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These aren't extermination camps, people are eventually being released from them. Their notional aim is re-education and making people genuinely love Big Broth

These aren't extermination camps, people are eventually being released from them. Their notional aim is re-education and making people genuinely love Big Brother/the Communist Party, but I doubt the deciders are naive enough to believe that will actually happen. Instead, it's sufficient that the detainees become broken, intimidated and compliant.

zdragnar 6y ago
Recent interview showed they also round up people for "further education" after releasing them the first time. Assuming the allegations are true- psychological, physical torture, rape, forced work and so on- is it not reasonable to assume that not all who enter will leave?
- Clewza313 6y ago
  People die in prisons too, that doesn't make them extermination camps.
  - zdragnar 6y ago
    They don't need to be extermination camps to have mass graves, and if I am not mistaken, many extermination camps were thought by outsiders to be prison / work camps until the truth came out. All of this- on every side- is pure speculation until a trusted independent inspection can be performed. Unfortunately, I am skeptical that will happen anytime soon- I seriously doubt China would see attempts to do so as anything other than a violation of their sovreignty.
yarcob 6y ago
> people are eventually being released from them According to what I've read, people in these camps disappear and are never heard of again. They sound a lot like concentration camps. Just because they aren't full blown extermination camps yet, doesn't make them any less despicable. The Nazi camps didn't start as extermination camps either, that was a gradual development.
- Clewza313 6y ago
  Well, actually, I'm pretty sure an extermination camp like Treblinka that's purpose-built for killing humans is more despicable. This is also pretty much what the article is saying: excessive hyperbole cheapens the very real problem.
  - VSerge 6y ago
    Excessive hyperbole, aka crying wolf, does make it less likely that if horror happens, it will be taken seriously. But this is not that. China has jailed over a million people from a single targeted ethnic group. Rapes, forced sterilizations, disappearances, etc have been happening and have been documented. It is genocide according to the UN definition, which the Economist writer mentions and ignores blissfully, because of course they would know better. History repeats itself, and good people will continue to discuss semantics while others are tortured and killed.
  - yarcob 6y ago
    So as long as it's just sterilisations and imprisonment and forced labor camps and just a few murders for organs it's hyperbole to call it a genocide? I don't get the point. Yes, they haven't reached the point of murdering by the millions yet. But its still a very worrying development. We know from history what happens when people are accused of being asocial and are sent to work camps. It's happened before, and people didn't believe it, and it took decades for people to fully realise what was going on. I always wondered why nobody did anything against the concentration camps, the doctors who killed patients, the mass murders. I think people were either choosing to not believe it, or they were watching in terror, helplessly, relieved that they were not yet victims themselves.

zdragnar 6y ago

Recent interview showed they also round up people for "further education" after releasing them the first time. Assuming the allegations are true- psychological, physical torture, rape, forced work and so on- is it not reasonable to assume that not all who enter will leave?

Clewza313 6y ago
People die in prisons too, that doesn't make them extermination camps.
- zdragnar 6y ago
  They don't need to be extermination camps to have mass graves, and if I am not mistaken, many extermination camps were thought by outsiders to be prison / work camps until the truth came out. All of this- on every side- is pure speculation until a trusted independent inspection can be performed. Unfortunately, I am skeptical that will happen anytime soon- I seriously doubt China would see attempts to do so as anything other than a violation of their sovreignty.

yarcob 6y ago

> people are eventually being released from them According to what I've read, people in these camps disappear and are never heard of again. They sound a lot like concentration camps. Just because they aren't full blown extermination camps yet, doesn't make them any less despicable. The Nazi camps didn't start as extermination camps either, that was a gradual development.

Clewza313 6y ago
Well, actually, I'm pretty sure an extermination camp like Treblinka that's purpose-built for killing humans is more despicable. This is also pretty much what the article is saying: excessive hyperbole cheapens the very real problem.
- VSerge 6y ago
  Excessive hyperbole, aka crying wolf, does make it less likely that if horror happens, it will be taken seriously. But this is not that. China has jailed over a million people from a single targeted ethnic group. Rapes, forced sterilizations, disappearances, etc have been happening and have been documented. It is genocide according to the UN definition, which the Economist writer mentions and ignores blissfully, because of course they would know better. History repeats itself, and good people will continue to discuss semantics while others are tortured and killed.
- yarcob 6y ago
  So as long as it's just sterilisations and imprisonment and forced labor camps and just a few murders for organs it's hyperbole to call it a genocide? I don't get the point. Yes, they haven't reached the point of murdering by the millions yet. But its still a very worrying development. We know from history what happens when people are accused of being asocial and are sent to work camps. It's happened before, and people didn't believe it, and it took decades for people to fully realise what was going on. I always wondered why nobody did anything against the concentration camps, the doctors who killed patients, the mass murders. I think people were either choosing to not believe it, or they were watching in terror, helplessly, relieved that they were not yet victims themselves.