Don't Mess with this Scholar...

In “Saboteur,” although Mr. Chiu is within reason to speak up against and be angry with the police, his revenge was wrong and cannot be justified. Mr. Chiu is a scholar which means that he has influence or knows people of influence. With this, he could have made the police pay for what they did to him, something he did have in mind at the beginning of his detention, “I shall report you to the Provincial Administration,” “he swore that once he was out, he would write an article about this experience.” These kinds of reactions would be more productive and civilized. Even a “common citizen” would have behaved in a more rationalized way. Innocent people paid for the crime of the corrupted police. He began an epidemic, “over eight hundred people contracted acute hepatitis in Muji. Six died of the disease, including two children.” I do not believe that Mr. Chiu could be satisfied with what he did. His crime was worse than the policemen’s. What angered Mr. Chiu the most, I think, was that his being a scholar did not matter at all to the police. “Don’t mistake me for a common citizen who would tremble when you sneeze. I’m a scholar, a philosopher, and an expert in dialectical materialism.” He even decided that “he might refuse to leave unless they wrote him an apology,” still believing that his being a scholar would intimidate them. All of his studies went down the drain once he was in custody. Admitting to the crime would have set him free, “your release will depend on our attitude toward this crime.” His pride did not let him admit that he was wrong. Although he was provoked, he did commit the crime he was charged for, “disrupted public order….” Mr. Chiu had a lot that worked in his favor to prove the police’s maltreatment of him. His wife was a witness of the policemen’s provocation, Fenjin was also abused by the police, and the conditions of the police station itself were all enough evidence to back Mr. Chiu. Once he was freed, Mr. Chiu could no longer rationalize, he had been humiliated and it was too much for him to take. “If he were able to, he would have razed the entire police station and eliminated all their families. Though he knew he could do nothing like that, he made up his mind to do something.“ In the end, he did not regain his dignity.