The Rest Is Politics: Leading - 181. Ai Weiwei: China, Censorship, and Dissidence Through Art

Episode Date: March 23, 2026

Why was Ai Weiwei kidnapped and held prisoner by the Chinese government? How did the 2008 Sichuan earthquake radicalise him into taking aim at the authorities through art? What’s behind Ai Weiwei’s belief that there is a serious censorship issue in the West?  Rory and Alastair are joined by Artist and Activist, Ai Weiwei, to answer all this and more.  Search IG.com to find out more and/or Look for IG in your app store. Join The Rest Is Politics Plus: Start your free trial at therestispolitics.com to unlock exclusive bonus content – including Rory and Alastair’s miniseries – plus ad-free listening, early access to episodes and live show tickets, an exclusive members’ newsletter, discounted book prices, and a private chatroom on Discord. Social Producer: Celine Charles Video Editor: Josh Smith + Bruno Di Castri Producer: Alice Horrell Senior Producer: Nicole Maslen Head of Politics: Tom Whiter Exec Producers: Tony Pastor + Jack Davenport Advertise with us: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Thanks for listening to The Restis Politics. Sign up to the Restis Politics Plus. To enjoy ad-free listening, receive a weekly newsletter, join our members chat room and gain early access to live show tickets. Just go to therestispolities.com. That's the restispolics.com. Welcome to the Restis Politics leading with me, Rory Stewart. And with me, Alistair, and we're very pleased to have Iowa-A-way. He's an artist, an activist, a prolific writer and filmmaker, and an important voice in some of the most complex. and important debates of our time. The rise of China, it was rolled in the world, corruption in public life, attitudes to refugees, a big theme, and also censorship and free speech. And indeed, whether we even have free speech, including in the West. He's 68. He's the son of a poet who was imprisoned, tortured and exiled in 1950s, China, which made for a pretty extraordinary childhood for him.

And he himself has known what it's like to be on the receiving end of harsh. treatment from the authorities and has therefore spent much of his life in the US and Europe, but which he's also got considerable criticism. Recently returned to China after around a decade away to visit his elderly mother with his son, and it would be fascinating to hear his views on China today as opposed to China when he was growing up there as a child. So Iwo-Way, thank you for being here. It's so nice to be your studio.

Can we begin a little bit with your Chinese? childhood and your father. Who was your father? And what was your experience when you were a child with your father? My father was born in 2010, which is 10 years after A-Nations invader China, which, of course, you know, which A-nations, England, French, Italy, Germany, Russian, Japanese, and Austria. they forced China to open up its market. But that effort started from 1840, the first Opium War and the second Opium War. So English have three times invade China, force China to open up. So this is very interesting moment. You're head of state still in China, and this time much friendly.

The head of state is the king, head of government. The head of government, prime minister is there. You're absolutely right. And to answer my father, he was born 10 years later, 1910, growing up as a poet and studied in Paris. And right after he went back, in his early 20s, he had been sentenced for six years for some kind of subversion of state powers. That state was a nationalist power, Guo Ming-Dang. So after years of some kind of refugee, because Japanese invaders and have such a strong impact in China, so he has to run in trying to find a place to be teacher or editor,

you know, for a literary man that's only job, probably at that time. but he could never really reach that point. He joined the revolution, communist, in Yan'an, which is a how to say, cradle for a communist. And later established New China, then he was in the very high position, probably highest position in literature. and the most renowned poet as patriotic, anti-mostly colonial and imperialism, then being criticized as a rightist. So the year, 1957, when he was exiled, I was born. That's a short story.

You were born, same year as me, 1957, and you were one when he was essentially banished from Beijing. He is completely disappeared, being sent to the most remote area. That area is in the ancient China. They would send out all the points or distant to. That means he would never come back. So I think it's not bad policy. Then kill them. And just so he was sent to Xinjiang.

And then you then had to travel with him in the back of a truck to what was basically. basically an army camp where he was given the job of cussing, trimming trees, but he also had to appear in public every day where he was attacked for being a rightist. He has to appear in this very remote, the poor village, but it's kind of semi-military type. That means if Russian invaders, the time Russian is number one enemy because they're getting so close and have a huge amount of soldiers restored next to the border of China. So every day we are preparing to defend ourselves from Russian. We even learned a few Russian words to say, raise your hands, or not kill you if you, you know, just raise your hand. So all those Russian

language. It doesn't sound true, but we have to live in the village. My father, I have to confess his so-called crime in front of those never-educated farmers. This episode is brought to you by IG. If you're listening to Leading, the chances are that you're someone who thinks seriously about politics, about economics, and your own financial future. So here's something genuinely worth knowing. IG's flexible, stocks and shares, ISA, lets you withdraw and top up money within the same tax year without losing your tax-free allowance. And that is all on top of charging zero commission and zero account fees. This ISA season, they're giving away up to £3,000 cash back when you transfer your existing ISA over to IG.

Use the code, ISA leading. That's I-S-A-L-E-A-D-I-N-G. Search IG.com to find that more. IG. Trade, invest, progress. Your capital is at risk, ISA rules, tax rules and T-N-N-E-N-R-E-N-RU-S. sees apply. Cashback offer is for new customers only and cannot be used in conjunction with other promotions. Offer ends 5th April 2026. Other fees may apply. What did they see as his crime? What was his crime? He doesn't really know he has any crime, but he has to say he's anti-revolutionary and most people think he's a no-voist because people doesn't even know how a poet can commit a crime. So, yeah, it's just, everything is so blind. And of course, this is basically a human condition at that time. And how did that, you growing up with that, so seeing your father

being punished, being humiliated, and you're alongside him, what did that develop in you? What developed me is to see how mass can be easily so dumb and so have no possibility to search him for any truth. That's built on me from very early age. You can say everyone is blind, everyone acted stupidly, and everyone think they are right. And how kind were people to your father? Were some people very kind and generous to him? Did people every day, some people say, I'm sorry for you, or were they afraid to say that? To understand him, I really have to read his poetry, which I cannot read because I, at that time, all the books had been destroyed. But for my daily sense about him, his honest man, he's very naive type.

he can be happy any moment, and he's not someone complain all the time. Even he does the most difficult job. He would tell me, you say, I'm 60 years old. I'd never know even who cleaned my toilet before. Now I cleaned for them. What's so, you know, nothing wrong with it. And he told my mom, of course my mom used to live in very high position with him. to see, we have just to think we were born here.

So I think he's a man with a big heart and a very kind. And what made you become an artist? What had happened in your life that led to that? And where does the creativity become? I still questioning, am I an artist? Yeah. Or, you know, people put a lot of name on me, artists or activists.

You're both. Also, I don't know what's different between artists and activists. But anyhow, I survive by doing my work now. And it's not such a good profession. I would not encourage anybody to do that. You know, what happened to me is purely chance and miracle. I cannot repeat it because the time, because my history, my position, and because my, I don't know, because what, because all mistakes I made,

I become a so-called artist. Just to get from when you were a young boy, age 10, to when you were maybe 25, what happened between the labor camp in Xinjiang to you as a young man? What happened in that period? That period of time, basically, there's time for huge political change. First, Nixon come to China, and then everybody shocked because Nixon, It's our top enemy suddenly appeared in Beijing. You know, Chairman Mao happily receiving him.

Then you realize, oh my God, what have been building our mind is all can be changed just within one second. Just to drill on that. The country would have seen Nixon as an enemy. Oh, yeah. And suddenly he's being portrayed as a friend. Yeah, there's capitalism. It's an enemy not only for this country for, you know, we learn. from Karl Marx about capitals. We learned from Vladimir Illich-Lenin, Lening, you know, the imperialism

is the end of capitalism. I read those books. I read a communist manifesto when I was 10. So how this could be this paper tagger, United States, which Chairman Mao called United States just a paper tiger really come to China and shake hands and hugs with top leaders, drink multi, and they are so happily together. Seems like their families. So that is my first education about international politics. What age were you then? 1972. You're a teenager. You're 15. Yeah. So that, that first. felt like a big moment in the country's life. Actually, one incident happened is 1971.

When Chairman Mao had official Hauditsi, someone would become a person at his position is Lin Biel, which is the highest top military leader. His airplane dropped in Mongolia when he tried to escape. Then that is about internal politics. How can and commerce party, the second person just trying to escape. Then the next year, you know, Nixon comes. That is changed, or such a very wild education beyond a new dream. Can happen that time. And by 76, Mao died.

Last same year, strange, three top leaders all that same year, Zhou Enlai and the Zhu De. And that time I was a streaming in a park. Then I heard the sound of, you know, the radio. That time was no television. So that means the sky collapsed for Chinese. This is like a holy person suddenly disappeared. So there's a few years of vacancy there.

Nobody knows what to do. And of course, Deng Xiaoping follows come up. Basically, Deng Xiaoping comes as some kind of military cope because they sized who's supposed to be in the government, you know, Mao's wife and other group called four of the... Gang of Four. Yeah, gang of four. So, you know, but everybody's happy because that really announced

the chairman Mao's time is over. But what is going to come, nobody know. So by that period of time, I get into Beijing Film Institute. The first art college after closing during the Cultural Revolution opened. So I get into the school and study, how do you call, cartoon design. The time, the only cartoon we can see is Tom and Jerry, which I still love today. And then I definitely think I have to escape, because there's many details I will not mention.

So I don't trust the new established government. So the only place I would like to go is New York, because that's the heart of our enemy used to be. So I like to be there. Then by 24, I went to the United States. And what was your assessment at the time? or maybe a little bit later when you're an adult into your 20s. What was your assessment of Mao?

Chairman Mao or Mao Zedong is a very special person, I would say. You can put a person in a historical contact. Nobody can judge anybody without this kind of historical contact. He born in a farmer's family in Hunan, but he's so knowledgeable about Chinese literature and history. His whole life, like the room, like this, or four of the old documents, he just loved to read his mind.

He's a crazy, he's a poet. He's very good strategical leader, and he knows how to play a political game. And he's also very subversive. He can use the public opinion to destroy the whole system. you know, system he established. So he destroyed the whole system trying to maintain his power under control. So he says he had a lot of respect.

Oh, he has a high respect in China. And from you? Half and a half. I have a respect for his wisdom in the struggle for Chinese early struggle because that time he has to fight, not Japanese, but really nationalist. And those had American-supported the army. And, you know, he only have very, very little chance with 40,000 people in poorest area,

which included my father there. And they have a great patient. They wait the moment to come. Then, you know, they got the chance. So it's very wisdom. But he's very good person. crew, yeah, a crew person because under his control, about half million of intellectual being perched. Of course, he doesn't kill anybody. He just lets him go to so-called

re-education camp. One of the things that's so difficult to understand about China is that you go from thousands of years of this very, very deep culture, civilization, and then you hit the cultural revolution. And everything seems to be broken. There's this break from the deep past to the present. What is this about? How do you think about the Cultural Revolution? Thank you. It's a good question, but we have to start a little bit earlier than cultural revolution. First, by 2021, China have accepted the idea of Russian Communist. 1921. Yeah, they had the first meeting on a boat about three, 13 people, someone said it's only 11, but it's never really clear. Under the date, it's not clear, to

establish a Chinese Communist Party. And there's two person on that group, one is from Russia, with Lenin's, how do you say, it's like a Russian delegation, just one person, and another, I think, is from Dutch. So from very beginning, Chinese Communist Party is really helped by foreign, forces, which, you know, the government every day now is so careful about foreign forces, anti-China forces, but they are the typical foreign anti-China. That time, the establishment. And the first document for Communist Party, you know, you have to write down the party's delegation is on Russian because they don't have type of writer for Chinese.

It's long before that established. Can you believe the Communist Party first document is Russian? And the page 11 is missing. Nobody knows where is the page 11? You know, all those details are so funny. And by then, China just overthrew the Qing Dynasty, the federalist control for thousands of years and trying to find a new way. Why they have to do it?

because 1900, they realized the West are very extendedly developed with their boat and their cannon. And China just still use knives trying to protect themselves. So they think the weakness of China is because Qing Dynasty is incapable to dealing with industrial state. So by that time, all the intellectuals had two ideas. I did two concepts called China have to be reborn and to establish Mr. De and Ms. S, that means democracy and science. So that's the first goal. All the intellectuals trying to establish China with this democracy and science till today, they cannot establish that. But that's early principle and ideology. But by that we call it the May 4th movement, but till communist established in 1949, that's the first time they destroyed the foundation of the old China because they killed of the landlord.

Landlord in China is only educated people, and they carries the fundamental values and all the culture. in heritages, only because the landlord, farmers are educated. They kill all the landlord trying to please the farmer to establish this Russian type of, not Russian, but how do you say, Soviet type of establishment. Your father's father was a small landlord. A small landlord. So he understood calligraphy, painting, books. Tell us a little bit about that culture which vanished.

Well, landlord in that time, not just someone trying to, you know, get money or land, but rather a very educated class. They all learn calligraphy, writing poems, build nice houses and, you know, not church, but Chinese, you know, to help the whole society to worship what happens in the past. So when that completely destroyed, then the Nixon is so-called anti-rightist movement, which vanished the children or related intellectuals to the old past. About half million of them. Disappeared. Yeah, they all like my father sent to exile. Then the next thing is cultural revolution. That is a movement.

and use their words, it touches every soul of every individual. Everyone is involved. There's no one exception. So children's school, they have to, you know, remember chairman-mouth sentence or, you know, or very political. So it comes to extreme cleanup of the society with heavy political propaganda. You mentioned that you went to the United States. States. And then when you went back to China, although as you say, you're defined as an artist,

it was actually, am I right that it was your writing as much as anything that drew you to the attention of the authorities and that then started to harass and become the victim of violence and also at one point become arrested for what was presumably a kind of invented crime? Can you just talk me through what that was like? you're talking about 30 years of history. I went to the United States first when I was 24. And I studied in New York for a short time. And let me make it short, I was very poor.

I was foreigner. I don't speak words of English. And the first words I learned is, excuse me. I think that is so difficult for me to see, excuse me. But my girlfriend said, you have to see this if you, you know, supermarket pulling a car somewhere, then I don't feel very comfortable in the United States. You know, it's so much free and nobody can really tell me what to do, but that also pretty bad because you don't know what to do. For me, I really understand this so-called

freedom. It's not exactly freedom. You have to really establish yourself. and meet this kind of personal competition and challenge and become successful or establish something, so-called to secure yourself. I don't like that that much, you know, because that too much effort you will put in. And I know I will never become a so-called successful artist. It's only 50 in the whole United States, and the rest is just endless struggle or disappear somehow. by 1993, I found an excuse to go back because my father was terribly ill. Under 12 years, I haven't seen him. I was promised never go back. But I broke my words. I said, ah, this is a last chance I have excuse to go back. So I moved back to China. So then I have

nothing to do. My father told me, hey, this is your home. You don't have a way. You don't have to act like a guest, you should do whatever you want to do. And I still cannot adjust myself. I still become a guest of my country because the country, I never have any nostalgia feeling about it. All I have is, you know, bad feelings. And then China has already moved forward to become a much progressive society under Deng Xiaoping's slogan, let's become rich first. That's all his idea. The idea affects China till now.

So it's very simple, very practical men, Deng Xiaoping, and smart, play poker game all the time. And that's an interesting part about him. He likes to play poker game. You're a blackjack guy, I also play poker game. and I like card game, you know. So then I have nothing to do until my mom said, you know, your same never went to the United States. You know, what have you learned?

I have no idea. You have no American passport. You never get a university degree. You don't even know how to drive a car. You know, you never married. What's wrong with you? Please move out because I have played poker with my brother all the time. She hated. She sank her. This boy is just a complete waste.

Just for a second on this, please. What did you do for 12 years in America? What is the answer to your mother? What did you do during that time? You didn't get a degree. You didn't learn to drive a car. What were you doing? I was hanging on street in Lower East Side, you know, with all the homeless drug dealers. And, you know, it's kind of dangerous, dark area. Not like today is very fashionable. I live on 3rd Street between Avenue A and B. If people ask me where you leave, I tell them my address, they suddenly become silent. They would not ask another question, which makes me very satisfied.

But how did you live? You have to make money. I did everything, you can imagine. I was babysitter. I was fixing antique furniture. I do house painting or, construction work. I worked in printing factory. I worked in framing shops. Also, I played blackjack in Tashemaha of Trump's casino. I gave finger to that too at the time. And, yeah, I do everything. And I was a street, do street portraits. So let's go forward then to when

you suddenly become a target of the authorities. I just want to know what that experience is like. Not so suddenly. I would never become like that. It's the first of this. I built my own studio after my mom kicked me out. I have to find a place to leave. I don't want to leave in an apartment. Since I come back from New York, I have a dream to build my studio.

I went to a village. They said, oh, yeah, you can rent the land because the land grow vegetables can never make as much money as renting. So I said, yeah, that makes sense, you know. So then I didn't think if I rent the land, what those farmers were? do. So that's just the same question. If AI happens, what all the people will do? So, yeah, I built my studio. Suddenly, that studio become some kind of landmark in China because nobody built studio like that. Nobody even knows what the studio look like. And all the architecture magazine internationally reported, I become a spokesperson with a new idea and a new style and new society.

they invite me to be on internet. I said, no, no, no, I don't touch a computer. I don't know how to type Chinese words. Even they say, hey, with you're so smart, you can learn quickly. They're right. I quickly learned it. The first sentence I put on there is to express yourself, need a reason. But to express yourself is the reason.

That takes me two days to think, what will be? First words I put on the internet. But that's a good starting point. After that, every day I would write three-four articles, openly discuss anything. Nobody wants to even discuss. So I just open the newspaper, see some topic, give some, my opinion until one day, I started to investigate a certain earthquake, the disappearing of the 5,335 children. And before that, I was involved in design of...

Olympic Stadium for 2008. So all those built me up in a very high, how do you call this kind of profile, because a lot of young people think this guy talked something, nobody ever would open the talk, and he's so gutty. At the same time, he's designed this most, you know, glimmers stadium. For internationalists, so the Sichuan earthquake happens, all these people are killed and some children disappear. Can you explain a little bit about?

Yes, Surat earthquake happened in May 12th, in Windchua area in Sichuan. During that time, it just maybe a few minutes of shaking. That's about an eight-level of earthquake, killed about 70 to 80,000 people. And of course, everybody said, but at the same time, they all blame. This is a natural disaster. What are you going to do about it? But I realize many buildings around school, not even collapsed, but those school collapsed. 5,000 more people, students disappeared, but government never answered me.

I made a hundred phone calls to ask this. They said, no, no, no, this is a national secret. And why you have to know it? And are you American spy or something? I said, what are you talking about? Also, online, because I'm very active announced, I will personally find those names. And you did eventually?

I did. I did. It's a miracle. We did it. We located 5,219 students named birthday, which school and their family. Daily, I post this online. That generates so much attention because the government is so shy to see every day this guy put one.

to 100 names there, newly found. And the government, local government, is shaking because this guy is ruthless and they don't know how to stop me till one day the shut off my internet. It's really interesting that the Citroan earthquake seems to have, and the consequence for these children, seems to have radicalized you in a way

that still to this day, a lot of your art seems to be about that. Why was that such a deep thing? Unfortunately, we have, have happiness and we have sadness, both human emotions. And I'm leaving a period of time and location. I see those tragic sadness relate to individuals very often being not to talk about. So as artists, I or not artists, as human being, I would think I have to protect my

integrity of, you know, a fellow human being heard. I have to really pronounce it and let people know what I feel about it. So that related to social justice. And for me, it's really for myself. I have to do it. And I don't have a choice. Do you define that as the artistic impulse? Later, because people keep asking me, your artist, It's like my interrogator during my detention, they said, well, way, you're artist. And why you're doing the work lawyers should do or journalists should do,

and you're even doing better than them. I said, maybe I'm not artist. So that's, I think the people's idea about who is artists and how artists should perform, which doesn't really fit me. Okay, I way, way. Rory, quick break, and then back for more. Hey, this is Michael and Hannah

from Gollhangers, The Rest is Science. This episode is brought to you by Cancer Research UK. We often think of beating cancer as treatment, but imagine stopping it before it begins. After years of work, Cancer Research UK scientists are launching a clinical trial of lung vacs, the first vaccine designed to prevent lung cancer.

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For more information about Cancer Research UK, their research breakthroughs and how you can support them, visit cancerresearchuk.org forward slash the rest is science. Hi everybody, it's Dominic Zavrick here from The Rest is History. Now, some of you may have heard me on your show, The Rest is Politics, when Rory was away, and I was filling in and enjoying Alistair Campbell's tremendous banter. and I'm back to tell you about our new series on the rest of history, which is all about Britain in the 1970s, a period with a lot of uncanny resemblances to our own. So right now we're living through a moment when oil shocks generated by war in the Middle East are rippling through the world economy, when Britain feels like it's sunk in a bit of a malaise, people are arguing about Europe, the government has got a few issues with the trade unions, and we have a kind of, I suppose, as you'd say, governing elite, a kind of political class that is really struggling to come to terms

with all of these issues. And people are asking if Britain is governable at all. So there are a lot of parallels between that Britain that I'm describing, which is our Britain, and the Britain of the mid-1970s. So in this series that's coming out on the rest is history, we'll be looking at these and other issues. We'll be talking about the rise of Margaret Thatcher, obviously a colossal figure in our political life even now, whether you love her or loathe her. And we'll be talking about the very first Brexit referendum of 1975, a subject that I'm sure Rory and Alistair will have strong opinions about. We'll be talking about the fall of the Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson, and we'll be talking about one of the grimmest moments in Britain's economic history,

the moment in 1976 when we had to go cap in hand, as people said at the time, to the International Monetary Fund, the IMF, for a then record bailout. Now, if that sounds good to you, how could it not sound good to you. Of course it sounds good to you. We have a clip for you to listen to at the end of this episode. And if you want to hear more, just search for The Rest is History, wherever you get your podcasts. Tell us a little bit about the detention. What happened? You only have one hour, right? And I always have a perspective of time and space. Detention simply should come to me because I've been too wild. And with my ideology of what I'm writing,

I can be easily punished a death sentence during cultural revolution 100 times. That's quote of their words. It's a way you did. You can be really killed 100 times if just 10, 20 years earlier. Yes, the tension comes to me, which I can predict, but at the same time, I kind of feel satisfied because I always jealous my father, he was sentenced for six years in his 20s.

I think anybody in fighting for aesthetic or ideology being sentenced early, it's really something can be proud of. So I think I never reached that point. I think 80 years later, I cannot predict I will be kidnapped by state. And I put in this secret detention for 81 days. So the story is pretty simple. They just want to, I think mainly scur me. Will you scared?

I'm not scared, but I'm, you know, I thought it was some kind of black humor because why you have to put a black hole for me and send me to some unknown location and not to let me get in touch with my family and give me like a very intensive interrogation, ask all kinds of funny questions. I'm not scared, but I feel sorry for myself. He's only two years old. So I feel one interrogator tells me, well, when you serve your sentence could be 10 to 13 years, when you come out, your son will never recognize you. That even may not be true, but it's scary to me. I feel deeply sorry. I did something which is very irresponsible to someone else.

That time your passport is taken off you. Eventually you get your passport back and you start to travel again. And what I've been really interested, you've got a book out at the moment on censorship. And I said in the introduction, I get the sense that you think we in the West sit here and we look at China and we think this is a repressive country. They have no free speech. They don't believe in human rights. But your experience of the West seems to have led you to conclude that actually there's not that much difference. I'm really interested in how you make that argument.

Well, I started early when US invaded Iraq. That time I was in New York, I was in part of this anti-war coverage. I take my photos and the demonstration. I realized the one demonstrate have less people than the police. Police on the two side of the street for the five-parts. You cannot even see demonstrators. You only see police there. So you can see this is a typical policy state. You would allow people to demonstrate, but their voice can never be really covered.

Or even those act up, you know, those gaze prey demonstration can never be heard. They have to find a strategy to running on highway to stop the highway. Then journalists would report the incident. So this is very established capitalism, society, media, and the education is all being controlled so well and to tell you what is wrong, what is right, which is not so different from the Chinese society, except it seems, yes, you can have some voice, but you can have some voice, your voice can never really be heard. There's a very interesting moment with Alexander Solzhenitsyn when he moves from Russia to America.

He criticized America. He had been a dissident criticizing the Soviet Union. And then in a favorite speech, he criticized America. But it's very difficult to hear because we want to say, come on, these two things are not the same. You know, nobody detained you for 81 days in America. Nobody put your father in exile. You know how long Julian Sanjee has been in, British jail, I visit the jail, I visit the court, I visit the embassy when he was hiding.

I know exactly the whole case. He was pulled out by British agent from the embassy. That is already pretty strange image. Everybody will remember he was carried out. Then he was being putting there. With all those heavy public pressure, he can end up his life in there. So then now you ask what kind of crime he really made, you know, so-called this WikiLeaks platform today, everybody has a, you know, it's not, that he's just a little bit early trying to expose. But without that, even the file relate to this island. Jeffrey Epstein. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, come on. We all know what's going on, but the file still not open, you know.

There's only possibility like weak leaks can open it. That guy even commits suicide in jail, can believe it? And they said the camera is not working. Come on, we have six, eight cameras, yeah. It must be strange for you because the West saw you as a Chinese dissident. They liked you criticizing China. Now you criticize the West, so they must get surprised or uncomfortable. Confused.

It's so uncomfortable after even yesterday I criticized, you know, I said something. The West have no moral position even to pose fingers to China because just look at the mirror what you did in past years. You know, in relate to all the international events, in related to Israel, Gaza event, in relative to almost every respect. what is really being openly discussed and, you know, so... But if somebody like Julian Assange had done the equivalent in China, there is a fair chance he would be dead by now. And where are Uyghurs? What would you say was the West's Uyghurs?

Would you say that's the Palestinians? In Xinjiang, the Uyghur. On Uighur situation. I think the West about Uyghurs also, So it's a problem. Because? Because you clearly put the concentration camps, you know, to use a name, we know conceptually use certain names, which has to clearly talk about something else.

And the Uyghur has been reeducated in some areas, but not start of Uyghurs, that for me, my father, as a Han dynasty, not Han, a Han raised people. We come much earlier than Uyghurs being re-educated in 1957. So the West's concept about that is really not respectful because you are chosen topics rather than giving an even hand about the situation. That means you don't have integrity in what you're talking about. That's why I keep criticise the West. But the Uyghurs themselves, we've talked to the Uyghurs who are based in London.

they talk about concentration camps, they say that's the reality of the life of the people that they've left behind. It could be true, but you cannot talk about Uyghurs, not talk about Gaza. Gaza has been longest prison for decades. You know that. Would you say that's an equivalent? It's more than equivalent. It's a much harsh situation in Gaza. You know what happens.

All the women's and children being killed. We were not being killed in this kind of education. In Chinese wars, they have been trained with some skills, with some propaganda education. You know, for them is what they did to me. So are you now in China more? Are you spending more time in China now? No, I only, in 10 years, I spent 21 days there. But you left Germany, and then you were in Britain a bit and then Portugal a bit.

I mean, give me a sense of these different countries. On my activity. People always ask, are you in Germany? I spent six years in Germany, only my son's study is there. So daily, six o'clock, I send him to school, three o'clock, I take him back. That's father's responsibility. He already totally forgot about that part. Now he's in Britain, and, you know, he's such a well-educated gentleman, 17 years old,

and he refused to talk to me anymore, you know, all the King Ages. You don't mean literally. You don't mean he literally refuses to talk to you. Oh, yes, literally. Why? Well, I think many parents would answer your question. They call it some kind of teenage rebellion. Yeah, but I never even heard about that before.

You can be rebelling, but not in this kind of completely sense. But I feel happy, proud about him. I said, yes, you can go as far as you can. That means that's what I want. I don't want you just trying to pay some kind of fake respect to me, but just go as far as you can, you know. But you'd be very unhappy if you never spoke to you again. Not true.

I think he loves me. I loves him. You know, this is a blood situation. But he doesn't speak to me. I haven't speak to my father for 12 years when I was in the United States. I haven't much spoke to my mom for previous 10 years, but still they're my family. Where do you think Chinese culture is going in the next 10, 20 years?

Do you think people will begin to rediscover the past? They will show more respect for traditional classical culture, or is that fading? What's happening with this? China has a lot of sense to do to fill up the gap between 2019 to this 120 years. And they have been in such up and down, tremendous. thinkable ideology switch from federalism or communist, then it becomes a post-state. You cannot call it a communist, but you cannot call it capitalism. So it's really a new society. So they have a lot to learn, and they have a lot to catch up. Can I just go back to the parallels between

Western East on freedom of speech? As you said, Kirstama, our prime minister in China, and anybody in Britain can go out and can protest against him visiting. They can say that it's the wrong thing to do. Indeed, many politicians have said that it's the wrong thing to do, and he can defend himself against that criticism. Whereas you couldn't make the same case against, let's say, that Xi Jinping came here. The Chinese state would make sure that there was very little public opposition to that of any kind. So you can't really draw a parallel. One way about this is the Cambridge, gave a talk, there's one Western boy threw a shoe to him. If you still remember that incident, of course, that is quite shocking for Chinese.

You sought a public official. But through a shoe to a state leader, it's not start from that boy, but a journalist threw the shoes to Bush, when he gave up a talk. And that journalist was being put in jail for years, you know that. So let's check on the facts. So I'm a good journalist. I try to make myself balanced view.

And, you know, if you check on the British record, there's over 1,200 people being put in jail over so-called hate speech in just recent study. You're sounding like Elon Musk now. Elon Musk? He always complains about hate speech. Well, I don't sound like anybody. I just based on facts, it is 1,200 people in jail because based on the so-called hate speech. But do you think there is such a thing as hate speech?

Well, that's a very vague words. I think hate speech should be the same crime as love speech philosophically. What do you make of Donald Trump historically, culturally? What do you think of Donald Trump? What does he represent? I think it's truly a phenomenon. Someone being elected, then someone being dumped, then somebody being elected again. That we call it a democratic practice, right?

And what does he tell us about American cultural world culture? I think it's the best product of American culture, capitalism, come to our American culture. clear, nude ideology or make a deal, art of a deal. So all he concentrated is about deal. There's not no ideology, no philosophy, but let's see what kind of deal comes out. And the corruption and the lies? Corruption? I'm not untitled to tell about corruption because I know very little about corruption,

but I would say certainly would be huge corruption because you heard his personal gaining of profit could be, I don't know, there's a number, it's hard to remember, three billion or something. But I don't know, you can call it corruption or it's just a political gaining. Of all the countries you've lived in,

rank them in order of the country that you felt was closest to your sense of what a country should feel like. You've had China, you've had Britain, you've had Germany, you've had Portugal. Is there any one of those countries? Because you said at the start, you never really felt at home in China, you never really felt in the United States.

Where have you felt most of the world? Well, I'm a global citizen. Not even citizen. Citizen means you have certain rights to be called a citizen. I'm just, I don't know, a creature, which maybe most fitting to my ideal. would be the moon. The moon?

Yeah. You're like Elon Musk again. He doesn't really interest in the moon. He's interested in some... Mars. Yeah, I think he should be sent into Mars. Okay. One-way ticket.

Yes. Are you interested in the idea of the scholar-gentleman, like your father, your grandfather. Do you think this is an important idea for life? I think it is absolutely most important idea of an individual. can be proud of is to be an independent thinker and to act on your belief. And explain a little bit more about the idea of this Chinese idea for people so they can understand. Chinese idea about a scholar rather is not just to help to build your inner strengths,

but also to serve the mass, to serve the people. So in old time, all the king and scholars only have one goal to serve the bigger purpose. You know, can be poet, can be writer. They all write a clitorography. They all have a deep understanding of past. And that has always been considered as a highest ritual. You said earlier you had a lot of respect for Mao, or there was a lot of respect for Mao. You clearly had respect for Deng Xiaoping.

What's your assessment of President Xi? We are about same generation. He's three years older than me. I don't even know him. His father and my father are a close friend. And of course, we are... Both punished? They're both punished?

Yes, his father also punished for a while. But, you know, that's in revolution. Being polished, how do they say, being purged, or it's not exactly a bad thing, you know, because it's too many struggles in different moment. I cannot give personal adjustments about him. Yeah, assessment, only because I'm not in the same position. I'm as individual artists.

He's taking care of this big state. But from foreign policy, I would agree with him, not him, but to China's national policy in relate to Middle East, in relate to world peace, in relate to nobody should or interfere other nations' business, not like U.S., not like Britain. Russia and Ukraine? Russia, Ukraine. They also kept themselves as a neutral position. They are not really support Russian.

They are associated with Russian because geopolitics, if they don't, you know, because the US, also because West. You know, with NATO, without US, there's no such a war. So, this is clear. Can I, we're moving back and forth, but I think my final question, I want to bring you back to the idea of the scholar and the gentleman. Thank you. So, for example, in the Tang Dynasty, often the officials would leave the imperial court and then they would return back to the countryside. Tell me a little bit about what this means in terms of people's lives, the meaning

of their life, their spirituality. I thank you for mention those details because you're a profound scholar in terms of history. I only can, from my experience, one, during cultural revolution, other than all the very end, Chairman Mao had an idea all the educated university students should go back to factory and a farmer. Farming. They said this is a much bigger world and you can do so many since when you're there. At the beginning, people do not really understand, but I do understand.

You know, President Xi has been working in the very bottom. I grew up in the very bottom. So I think what teaches the most is not school, but really about society, about people, about struggle from the bottom. My final question. I mentioned in the introduction that you've focused a lot in your work now

on the theme of refugees. And as we said, you lived in Germany and there was a point where Germany took in an awful lot of Syrian refugees and you said this, Europeans should not have the privilege to feel any moral superiority. Asking for gratitude from those who are struggling makes me sick. And I just wondered what you think governments should be doing about the extraordinary refugee flows. Yeah, this is a very question with such a complex level.

Now we are dealing something like, let's see it's a cancer. Then in the West we always think that cancer, we have to cut it off. We have to use all kinds of treatment. But with Chinese medicine, we think we have to provide that become a cancer. That's a living style. That's some kind of philosophy. And what you eat, what you're behaving. So prevent that is much more important than to just,

treated. That's the Chinese medicine's philosophy. I totally agree. With refugee situation, we have to look at history of why so many people have to pull out themselves with their family, you know, their language, their tradition, the religion, come to some place like Germany or Switzerland, which completely very hard to settle. You know, even for me, not as that kind of refugee, still very hard for me to settle. So we have to have compassion and to understand they escape the war and the famine and who caused those war and famine. We have to really question ourselves why we don't help them to stay at their home. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Well, Rory, I found that very, very interesting. Yeah. What did you think of that?

I, it was not what I expected, because it strikes me that we were getting perilously closed to lots of what aboutery. And I don't know. I mean, you know, so he's defined the whole time as dissident. And yet he seemed at pains at almost every stage of the conversation to be far more defensive of China at various stages in his history. And whether that's age, whether it's the fact that he's just being. there, whether it's the fact that he's just reconnected with his mother, who I think is in her

90s, she's 93, and she'd met her son, her grandson. But he seemed a lot more romantic about China than I was expecting. Well, I think there's also the person experience. I was being a bit pompous about Solzhenitsyn, but there's this famous moment where Solter Nixon gives a speech at Harvard where he attacks the United States. And this is during the Cold War and everyone goes ballistic because this guy's been celebrated as an anti-Soviet dissident. Partly, I guess it's also the personal experience.

I mean, it was clearly unbelievably difficult and tough for him living in America in the 80s, early 90s. He must have felt profoundly homesick. He could barely speak English. He's in a completely alien culture. He's right down there on the minimum wage, struggling to get by. And, yeah, he returns to China. But, I mean, how you weighed up, and we didn't talk enough about his childhood. But if people want to pick up his autobiography, it's absolutely unbelievable.

That's the earlier book, not the current one, a much earlier book, yeah. But it means absolutely unbelievable. I mean, essentially, he doesn't want to call it a concentration camp, but it's certainly a labor camp. A re-education camp, I think they actually called it. And it's right in the middle of the desert in one of the most arid, remote places on earth. And it's basically a military base. And his father, who had been at one point, you know, the most famous poet in China, is stuck with his young son. in a tiny little room.

They can't heat it. His father's got, is wearing an old jacket that's just kind of burnt pieces. He's trying to put enough money together for his tobacco. He's outside the dining hall every day. He has to watch his father beating a drum and saying, I'm a writer's traitor to the gun. And then every evening his father has to fully prostrate himself and lie down and be mocked. And people pour things on him and mock him.

And one of his jobs was to clean the toilets. That's the point he made about it. So his father's life was extraordinary because he went from being the son of a relatively prosperous landlord. I mean, what we'd call a kind of country gentleman, to then absolutely nothing. And then his, Iwe has built himself out of that horror. You made a good analogy with Xi Jinping. Or in Jet people, June Chang, who's five years older. All these people who went through the 50s and the Cultural Revolution.

It's almost impossible for anyone to imagine. You go from being wealthy and actually quite privileged in the Communist Party system, smashed right down to the bottom where you are on the edge of being killed and worked to death, and then you rise up again. And it was interesting as well. I mean, I get the sense, and I read that book a while ago, he's bought a autobiography. I found his book on censorship a bit strange, because, I mean, maybe we're being what abouterist here, but I think it is quite hard to say that you again. equate our freedom of speech with the freedom of speech in China. I mean, just to go on the record, I mean, the situation in China in terms of censorship

is 10,000 times worse. My Chinese friends are afraid to speak openly now in any way about the government. If you post the wrong thing on the internet, it's not like these hate speech things. I mean, it's very difficult to get this across the people. Maybe people need to go to China more and spend more time talking Chinese. Well, now that we're getting the visa-free arrangement. Right. Well, to understand that the total difference, it is a police state. It's a totalitarian police state.

Or to go to Hong Kong and think back. I was there at Andando, it's not that long ago, quarter of a century. And Hong Kong is a very, very different place. Right. I was born in Hong Kong. Yeah, I know. And the Chinese Communist Party essentially is like a military organization. It runs like a military state. I have friends who've been journalists there for many of simply can't get visas to go back in and report.

but we don't need to prosecute that on the thing. I mean, I think this sort of bigger... But what's that about? So... But I have many people in Britain who sound like him. I mean, that is what a lot of the people who support Jeremy Corbyn's party sound like when I talk to 17, 18-year-olds. I mean, this what about...

He didn't used to sound like that. This what about... It's not very surprising, right? You must be used to it from your use of people saying, how about this? How about that? No, he doesn't... And if you go... Look, and I get it.

If you go through the things, like, he would say, the guy who threw a shoe at George W. Bush went to jail for 9. months. Which we don't talk about. No, and all I can remember at the time was George W. Bush laughing it off and talking about his shoe size. See, yeah, listen, he's got a point, but I found the, maybe we were both indulging in a bit of water boutary, I don't know. No, no, I think you did what you needed to do, which was to register that you don't want to take this at face value.

Yeah, okay. But Julian Assange, I get, it's a big cause for the left. I get that. But I think I made a fair point there. If that was tuning this on in China, leaking thousands of Chinese state secrets, he wouldn't have survived. Yeah, I also think that one of the things, I don't know this is not getting into it, but I guess his sympathies are quite Corbynista. If you hear him about Russia, Ukraine and NATO, it's simply not true that China's not supporting Russia or Ukraine. I mean, all the components for the Russian drones depend on Chinese secondary equipment, by the oil revenue flying.

to Russia comes a lot from China. I mean, Russia would simply not be able to do what it's doing in Ukraine without China, and actually China has made a real choice to back Russia and Ukraine if they hadn't Russia and a really weak position. But I guess the issue with interviewing an artist or a sportsperson is whether it really makes sense to try to interrogate them as a geopolitical commentator. The thing was, though, that right from the top, I having described him as an artist, an activist, he clearly, I think, sees himself as an activist, every bit as much as an artist.

Presumably he's also irritated with the fact that for 20 years he's been used he may feel as an instrument for anti-Chinese attacks. Yeah, possibly. Yeah. And he's a bit fed up with it. Yeah. So he's going to flip it around and enjoy tweaking the tail of the people. Can you really flip around the treatment of the Uyghurs in that way? You can't, but I think from his point of view, he's probably may have felt that he's been used for a long time to stick to beat the Chinese government. I just wonder whether as he gets older, he's exactly my age, he's 68, he's just been to see his mom in charge. I wonder whether, although he said he's never really felt at home anywhere, whether actually

ultimately there is something about as you get towards the latter stages of your life, you are more drawn to your homeland. Yeah. And I wonder if that's going on. And where you come from, I mean, look, I don't want to push this into our own personal lives, but he clearly was not, did not have a comfortable time in the States, and he didn't have that comfortable time in Germany. I hesitate to raise the famous issue of Alastair going to Cambridge, but it's quite possible that there are experiences that you have in your life, which make you think actually, I'm not like these people, I'm something different, and actually it gives you more desire to defend where you came from. I sort of the thing about his son was very sad.

Very sad. Very sad. It's really sad that he's... Very sad. I mean he's in London, his son's in Cambridge and they're not speaking. Very sad and very difficult for him. I didn't really want to push on that, but I found that very sad. And very difficult for him.

And to be fair to him, there is a wonderful honesty about that to bring that up. Many of us would have veered away from that. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. No, listen, he's a fascinating guy, and the other thing we didn't get into, because I mean, he's, as well as being an artist, he's an extraordinary prolific documentary maker, and some of them are really, really powerful. I also love his frankness.

I thought he was incredibly funny about his time in New York. That was a wonderful sort of. And I really enjoyed his description of the, I mean, because when we talk about history, Nixon goes to China is absolutely a moment in history. And I thought he captured that, really compelling way. My final one, if I was going to be allowed to be a little bit pretentious, I don't think Go on, Rory, you can do it. I don't think people have done enough on how old-fashioned he is.

He's basically deeply nostalgic in some ways towards the pre-revolution classical Chinese culture when he thinks about his grandfather, his description of his grandfather and his literiness. And pen and paper. Pen and paper. No typewriters. All this sort of stuff. So I think he is somebody who's a sort of gentleman scholar, and if he thinks about himself, when he says, am I an artist, am I a journalist, am I an activist, I think what he really is, is a traditional Chinese gentleman. He's somebody who wants to be able to be utterly independent, retain an interest in public service, and do art, but the art is not the purpose of his life. It's part of a bigger package to me. Absolutely. Well, very good. I hope our listeners and viewers enjoy that.

Thank you soon. Bye-bye.