In the history of Taiwanese's struggle to democracy, some scars seem never healed and when time comes, they bleed. “Ethnicity” is one of these scars. From the biological point of view, mainlanders who immigrated from Mainland China to Taiwan around 50 years ago and “Taiwanese” who too came from Mainland China 200 years ago belong to the same Han people. However, due to the divides and differences between social classes, language uses, political views toward China and reunification, historical complex, and constant arousal by media and elections, the two “ethnic” communities are under certain kind of tension which is hard to resolved till now. The latest example of the tension, according to Michael Turton, is:

A huge story last week was the revelation that Kuo Kuan-ying, an information officer in the Taiwan diplomatic service in Toronto appears to have an alter ego named Fan Lan-chin who is a raving mainlander bigot.

On March 11, the opposition party (Democratic Progressive Party, DPP) Legislator Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲) accused Kuo of having written a number of articles defaming Taiwan and its people under the pen name. From Taipei Times:

In the articles, the author referred to the Taiwanese as taibazi (台巴子, “Taiwanese rednecks”) and wokou (倭寇, “Japanese pirates”). The author said “the imposition of martial law had been a benevolent act of the then government,” and that “[China] should spend many years suppressing [people in Taiwan] instead of granting any political freedom [to them] once it has taken Taiwan by force.” The author also called Taiwan a “ghost island.” Kuan said her allegation was based on the fact that one of the online articles about Taipei’s Jiancheng Circle market posted on Fan Lan-chin’ blog on July 25, 2006, was also published by Kuo in the Chinese-language China Times on Aug. 2, 2006. The article described feelings about the decline of the Jiancheng Circle, Taipei’s oldest food market. A phrase that read “we are high-class mainlanders” was mentioned in the article. Hsu said Kuo sent a statement to the GIO to explain himself, in which he said that he wrote the China Times article but not the others under the name Fan Lan-chin. Kuo was quoted by Hsu as saying the article he wrote was then posted on Fan Lan-chin’s blog. Kuo was also quoted by Hsu as conceding that he did write “we are high-class mainlanders” in the article, but saying that the phrase was meant as “an expression of self-depreciation.”

Since Kuo denied the authorship of other insulting articles, netizens started to figure his identity out on their own. Billy Pan uses “human flesh search engine” to affirm that Guo is Fan.

郭冠英在網路上用化名范蘭欽寫文章，自稱是高級外省人，高調地罵台灣人是台巴子，倭寇。被PTT鄉民和部落客揭發後，卻矢口否 認。……不敢捍衛自已的主張，是這群所謂的『高級外省人』(超惡劣的名詞，那難道有低級外省人嗎?或低級本省人嗎?)，還有馬冏團隊的特徵。巧言 令色，玩弄文字，前後不一。

東窗事發後，筆名『范蘭欽』的部落客馬上刪去了他所有的文章。這是個很笨的作法。因為，網友和 Google都備份下來了。打實體的『郭冠英』，虛擬的『范蘭欽』馬上刪文。……除了已經在新聞媒體上曝光的，有PTT網友指出曾為郭冠英輸入這 些文章的報導外，……根據某噗浪網友的比對，『范蘭欽』至少有 55 篇文章又以『郭才子』的筆名發表，有時是同一天，有時是郭才子早，有時是范蘭欽早。

水月清風 The Lotus Pool By Moonlight also finds that:

2.29的八卦版有人轉錄了一篇聯合報的社論「被掩蓋的真相…陳儀 是非魔痴228」，內容約略是陳儀屠殺出於不得已，錯在台灣刁民。本來鄉民大家酸一酸也就算了，但是現在是個google很好很強大的時代，鄉民不只發現 這篇文章的作者泛藍欽有許多奇文值得共賞外，更發現了，同一篇文章被刊登在郭冠英的Blog上。

However, 水月清風 The Lotus Pool By Moonlight argues that:

其實就言論自由的角度來說 范蘭欽的文章是沒有問題的 (雖然罵到很多台灣人，我覺得也很不爽) 但畢竟嘴巴長在他臉上，手生在他身上……

但這問題的癥結就是  范蘭欽背後的真實人物的身份？ 如果是政府的公務人員呢？ 而且又是坐領高薪從事新聞外交事務的官員呢？ 這就很有爭議跟責難的地方了。

Jostar2 thinks that:

今天，我把范蘭欽是不是就是郭冠英交給輿論（難道就是人肉搜索隊嗎？）處理。我關心的問題不在這兒；我關心的問題是身為外省族群的范蘭欽那種莫名其妙的優越感為何要公開地顯示出來、用以挑釁眼睛瞧不見的「對方」。

問題的嚴重性其實還出在對「台灣人」的認知：如果把外省人排除在外，根本沒把外省人視作是台灣人，問題才真正地嚴重。

Not everyone thinks that Kuo should be dismissed from office. aguai thinks that even a bastard has his right:

即便郭冠英是個親中深藍滿腦子大中國思想的人 我看不出來他有任何因為歧視辱罵台獨分子而被迫失去工作的正當性 他可以完全是一個大中國沙文主義的混帳 而我們應該誓死維護他混帳的權利 理論上來說 這才是所謂的民主吧

However, on traditional and social media as well as in political arena, Kuo's articles and his attitude have become the most convenient target for politicians and angry “country men” who are motivated to use even more insulting arguments to fight back. The issues of freedom of speech, ethnic controversy, and President Ma's awful governance are all mixed together in the debate this time. With the approaching of municipal election, what is sure is that more and more “accidents” like Kuo's event are on the way.