不要让恐惧掌控你的心灵与生命
Do Not Let Fear Dominate Your Life


每日一语：

The biggest risk in life is not taking one. --- Unknown

你生命中最大的风险就是你的不愿承担风险的怯懦。 --- 无名者

In my contact with the Chinese, the most disturbing phenomenon is that the Chinese fear their authorities and fear the majority, to a frantic and pathological degree. Yet they don't fear losing their souls to the devil. They don't fear God.

The ones that observe their own conscience will fear no man. The ones that fear man will never face their own conscience -- God. --- Kai Chen

在我与大多数中国人的接触中，最使人不安的一个现象是他们最恐惧的是政府与多数人, 到达了一个恐慌与病态的程度，而从不担心为此将自己的灵魂出卖给恶魔。 他们从不愿面对自身的良知。

那些尊崇自身良知与上苍的人绝不恐惧他人与政府。 那些恐惧他人与政府的人也绝不愿面对自身的良知 - 上苍。 --- 陈凯

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Dear Visitors:

From HoopChina's reprint of my forum's messages and photos to their open display of fear of the Chinese authorities only takes a few days. But it has etched in my mind how irrational and how fearful the Chinese are.

When they claimed that China has changed for the better nowadays and invited me to visit China, they sounded as if China now is a normal member of the world community. Everything is rosy enough to me to feel safe shall I go to China. But in the next few minutes after a few colleagues and I discussed their letter openly on the internet, they panicked and sent me an email requesting that all the related messages be erased, fearing trouble and punishment, even a total shutdown of their website by the Chinese authorities. (I thought China had changed.)

Has anything really changed and been improved in China?

Regarding the hardware, of course, much has been changed. There are more buildings and food. But what about the software -- people's mindset? I would say that nothing seems to have changed. Fear of man and authorities still dominates the Chinese people's lives and their cultural mindset.

I will paste this letter here for you to read. But I will erase the names of persons related to the event:

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Dear Mr. Kai Chen,

Please forgive me if you feel disturbed by this email. My name is ( ). I'm the owner and CEO of hoopCHINA.com, the largest basketball website and fan community in China. I'm writing to ask you for a favor, representing a basketball community with over 330K hoopCHINA members.

I read your story and was told that my friend ( ) has contacted you. I admire you because of the your contribution to the basketball world. However, there are some messages from you and your friends making us feel insecure and uncomfortable, such as: Ms Kate Zhou wants to cite ( )'s writing in her book.

We are a basketball community, a very happy and harmony one, largely thanks to the fact that sports has very little to do with politics. We 330K members are enjoying a place like hoopCHINA where we could just talk about basketball. But, if the letter gets published at Ms Zhou's book or our talk is mentioned in your blog, your friends' blog or any other publicly accessible online space, we would be in the danger of losing our community.

You are at LA. I'm at Shanghai. Most of members are in China and do not have US green cards. If our talk and letter get published, I'm the one who's going to be questioned. hoopCHINA is the one who would have everything to lose. 330K basketball fans would probably lose their home. You were from China, so I assume you understand the rules and how things work here.

here, ( ) and I are asking you a big favor: Please do not publish the letters or any part of our encounter story anywhere, paper media, online or any other places. Please do not share the letters or any part of our encounter story with anybody anymore. Please forward this email to Kate Zhou, Ann, Lau and any other friends of you who has heard the story. Please ask them not to share with others. We fully understand that we do not have the right to direct your action. Please consider this a big favor from you to many many true basketball fans in China. We would deeply appreciate your help.

Regarding ( )'s letter, please consider it as his personal opinion and expression. ( ) is a well respected member of hoopCHINA and a very very good friend of mine. But the letter should not be titled as representing hoopCHINA.com for the reasons we both understand. Thank you.

(Name of the sender)

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Yes indeed, he has evey right to request us not to discuss the letter openly. And I have sent an email to affirm that we will erase the letter and quotes from our discussion. But two things disturb me:

First, the HoopChina's CEO person apparently sent the email, overruling the member who contacted me in the first place. I would rather have that person contact me for such a request.

Second, there is no apparent torment over the contradiction and conflict in their (the CEO and the member) messages. There is no reflection on their part. There is no display of moral courage. There is only a demand of understanding of "China's special situation". There is absolutely NO moral judgment. If was as if the Chinese live in a moral vacuum. The only existence displayed on their part is physical, not spiritual, not mental, not abstract meaning....

I will post my response here for you to read:

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Dear Mr. ( ):

Thank you for your warning about the present situation. I will do everything I can to forward this message to Ann and Kate as soon as I get back to LA. I am out of town with my daughter on a basketball tournament. I think with your request your wish will be fully observed.

( )'s letter is well received and the content is positive. The only thing that will raise issues with the authorities is the contact with me. I hope everything will be OK with you and your operation. I think you have done a good job to serve the basketball fans both in China and overseas. Please keep up the good work. If the reprint causes you further trouble, please delete it in your website.

Sincerely. Kai Chen

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I hope you guys will think deeply about the related issues and dwell hard on the "fear factor". Fear controls and dominates every facet of the Chinese lives, either in China or in the overseas Chinese community. Most Chinese consider living a long physical life is the ultimate accomplishment without asking themselves the meaning of their own existence. Should the Chinese continue to live that way, they can only maintain their zombie-like shapes and "Using their blood and flesh to build yet another Great Wall", as the Chinese National Anthem openly espouses.

Take care of yourselves and may God give you courage. May you pursue the meaning, freedom and happiness in your life.

Best. Kai Chen. 陈凯