Not even lately, as it's a long recurring pattern. Very relevant story: I was in Cleveland in 1989 at the time of the Tiananmen Square massacre, where 10,000 s

Not even lately, as it's a long recurring pattern. Very relevant story: I was in Cleveland in 1989 at the time of the Tiananmen Square massacre, where 10,000 student protesters were killed [1]. At the time, we know there were many deaths through word of mouth (our Chinese students stayed in touch with friends and family back home) but nobody knew the actual numbers. So we held a local protest to support them, lots of white and Chinese students, in downtown Cleveland. There were Chinese men in sunglasses and trench coats with long-lens cameras taking pictures of everyone present. The Chinese students told us they were government political officers, keeping tabs on them, and they were accustomed to seeing them. They feared retribution on their families back home, and on themselves if they went back home. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1989#Death_toll https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1... PS. When asked, at the time, why a billion people don't stand up, a common reply was "such a people deserve such a government." At the time they were largely agrarian and pre-internet; only people with good information or who had travelled abroad knew how bad they really had it.