Everyone must have standards in how they conduct themselves, and with consistent standards, others have a basis to understand you. Therefore, the standards that extend from a person’s values form others’ impressions of that person. In business, this is called corporate culture’s unwritten rules—understanding these unwritten rules means fitting in well.
The only exception is perhaps when you’re the chairman’s son—even if subordinates have a thousand objections, they’ll adopt a graceful facade for you. But these people typically perform only when you’re watching.
The Taipei political headlines from the past week or two were probably dominated by the “special relationship” between “Ko Wen-je,” “Tai Chi,” and “Hitomi Tanaka.” This storm in a teapot finally reached its climax when Taipei Councilor “Hsu Hung-ting” told Ko Wen-je in the council, “Feng Guang-yuan would also say you and Tai Chi have a special romantic relationship,” triggering the explosion. Probably due to this incident’s impact, Tai Chi finally agreed to resign voluntarily (though later it was revealed he promoted favorite protégés before leaving).
Whether it’s “special romance comma relationship” or “special comma romantic relationship” isn’t worth mentioning. Because either way, this isn’t culture worth learning from or deserving discussion space—this clever sophistry about where commas should go only reflects speakers’ inferior character and shrewdness disguised as cleverness.
Counsilor Hsu Hung-ting publicly spoke such ungentlemanly language to the city’s mayor in the council, showing no respect for others whatsoever, treating etiquette and protocol as meaningless. The real problem is these people’s fundamental lack of understanding: they’re merely defaming themselves and their intelligence.
Especially recently, hearing netizens constantly throw labels like “fake morality” and “fake propriety,” actually reflects their own already-degraded argument standards. Often they can only shout incomprehensible slogans, seeming to think labeling others is an achievement. In many people’s eyes, these “label-makers” lack substantive learning and knowledge, truly making a laughingstock.
Since Ko Wen-je erupted in anger at Hsu Hung-ting’s jest about his special relationship claim, rising and flipping the table in council, Ko presumably has certain sensitivity to sexual orientation claims. Therefore his reaction is like any normal person—not wanting baseless malicious accusations against one’s personal life, especially defamatory ones.
Not suffering others’ deliberate harm, whether physical violence or psychological bullying, represents the embodiment of high-level freedom and democracy.
Yet contrasting Ko’s reaction, regarding “special romantic relationship” claims—the originator Feng Guang-yuan—not only repeatedly mentioned Ma Ying-jeou and Kim Bou-kong’s “special romantic relationship” on his blog but used words like idiot, kept man, and bitch (vulgar terms auto-censored) sneering at Kim Bou-kong.
Kim Bou-kong eventually angrily sued Feng Guang-yuan in court, yet in first-instance proceedings, the judge ruled that Feng’s statements about “special romantic relationship” characterized Kim and President Ma as intimate and mutually trusting relationships, etc., while “kept man” and “idiot” though “not positive and sarcastically pointed, target specific events rather than abstract abuse. Sarcastic commentary represents Feng’s personal style, influencing society’s perception of Feng rather than the targets…” ruling Feng not guilty.
This judge proves courts aren’t “run by the KMT,” yet also shows how individual judges’ free interpretation affects verdicts. Because by his logic, anything recognizable as personal style can cause infinitely elastic legal interpretation—how nonsensically sophistic.
Feng had been sentenced to 20 days detention for sarcastically calling former Minister of Culture Sheng Chih-jen a “trash civil servant,” yet received completely different verdicts despite directing worse language at Kim Bou-kong. Quite intriguing. Currently, Kim Bou-kong and Feng Guang-yuan again face off in the High Court, with the verdict scheduled for October 6. Who knows what verdict this judge will render. We’ll wait and see.
Incidentally, among all this bickering, the only unmoved figure is Ma Ying-jeou himself. As president—especially in his second term—simply ignoring subordinates’ squabbles represents the best approach. It genuinely seems Ma Ying-jeou’s consistent attitude shows true gentlemanly bearing (his most rebellious moment was probably surrounding Lee Teng-hui en masse, which explains why those two bear such a grudge).