Rising Up and Rising Down with the Seediq Aborigines of Taiwan: William T. Vollmann and Wei Te-Sheng�s Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale

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*This post discusses major plot details of Wei Te-Sheng's Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale*

You know, you just don�t see that many cinematic representations of Taiwanese Aborigines.  In fact�and I�m just speaking for myself here�prior to Wei Te-Sheng�s Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale (2011), I had never seen any.  I suspect most people don�t even realize that Taiwan has an aboriginal population.

But let�s clarify terms here first.  What do I mean when I say �Aborigine?� Because I don�t mean Australian Aborigines, which is the usual association, but rather �aborigine� in the sense of �indigenous,� as in, �these are the original people of this place� (that�s the Latin root of it, I believe).  All indigenous peoples are aborigines in that sense.  In Canada, the word has some currency in discourse surrounding Canada�s native peoples (it was also Canada that gave us the term �First Nations.�) The term never seems to have caught on in the United States, where we still vacillate between Native American and American Indian (or, and I understand that many indigenous people would find this preferable, we specify the individual tribe/nation rather than some racial abstraction; or at least we should).

Ok, so what are Taiwanese aborigines? (Well, that sounds awful.  They�re people, James).  Well, in addition to that, they are peoples of Austronesian decent who are the original inhabitants of Taiwan, prior to the arrival of Han Chinese (and the Dutch, who briefly and incompetently colonized the island in the mid-seventeenth century).  As is the case with so many indigenous peoples who lack the technological attainments of their colonizers, they were looked down upon as �uncivilized� and �savage� by the settlers who established themselves in Taiwan.  This seems to have been the attitude of the Qing Dynasty Han Chinese in Taiwan in the period between Dutch rule (1623-62) and Japanese rule (1895-1945).  The Wikipedia article on this topic is pretty good if you overlook the fact that it was clearly written by a cultural studies major with Foucault looking over his/her shoulder.

A Taiwanese aborigine, just one of many, it would be racist and dehumanizing to suggest that this one man could stand in as a representative of an entire group of people.  But I thought it would be useful to clarify that Taiwanese aborigines don't look like Australian Aborigines and they also don't look like the Han Chinese who make up most of Taiwan's population.  They are a distinct group.  Sigh, but should it really matter? What people look like, I mean? I've never been fond of the idea of racial categories, but, as a white person who enjoys white privilege, that's easy enough for me to say.  Whatever, please, carry on with the post.

Wei Te-Sheng�s Warriors of the Rainbow begins circa-1895, following the first Sino-Japanese War, as the Qing government is ceding Taiwan to Japan.  The movie opens Apocolypto-style, with a pig-hunt (must less bloody, though, as the pigs look more obviously CGI�d than they did in Mel Gibson�s Mayan bloodbath).  Here we meet our hero, Mouna Rudo (played as a young man by Da-Ching), who kills the pig and also kills some members of a rival clan, thusly establishing his manhood.  And these opening scenes provide us with a good introduction to the situation of the Taiwanese aborigines of this period.  Now, just as the Native Americans of the United States are not one monolithic group, but are rather divided into nations and tribes, so are the indigenous Taiwanese similarly divided.  I will now stop referring to them as �Taiwanese aborigines,� because this film is not concerned with Taiwanese aborigines as a whole, but rather more specifically with the Seediq ethnic group, which is in turn divided into smaller clans.

Several things about the Seediqs (as they are presented in Wei�s film; I cannot speak to the historical and cultural accuracy of Wei�s Seediqs).  First, �Seediq� means �man� and the �Seediq Bale� of the title means �True Man.� It�s interesting to consider the number of indigenous groups whose name for themselves just means �the people� or �the true people.� There is certainly something universally human in that tendency.  Second, the Seediqs of 1895 are a people divided amongst each other, and there appears to be frequent violence over which clans control which hunting grounds.  These bouts of violence provide the young men of the clans with opportunities to kill enemies and thusly become the �true men� of the title.

A young Mouna Rudo, carrying his father like Aeneas.  Note the face tattoos, which indicate that he's killed enemies of the clan and is thus a Seediq Bale (True Man).

And they seem to be able to go about this business unmolested by the forces of the Qing government.  In the period before the Japanese invasion, the Seediqs� only interactions with Han Chinese seem to come from various expeditions into town to trade with them.  Otherwise, it looks like they�re left to themselves and are free to handle their own affairs.

The young, pre-Japanese Mouna Rudo (and Mouna Rudo was a real person, apparently, Wikipedia confirms it) is, to put it bluntly, something of an asshole.  He�s imperious and quick to anger, always seeking to aggrandize himself and happy to jeapordize the always shaky relations with other clans if he sees an opportunity to promote himself or if he feels his honor is slighted.

Reader, where am I going with this?  Well, as I say all of this, by way of background information, really, I have at the front of my mind William T. Vollmann�s epic treatise, Rising Up and Rising Down: Some Thoughts on Violence, Freedom, and Urgent Means.  In this book, Vollmann attempts a sweeping analysis of the situations in which violence occurs, and if and when violence is justifiable.  Much of the book is devoted to the exposition of historical scenarios that resulted in violence, at the end of each of which Vollmann deploys his �moral calculus� and attempts to determine if the violence was justifiable or not. 

William T. Vollmann, in what I swear is the most flattering picture of him that I could find.  He's wearing a flack-jacket because he's in war-torn Bosnia, doing research for his treatise on violence.

Vollmann�s historical knowledge is vast, but I don�t know if he was familiar with Seediqs of Taiwan, and so I consider my own analysis here to be my own humble attempt to provide a �Vollmannesque� analysis of Wei�s film.  And so it is my intention to explain the background the Japanese encroachment on the Seediqs� traditional territory, the conditions under which the Seediqs and Mouna Rudo end up living, and finally an analysis of the violent crisis with which the first part of the movie ends (Warriors of the Rainbow was originally released in Taiwan in two parts, which come to about four and a half hours; for the American DVD release, there�s an abridged one disc version�which, fear not, I have not procured�and a full, two disc version, which is the version of the film I�ve seen).  Now, I�ve been told that my blog posts could benefit from more brevity, as they are sometimes tl and people dr them.  So, I will attempt to do all these things as quickly as possible! It will be a healthy challenge to me and hopefully a relief to you, my dear readers. (But there�s so much more to say! But there�s so much more to say� Perhaps in a future blog post).  Ok, now back to the movie.

Well, after the Japanese arrive and swiftly crush both Qing and Seediq resistance, the movie does an awkward �and then time passes� thing, and it�s only awkward if you don�t speak Mandarin, because a Chinese title appears on the screen which presumably tells us how much time has passed, although, for whatever reason, this doesn�t get subtitled.  Nonetheless, I�d guess forty years, because the Japanese arrived in 1895 and the �Wushe Incident,� the Seediq uprising upon which this film is based, took place in 1935.  And in those intervening forty years, the Seediqs have been subjected to the depredations and oppression that have historically befallen so many indigenous groups.  The Japanese have attempted to �civilize� them and their kids are sent to Japanese schools, where they�re beaten and treated as inferior.  The adults, once warriors, are now engaged in menial labor, hauling logs to build the Japanese settlements; for their labor, they are paid a small sum which they promptly squander on alcohol (sold to them by a Han Chinese shopkeeper, the only Han character in the film; after watching this movie, one would be forgiven for the thinking that there weren�t any Chinese people in Taiwan).

And what of Mouna Rudo? Mouna Rudo (now played by Lin Ching-Tai) has become old and bitter (his asshole-ishness only partly tempered by the ravages of time).  He�s generally resigned himself to the presence of the Japanese, because in 1911, he and the other Seediq chiefs were taken to Japan to see the civilization of their colonizers (much as the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama were taken to Beijing in the mid-fifties to gawk at Chinese industrial achievements).  And Mouna Rudo saw the Japanese airplanes and the Japanese machine guns and artillery, and he saw all the Japanese people, and for the first time in his life probably realized how small the Seediqs were when looked at on a global scale.

Mouna Rudo, old and bitter.

But if Mouna Rudo has all but given up, the young people of the Seediq nation have not.  We have two more generations of Seediqs now�the children of Mouna Rudo and his generation and their children�and it pains them to see their hunting grounds despoiled by Japanese colonizers and their children bullied in school and their culture treated as inferior and dismissed as savagery.  Furthermore, they have never had the opportunity to distinguish themselves in battle, and it is through heroic combat that a Seediq man becomes a Seediq Bale (a true man) and gains ingress to the celestial hunting grounds of the Seediqs� ancestors, across the Rainbow Bridge (hence the title).  The older generation of Seediq men, like Mouna Rudo, have tattoos on their faces which indicate that they�ve killed in battle and are thus Seediq Bale.  The younger generation have no such tattoos, and they feel this quite keenly.

And so in 1935, several of the Seediq clans, including Mouna Rudo�s Mehebu Clan, launch a bloody, well-coordinated uprising against the Japanese.  Mouna Rudo makes it clear that they�re fighting to �render a blood sacrifice to [their] ancestors,� so as to justify their posthumous entry into the ancestral hunting ground.  Mouna�s character is fascinating to watch here, because he�s always the voice of caution and restraint (the Japanese being undefeatable, he thinks) right up until the revolt becomes inevitable, and then the old Mouna comes to the forefront, and it�s as if he�s thinking, �Well, if we must fight, then I might as well seize this opportunity to kill as many of the Japanese who have humiliated me over the years as possible.�

Now, William T. Vollmann, were he to analyze the Wushe Incident, would set out the reasons that the Seediqs are using to justify their violence.  We have here: Defense of culture (as the Japanese are attempting to destroy the Seediq culture and forcibly assimilate the Seediqs into the Japanese cultural hierarchy, albeit into the very bottom of that hierarchy); defense of honor, as the Seediqs seek revenge for the humiliations they�ve suffered; and defense of territory, which is obvious; the Japanese have occupied their territory and the Seediqs would like it back.  Now, tied up with all of this is, I think, a more fundamental �defense,� and that�s the defense of life itself, as the Seediqs can see in these Japanese attacks on their culture and territory nothing less than an attempt to destroy the Seediq people�but destroy them as a culturally distinct entity, or physically kill them? Or would these various attacks wipe them out in such a manner that it would be as if they had been killed?

As Vollmann said, �the means must justify the ends,� so let�s look at the actions of the Seediqs in the execution of the revolt.  The revolt begins with attacks on Japanese police stations, with the killings of the policemen and the theft of their weapons.  Well, so far, so good, I suppose? As these policemen are agents of Japanese imperial violence and as they certainly qualify as �combatants.� But then the Seediqs attack the Japanese settlement at Wushe, and here things become much more troublesome.  Because they kill not just Japanese soldiers, policemen, and colonial administrators, but also their wives and children, who are most definitely non-combatants.  And some of the Seediqs themselves are clearly troubled by this excess, as one of the Seediq women laments to her father, �Why must you take heads?� (It is the tradition of Seediq warfare to decapitate one�s enemy; the Japanese did the same thing during the Sengoku-jidai period prior to the Tokugawa shogunate, as the display of an enemy�s head proved that you�d taken it and were thusly entitled to the honor that such a killing would bestow upon you; the Seediq practice of decapitating enemies seems to have a similar purpose).  Furthermore, young Seediq boys join in the revolt and murder their Japanese teacher with sharpened sticks (shades of the Cultural Revolution to come on the Chinese mainland thirty years later).

And so Part 1 of Warriors of the Rainbow ends with this bloodbath.  How much of it was justified?  Personally, my first inclination is to say, �None of it.  All violence is repellent and war is psychotic.� But I have the luxury of saying that: I�m not being attacked, I�m not living under occupation.  I am always reminded of an exchange in Woody Allen�s Love and Death, when Boris Dmitrievitch (Woody Allen) and his brothers are preparing to join the Russian army to help repulse the Napoleonic invasion of Austria.  And Woody says, �But I�m a pacifist, I don�t believe in war!� And his more bellicose brother responds, �He doesn�t believe in war, eh? Well, Napoleon, he believes in war� (emphasis added).  And for me, that�s the best summation of the problem of non-violence that I�ve ever heard.  If you don�t believe in war, that�s all well and good, but what do you do with the Napoleons of the world?  Or what do you do if you�re a Seediq? Do you just consent to be dispossessed of your land and reduced to indigence and degradation?  During one of John Lennon�s and Yoko Ono�s �bed-ins for peace� (and I believe I�ve recounted this anecdote before, so I crave the reader�s indulgence), some journalist asked them, �Would you have preached non-violence to Churchill?� And Yoko responds�and this is as good a response as she and Lennon could have given��No, we would have preached it to Hitler.� Yes, but Hitler probably wouldn�t have been interested.

To return to the Seediqs and Vollmann, I can say with certitude that the Seediqs went too far and that, in killing Japanese women and children�undeniably non-combatants�the means did not in fact justify the ends.  Beyond that, I don�t quite know what to say.  The film does a wonderful job of depicting the proverbial �disasters of war� as experienced by the Japanese and especially by the Seediqs.  Was this bloodbath worth it? Because the Seediqs must have gone into the battle knowing that they�re weren�t going to win; they did it to �render a blood sacrifice to the ancestors and to justify themselves,� not to win (and that�s not a spoiler; I think it�s a fairly well-known historical fact that the indigenous people of Taiwan did not drive out the Japanese occupiers in 1935; so bearing that in mind, how did you think this was going to resolve itself?) So yes, wars are to be avoided at all costs, but if they�ve been foisted upon you, what can you do? Especially if you know you can�t win, what can you do? Do you make the grand suicidal gesture of resistance, as an end in itself? Consider the thirty-plus Tibetans have who have committed self-immolation in Tibetan areas of Sichuan province over the past year and a half; were those gestures worth it?

Well, I certainly don�t have an answer for these questions.  People, the comments section, you would warm my heart and fill me with delight if you used it.  So, please, tell me your opinions on the matter.