Press Interpreter

02/16/06 -- Henan is a microcosm of China. China is the world's most highly populated country, Henan is China's most highly populated province. China is also the world's largest agrarian country, Henan is China's largest agrarian province. China is the world's largest developing country and it can be said that Henan is China's largest developing province. China's GDP is among the highest in the world but its per capita GDP falls below average. Henan's GDP is the fifth largest in China but the province's per capita GDP is only 18th in the country.

Although Henan is a poor province it is not China's poorest. From an outside perspective the prejudice against people from Henan can be viewed as regional or cultural discrimination. This intolerance is in fact almost purely economic discrimination. Hardly any of the world's prejudice has cultural roots. No matter whether racial, regional, ethnic or sexual discrimination, when examined closely it is possible to see they all stem from differences in wealth. It is near impossible to find any circumstance where the discriminator is poorer than the one they are discriminating against. Economic discrimination is man kind's most basic type of injustice and thus deeply rooted into our society.

Henan is poor but not the country's poorest province. It has a successful economy, making it strange that its people are singled out for being poor and not provinces or areas poorer than Henan.

The reason for this may not just be that those discriminating are unaware of regions poorer than Henan. They often feel that bullying someone weaker than themselves is not heroic and shows little superiority. Instead it makes them look like a nasty piece of work.

Mocking, vilifying and discriminating against someone from Henan has none of these dangerous repercussions. People from Henan are different to the people from the undeveloped frontier regions of China, they are not poor to the extent they can't afford basic clothes or food. Laughing at people from Henan does not go to the degree of belittling their dignity. It may not be possible to compare Henan's economy with that of developed coastal regions but it still has the initial foundation of a good economy.

Mocking people from Henan is similar to a strong person mocking a weak person, comparible to the way the extremely skilled kung fu experts Dongxie and Xidu bullied the Seven Quanzhen disciples in Jin Yong's novel.

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--Translated by Silas Jenkins, University of Leeds, UK

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