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Ask the Tiananmen Mothers how much China has changed. Ask the Uighurs or Tibetans. Ask some of the current crop of Chinese dissidents - the ones currently bei

by wtrk 18y ago

Ask the Tiananmen Mothers how much China has changed. Ask the Uighurs or Tibetans. Ask some of the current crop of Chinese dissidents - the ones currently being harrassed, kept under house arrest, or those who've been secretly arrested, beaten, and tortured. Ask factory workers who are finding that the new labor law gives them little/no real protection from their employers. Ask nail house residents who are being forced out of their homes with little or no compensation to make way for developers with close ties to local officials. You won't read about any of these people much in the local press - either the government mouthpieces or the censored commercial media - and any significant interaction with them will end up with you being branded an "enemy of China" and hounded out of the country. I have been living and running a business here, in China, for the past several years and I see plenty.

cglee 18y ago
You're right, if I ask the most oppressed people in a society, they will tell me everything wrong with the government. I'm sure that's no different anywhere else. My question is: what do you do about these problems? How do you curb local political corruption? How do you maintain governance of a mostly uneducated mass, while transitioning to capitalism? How do you keep the country developing while minimizing pollution? etc etc etc...throwing stones is the easy part. Building is the hard part. My entire point is: you won't be able to come up with good, sound solutions to any of these problems without a deep understanding of China, and even then, I doubt there are any really great solutions without side effects. Edit: but to reply, a lot has changed since Tiananmen. I don't have to ask the Mothers of those killed, I can see it myself. Maybe it hasn't changed as much as you like, but it has changed a lot.
- wtrk 18y ago
  Yeah - find some Australians, British citizens, Canadians, etc. who are serving lengthy jail terms or are currently under house arrest for speaking out about environmental disasters, labor disputes, and the like. Especially reach out to the ones who've been beaten and tortured for voicing their views and attempting to organize. The problem of course is that none of that stuff happens to peaceful protesters and activists. It does happen in China. Any effort to cast the Chinese government and its policies as somehow morally equivalent to the governments of liberal Western democracies is going to fall flat.
  - cglee 18y ago
    I made no such argument.

by wtrk 18y ago

cglee 18y ago

You're right, if I ask the most oppressed people in a society, they will tell me everything wrong with the government. I'm sure that's no different anywhere else. My question is: what do you do about these problems? How do you curb local political corruption? How do you maintain governance of a mostly uneducated mass, while transitioning to capitalism? How do you keep the country developing while minimizing pollution? etc etc etc...throwing stones is the easy part. Building is the hard part. My entire point is: you won't be able to come up with good, sound solutions to any of these problems without a deep understanding of China, and even then, I doubt there are any really great solutions without side effects. Edit: but to reply, a lot has changed since Tiananmen. I don't have to ask the Mothers of those killed, I can see it myself. Maybe it hasn't changed as much as you like, but it has changed a lot.

wtrk 18y ago
Yeah - find some Australians, British citizens, Canadians, etc. who are serving lengthy jail terms or are currently under house arrest for speaking out about environmental disasters, labor disputes, and the like. Especially reach out to the ones who've been beaten and tortured for voicing their views and attempting to organize. The problem of course is that none of that stuff happens to peaceful protesters and activists. It does happen in China. Any effort to cast the Chinese government and its policies as somehow morally equivalent to the governments of liberal Western democracies is going to fall flat.
- cglee 18y ago
  I made no such argument.