I was talking with another member on how western media has always disrepected China while Taiwan does not receive that level of disrespect.
You jumped in and made the conclusion that it simply "proves" that the US/west sees China as an adversary and Taiwan as an entity that can be influenced.
Why can't you see my counter-examples? The US was on friendly terms with China during 1970-90, and perceived China as a potential partner to counter Soviet policies in Asia (as you have rightly argued), yet mainstream western media was disrepectful towards China, and the Chinese people in general during that same period.
According to your logic, China should have been given respect by mainstream western media during that time period, but it wasn't the case. Your assertion that China was favoured by mainstream western media is not true. If you had said China was favoured in the diplomatic and academic literature during that period, I would have agreed, but certainly not in mainstream western media. And that form of disrespects in mainstream media continues until this day. One of the main factor for this attitude in mainstream western media is its "racism."
We are talking about something that is absolutely subjective here. I can bring some piece of news from 70's and 80's that praises China and you can bring some piece of news from the same era that opposes China. However for 70's and 80's era that is absolutely clear that a good portion of Western Media was much more softer to China.
For example Deng Xiaoping was selected 2 times as the Most Influential Person of the year by Times Magazine. First in 78 than in 85.
From the early times of the Rapprochement wit China movement in United States I can also give following examples :
In a column “Looking Toward Peking: Washington Shows New Frankness on Policies Long under Discussion,”
Max Frankel, chief of the Times’ Washington Bureau and its major China watcher, claimed that the most important
thing about the speech was that “it was made at all.” While calling Kennedy’s China advisers timid because of the offensives of Joseph McCarthy (R-WI) and the China Lobby during the 1950s, he described the Chinese leaders as
“prudent and sensible.” Frankel also appealed to readers by saying that the statement was “aimed at Americans” and that it was a call for their “realism and moderation” in dealing with Beijing.
Washington Post also critisized the foreign policy of US in early 60's. It criticized the absence of fresh policy on China by asking a question,
“After six years, has the United States nothing more to say than that if China changes, the situation might improve? Not even a trial balloon?”
Also there is a reason why Times was so anti-PRC back in 60's and changed itself later in 70's.
The hostility of Time to China was closely related to its owner Henry Luce, the son of missionary parents who had worked in China before 1949. Luce liked to tell friends that the only ambassadorship he would take was to a “restored democracy in China.” His championing of the Nationalists was so much that by the time they were driven out of the mainland, Chiang Kai-shek had appeared on the cover of Time more often than anyone else--even more frequently than
Roosevelt or Churchill or Hitler. Luce was a leading member of the China Lobby, in which the most important nation-wide bipartisan organization was called the Committee of One Million, founded in 1953 to mobilize sentiment against any “appeasement of Communist China.”
And the following is from the Henry Grunwald era of Time Magazine.
Time published several large pictures of the American team’s activities in China. In an article based on witness accounts of Life’s two reporters,
it described China as “a nation that was unified and organized--with a level of poverty, but absolutely no misery” and
the people as “healthy and self-confident.
Moreover, it described Zhou Enlai as “smooth, very handsome, and quite witty.”
In 1954 when Zhou Enlai led the Chinese delegation to the Geneva Convention, Life had called him “a political thug,” “a ruthless intriguer, a conscienceless liar and a sabertoothed political assassin.” In the brand new atmosphere, newspapers and magazines also ran articles tracing the development of Sino-American relations. Some of them dated the “traditional friendship” between the two countries back to the American Revolution.
By the way your remarks made me find an extremely nice piece of academic thesis about the media and China-US relations. The author made cross reading between Chinese and US sources. A brilliant academic piece, of course written by a Chinese academician - Guolin Yi. Here's the link.
http://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1718&context=oa_dissertations
You can also read that to have more information on the topic and to see how parallel the media coverage is to US foreign policy.
@LeveragedBuyout you can also have a look at this brilliant study. I haven't finished it entirely yet it's very delightful to read.
This is false. NZ is not an ally of the US. They have already broken off their alliance, which was stipulated in the ANZUS treaty, back in 1984. NZ had refused entry for any US military vessels that carries or is powered by nuke. The US then suspended its ally obligations to NZ as a response. NZ further hardened and made it a law to make NZ a nuke-free zone. Ronald Reagan then publically announced that NZ is no longer a US ally.
Up until this day, NZ and the US still have not reinstated their alliance. The US banned port entry for NZ navy vessels right up to 2012. Saying that NZ is a non-NATO US major ally is a lie. NZ have refused, and even criticised, to participate in fighting against Iraq (when Saddam was still alive). It never gave up its nuke-free policy, even when pressured by the US. Simply, NZ is not a country that the US can just simply influence or push around. Yet, NZ haven't generally received any disrespect from mainstream western media (hint: NZ is Anglo-Saxon majority).
NZ is an example that disprove your simple logic about "disrespect = you are perceived as an adversary" ... "no disrespect = you can be influenced" (a pawn).
Your information about alliance of US with NZ is not up to date. NZ is a major US non-Nato ally. Bill Clinton officially gave NZ this status 1997. Here is the link.
22 U.S. Code § 2321k - Designation of major non-NATO allies | LII / Legal Information Institute
(a)
Notice to Congress
The President shall notify the Congress in writing at least 30 days before—
(1)designating a country as a major non-NATO ally for purposes of this chapter and the Arms Export Control Act (
22 U.S.C.
2751 et seq.); or
(2) terminating such a designation.
(b)
Initial designations
Australia, Egypt, Israel, Japan, the Republic of Korea, and
New Zealand shall be deemed to have been so designated by the President as of the effective date of this section, and the President is not required to notify the Congress of such designation of those countries.