By Emma Graham-Harrison
BEIJING (Reuters) – Only two memories brought tears to Sun Yaoting’s eyes in old age — the day his father cut off his genitals, and the day his family threw away the pickled remains that should have made him a whole man again at death.
China’s last eunuch was tormented and impoverished in youth, punished in revolutionary China for his role as the “Emperor’s slave” but finally feted and valued, largely for outlasting his peers to become a unique relic, a piece of “living history.”
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{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
Yes, it’s sad how his life turned out. What he did to better his and his family’s life was in vain.
But I agree with Monica, I don’t think it’s completely accurate to say that it was stupid. People all over the world have different worldviews, and I think it is crucial to comprehend that his father probably made him do it, not because he wanted to be cruel, but because he probably truly believed that it would help the quality of his son’s life.
I mean, look at the castrati. Though their parents castrated them on the low, at the heart of it, it was genuinely about giving the families and their children a better life by possibly becoming great opera singers.Some cultures are like that. And especially within the Asian community, we are forever bound to our parents. We live for our parents, and in many cases, many of us find ourselves abiding to what they want us to do, because we believe they do know what’s good for us.
.. Even if that wasn’t true, most of the time.
Yes it is a tragedy, a tale of a life less fulfilled perhaps but this is sometimes not a nice world. Traditions exist in every culture and Chinese oddities are for the Chinese to deal with. Clearly they have done; this is a tale of the last eunuch.
I don’t know what apart from fear and ignorance would inspire such a practice but similar still exists. Female genital castration is still practiced in parts of Africa today. Josephine in Brussels mentions this too.
It is deplorable.
I however see that here in fact is a story not of a sickening tradition but of a good and dutiful son.
It seems very sad indeed, however, I don’t think it’s okay to say it is stupid, they were (are) different cultures and ways of seeing life..
I think some people from another cultures would think that piercing a little girl’s ear or having to go through plastic surgery to meet with our culture aesthetic is as “stupid”…
Whaaat??? I’m in shock here!
I’m going to read all the article now…
Blessings of good will and the will to do good to all!
Beijo, Paulo!
Marta
Poor man,I am so sorry for him.Why parents take the right to change destiny of their child?I really feel pain for that person.He might be suffering a lot.
Besides,I think in China too many things are pretty weird.The use to eat dogs and cats,and more,the rob them from people who love and raise them.The way they kill the dogs before cooking them is barbarian,they beat them to dead.I love dogs,such faithful friends .
Still ,I know some parts of Chinese culture is more than interesting,I love martial arts,e.g.Bruce Lee.Than I Feng Shuy ,Confucius,the green tea.
Some traditional cruelties are still practised in the world today. Like female genital mutilation.
The history of China during the 20th century is very interesting. Thankyou for the booktip.
Taboo.Anything can be avoided for religious or social reasons.James Meek in his book “The People’s Act of Love” shows what is needed to destroy the Miracle of Love.We put into lofts things,which we don’t need-we put into our heads some ideas,which we don’t need either.Why do we want to step into sb’s shoes so often?To think on your own-it’s a hard job to be done.P.S.Once a woman came to a holy man to seduce him.From the very beginning he realised,that all years of solitude will go to the hell in a minute.He cut off his finger.After chinese story and the story by James Meek this one is a fairy-tale for children.And as L.Tolstoy liked to put “moral” everywhere-he,probably,thought,that better finger,than..
Sad and emotional story. Some of the unkind social structures that had been built and now gone, or those that still exist lack Light. It is the part of man that is not connected to the Light, but something which strive for absolute control, power, selfishness, material, status.
It is also sad when families follow tradition which holds no love, inspiration, or support for love ones. All it does is keep people in line and prevent people from following their dreams. I understand why the man never confided in his family because he felt they never had his best interest in mind.
Thelma, I agree with you and you put it so beautifully ‘our bodies were created so that we will be able to live a full life and enjoy ourselves with our senses in full portential’.
Too often in life we deny a part of ourselves – whether emotionally, mentally, physically or spiritualy – in the hope that it will bring us what we want. Too often people are forced by others to do the same. But by speaking up, we break the silence…
Love
Toni
There are some traditions that shouldn’t exist.there are plenty more like that.Thelma,you’re right.
yes it is very sad, i agree…
castration is a stupid tradition…
and what a sacrifice the man made for another [albeit his father stole from him twice]..
like the slave/servant eunachs buried alive with the pharoah at Giza – can’t recall the reason – was it to be the final guards on duty or something?
This inhuman, brutal tradition, whenever I read about, brings tears in my eyes and sadness into my heart. To be born a healthy, complete human being and for just a ‘stupid’ tradition to have a life destroyed.
I consider our identity to be based on ‘SEX’, the big issue for every creature on Earth.
The same tradition was used for the harems, in Muslim World – I have seen a few sad films, based on this theme-. I also remember the same tradition for the famous Vienna Boys Choir so that the boys’ voice would … stay unchanged!! I have read the story that Joseph Haydn, being in that choir, had avoided last minute the .. castration!
Our bodies were created so that we will be able to live a full life and enjoy ourselves with our senses in full potential. A magnificent body fully ‘equipped’ and functioning in full harmony with the .. Universe and giving us the … experiences, we came destined to taste. I would not accept to deprive any living creature from enjoying life to the full.
LOVE,
Thelma.
a different world
a great insight beyond the veil
a fascinating glimpse of a disappearing world
and the concepts of sacred for that world.
i am happy he has shared his secreats