Occupation Era. The few names they can mention are probably limited to people like Chen Cheng-po.
However, Chen Cheng-po is famous because he was a brilliant painter, but few people know the real reason he got entangled in the 228 Incident and was executed (or it could be said that his story has been overly diluted and romanticized by the DPP education authorities).
👨💼 Chen Cheng-po’s Identity Was Not a Painter, But a Politician
Chen Cheng-po’s role during the 228 Incident was not as a painter, but as a Taiwan Regional Council Representative—he was a politician.
Chen Cheng-po was protesting the excessive force used by the National Army in suppressing the 228 riots that broke out across Taiwan (it has now been proven that a large number of Communist agents took the opportunity to organize large-scale armed resistance). He was shot after stepping forward to intervene, meeting the same fate as others.
In that chaotic time and space, just imagine what would happen if Wang Shih-chien (a prominent figure) rushed into the Sunflower Student Movement to loudly oppose storming the Executive Yuan.
It’s easier to verify facts today with advanced media. Back then, soon after the chaotic World War II, how many people were able to specifically recognize the face of a single politician amidst the riot’s intelligence confusion?
The brain is for thinking, not for spewing bullshit…
If you want to talk about the beautiful possibilities killed by the 228 Incident, the number of Mainlanders or “our own people” indiscriminately killed by the “Taiwanese people” (as narrowly defined by Taiwan independence advocates, including modern Imperial Subjects) during the riot’s chaos was certainly not insignificant.
🤷♂️ The Beautiful Imagination of the Japanese Occupation Era Elites?
Those great Taiwanese elites of the Japanese Occupation Era, as described by Taiwan independence advocates, neither stopped the Comfort Women who were tricked and abducted by the Japanese military, nor stopped the Japanese military’s plan to eradicate the Chinese culture of their ancestors through high-pressure Kōminka (Japanization) education, nor stopped the Japanese military from throwing Taiwanese youth into a war that was not theirs.
Are you sure these generational elites have the face to meet their descendants and be hailed as generational elites? And do you really expect them to bring many beautiful possibilities to Taiwan?
After Nazi Germany was defeated, most of the elites who supported or did not oppose Hitler chose to go into hiding and vanish because they still understood the meaning of “dignity”…
If they were truly elites cultivated during the Japanese Occupation Era, they could have followed the Japanese back to Japan after Japan’s defeat; the sea between us was not sealed off.
Just be honest and admit it: the so-called ROC aesthetics, ROC education, Confucian thought, morality, and culture are all the indelible national history and Chinese culture deeply rooted in your hearts.