Keywords

Betel Nut

Politics, Race

Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) is the Vice President of Taiwan. She has always been criticized for being outspoken.” Although I feel many of the things she’s said are nutty, I’ve often been willing to give her the benefit of the doubt because I think there is a tendency to attack women for having strong views on any subject (a tendency that is just as strong in America as it is in Taiwan). However, her latest fiasco is so shockingly stupid that it defies belief. (via Muninn.)

Taipei Kid has it right:

Flybort asks if Annette Lu actually said that Taiwan’s aborigines should move to South America. Yes, it is true, the vice president of the Republic of China actually said that the victims of the recent storm (mostly aborigines) should move to South America.

I have a better idea–how about Taiwan stop its ridiculous addiction to betel nuts, a crop that helped bring this storm mess in the first place.

When I visited Aborigine areas in the mountains in the East of Taiwan, there were numerous illegal betel nut plantations everywhere. They were all owned by Han Chinese, not by the Aborigines, who are under strict governmental regulations about what they can or cannot grow in the mountains. Betel nut trees don’t hold the soil together and promote landslides. Aborigines die because of government corruption, and the Vice President’s solution is to ship them to South America? (Like things are so great for indigenous peoples in South America …)

No wonder so many of the Aborignes I met hated the DPP. With the Vice President saying things like this, it is hard to blame them.

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