Again, We Weep for Those Who Fly Without a Horizon

Chu Dần wrote this article in Vietnamese and published it in Luat Khoa Magazine on August 5, 2025.  

News of Vietnamese students winning international academic competitions is, of course, a cause for celebration. Yet, behind the gleam of those medals, invisible strings still seem to quietly bind the stature of the Vietnamese people. 

I was reminded of this when I came across a TikTok video of a relative congratulating a young math champion who had won a gold medal at the International Mathematical Olympiad. They had simply shared a family photo with Professor Ngô Bảo Châu to commemorate their younger sibling’s achievement. Alongside the congratulatory comments, a familiar chorus appeared, calling Ngô Bảo Châu a “traitor to the nation.”

I was not particularly surprised. For years, on social media, any news about Ngô Bảo Châu—be it a scientific achievement or a casual photograph—is met with a barrage of attacks: “reactionary,” “ba que,” “traitor.” 

This narrative extends beyond the internet. During my high school years, a teacher cautioned me against using him as an example in a literature test, saying one should not cite someone who had made statements “against the country.” I didn’t fully understand it then, but from that day on, the name Ngô Bảo Châu gradually disappeared from my writing—a quiet form of self-censorship.

Later, with access to more diverse perspectives, I realized his once-condemned statements were neither “reactionary” nor “subversive”; they were simply his frank thoughts on history and society. Expressing personal opinions is entirely normal in a democracy, yet it is seen as alien in a place that tolerates no divergence in political stance.

This perception was actively shaped by state-run newspapers, which spared no ink in tarnishing his reputation with articles like Ngô Bảo Châu on the Road to Becoming a Pseudo-Democrat Betraying the Nation, On the Misconceptions of Professor Ngô Bảo Châu, A Talent Wasted: Professor Ngô Bảo Châu, and so on.

Through this campaign, a mathematician who had received the Fields Medal—the most prestigious award in his field—was recast as a misguided figure, ungrateful to his country.

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Ngô Bảo Châu is not an isolated case. A similar story happened to journalist Phạm Đoan Trang; when she was honored with the International Press Freedom Award and the Martin Ennals International Human Rights Award, state-run newspapers mocked her as “a lawbreaker” and dismissed the accolades as “politically motivated.” In the eyes of the Vietnamese government, she is nothing more than a criminal.

Or take Amanda Nguyen, the first Vietnamese American woman in space, admired globally for her advocacy for sexual assault survivors. To many in Việt Nam, she is still labeled “ba que” because of her family’s refugee history.

Figures like Zen master Thích Nhất Hạnh and philosopher Trần Đức Thảo share a similar fate. The common thread is that they could not freely spread their wings in the skies of their homeland; only after they escaped that murky airspace were they recognized for their true stature. Though honored by the world, they were rejected and attacked by a portion of their own countrymen.

Indeed, producing talent is difficult, but creating an environment that nurtures it is infinitely harder. 

Under the communist regime, there is almost no tolerance for differing thoughts. Personal viewpoints can be instantly branded as subversive if they run counter to the Party’s line. This is enforced through vague provisions in the 2015 Penal Code, such as Article 331 (“Abusing democratic freedoms”) and Article 117 (“Making, storing, disseminating... information... against the State”), which gives authorities a legal tool to punish anyone who is “out of tune.”

This creates a paradox. The government speaks of a new era of national rising, but has it created a space wide enough for its own talent to soar? Or is the country still a narrow sky, too small to hold the wings of freedom?