Communist bandit

Communist bandit (Chinese: 共匪; pinyin: gòngfei) is an anti-communist insult directed to the Chinese Communist Party. The term originated from the Nationalist Government in 1927.

Nowadays outside mainland China, some Chinese people use the term "中共" (literally "Chinese Communist") to refer to the Communist China or Chinese Communist Party.[1][2]

Etymology

The sinograms for "Communist bandits," or gòngfei, can be analysed in the following manner:[3]

  1. Gòng (Chinese: 共; pinyin: gòng) is a shorter writing for the term meaning Communism (gongchandong).
  2. Fei (Chinese: 匪; pinyin: fei) means "bandits", and the character used is the combination of the characters for "enclosure" (xi) and the negation (fei), meaning, in aggregate, the Communists were denying what the Kuomintang advocated. The term of fei to excoriate the adversary was first used during the Warlord Era, in the form feifei, or "bandit troops"

History

The term of "Communist bandits" to describe the Communist Party of China was first heralded in the tumultuous years of the Chinese Civil War between the Nationalists and the Communists.[3]

On July 15, 1947, the Document 0744 ordered the Chinese Communist Party and its forces to be called "Communist bandits" as a form of rectification of names, to the exclusion of all other terms, such as "Red bandits"(In Chinese 赤匪)[3]

Along with the term fei, the term was used in official documents to describe the authorities established on Mainland China and their agencies, and in several slogans such as "Fight against Gongfei's Animalistic Life".[3]

In the 1980s, the term was replaced by "Chinese Communist Authorities."

In 1996, Microsoft halted sales of its Windows 95 operating system in mainland China due to discoveries that it contained the term in Chinese-language input method software bundled with the operating system following police raids on computer stores. [4][5][6]

The term is used today as a slur against Beijing authorities and their sympathizers, particularly by Taiwanese independentists.[7]

See also

References

  1. ↑ 陳茂雄. 馬英九不該過度依賴中共. 蘋果日報. 2008年12月25日.
  2. ↑ 钟声. 中共十八大是读懂当代中国的新契机. 人民日报. 2012年10月11日.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Chang, Hui-Ching; Holt, Richard (2014). "Communist bandits (共匪, gongfei) - the evil enemy". Language, Politics and Identity in Taiwan. Routledge. pp. 15–56.
  4. ↑ TEMPEST, RONE (28 September 1996). "Microsoft Halts Sales of Chinese Windows 95". Los Angeles Times.
  5. ↑ "Microsoft Translates 'Oops' Into Chinese Company Software Tags Leaders 'Communist Bandits'". Spokesman.com. September 29, 1996. Retrieved 20 August 2018.
  6. ↑ "Offending Software Pulled From China". The New York Times. 30 September 1996. Retrieved 20 August 2018.
  7. ↑ "Visit From Chinese 'United Front' Official Sparks Fears in Taiwan". Radio Free Asia. August 25, 2016. Retrieved January 8, 2017.
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