The Question of Miss Zhao’s Personality
(November 18,1919)
The day before yesterday, I wrote a commentary in which I said that the cause of
Miss Zhao’s death was entirely determined by her circumstances, that is, by the society
in which she lived and by the two families, those of her own parents and of her fiancé.
Consequently, I would like to say a few words about the personality of Miss Zhao.
Someone asked me whether Miss Zhao had a personality or not. I said that I had
two replies, one, that Miss Zhao did not have a personality of her own, the other, that
she did have a personality.


What did I mean by saying that Miss Zhao did not have a personality? If Miss
Zhao had had a personality, she would not have died. Why not? Having a personality
requires respect from those one deals with. Its prerequisite is freedom of the will. Was
Miss Zhao’s will free? No, it was not free. Why wasn’t it free? Because Miss Zhao
had parents. In the West, the free will of children is not affected by the parents. In
the Western family organization, father and mother recognize the free will of their
sons and daughters. Not so in China. The commands of the parent and the will of
the child are not at all on an equal footing. The parents of Miss Zhao very clearly
forced her to love someone she did not want to love. No freedom of will was recognized
at all. If you do not want to love me, but I force my love on you, that is a form of
rape. This is called “direct rape.” Their daughter did not want to love that person,
but they forced their daughter to love that person. This, too, is a kind of rape, which
is called “indirect rape.” Chinese parents all indirectly rape their sons and daughters.
This is the conclusion which inevitably arises under the Chinese family system of
“parental authority,” and the marriage system in which there is the “policy of parental
arrangement.” For Miss Zhao to have had a personality of her own she would have had
to have a free will. For her to have a free will, her parents would have had to respect
her and accede to her wishes. If Miss Zhao’s parents had respected her, had acceded
to her wishes, would she have been put into that cage-like bridal sedan chair in which
she finally committed suicide? But it is now a fact that this happened. Thus, my first
reply is that Miss Zhao did not have a personality of her own.


Why do I also say that she did have a personality? This is with reference to Miss
Zhao herself. Although Miss Zhao lived for twenty-one years (she was twenty-one sui)
in a family that did not allow her to have a personality, and for
twenty-one years her father and mother kept her from having a personality, in that
last brief moment of her twenty-one years, her personality suddenly came forth. Alas,
alas, death is preferable to the absence of freedom. The snow-white knife was stained
with fresh red blood. The dirt road of Orange Garden Street, splashed with blood, was
transformed into a solemn highway to heaven. And with this, Miss Zhao’s personality
also gushed forth suddenly, shining bright and luminous. Consequently, my second
reply is that Miss Zhao did indeed have a personality of her own.