With the visit of Chinese President Hu Jintao to America this past week China has been much in the news. I won't try to post links except to say that you can do a Google search or go to Drudge and check old headlines.
For my two cents I wanted to say a couple of words about some words that Michelle Malkin had about China and offer a few thoughts on Christians and China.
Michelle has launched a new online webcast called "Hot Air," today with a program on China, wherein she mainly chastizes companies like Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, and Skype for kowtowing to China by letting the government censor their searches and content. She mentions the case of Hao Wu, a filmmaker who has been detained without being charged since February 24th. The reasons for his detention are unknown at this time. Michelle also praises Wenyi Wang, the lady who heckled Hu Jintao as he was speaking on the South Lawn of the White House. She mentions that you can get arrested in China for attending a non-government church, and wonders why none of the people that met with Hu Jintao this week spoke out against these things.
My two cents are that Michelle brings up some valid points in her broadcast. To be sure, there is a good deal of censorship in China. On the other hand, the Land of Ozz brings up some interesting things about the censorship of Google in China.
It seems that the main Google.cn search engine actually returns more hits than the US version of Google when searching on the word Christian. Why make such a big deal over the images site and skip the fact that the main search engine seems to not reflect such an anti-Christian sentiment?
I got 251 Million hits on Google.cn when searching for Christian
I got 201 Million hits on Google.com when searching for Christian
Why not report this? Is this a case of a blog gone MSM? Why not share these facts Mr. Preston?
I also wondered what would happen if you took some of the terms that are likely being censored and translated them to Chinese and then run the search again on Google.cn. I did come up with very different results. I got less than 64 million results when I searched for “Jesus” on Google.com. You can click on the images below to see the actual current search engine results.
I then searched for “Jesus” in English on Google.cn. I got just over 93 million results.
Then I translated “Jesus” into Chinese using the Google Language Translate page. Next I searched Google.cn for the translated version of Jesus. I got 1.7 million results.
This example of the differences in the Chinese version of the Google Search engine and the regular Google.com site does not confirm censorship at all.
I actually tried the same experiments he did and got different results. It looks to me like I get 348 million hits on google.cn when I search for the word "Christian" and 639 million on google.com. So, it does seem that there is a big difference although I have to say that 348 million is still a lot. I did not try the Chinese character translations like he did. I will also say that many of the standard evangelical websites made the list on google.cn.
This is not an argument that Michelle is wrong, it is just to point out that a good deal of Christianity gets through on google.cn and there may be more to the story than we know. The issue Michelle brings up is the hypocrisy of companies who will fight for freedom against the U.S. Government and submit to the strictures of the Chinese government. That is a valid argument and a valid point.
But I also want to say that it seems clear to me that the Christian message is getting through at least on google.cn.
It is also true that the Chinese government still cracks down hard on dissidents and we ought to be much in prayer for people like Hao Wu.
And I don't want to come across as justifying censorship or persecution but I would like to ask us all to take a God's eye view of things in China. China is not where it ought to be in terms of freedom, yet the gospel is moving in China ln ways that are unprecedented in world history. Missiologists tell us that there were roughly 1 million Christian believers in China at the beginning of Mao's reign in 1949.
After two and a half decades of repression under Mao many believed the church was extinguished in China. Yet today, estimates are that there are anywhere between 80 million and 150 million believers in China. I am not sure that the world has ever seen such a rapid advance of the gospel in any nation in history.
China is changing. What it will be is yet to be seen. Some believe that within three decades China will surpass America as the world's leading superpower as it will surpass us economically and militarily. I don't know the details of things like that, but I do know that there are those who believe that within the next three decades there will be more Christians in China than any other nation.
So China is growing economically, militarily and spiritually. It is coming out of an extended period of being closed off to the rest of the world and is changing into who knows what? But it is key that Christians around the world pray for the continued advancement of the gospel in China.
Obviously our politicians have to deal with the political issues related to China and this is what Michelle was addressing. But the story behind the story is that in the midst of the things she addressed, God is on the move in a powerful way in China.
I would encourage anyone to learn more about China and be diligent in prayer for that great nation and people.
A good place to start is with the book Jesus in Beijing, by David Aikman. This is the best place to go to get a popular level treatment of the history of Christianity in China. The book has gotten mixed reactions here and abroad. Aikman tells stories and names names and because of this, there have been crackdowns on believers in some parts of China. So, some are not too thrilled with the publication of this book. Still, I have been fortunate enough to talk with Chinese believers in various places and with those who have worked in China and almost to a person they say that this is the book to start with in learning about Christianity in China. Yes, most wish Mr. Aikman had been more circumspect in telling his stories, but they pretty much all agree that this is one of the best treatments of Chriistianity in China. For myself I will say that the book is thrilling - I have some new Christian heroes from reading this book, heroes who have never made the standard church history textbooks.
Also, a good website is China's Millions which offers a plethora of information about China.
And, China Soul offers some wonderful videos you can download and watch.
Related Tags: Books, Current Affairs, Politics & Society, Michelle Malkin, China, Religion, Christian, Christianity
NYT had a lengthy article yesterday about the big disconnect between Google and China, and that self-censorship concept that Google is engaging in, cf. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/23/magazine/23google.html
The article mentions the interesting twist of how Google gets its foot in the door, to do business in China (everybody wants a piece of the action, when China is the largest market in the world by being the most populous nation) while at the same time, making known to China web searchers that there is the existence of content outside of China that cannot be accessed inside of China.
Posted by: djchuang | April 24, 2006 at 05:11 PM
The die was cast when Bush 1 was made ambassador to China after the ping-pong nonsense. China was in the middle of the cultural revolution, which killed at least 10 million innocent folks, while Nixon, Kissinger and Bush 1 were making friends. That's why China got only a slap on the wrist after Tienamnen Square. The Bushes and American capitalists have been in bed with the Chinese for almost 35 years. Lenin was right...the communists will sell us the rope to hang ourselves. Or as Scripture would tell us, Babylon with the violence of its trade will fall.
Posted by: stan | May 03, 2006 at 10:54 PM