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The saddest thing in this thread is that people in the West think they are free. Western civilization is hardly more free than China's. The media just has more sophisticated methods of propaganda. And it's a Western prerogative to trash talk China. Insecurity about world dominance anyone?
Edit: Most of those pictures posted show HAN Chinese bloodied and murdered. Only morons read about the issue and think the gov't is at fault here. The Uighurs are the aggressors here. They're gathering in bands and killing any Han Chinese they find. Does that sound like a group of oppressed people? That sounds like a bunch of crazy racists to me. The reason the Han Chinese are starting to riot is in their own self-defense because the gov't is pandering so hard to the minorities that they barely do a thing when a HAN Chinese is murdered. So the people are starting to arm and defend themselves, hence race riots occur.
If anyone ever read the articles rather than just searching for buzzwords to reaffirm their ignorant views, they'd see the police are dispersing HAN mobs just as much as UIGHUR mobs. This isn't a case of "the system" holding down the man. Do people call the police evil when they break up a bar fight?? What kind of crap is this?
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On July 10 2009 03:16 BisuBoi wrote:
The saddest thing in this thread is that people in the West think they are free. Western civilization is hardly more free than China's. The media just has more sophisticated methods of propaganda. And it's a Western prerogative to trash talk China. Insecurity about world dominance anyone?
No one is truly free to do whatever they want ever. There are consequences in one form or another.
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On July 10 2009 03:21 CharlieMurphy wrote:Show nested quote +On July 10 2009 03:16 BisuBoi wrote:
The saddest thing in this thread is that people in the West think they are free. Western civilization is hardly more free than China's. The media just has more sophisticated methods of propaganda. And it's a Western prerogative to trash talk China. Insecurity about world dominance anyone? No one is truly free to do whatever they want ever. There are consequences in one form or another.
Exactly. That's why this concept of "freedom" is retarded to me. It's all a matter of relativity, yet a lot of people in the West treat it as some kind of definable thing that's also totally necessary to life or else people will wither up and die.
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The Uighur were the aggressors and the victims were the Hans in the killings. However whether or not the Uighur's were "oppressed" is hard to talk about. But in this case yes, the violence came from an ethnic minority.
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Well. Ok. Hm. Here's how is see it, or what i know. Maybe i'm wrong, because i can't be unbiased, and maybe someone can share their viewpoint.
Han-Chinese are the majority in almost all provinces, besides Tibet and Xinjiang. I don't have numbers when it comes to Xinjiang but as far as i know it's getting pretty close between uyghurs and han's. Even tough they are both "autonomous" the chinese control these areas tightly. And altough the governors are tibetan / uighur people, the party secretaries are the guys with the pants on and decide whats going down, and they are always chinese.
To me this doesn't sound bad "just because". That's why i'm always scratching my head when these problems arise. If it's any close to Tibet in Xinjiang i'm probably not wrong to assume that in schools "national unity" is preached like a motherfucker to all of them. But that's no reason to be angry, right? All around the world people do hate each other because they are "different". Just think of any country, as small as it may be, there's always "them".
If i learned one thing over my lifespan, it's that chinas one-party-dictatorship that so desperately tries to unite all powers to it's center is paranoid.
Not all the time, just when it comes to challenges, pluralism, even among han-chinese is a no sir no. Plus with us tibetans and uyghurs there's the deep rooted religion thing. Yes you chinese people might be ok with it, but for the party it is regarded as a threat. For them the line between praying and "illegal religious activity" is damn thin. And the next label is usualy "terrorism" or "separatism". We're sometimes no different over here with islam being pushed to the terrorism side...
But that's all in all hardly something new right? Politics smolitics. What i think is next, something that's floating around in lots of your heads chinese people is... and that might come of as strong... is the han-chauvinism. China always tought of itself as the center of civilitation and to them it's just natural that even greater and more powerfull conquerors got sucked in and assimilated by chinas superior culture. Be real, even today you look at tibetans and uyghurs as kinda backwardly, superstitious and *sigh* ungrateful people.
Han-chauvinism is to the rest of us like a great wall we never be able to climb over, because your colonial attitude, a system with no emotions when it sends wave after wave of han-settlers in and on the same time transports resources by the tons out, a system like that won't listen, can't be talked to and leads to powerlessness for the other side. There can never be "harmony" like this.
Last but not least, both tibet and xinjiang are strategical points and the party does not want to show any weakness there. That's why resettlement is such a big issue. As far as i know 50 years ago there were like 5% han-chinese in xinjiang and now it's around 45%!
And now we have the chinese taking the victim role inbetween all these riots and the uighurs cant understand the world anymore. Fire and oil man. Fire and oil.
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So a country transferring resources from one of its regions to another should be considered a crime? Citizens of the dominant ethnicity moving to ethnic areas is wrong and should be punishable by being beaten to death with sticks?
Yes, if white people moved to Brooklyn, the blacks should come out, say "they're trying to dilute our culture" and start mass murdering James and Susan right? What part of "the Tibetans and Uighurs are ethnocentric and willing to get violent over it" don't you get?
Han Chauvinism? People from the West tend to think there's something beautiful about Tibetan culture, like it's some kind of pristine wonder and Han Chinese are stamping it out in the name of imperialism. It's not like that. The people don't shower there. They drink butter half the time and the other half they sit around doing subsistence agriculture. In any modern Western country, they would consider these citizens impoverished and would be going in there 24/7 with social programs and welfare agents trying to get these people to "civilize." As if "modern society" was a Han invention. What a crock of shit.
The thing that really gets on my nerves is how these Western kids run in here and have all these lofty ideals, when they've lived their entire lives on the profits of rape and plunder. Sure is convenient to start declaring war is wrong and nothing should be solved through violence AFTER they raped and conquered the world and set themselves up as the rulers of it all. The ones in power always want to maintain the status quo. God forbid another nation try to pull the same shit they did. It'd be terrible if China added to its territorial possessions but N. Ireland? Oh... that's another issue. US bases all over the world? "They're there for the world's safety." Pffffft.
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would be a perfect timing for tibetan and others to riot too
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On July 10 2009 04:16 LuckyOne wrote:
would be a perfect timing for tibetan and others to riot too
Nah, they already missed their ee-han timing. The Dalai Lama is quite poor at micromanaging the Tibetans.
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All governments will lie to its citizens -_-
Most Chinese people know that their government lies to them.
However, too many Americans don't realize that their government lies to them.
They only make the situation worse when they present the information they get from their not-always-truthful media, attach some keywords like free speech, and use that as their sole supporting evidence/knowledge to make stubborn arguments.
This is why every time someone makes posts that sound like they did no research, it drives most Chinese people insane. Because they are presenting the "lies" (not entirely lies, most times half truths designed to hide the complete picture) of their free speech media as truths. While Chinese people know to not completely trust their media and often seek additional information elsewhere.
But hey, I'm no expert.
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On July 10 2009 04:02 BisuBoi wrote:
So a country transferring resources from one of its regions to another should be considered a crime? Citizens of the dominant ethnicity moving to ethnic areas is wrong and should be punishable by being beaten to death with sticks?
Yes, if white people moved to Brooklyn, the blacks should come out, say "they're trying to dilute our culture" and start mass murdering James and Susan right? What part of "the Tibetans and Uighurs are ethnocentric and willing to get violent over it" don't you get?
Han Chauvinism? People from the West tend to think there's something beautiful about Tibetan culture, like it's some kind of pristine wonder and Han Chinese are stamping it out in the name of imperialism. It's not like that. The people don't shower there. They drink butter half the time and the other half they sit around doing subsistence agriculture. In any modern Western country, they would consider these citizens impoverished and would be going in there 24/7 with social programs and welfare agents trying to get these people to "civilize." As if "modern society" was a Han invention. What a crock of shit.
The thing that really gets on my nerves is how these Western kids run in here and have all these lofty ideals, when they've lived their entire lives on the profits of rape and plunder. Sure is convenient to start declaring war is wrong and nothing should be solved through violence AFTER they raped and conquered the world and set themselves up as the rulers of it all. The ones in power always want to maintain the status quo. God forbid another nation try to pull the same shit they did. It'd be terrible if China added to its territorial possessions but N. Ireland? Oh... that's another issue. US bases all over the world? "They're there for the world's safety." Pffffft.
I think there is probably a middle ground--it just requires so much more work than any other position and will never be perfect. Ethnic majorities always have advantages of the peripheral communities. It seems reasonable to assume that someone who feels that their voice is not heard--or not adequately represented by conventional means--resorts to violence as an outlet for built-up tension and repression. I imagine that this response is to what Jayson is calling "Han-chauvinism" and colonialism. The second word, is probably more accurate. It is colonialism.
If there was a way to incorporate the peripheral and the central easily then all of the people who are much more informed and intelligent than us would have done so already. The problem is that there is no answer. You will always have strife and resentment between distinct cultures that inhabit the same space. All you can do is attempt to remain aware enough to constantly react and re-address the situation.
Your response that it is sure fucking opportune that once the US, and other primary western powers, obtain their position they then switch to exporting tolerance to other nations. It is absolutely hypocritical and serves the status quo. However, that does not mean that the concept has no merit.
I have no knowledge of this conflict, or of modern China in general. What I found so intriguing in Jayson and your argument was how concisely you mirrored academic positions on post-colonial/colonial critical theory. This is a current and real problem and is one that is getting addressed and thought about, but obviously there will never be a pat answer. That is also the reason why some probably do not bother to post, or just troll these types of threads. No one has a correct answer, but I am tempted to think that any tolerable solution is going to result from dialogue and more of us ignorant (not necessarily stupid) non-chinese picking up pieces of information in threads like these. Try to be patient.
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holy crap. stuff got out of hand
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O_O great post maleorderbride, agree 100%.
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Every post on this page is excellent except for CharlieMurphy's.
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On July 10 2009 03:21 CharlieMurphy wrote:Show nested quote +On July 10 2009 03:16 BisuBoi wrote:
The saddest thing in this thread is that people in the West think they are free. Western civilization is hardly more free than China's. The media just has more sophisticated methods of propaganda. And it's a Western prerogative to trash talk China. Insecurity about world dominance anyone? No one is truly free to do whatever they want ever. There are consequences in one form or another.
They are free to do whatever they want. They have to also know that whatever they do has consequences, that doesn't take away the "free" part of doing w/e you want.
or does it?
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Yeah I have to agree, maleorderbride's post can be respected. It's nuanced and fair minded.
Also on the issue of post-colonial vs colonial critical, I think of it as the haves versus the have-nots.
The haves cry when the have-nots take from others. But the have-nots say "you already got yours, now I'm trying to get mine. Why hate?"
And the haves say "oh, that's wrong though. We don't do that anymore."
The obvious retort to that is "well, yes. That's because you GOT yours already."
It's really quite simple to see why the positions hold the views they do. You are right, the problem remains the same. How do you arbitrate who gets what in a world where scarcity rules? What system is actually just and fair? And to be frank, who lives in the adult world and still believes in principles like just and fair? Most of the world operates on a system of pragmatism, rather than ideals. And pragmatism as a rationale tends to work a heckuva lot better than abstract notions or ideals.
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Vatican City State1650 Posts
Wow... I never knew the extent of rabid Chinese nationalism rampant among TL's forums.
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Where do you see nationalism orgolove
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On July 10 2009 06:41 orgolove wrote:
Wow... I never knew the extent of rabid Chinese nationalism rampant among TL's forums.
It's not Chinese nationalism but the simple folly that most people try to falsely apply Western/European models to other cultures. Like Zulu said, the posts on this page are pretty solid and well thought out, but overall in the thread there are still some hints of that.
At least all I am trying to do is get people to think from a different perspective, so this thread actually has some legitimate content (which it already does).
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Baa?21244 Posts
On July 10 2009 03:49 Jayson X wrote:
Han-chauvinism is to the rest of us like a great wall
icwudt.
The feeling that regions like Xinjian and Tibet are "ungrateful" isn't really hard to understand. China views those areas as a rightful part of its territory, and has invested a lot of time and resources into the regions in an attempt to improve the conditions and try to make the locals feel the same way. When these generally good-intentioned attempts are met with accusations of destroying culture/heritage, it's only natural that some of the Chinese feel offended.
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EPT
