Friday, August 22, 2008 from my blog: myspace/wallieworld.com

The Olympics opening night extravaganza had me thinking of Mussolini. You know what they say about him: he was a killer and a torturer and a horrible dictator, but at least he made the trains run on time. That's the way I felt about China as I watched the spectacular show they put on for the world August 8.

In the days leading up to the 'big event' I had thought seriously of not watching it. As a way of staging my own one-woman protest, I was set to boycott the Olympics altogether. But my curiosity got the best of me, and I tuned in anyway that first Friday night.

My husband, who was also launching his own one-man boycott of the festivities in China, happened to walk by as I was watching. In a few moments, he too was hooked. It was a visual and visceral feast for the senses: the choreography of the two-thousand and eight drummers; the nimble dancers who defied gravity as they pranced around the huge model of the earth. The visual effects were splattered across the huge Bird's Nest coliseum as if it were a single canvas. The lights, the fireworks, the human artistry of it all, created a work of art on a scale this world had not heretofore known.

That was what my husband and I both thought of it. It was on a scale that was larger than life. A scale that seemed almost as if it were not being put on by mere humans, but produced by alien beings from another planet who are bigger and more technically-advanced than our species. In a word, the show was Impressive.

In the days following that first night of fanfare, the stories from "behind the scenes" began to surface. There was the little girl who was deemed 'not pretty enough' to be seen on camera so she sang off stage while a 'cuter girl' did pantomime. And there were people who complained that they been forced out of downtown Beijing when the bulldozers and bureaucrats had arrived many months earlier to start the Olympic planning. But that story was quickly mentioned and gone.

Then I remembered the reason I had planned on boycotting the Olympic coverage in the first place. It's the Mussolini factor. You see, I am an Immigration Attorney and I have represented many people from China. I have heard horrible stories of torture and abuse taking place in that country. So I already knew, that despite all the beauty that the Chinese government put on display for the world at the opening ceremonies, that same single-mindedness, focus and dedication to purpose have also been aimed at less pleasant creations. They are busy creating other Chinese products like new methods of torture (as if creating the infamous water torture wasn't enough!)

We hear sometimes about China's "one child" policy, but there is not as much information around about how that policy is enforced. Not many Americans have heard about the mandatory physicals and surprise sonograms that female workers have been subjected to. But I have. I had a client once, a woman who was very credible. As she sat safely in my Washington, DC office, she sobbed and hung her head as she gave me her testimony. She told of how she and the other women who worked at a Chinese factory in Zheijang Province were subjected to random sonograms. It was during one of these exams that it was discovered that my client was pregnant. Since she already had one daughter, her condition was quickly pointed out to her supervisors. At first the managers talked to her and told her she couldn't afford to pay the extra tax that a second child required. As she resisted their urging to terminate the pregnancy, their demands got more intense. Finally, one day she was taken to a medical facility and given an abortion against her will.

This rigid Will of some people in China—they are the ones that make up the iron fist of dictatorship. And it was that iron fist that steered the hands that put on the Olympic Opening Spectacular. The same fist which has forced women to have abortions against their Will, was the same hand that put on that beautiful spectacle of light for the world to marvel at.

When I first heard the story of the little girl who sang off-camera while a "cuter" face was put out in the spotlight for the world to behold, I was reminded of another Chinese family I represented back in the late 1990s. They had two gorgeous teenage daughters who were twins. In the course of preparing their case, I was given some photos of the twins when they were much younger, still living back in a western Chinese province. The photos appeared to be of two boys. The children's heads were shaven and they were dressed in shirts and pants which made them look even more boyish. The parents told me that where they were from an area where women and girls were treated very harshly. The couple had purposely made their twin girls look like boys in a hope that wouldn't be kidnapped or raped. They said they were already "looked upon with disfavor" because they had twins. By having twins, an event looked on with great joy in many cultures—the poor couple had violated the one-child mandate, without even intending to. So they lived quietly, trying not to stand out. They did what they could to make their children 'blend into the crowd.'

China's occupation of Tibet and its subjugation of the Tibetan people have rightly gotten media attention. The world needs to stand up for Tibet. And we need to recognize that China's attitude towards Tibet is a continuation of its policies against other ethnic minorities who reside inside its borders.

In my office I have a picture which one of my Chinese clients gave me. It's a pastoral scene of a beautiful garden filled with flowers. In the distance are rolling hills which seem to go on forever. When my client, a young man of 23, gave me this picture, he told me a touching story. He said that when he was imprisoned in China he was subjected to physical torture. In order to endure the pain, he tried to picture a beautiful place. This painting, which he found some years later in a DC shop, represented to him the place he had gone to in his mind. As his Chinese guards inserted long wires up the shaft of his penis, he would imagine the garden. He said that they used that torture against him not only because it was painful, but it was also intended to prevent him from fathering children. He too was a member of an ethnic minority and it is a common theme of the Chinese government to control the reproduction right of all its citizens, and to take a special interest in the reproduction of disfavored, ethnic minorities.

China is an enigma. It is a country and a culture which is over 5000 years old. It is a country of grandeur and beauty. It is a country of contradictions. Watching the Olympic opening ceremony, I was made even more aware of all this.

As the games come to an end, I have come to the conclusion that members of the Chinese government are probably quite happy with themselves. China wants to display its power to the rest of the world. It has done that. It has dazzled the world. China wants to be recognized as a mighty nation of over a BILLION people. And, it wants to be seen as a nation of ONE. One voice, that is. The image of those 2008 synchronized drummers is still playing in my head. That is the China they want us to see. But I know there is more to China than just those who were deemed worthy to perform in that orchestrated event two weeks ago. Because, despite all the pageantry and pyrotechnics and breath-taking performances the world witnessed that night, I know that offstage there are people who are marching to the beat of a different drummer. And they want to be heard.

I suppose someone, somewhere, is now saying, "yes the Chinese are persecuting the people of Tibet and torturing political prisoners, but, hey, they sure do know how to put on a great show." Mussolini would be proud.