A media activist, researcher and educator currently based in Hong Kong. My Twitter account is @oiwan and personal views are published on: patreon.com/oiwan
Latest posts by Oiwan Lam from July, 2013
Student Movement in Taiwan
“The Far Eastern Sweet Potatoes” has written a review and analysis of the development of student movement in Taiwan in reaction to issues such as media monopoly and land justice against the background of cross-strait relation.
An English Written Chinese Classical Couplet
Chinese couplet is a kind of classical poetry written in two lines, which are corresponding to each other in length as well as syntactic and semantic properties. As the couplet can be pasted to the entrance of a house, sometimes a short extra line, horizontal line to be pasted in...
Is the Man Who Bombed Beijing's Airport a Terrorist or Victim?
A man in a wheelchair, who claims he is paralyzed as the result of cruel beatings by police officers in 2005, set off a homemade bomb in Beijing's airport.
Chinese Court's Bizarre Anti-Sexual Abuse Poster
A poster, warning people to obey the law otherwise turn from “a fresh daisy” to “a shriveled sunflower”, was recently put out by People’s Court in Manzhouli, a small city in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. See Ministry of Tofu for the poster's sexual implication.
China Law Professor: Raping Bargirl Does Less Harm
While commenting on a recent rape case, Tsinghua University law professor Yi Yanyou argued on microblogging site Sina Weibo that, “It does more harm to rape a good woman than to rape a bargirl, a dancing girl, an escort or a prostitute.” Such arguments were echoed when the lawyer of...
Experience of Being Black in China
Marketus Presswood, who previously lived in Beijing for more than eight years, wrote in Tea Leaf Nation about his experience of being black in China in late 1990s. I overheard students speaking in Chinese about how they were paying so much money and wanted a white instructor. One student went...
China: Crackdown on Citizen Movement Activists
Chinese Human Rights Defenders has an update on the arrest of citizens and activists in China. The latest detainee is prominent activist Xu Zhiyong, who is considered a moderate reformer. 25 individuals have been confirmed criminally detained since February for publicly appealing for an end to official corruption and for...
China Cracks Down on Corruption Whistleblower
China has blocked the web presence of anti-corruption hero Zhu Ruifeng for reporting on the shady relationship between two local communist party officials.
Billionaire Jack Ma Makes About-Face, Praises Chinese Government
Was Ma's change of attitude related to the recent secret execution of “China's Madoff”?
Punish the Unmarried in China?
Starting from July 1, 2013 China put into effect a new filial piety law, requiring grown children to visit their parents “frequently”. In reaction to the law, an elderly suggested to punish the unmarried one: My kids shouldn't be treated as a violator of any law if they don’t visit...
Outcry Over Hush-Hush Nuclear Plans in Southern China
A complex of nuclear fuel facilities has been quietly planned in Heshan in China's southern Guangdong province, unleashing a wave of anger among Web users over the hush-hush nature of the project once local media brought the plan to light.
China: Rural Identity, Urban Heart
Off Beat China translated a photo feature by Sina which gives a snapshot of the life of a few post-90s migrant works in Beijing.
China: Statue Built and Removed
The Statue of the Soong Ching Ling, wife of Sun Yat-sen, the founder of Republic of China, was appeared in November 2011 in Zhengzhou to mark the 100th anniversary of the 1911 Revolution, was quietly removed. Why? See Beijing Cream for the story.
Chinese Social Media Users are Rumor-Happy, Low-Educated, Report Says
A new report from the state-run Chinese Academy of Social Sciences that labels social media in China as a rumor mill and social media users in China as having low levels of education and income is raising alarm among netizens.
We're Uyghurs. We're not terrorists.
Against the background of two violent unrests in Xinjiang, a plea from an Uyghur from Xinjiang stirred up discussions of how to make peace with people from different ethnic backgrounds on Chinese social media. More from Offbeat China.