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Sounds like so-called "concentration camps" are preventing you seeing anything else you could learn. How useful is that for you? Or, if you need some help to g

Sounds like so-called "concentration camps" are preventing you seeing anything else you could learn. How useful is that for you? Or, if you need some help to get beyond that, let me flip it around for you. Do you disagree with an effective law-enforcement and counter-narrative strategy for countering radical extremism?

AnimalMuppet 7y ago
I disagree with that law-enforcement and counter-narrative strategy for battling radical extremism, even if it is effective. And seeing concentration camps (or, if you prefer, re-education camps) makes me rather hesitant about learning the rest. If what I learn is attached to re-education camps, I'm not sure I want to learn it. For example, social cohesion is a good thing. We could really use some of that! But the Chinese method of achieving it ranges from the "social credit" system to the re-education camps. Do I want social cohesion? Sure. Do I want it that badly? No.
- yourbandsucks 7y ago
  Every big country has got some skeletons attached to it, especially including the US. If you're primed to see the foreign country as monstrous and evil, you'll see it that way, whatever the balance of the facts for people who live there may be. For example, social credit. Do you know what it is? Do you know specifically what's being proposed and implemented right now? Or are you going off of some breathless reporting? (super briefly, there's no consumer credit system in China. Currently there are 2 corporate credit systems evolving in response to need (alipay, wepay), and something like 15 different government-sponsored pilot programs testing different ideas in different provinces, because having consumer credit scores is in fact important for finance. This gets reported as some Big Brother Social Credit Program With A Big Dystopian Plan by western media).
- slowenough 7y ago
  They have more ways than that to create social cohesion. You'd probably see it if you weren't blinded by the China bad hate narratives. But that's for you to work out. You've got to open your mind on your own. It's not my responsibility to do that for you nor even help you do that. Good luck seeing China accurately tho, I hope you achieve that! :)
philwelch 7y ago
Yes. Here are some of the practices I disagree with, as reported by an Uighur refugee fleeing the "counter-narrative strategy" of imprisoning people in "reeducation camps": > “I will give you an example. There was an old woman in the camp who had been a shepherd before she was arrested. She was taken to the camp because she was accused of speaking with someone from abroad by phone. This was a woman who not only did not have a phone, she didn’t even know how to use one. On the page of sins the inmates were forced to fill out, she wrote that the call she had been accused of making never took place. In response she was immediately punished. I saw her when she returned. She was covered with blood, she had no fingernails and her skin was flayed.” > Tears stream down Sauytbay’s face when she tells the grimmest story from her time in the camp. “One day, the police told us they were going to check to see whether our reeducation was succeeding, whether we were developing properly. They took 200 inmates outside, men and women, and told one of the women to confess her sins. She stood before us and declared that she had been a bad person, but now that she had learned Chinese she had become a better person. When she was done speaking, the policemen ordered her to disrobe and simply raped her one after the other, in front of everyone. While they were raping her they checked to see how we were reacting. People who turned their head or closed their eyes, and those who looked angry or shocked, were taken away and we never saw them again. It was awful. I will never forget the feeling of helplessness, of not being able to help her. After that happened, it was hard for me to sleep at night.” Source (you probably have to open it in incognito mode): https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-a-million-people-are-jailed-at-china-s-gulags-i-escaped-here-s-what-goes-on-inside-1.7994216 https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-a-milli...
- slowenough 7y ago
  Masterful persona work there. But for your reference, to respond to some of the attitudes of your account, I just don't believe the Western media narrative about Xinjiang. Here's what I think: There is some torture and physical beatings of residents, but a very small percentage of "worst offenders" go through that process. The vast majority of stuff that happens in the campuses is designed around getting people to be constructive members of society. If you compare the level of violence there, with violence against detainees at various black sites, extrajudicial prisons, or even just the regular prison system in the West, I think you're just splitting hairs. So what are you so concerned about this for? Of course, if you really care so much about Xinjiang, just go there and "die as a martyr" if that's what you really believe happens. I'm joking. Xinjiang is a problem, because the rise of terrorist ideology using Islam as a delivery vector could easily spread through the region and cause unrest. I think what the government did by pre-emptively controlling the area was very masterful and a good thing. They prevented unrest and contagious unrest by taking decisive steps, and now that area is going to be saved, instead of damaged by the virus of terrorism. The other problem is just cultural. Those steppe people are stubborn, they think they can do whatever they like, since for thousands of years their culture is independent. But they have to adjust to the contemporary world where everything is under the purview of one state or another. That is a cultural adjustment against the DNA of those people to be stubborn and independent. So China has to shape them into a more compatible form, so they don't deal with issues in future. It's sad about the old ways having to die out and change, but at the same time, these people would cause problems anywhere, since no place in the world is compatible with that. If you look throughout history these people of the steppe caused recurring problems again and again at the fringes of all empires. Eventually, this type of culture has to be assimilated into a larger more stable culture and preserved that way, or it won't be able to exist. At least it's not an out and out slaughter like of the Native Americans. The solution the Chinese are doing, is actually more humane that just starting a war in the region, or killing everyone. China doesn't want to have to deal with the problem, but it's their problem because it's under their state, so they have to deal with it. Also, people think that China wants "homogeneity". That is rubbish. They don't care about everybody looking the same, acting the same, or whatever. There are so many regions in China with different dress, food, language, custom. More variety than in the West. But that's whitewashed by the Western "journalists". They even don't want everyone to think the same. They do want to promote common purpose and collective identity, because that makes the country strong. Also, in the West, the media is used to inflame divisions and further divide people, and create a milieu of confusion and conflict. Half the reason China censors the media and online is to prevent the abuse of it leading to this kind of Chaos. Because China is not a democracy it gets no utility from inflaming people's passions and dividing them against each other. So it can afford to promote their own collective harmony, and individual peace and happiness.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

AnimalMuppet 7y ago

I disagree with that law-enforcement and counter-narrative strategy for battling radical extremism, even if it is effective. And seeing concentration camps (or, if you prefer, re-education camps) makes me rather hesitant about learning the rest. If what I learn is attached to re-education camps, I'm not sure I want to learn it. For example, social cohesion is a good thing. We could really use some of that! But the Chinese method of achieving it ranges from the "social credit" system to the re-education camps. Do I want social cohesion? Sure. Do I want it that badly? No.

yourbandsucks 7y ago
Every big country has got some skeletons attached to it, especially including the US. If you're primed to see the foreign country as monstrous and evil, you'll see it that way, whatever the balance of the facts for people who live there may be. For example, social credit. Do you know what it is? Do you know specifically what's being proposed and implemented right now? Or are you going off of some breathless reporting? (super briefly, there's no consumer credit system in China. Currently there are 2 corporate credit systems evolving in response to need (alipay, wepay), and something like 15 different government-sponsored pilot programs testing different ideas in different provinces, because having consumer credit scores is in fact important for finance. This gets reported as some Big Brother Social Credit Program With A Big Dystopian Plan by western media).
slowenough 7y ago
They have more ways than that to create social cohesion. You'd probably see it if you weren't blinded by the China bad hate narratives. But that's for you to work out. You've got to open your mind on your own. It's not my responsibility to do that for you nor even help you do that. Good luck seeing China accurately tho, I hope you achieve that! :)

philwelch 7y ago

Yes. Here are some of the practices I disagree with, as reported by an Uighur refugee fleeing the "counter-narrative strategy" of imprisoning people in "reeducation camps": > “I will give you an example. There was an old woman in the camp who had been a shepherd before she was arrested. She was taken to the camp because she was accused of speaking with someone from abroad by phone. This was a woman who not only did not have a phone, she didn’t even know how to use one. On the page of sins the inmates were forced to fill out, she wrote that the call she had been accused of making never took place. In response she was immediately punished. I saw her when she returned. She was covered with blood, she had no fingernails and her skin was flayed.” > Tears stream down Sauytbay’s face when she tells the grimmest story from her time in the camp. “One day, the police told us they were going to check to see whether our reeducation was succeeding, whether we were developing properly. They took 200 inmates outside, men and women, and told one of the women to confess her sins. She stood before us and declared that she had been a bad person, but now that she had learned Chinese she had become a better person. When she was done speaking, the policemen ordered her to disrobe and simply raped her one after the other, in front of everyone. While they were raping her they checked to see how we were reacting. People who turned their head or closed their eyes, and those who looked angry or shocked, were taken away and we never saw them again. It was awful. I will never forget the feeling of helplessness, of not being able to help her. After that happened, it was hard for me to sleep at night.” Source (you probably have to open it in incognito mode): https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-a-million-people-are-jailed-at-china-s-gulags-i-escaped-here-s-what-goes-on-inside-1.7994216 https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-a-milli...

slowenough 7y ago
Masterful persona work there. But for your reference, to respond to some of the attitudes of your account, I just don't believe the Western media narrative about Xinjiang. Here's what I think: There is some torture and physical beatings of residents, but a very small percentage of "worst offenders" go through that process. The vast majority of stuff that happens in the campuses is designed around getting people to be constructive members of society. If you compare the level of violence there, with violence against detainees at various black sites, extrajudicial prisons, or even just the regular prison system in the West, I think you're just splitting hairs. So what are you so concerned about this for? Of course, if you really care so much about Xinjiang, just go there and "die as a martyr" if that's what you really believe happens. I'm joking. Xinjiang is a problem, because the rise of terrorist ideology using Islam as a delivery vector could easily spread through the region and cause unrest. I think what the government did by pre-emptively controlling the area was very masterful and a good thing. They prevented unrest and contagious unrest by taking decisive steps, and now that area is going to be saved, instead of damaged by the virus of terrorism. The other problem is just cultural. Those steppe people are stubborn, they think they can do whatever they like, since for thousands of years their culture is independent. But they have to adjust to the contemporary world where everything is under the purview of one state or another. That is a cultural adjustment against the DNA of those people to be stubborn and independent. So China has to shape them into a more compatible form, so they don't deal with issues in future. It's sad about the old ways having to die out and change, but at the same time, these people would cause problems anywhere, since no place in the world is compatible with that. If you look throughout history these people of the steppe caused recurring problems again and again at the fringes of all empires. Eventually, this type of culture has to be assimilated into a larger more stable culture and preserved that way, or it won't be able to exist. At least it's not an out and out slaughter like of the Native Americans. The solution the Chinese are doing, is actually more humane that just starting a war in the region, or killing everyone. China doesn't want to have to deal with the problem, but it's their problem because it's under their state, so they have to deal with it. Also, people think that China wants "homogeneity". That is rubbish. They don't care about everybody looking the same, acting the same, or whatever. There are so many regions in China with different dress, food, language, custom. More variety than in the West. But that's whitewashed by the Western "journalists". They even don't want everyone to think the same. They do want to promote common purpose and collective identity, because that makes the country strong. Also, in the West, the media is used to inflame divisions and further divide people, and create a milieu of confusion and conflict. Half the reason China censors the media and online is to prevent the abuse of it leading to this kind of Chaos. Because China is not a democracy it gets no utility from inflaming people's passions and dividing them against each other. So it can afford to promote their own collective harmony, and individual peace and happiness.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]