You know you’re halfway across the world when students idolize a mass-murderer in a midterm project. My students' assignments were to create a political party running for office in a struggling country known as “Petoria” (technically Family Guy coined this name before I did.) It was something I hadn’t tried before and it was a great opportunity to subliminally indoctrinate them with ideas about governments with more than just one political party. I gave them some issues to address in their platforms: environmental and economic decline, poverty, and a war with Belgium.
Most of the parties were pretty ordinary and the solutions they promised airy and vague (yep, they hit the nail right on the head). Some of these had a few good ideas, like raising the retirement age and spreading awareness about the importance of the environment. However, some of them were quite inspired, such as the “Slim Party,” which advocated that girls should lose more weight in order to attract rich husbands, therefore protecting themselves against economic recession. The “Fruit Party” not only solved every single problem with a diet heavier in fruits, but also reduced the nation's risk of cancer.
Then there was the “Hitler Party.” Leave it to my English majors to suggest the policies of a genocidal dictator to solve Petoria’s problems. And they had some good arguments to boot. By emulating Hitler' s militarism, they would continue the war against Belgium in order to boost the economy. Sure, he completely devastated Europe, but not before he brought Germany out of the Depression. “After all,” said one, “the US did the same thing by invading Iraq.” I informed them that though their point was valid, it actually didn’t work in that case. As a means to improve the environment they suggested exporting all pollutants to developing countries. And all traitors would be shot without due process, etc.
Western political correctness doesn’t exist in China—which is why I love it. Of course there are a number of other issues you have to avoid—Tibet, Taiwan, etc.—but National Socialism is not one of them. Despite the fact that these “superfans” of the Führer were being funny, I did try to emphasize just how diabolical the man was. When it comes to World War II and the subject of genocide, Chinese students dwell mostly (and intensely) on Japanese atrocities like the Nanking massacre.
Acts of oppression outside of China are sometimes completely unheard of. None of my students last semester were aware of the Iranian protests. At the same time the catastrophic experiments of Mao and the CCP, like the Cultural Revolution, are usually downplayed using the old 60-40 argument (60% of what he did was good, 40% was bad). Of course when it comes to my students, much of this could just be adolescent indifference (and a little harmless state-controlled media brain-washing). Regardless, sometimes I find myself trying to break the Chinese "bubble" and debate violence and oppression with them in a more international perspective.
Leb Wohl.
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