Tensions have escalated at St Anne’s following an incident involving a student who displayed a Tibetan flag in her window.
Last week third year Sophie Chau had stones thrown through her window. A number of Chinese students have now hung the Chinese flag in response to her Tibetan one.
The day after the stone-throwing, carried out by three unidentified students, Chao was approached by a Chinese acquaintance in college who asked her to take down her flag.
The student, who wished to remain anonymous, defended his decision.
He said, “I asked Sophie if she could consider taking the flag down because we didn’t want to escalate this issue.
“Hanging the ‘Snow Lion’ flag is a very serious criminal offence in China, as people perceive it as a symbol of violence. Any Chinese students would be disturbed by this flag.”
Chao responded, saying that the Tibetan flag “is in no way anti-Chinese.”
“The Tibetan flag is not pro-independence; it is a pro-human rights and this is not particular to China. This distinction is one that many Chinese people fail to make.”
The political stand-off in St Anne’s has affected the student body, with Chao saying, “The atmosphere in College is slightly tense. My flag looks down on the Quad. It is provoking quite a bit of discussion.”
One first year at St Anne’s described college atmosphere as “awkward”.
She added, “Expressing political opinion is one thing, but it shouldn’t have to affect the community we all live and work in such a negative way.”
St Anne’s College Dean, Dr Liora Lazarus, condemned the response to Chao’s flag, although she admitted that she could see why it might have caused offence.
She said, “Throwing stones at somebody for whatever political beliefs they hold is just not acceptable.
“But we appreciate that there are some students in this College who do not agree with the hanging of the Tibetan flag.”
One St Anne’s student, Edward Allbutt, an undergraduate in Arabic studies, described the violence that had taken place as “shocking”.
He claims to have found the behaviour of some Chinese students strange. “It’s frankly bizarre that they think they can just casually complain to the authorities and so force someone to stop making a slightly controversial political statement.”
Chao has expressed surprise at the controversy she has caused.
She said, “I was disturbed by the reaction of the Chinese students studying in Oxford. I had expected a higher degree of open-mindedness from these people.”
The College authorities claim that they do not want to intervene in this situation from any political angle and stressed that they wished to remain neutral.
Lazarus stated, “It is not the place of the College Dean to stipulate whether or not people should exercise their political rights.”
“All the students are intelligent and are able to make this decision for themselves. The College respects everyone’s right to express their political belief and is certainly not taking a political stand.”
To this she added, “Everyone has a right to hang up a flag should they chose to do so. At this stage we would like the students to come to a resolution on their own.”
JCR President Amaru Villanueva Rance, said he supports students’ rights to express their beliefs, but added that he hoped students would be able to work through the issue without too much College interference.
He said, “What we don’t want is latent animosity in College. We don’t want to cauterise debate and pretend nothing is going on. We also want to prevent the issue from snowballing.”
There have been no further incidents of physical hostility from any students in St Anne’s.
However Chao claims that due to the negative response, she no longer intends to remove her flag any time soon.
She said, “Recent developments have placed me in a position where I cannot remove it. Chinese flags will stay up and it will legitimise their claim of being the victim in this scenario.”
She added, “Some college students have even asked me to get hold of Tibetan flags, and the order is underway!”
In a bid to settle the problem, Villanueva Rance said that he was willing to give time to the issue at last Sunday’s JCR meeting.
“Before the meeting I mentioned that we would be talking about the flags issue. I was hoping that there would be a debate and that the students would work out a solution or a compromise.
“We made reference to the situation during the meeting but it seems that no-one turned up to discuss it.”
He added, “The JCR wants to protect freedom of expression and in this sense we support people’s freedom to exhibit their flags in public from their balconies.”
