Hey there! I would consider myself heavily anti-china, possibly because I spent too much time listening to western anti-china propaganda. Since this community seems to be mainly pro-china, I thought this should be a good place to clear up some misconceptions I might have. There are some issues which are repeatedly used to draw the picture of Chinese dystopia. A few of these points are:

  • The proclaimed genocide of Uighurs in Xinjiang.
  • Heavy restrictions of freedom of speech. It seems really dangerous to be publicly critical of the CCP; There is no chinese newspaper criticizing the works of the CCP, also it is forbidden to access foreign newspapers.
  • Along with the freedom of speech go restrictions of political freedom. “The most recent major movement advocating for political freedom was obliterated through the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989”. (Wikipedia quote) There also are many recent examples of people disappearing after publicly expressing differing political views.
  • Mass-surveillance of citizens. Anything the citizens do seems to be recorded. Appearently even saying anything anti-CCP on WeChat can have you imprisoned and a low credit score can make it impossible for you to leave the country (along with other restrictions of freedom).
  • The planned occupation of Taiwan and Hong Kong. At least in the case of Hong Kong there is some justification due to the completely stupid 99-year-lease, but china being so offensive about annexing Taiwan seems odd.

I would be happy to see what the pro-china views on these claims are. I realized that one could argue that claims 1-4 are simply made up or at least presented overly problematic in western media. If this is your whole point, don’t bother to answer.

I’m looking forward to your responses!

  • @SloppilyFloss
    4•3 years ago

    This is a great write-up, as all of your comments have been so far! I had never heard of any massacre in Muxidi during those time. Do you have a link to somewhere I can read about it without worrying about it being too distorted by the Western press? Thank you so much!

    • @ttmrichter
      2•3 years ago

      I’m about to hit the hay. I’ll dig up some references tomorrow. (I may have the wrong bridge. I’m going from memory here.)

      • @SloppilyFloss
        4•3 years ago

        No problem, I appreciate all the insight you’ve given, since it’s all needed more than ever right now when the US is so anti-China. Have a goodnight!

        • @ttmrichter
          2•3 years ago

          OK, I’m going to temporarily walk back Muxidi. I think I got it from Black Hands of Beijing: Lives of Defiance in China’s Democracy Movement, but I’m not able to find this (book, I mean) anymore. I just remember a stark description of a clash at a bridge (which I thought was Muxidi) where civilians with molotovs and the police clashed before the PLA started moving in and mowing down people. It included interesting details like how some Party officials wound up as collateral damage because stray machine gun rounds went through where they were standing on their home balconies and such.

          The 1989 protests were a massive clusterfuck at every level. The government was intransigent and paranoid after watching dictator after dictator fall in Europe. The main instigators of the protests—students—were, like most young people, stupidly impatient and unwilling to work on gradual change. (They were also seemingly intent on martyrdom rather than negotiation.) Further, since they all came from China’s upper crust, practically, they did zero coordination with the worker protest groups going on at the same time, disdaining them as uneducated, unimportant peasants.

          Tragically, the people who bore the brunt of the clapback were those very same workers, struggling with the PLA to prevent their approach to the square.