EDITORIAL - Chinese friendship

Anti-China sentiment has become fodder for the editorials, columns, and commentaries lately, not just of this newspaper but of many other news outlets around the country.

We continuously criticize China for a number of different issues including the entry of their illegal workers here, their offshore gaming operations, and their ridiculous claim over practically all the ocean between our countries. We have even taken a swipe at them for their constant interventions in the affairs of Hong Kong, and their economic expansion in the region cleverly disguised as “aid” for poorer nations.

However, all that does not change the fact that we have a shared history with the Chinese people. They have been part of our history for a long time. In fact, history recognizes them as our first trading partners. Many of us can even trace our roots to mainland China.

Many Chinese families here or families with origins in China have also been essential to building what the Philippines has become, and they continue to make their beneficial presence felt in our society today.

And today, it just happens to be Filipino-Chinese Friendship Day. The day the Philippines established diplomatic relations with China.

While our beef with the Chinese Community Party and many of its policies can be justified, this negative sentiment should not extend to the Chinese people in general.

Sure, it becomes so easy for some of us to feel a certain degree of hostility or resentment toward anyone Chinese. It becomes easy for us to believe all of them are blind followers and enforcers, if not just subtle promoters, of the concepts and ideas of their authoritarian government. It’s so easy for us to lump them all into the same group.

But many of the Chinese people we meet actually have no hand in determining their foreign or military policies. Some may even be opposed to them, although they cannot freely voice out their sentiments considering the authoritarian and oppressive nature of their government.

We must be careful that our feelings don’t translate to misplaced racism against whoever just happens to be Chinese.

This Filipino-Chinese Friendship Day, let us at least be aware that even as we should oppose the Chinese Communist Party and its doctrines and foreign and military policies, as well as resist its intrusions into our territory, this country owes part of what it is now to the Chinese people.