The notion of freedom of speech is damned pretty, but it contains one fundamental flaw: it allows people to speak freely. This severe shortcoming has presented immense obstacles to progressive societies over the centuries and while some of the more athletic Occidental nations have made strides in correcting its foibles — lime quarries and guard dogs seem to have a retardant effect on its more extreme symptoms — the most insidious fantasy of our age has taken hold of the public imagination and shows no sign of being crushed any time soon.
The problem, of course, lies in the fact that those who champion free speech are generally too busy erecting wigwams in their hydroponic gardens and training their vaginas to perform monologues, to do much listening. Deafened by the fluttering of the hummingbirds and butterflies in their hearts, they cannot hear the monster they have created. That evening, as they reach for the Paulo Coelho book on the nightstand and take one last suck of carrot juice, they smile as they imagine their protégé, a shining orator on a hill, conquering injustice with glittering language. And all around and underground, in a billion pits of blithering jibber, the creature jaws its way through little words, dull words. Many, many dull little words…
But there is hope. The vanguard of the resistance is bold and determined, and every day new allies join in the struggle against rampant expression. Indeed, this week our ranks were swelled dramatically by Google, casting off the yolk of effete liberal humanism and announcing that it would help the Chinese government prevent its citizens from gaining access to incendiary information. No longer will easily swayed Cantonese be able to fool about with literary powder kegs like the recipe for choc-chip cookies and the lyrics to I Am a Woman in Love by Barbra Streisand.
Of course, while one is happy for the Chinese government, one’s celebration of Google’s decision is entirely selfish. Yes, the thoughts of the world are being kept out of China; but much more importantly — oh rapture! — the thoughts of Chinese are being kept away from us.
According to the Internet about to be switched off east of Stalingrad, 80 000 new blogs are launched every day. This is truly nightmarish. Tell us that 80 000 new Dan Brown novels are launched every day. For pity’s sake reveal that 80 000 new airborne strains of syphilis are launched every day. Anything but blogs. Anything but this glimpse into a ghastly basement world of sun-starved troglodytes, bleached bluish white by their PC screens, living vicariously through the anaemic lives of wannabe correspondents.
Perhaps now the outraged lobbyist will begin to understand what a great debt we owe to Google. Had those brave computer dorks with their elastic ethics not intervened, we would be staring at the prospect of a billion blogging Chinese. Nothing would have survived that apocalyptic flood of banality. Our way of life would have ended not with a bang or a whimper, but with a Kahlil Gibran quote and an animated Hello Kitty hugging a heart.
Still, one can’t help wondering what those billion blogs might have contained …
Friday. Chin’s poodle next door apes Western running dogs. Yap yap yap it say. My head hurts, but perhaps is not fault of dog but rather mercury in drinking water. Will meditate on it. Saturday. Ate Chin’s poodle. Bit stringy, and tasted like mud, but perhaps this is fault of plutonium in cooking oil…
And elsewhere…
Juniper berries gleam in the rain, but I am blind to all but rage. My computer tests my fury like typhoon tests young green bamboo shoot. Computer it say that fatal error has occurred, but it speak with forked tongue, for when I inscribe Alt-Ctrl-Del it reboot as meek as sucking pig and as serene as first winter snowflakes. If I am fated, perhaps one day I will meet the counterrevolutionary who sell me copy of Windows XP for $9.99, and another fatal error will occur, with ninja stars in his eye sockets.
And still elsewhere…
Sunday night — moonlight on the pagoda roof, the peacocks clucking fretfully in the yard below. Father said to jam newspaper under the doors, for the Americans are abroad on the night winds, sniffing at lintels and slipping their long white fingers under slumbering silks. I will listen to my Justin Timberland album again, with the covers over my head. Justin, when will you come to me, you with your little round close-together eyes and your trousers hanging from your buttocks? Justin, my Justin, would that you were mine and we could get our freak on…
Is censorship a good thing? One final fact. The eight million Google pages that feature Britney Spears are not viewable in China. The prosecution rests.