In the days after the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown, two Chinese doctoral students at the University of Chicago, Sanyuan Li and Hui Yun Wang, wanted to do something to help the quelled democracy movement, something that was more than just a gesture. They saw no point in trying to tell Westerners what the Chinese government was doing–for once, Western journalists were crawling all over a China story, even if they couldn’t seem to see beyond Beijing. It was the Chinese people who didn’t know what was going on. “The government told people all over China that there was a counterrevolutionary rebellion against the government and the government killed no one,” says Wang. “We wanted to transmit the true news.”
Funds began to trickle in, and in October 1989 they sent a tape to a station that broadcast the program to China from outside its borders. They promised not to reveal the station’s location, and they’re still keeping their word. Nevertheless the Chinese government knew from the very beginning exactly where it was. Monitoring Times, a radio enthusiasts’ monthly, listed Taiwan as the source of the broadcast.
The door to the recording studio opens, and Ren comes down the hall. Everyone says hello to everyone else in English, and then Ren, Yi, and Li switch to Mandarin. Ren was a chemistry professor in Nanjing before he came to the United States as a visiting scholar nearly three years ago, and Yi worked in international trade. Neither speaks English well, and when they’re obliged to try, they seem awkward and self-conscious. Even Li, whose English is good enough that he can be genuinely witty in it, seems relieved not to have to make the effort.
This program begins, as they all do, with a fanfare from Dvorak’s New World Symphony and the program’s signature voice-over: “This is the Voice of June Fourth. We are representing Chinese students overseas broadcasting to China.” The programs generally start with shorter news pieces, then shift to longer stories and commentaries. Ren’s crisp, authoritative voice is first, reading a report on censorship in China and then a short commentary on how the concept of an ideal society is false–on how, Li summarizes, “One can do all sorts of evil things in pursuit of a perfect society.” Yi’s sweet, musical voice follows, describing a survey done in the Soviet Union on people’s concepts of the function of money. Among other reports that Li summarizes for me is an interview with a policeman in Moscow about the rising crime rate in the city, the difficulty of arresting the many criminals who are protected by the KGB, the resurgence of religion in the U.S.S.R.
