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The crazy thing is that we still criticize China's concentration camps. We have a larger proportion of our population enslaved than they do.
by carabiner 4y ago
The crazy thing is that we still criticize China's concentration camps. We have a larger proportion of our population enslaved than they do.
- zirror 4y agoNot only a larger proportion, but a larger number in absolute terms. ~2,000,000 in US vs ~1,700,000 in China. Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/262961/countries-with-the-most-prisoners/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/262961/countries-with-th...
- carabiner 4y agoYeah, I await the “At LeAsT wE cAn TaLk AbOuT iT” crowd to say how we are still better than China, because talking ensures some restitution at some point? How many decades have we had these camps? Freedom of speech is a privilege without teeth.
- ch4s3 4y agoThere are a few things to note here the first is that China executes at least 8,000 people per year vs. 25 per year in the US. The other is that the 1.7 million number is an estimate.
- throwaway742 4y agoWell at least they aren't disproportionately ethnic minorities. /s
- ameister14 4y agoThat doesn't include the 1-3 million Uyghurs detained, I believe.
- dionidium 4y agoWhat's genuinely crazy is that you would equate the forced internment of an ethnic or religious minority with the confinement of convicted criminals. I can hardly imagine two things less alike.
- SamoyedFurFluff 4y agoI think using the minority argument here actually doesn’t fill the point you think it does in this specific context, explicitly because America has historically enslaved and criminalized ethnic minorities. Practices like redlining, which is the intentional withholding of economic benefits from certain geographic populations where minorities are located, as well as historically destroying minority communities through lynch mobs as well as eminent domain to build highways, have directly made minority communities harder to avoid poverty. Additionally, America has a problem with not doling out punishments equally- minorities are put into prison earlier, for longer, for lesser crimes.
- dionidium 4y agoWe can talk about how we got here, why the crime statistics are what they are, and what to do about it, but none of that makes imprisoning a convicted rapist or murderer equivalent to the forced internment of an ethnic minority with little pretext. They simply aren't equivalent in any way, our history notwithstanding. I've noticed that there seems to be something in the progressive mindset -- and here I'm speaking generally, not about you -- that says, in effect, "if we can describe a reasonable causal chain that led to a behavior, then we can excuse that behavior." I don't think this follows. A description of the hardships that led to violent behavior, say, is not universally exculpatory (neither morally, in my own view, or as a matter of law).
- andsoitis 4y agowhile I agree with you that there isn't an equivalence between imprisoning someone who has committed a crime with someone who hasn't, I do think it is universally barbaric and evil to practice slavery.
- therealdrag0 4y agoIs it barbaric to force children to do chores?
- 4y ago
- walkhour 4y agoSimply mind blogging that you have managed to find a connection between both situations, when in one case an autocratic state has decided homogeneity is the end state; and mass detentions, forced sterilizations, and genocide is the way.