Judicial Reform Inner Voice ｜ Rebuilding Resonance Within Context: My Seven-Year Rescue Journey with the Chiou Ho-shun Case

This year marks my seventh year working at the JRF. This period has been the most vital source of nourishment in my life since I engaged in civic movements. Deeply participating in the rescue operation for the Chiou Ho-shun case in particular has allowed me to accumulate much practical experience during the advocacy process and deeply appreciate the weight behind promoting an issue.

Reflecting on when I first began explaining A-shun's case at exhibition booths, those case details truly felt like mere words on paper to me. Although I had read a great deal of materials, I always felt a sense of detachment inside, unable to concretely imagine what had actually happened back then.

Later on, I came to realize that the most difficult and crucial part of issue advocacy is "context," and this kind of context cannot be pieced together merely by reading online articles. It requires spending time with lawyers, rescue partners, family members, and even co-defendants, feeling the social atmosphere of that era through their tones of voice and the emotions left unwritten in the judgments. This emotional understanding and connection are the keys to giving the public a chance to resonate with the issue, allowing everyone amidst their busy lives to develop a shred of curiosity. For people living together in the same society, I believe that despite diverse backgrounds, certain shared feelings must exist deep within our hearts.

I still remember my former colleague Mei-hui once telling me:

To observe the emotions and pulse of society, issue workers have the responsibility to respond. After all, we are the ones working on the front lines, and we have the responsibility to guide the public with knowledge.

When promoting the Chiou Ho-shun case, I grew accustomed to first establishing a few easily understandable labels so that the general public could form an initial concept of this "person," and then gradually guiding them to deeply understand the historical and spatial background in which this case occurred, as well as why the JRF persists in its rescue efforts to this day. Among numerous forms of advocacy, I think organizing the "Hsin-wang's Dawn" exhibition remains the experience that has impacted me the most.

▲The Hsin-wang's Dawn exhibition was held respectively in Hsinchu, Taichung, and Taipei, and subsequently collaborated with students to curate exhibitions on campuses. Pictured here is the opening press conference for the Miaoli Chunan leg of Hsin-wang's Dawn on January 30, 2021. (Photography / Ma Ch'ien-ya)

Aside from prompting me to think about how to transform cold legal information into content that visitors could empathize with, the exhibition also gave me the opportunity, through this catalyst, to meet many partners fighting side-by-side on the rescue path. Through their sharing, I had the chance to hear firsthand those long-sealed details of the rescue efforts. These real fragments of life pieced together a more complete "context," granting me a more three-dimensional and warm understanding of this rescue journey spanning over twenty years.

After the exhibition concluded, in order to prevent this advocacy momentum from breaking off, I began trying to collaborate with students, allowing them to bring the exhibition onto campuses. During the course of our collaboration, I was extremely thrilled to see that this action was no longer merely a school assignment for the students, but rather something they proactively participated in organizing out of genuine care from the bottom of their hearts.

Even when encountering skepticism from school administrators who deemed the issue too "radical" when renting venues, or facing the predicament of funding shortages, the students and I would discuss countermeasures together. Through that process, I saw the sparks of civic action. Those students who walked into the exhibition space out of curiosity, or youths who decided to join the ranks of volunteers because they recalled a lecture they heard in high school, all made me feel that seeds of hope were being planted.

These seeds may not sprout immediately, but they will echo repeatedly within people's hearts, causing them to return to the scene with questions and curiosity the next time they hear the name Chiou Ho-shun years later.

▲The right image shows the collaborative curation with National Tsing Hua University; the left image shows the collaborative curation with Chien Kuo High School. (Photography / Mido)

Having walked through these seven years and watching A-shun still imprisoned behind bars, I inevitably feel incomparable frustration and loneliness in my heart. Each time we take action, I also worry that if the results are poor, surrounding partners might feel disheartened and think that doing all of this is meaningless. I might even instinctively want to pull back and simply act on my own, but I still believe that the most significant meaning of civic action is not pursuing momentary public attention, but rather getting a group of people to start paying attention to an issue and initiating any micro-action whatsoever.

I suppose what is most frightening is not setbacks, but rather the general public pretending that nothing is wrong and collectively forgetting these existing injustices and wounds. Every time I communicate face-to-face with the public, I reflect upon the value of my actions through the interaction. I cherish every bit of experience these seven years have brought me; no matter how minuscule our strength may be, as long as someone is willing to stand up and act, there is an opportunity to accumulate into a force for change.

I still hold onto this expectation, awaiting the day when Hsin-fu and Ho-shun return.