Independence, Secession, and More

The other day on signing out of a hotmail account, I was as usual taken to the MSN website. Like Yahoo and similar sites, on the front page there are a number of featured "news" stories. I put that in quotations because, on the Taiwan version of the MSN site at least, these stories are for the most part are completely inane and pointless, or even worse than pointless. Many are along the lines of "celebrity A and celebrity B have broken up/started dating/been seeing eating dinner together" or "celebrity C cries as she talks about her dead father" or "celebrity D wears outfit which shows lots of cleavage" (not that I have any objection to cleavage; it's simply that something like this is about as far from newsworthy as it is possible to get). Then there is absurdly unscientific nonsense like which astrological signs are most likely to have affairs. But while one of the "headlines" the other day was also not really newsworthy, it at least was something that could give rise to further discussion, even if only be virtue of its absurdity.

The news item in question said that a Chinese celebrity had claimed that several Taiwanese celebrities were pro-Taiwan independence, and the latter had angrily denied it, with at least one threatening legal action. Now the first thing that struck me as absurd was the reaction of the Taiwanese stars. I can understand being unhappy at someone saying something false about me, but the strength of my reaction would depend on what it was. In this case, it would be somewhat like having someone say I liked Ma Yingjeou (or, for that matter, Chen Shuibian). I would be annoyed simply because it wasn't true, and it would be a definite mischaracterization of my political views. However, I wouldn't threaten to sue anyone over it. I wouldn't even threaten to sue anyone who said I liked George W. Bush, though I might be tempted.

To be sure, a person's political inclinations are often an important part of who they are, as they say something about the person's principles and philosophy of life. But still, it is absurd to react to a false statement about your political views as if you had been accused of murder, domestic violence or other reprehensible behavior. It's even more absurd in this case, as being "pro-Taiwan independence" is the position anyone rational, relatively unbiased, and in possession of a modicum of relevant facts should take. I won't go into a full recitation of the arguments on this issue here as they deserve a separate essay (I may have one already written somewhere), but simply put, Taiwan is already a de facto independent state (which is why I don't really like the term "pro-independence", as it implies advocating becoming independent rather than just acknowledging an existing reality) and its historical ties to China are far more tenuous than the Chinese government and other pro-unification types would have everyone believe. Aside from this, I support the principle of self-determination, at least for regions of viable size with substantial cultural and/or historic reasons for claiming a separate identity.

This topic in turn reminds me of the fact that at the time of my recent trip to Texas, one of the major news items was the Republican and Democratic primary elections for governor of Texas, and the fact that both current governor Rick Perry and another Republican candidate (the one some news analysts called the "tea party" candidate) made statements that were generally interpreted as being in favor of Texas's secession from the US. Given what I have just said about self-determination, it might be thought that I looked favorably on these statements, but the contrary is the case. Am I being contradictory? No, as my objection is not to the idea that Texas could break away from the US, but the reasons that people like Perry tend to cite as justification for such a move.

The problem is that extreme right-wing politicians and their followers oppose the US federal government because of things like health care reform, measures to protect the environment, taxes, same sex marriage, and other issues like these. As I have stated elsewhere, the US needs health care reform, including a public option if not single payer; moves to regulate carbon emissions and to promote clean energy are even more vital, not only for the US but the world as a whole; taxes are necessary to reduce the deficit, pay for necessary government programs (and many if not most are necessary), and to promote other initiatives (e.g., gas taxes to promote energy conservation); and allowing same-sex marriage is simply a matter of justice. So if people like Perry want to leave the US in order to avoid having these things "forced" on them, then of course I will oppose them. If, on the other hand, a US state wanted to leave the US in order to more easily accomplish reforms of this sort, then I would support them, particularly if there were additional historical or cultural reasons for the state in question to become independent (such as in the case of Hawaii).

A good analogy would be the American Civil War in the 19th century and the period leading up to it. The Chinese like to cite this as an analogy for their opposition to separatism though they of course ignore the fact that Taiwan has already been separate from China for a long time, and places like Tibet and East Turkestan were forcibly incorporated territories, more analogous to the Southwest US, Native American lands or Hawaii than to the southern US states, which originally joined the US voluntarily. They say that their "anti-separatism" is like Lincoln's refusal to let the South secede. While this is not really true for the reasons mentioned, I will also say that Lincoln was in the wrong in his denial of the right of states to secede. However, the South was also wrong, because their reason for seceding was because they wanted to maintain slavery. Some now try to claim that the Civil War was not really about slavery, but about states' rights, economic power and so forth. But while there were certainly other factors involved, slavery was clearly the main cause of the conflict. The "right" that the southern states were most interested in was their "right" to legalized slavery. This is proven by the endless disputes over slavery that preceded the war, and the fact that they opposed Lincoln and the Republicans because they were considered abolitionists. So to claim that the Civil War was not about slavery is obviously nonsense.

Likewise, when southerners like Strom Thurmond and George Wallace ran as third-party candidates in presidential elections in the mid-20th century, while they were running under the banner of "states' rights", the right that they were particularly concerned with was the "right" to segregate blacks from whites. No government has the right to maintain oppressive systems like slavery and segregation, so to claim independence in order to do so is obviously not acceptable. Likewise, I don't support the right of a state like Texas to secede in order to avoid obviously progressive measures. As I stated above, I do support its right to secede in principle, as long as it is doing so for good reasons. While someone like Rick Perry is almost certainly never going to have a good reason for supporting Texan independence, if someday some politician does call for secession for a good reason, then I'll certainly give their ideas consideration. And if someone says I'm pro-secession with regard to Texas, while it wouldn't be true now, I wouldn't sue them for saying it.