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The Number Of Uyghurs Has Tripled – The U.S. Calls It A Genocide – Propaganda Fails To Explain It
After being bashed with 24/7 "Trump is bad" news we are now punished with 24/7 of "Biden is great" news.
Actions which were an outrage when taken under Trump are now sold as rational endeavors when argued for by Biden acolytes.
To cover for the turnabout media are getting a bit in a twist and have to make up stupid excuses.
Consider this New York Times piece that now justifies a last minute action the former Secretary of State Mike Pompous took when he falsely declared that the Chinese development of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region is a 'genocide'.
China’s Oppression of Muslims in Xinjiang, Explained
On the final full day of the Trump presidency, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared that China was carrying out a genocide against Uighurs and other Muslim peoples, the toughest condemnation yet of Beijing’s crackdown against its far western region of Xinjiang.
…
The incoming Biden administration has indicated its general agreement with the designation. A spokesman for Joseph R. Biden Jr. said during the presidential campaign last year that Beijing’s policies in the region amounted to genocide.
…
Here’s a look at the Xinjiang region, China’s crackdown there and what the genocide declaration could mean for the global response.
Uh oh – the 'good Biden' endorses something 'bad Trump' has done. Some mumble is needed to explain that!
Thus follows a number of inaccurate descriptions of the historic and current situation in Xinjiang:
Xinjiang, in the far northwestern region of China, has large numbers of Uighurs, Kazakhs and other mostly Muslim groups. It is culturally, linguistically and religiously more similar to Central Asia than the Chinese interior.
…
Uighurs have long bridled at Chinese control of the region, which has seen an influx of ethnic Chinese migrants and an increase in restrictions on local language, culture and religion. Minority groups in Xinjiang say they aren’t given jobs or contracts because of widespread racial discrimination.
The resentment has sometimes boiled over into violence, including attacks on police officers and civilians. In 2009, nearly 200 people, mostly Han Chinese, were killed in riots in Urumqi, the regional capital.
Most of Xinjiang has been under 'Chinese control' for more than 2,000 years. It has always been a mixed region with several ethnic groups including a significant Han population. It has also seen fast population growth caused by high birth rates and migration following strong economic development:
In the early 1800s the population under the Qing (Manchu) Dynasty was roughly 60% Turkic and 30% Han. In 1953, a People’s Republic of China census registered 4.87 million of which 75% were Uyghur and 6% Han. In 1964 the census documented 7.44 million of which 54% were Uyghur and 33% Han. After the beginning of the economic reforms, Xinjiang registered 13.08 million of which 46% were Uyghur and 40% Han. In terms of the 2000 census, Xinjiang’s 18.46 million people are 45.21% Uyghur and 40.57% Han. The current population situation is similar to that of the Qing when many Han lived in the area.
In 1953 there were 3.6 million Uyghur in Xinjiang. In 2,000 there were 8.4 million. Wikipedia says that in 2018 Xinjiang has a total population of 25 million of which 11.3 million are ethnic Uyghur.
It is quite weird to claim that such a consistent population growth of an ethnic group is somehow a 'genocide'.
This sentence from the above quote is especially interesting:
Minority groups in Xinjiang say they aren’t given jobs or contracts because of widespread racial discrimination.
It is followed a few graphs later by this claim:
In addition, the authorities have pushed work programs in Xinjiang, including the transfer of workers within the region and to other parts of China, that critics say most likely involve coercion and forced labor.
Which is it?
Are the Uyghur excluded from labor or are they coerced to labor?
The Times won't explain that contradiction so we will have to do that.
There has been high economic growth in Xinjiang for several decades. The state owned Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, which was founded 64 years ago to develop the region, has seen above 10% growth rates in its industries over several decades.
Some of this growth has been in rural areas with extensive cotton farming. There are also large coal, oil and gas reserves in Xinjiang that have been developed. Another growth factor has been a rapid urbanization within the province.
Cotton farming, unless highly mechanized, requires a lot of seasonal workers to pick the cotton. These often came from Han provinces. A 2009 report in the NYT said:
The first wave of workers has arrived in the annual migration to China’s restive western region of Xinjiang this year to pick cotton, according to a report on Friday by Xinhua, the state news agency.
The workers are mostly ethnic Han and are the first large batch of migrant workers to make the journey to Xinjiang since deadly ethnic rioting broke out this summer.
A Reuters piece from 2014 tried to use the fact that Han migrants came to do such work to justify Islamist terrorism in Xinjiang:
URUMQI, China (Reuters) – Hundreds of migrant workers from distant corners of China pour daily into the Urumqi South railway station, their first waypoint on a journey carrying them to lucrative work in other parts of the far western Xinjiang region.
Like the columns of police toting rifles and metal riot spears that weave between migrants resting on their luggage, the workers are a fixture at the station, which last week was targeted by a bomb and knife attack the government has blamed on religious extremists.
“We come this far because the wages are good,” Shi Hongjiang, 26, from the southwestern metropolis of Chongqing, told Reuters outside the station. “Also, the Uighur population is small. There aren’t enough of them to do the work.”
Shi’s is a common refrain from migrant workers, whose experience finding low-skilled work is very different to that of the Muslim Uighur minority.
Employment discrimination, experts say, along with a demographic shift that many Uighurs feel is diluting their culture, is fuelling resentment that spills over into violent attacks directed at Han Chinese, China’s majority ethnic group.
It is correct that some employers preferred Han workers as they were schooled and spoke the main countrywide language. But the Chinese government had long recognized that a large part of the local rural population was still underemployed and already had taken measures to change that:
The Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, China's prime cotton-growing area, plans to pump some 20 billion yuan ($3.2 billion) into its textile industry to create jobs and maintain social stability, local officials in its Beijing representative office said on Friday.
"The push for textile development will create more jobs in the sector," said Yan Qin, a top official of Urumqi. "It is not only a matter of economic returns and social benefits, but also a political issue."
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Local officials said the policy focus will favor the underdeveloped southern part of the region. The southern Xinjiang city of Aksu, one of the major cultivation areas, is one area where the government aims to improve employment.
The move is part of Beijing's call to attract more labor-intensive textile manufacturers from the eastern cities to Xinjiang to open up employment opportunities for local people.
In 2016 Reuters reported on the success of Beijng's development policy:
AKSU, China (Reuters) – The Youngor cotton spinning factory is one of the biggest employers in Aksu, an agricultural town on the edge of the Taklamakan desert in China’s restive Xinjiang region.
Youngor, one of China’s largest shirt-makers, opened the plant in 2011 to be closer to the main cotton-growing region in Xinjiang. Soon it will be joined by others: Beijing wants to create 1 million textile jobs in Xinjiang by 2023.
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Almost all of the 520 employees at the Youngor factory are Uighurs. The average factory floor salary is around 3,000 yuan ($463.18)a month, and comes with food and lodging – compared with roughly 4,000 yuan for textile workers in the southern China factory belt.
“There are still a lot of people to come out of (Xinjiang’s) countryside,” said Xu Zhiwu, general manager at Youngor’s Aksu factory, referring to government data that show 2.6 million rural residents sought work in Xinjiang’s cities in 2014.
Xinjiang Youngor Cotton Spinning Co Ltd, a unit of Youngor Group, is planning to expand its factory, built among apple orchards on Aksu’s outskirts, Xu said.
Beijing's development policies were successful. The seasonal cotton picking campaign is no longer done by Han migrant worker but by locally recruited people:
The replacement of Han labor migrants from eastern China with local ethnic minority laborers who are mobilized through labor transfer schemes is taking place in all cotton-growing regions in Xinjiang. In 2018, of 250,000 cotton pickers in Kashgar Prefecture, 210,900 were locals (via labor transfer policies), 39,100 came from other regions of Xinjiang, and only 6,219 or 2.5 percent hailed from other parts of China.
The report notes the numbers of cotton pickers from other parts of China are declining. In the same year, the number of cotton pickers in Aksu Prefecture who were organized through the labor transfer mechanism increased by 21 percent. In 2020, Aksu needed 142,700 cotton pickers; of them, 124,500 were locally organized (likewise via state-arranged labor transfers).
Karakax County in Hotan Prefecture sent out more cotton pickers mobilized through labor transfer – an increase from 40,600in 2017 to 54,000 in 2018, mobilizing 15.7 percent of its population aged 18-59 years to pick cotton in other regions. A 2020 news article from Aksu explains that counties with more cotton plantations request labor from those with fewer plantations, stating that as a result the region “no longer needs to attract cotton pickers from elsewhere.”
The 'labor transfer policies' are in fact state sponsored local recruitment campaigns for well paid seasonal work. This local recruitment is what the Times calls "coercion and forced labor".
When, years ago, Han migrant workers came to Xinjiang to pick cotton and for other work 'western' media complained and used that to justify Islamist terrorism.
After China introduced a better development policy and the companies started to recruit from the local Uyghur population for cotton picking and other textile industry work the very same 'western' media complain about "coerced labor".
Instead of explaining the successful development the New York Times is using it to argue that an ethnic group, which over the last seven decades more than tripled in size, is under threat of genocide.
There is nothing that China could do to end such silly propaganda.
Congratulation smith the ‘vn’
Once again you’ve hijacked an entire thread !
This proves that you can talk about the uighurs for days but people will not get tired of it.
But if you talk about China actions towards their neighbors, people get defensive immediately. Why? Because that issue is very hard to defend
I didnt call you moron before for nuthin you know …
This happens to be a thread about Uighurs, of course we can talk about it all day.
YOu are turning it into a SCS thread.
This happens a lot in other sites where
no OT threads are available.
There’s no excuse here .
Have some respect to our host even if not for us.
————-
aton , offguardian’s resident indian troll
The last time you quoted indian source about ‘Chinese occupation of Nepalese land’.
Well the Nepalese say you’r the ones squatting on Nepalese territory since 1962
This time its Chinese ‘intrusion’ into Indian land.
We have heard such stories many times before and it all turned out fake.
When it comes to brutality, Indian forces could actually teach both Israelis and the United States quite a few things.”
https://www.countercurrents.org/vltchek080215.htm
When it comes to fake news, Indian cow dungs make gringo bullshit smell like roses.
Wonder why aton and his ilks keep coming here to crap their cow dung when we can smell an Indian troll ten miles away ?
Are theY masochists coming here for a fix or…
ISI agents trolling to make indians look silly ? 😉
———————
Our friend ‘murikkan muslim’ gloats on his ‘Persian’ stock.
we are the smart set amongst the moslems
Seems to be a ‘Persian’ invasion lately , there’s this poster ‘no friend of the devil’ , an avid China baiter, very active over at UNZ and SAKER.
He always sign off with his supposedly ‘Persian’ID
I suppose [[[they]]] figure a Persian China critique sounds more credible than an Indian or anglo variety, since both are known sinophobes.
am
‘WTF with this good re ed and bad re ed BS ?’
nOT ALL re ed are born equal genius.
China detox radicalised jihadists to prevent them killing innocent bystanders and themselves.
fukus literally manufacture terrorists outta misguided social misfits .
Besides, not all muslims are born equal either,
Many can see thru fukus shenanigan to divide and conquer…misdirecting muslim anger from the great satan towards the victimised Chinese.
Like so…
Combined with the tied and true cold war era anti-Communist hysteria, the absurdity of appealing to the moral conscious of US warmongers such as Pompeo or Rubio in the service of human rights as they aggressively back the slaughter and repression of Palestinians and Yemenis reveals a grave misstep in logic and an encouragement of such propaganda. Moreover, it makes US Muslims pawns of the foreign policy objectives of a government that otherwise surveilling, enslaving, and engaging in warfare against them–domestically and globally.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/04/12/civil-rights-groups-and-pro-war-republicans-an-unholy-alliance-in-the-soft-war-against-china/
Question is…
Are you a witting/unwitting pawn of the
great satan , AM ?
Posted by: denk | Jan 26 2021 5:37 utc | 309
Posted by: Smith | Jan 26 2021 4:20 utc | 305
Nobody has beef with China’s boosting their own defense in their own defined territories.
It is irrelevant what anybody’s beef is or is not with wherever China chooses to boost their defense, since it is China which is threatened by US imperialism.
It is also stupid to limit defense within one’s borders only if one’s vulnerability lies outside like in a nearby strait.
Defense must be boosted where it is required in response to enemy action (The US and it’s SEA vassals).
If China boosts it’s defenses to play by the ‘queensberry rules’ within it’s borders but it’s marine traffic suffers blockage on the high seas, that’s stupid.
It had better make sure it has control over whatever buffer it needs to ensure an adequate balance of terror.
If that means dominating the SCS, then that is the Game Theoretic requirement for it not to be overwhelmed by a Naval blockade.
Nothing to do with fair/unfair, wrong/right. Just the requirement to ensure adequate defense against an Imperial Power.
The problem is China knowingly makes up claim like the 9-dash-claim and intentionally makes it as vague as possible in order to organize illegal fishing trips,
military expeditions and building military bases, and now oil harvesting.
None of that stands because it goes against the laws and the wishes of the actual locals living in maritime ASEAN nations.
Firstly, anyone can make up vague claims and everyone does.
This is not Imperialism, as you falsely define it.
Claims are just that – claims. They are imaginary entities buzzing around in your head, Agent Smith.
The fact that China is not enforcing the 9-dash line means that it is not engaging in Imperialism in the SCS at all.
That is indisputable: There is no enforcement of the 9-dash line in the SCS.
And really now, you don’t support the 9-line-claim but you AREN’T against it either? What kind of wishy washy is this bullcrap?
It’s very clear to me, regardless if you struggle to grasp that subtlety.
Let me try to put in terms 10-year old may understand:
The 9-dash line is a claim. It is an arbitrary declaration by the Chinese government which has no material force.
Therefore it is not real. Not in force. Not material enough to care whether it’s there or not.
When it was announced following HRC’s announcement of the Pivot to Asia I knew what it was:
A declaration in response to American declarations of Imperial Intentions in the SCS. Nothing more than PR.
The cognitive defect you’re suffering from is that of a “binary mindset”: you can only conceive of either being for or against something but your mind is not advanced enough to understand the existence of a third position: Being neither for nor against something.
Here, this might help:
In some countries, Sodomy is declared illegal.
I don’t have an opinion on a ban on Sodomy.
I’m not against it – ban pooning each other’s bungholes if you want, they’ll just poon somewhere else.
I’m not for it – I have no reason to be, banning sodomy has no effect on me whatsoever, it’s not my ‘thing’ either way.
Would you call that wishy washy bullcrap? Insist that I take a position on legalisation of it?
Don’t worry – you’ll get to grips with the idea eventually.
About proofs, you have chinese fishing fleet, protected by chinese coast guards, harvesting resources in “traditional fishing zone” that the host country protests again:
China announcing ban on the whole SEA Sea, with no consultation or acceptance from neighbors:
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1123219/south-china-sea-news-china-fishing-ban-vietnam-indonesia-rights
Nonsense.
All parties in the SCS periodically protect their fishing vessels with coast gaurds – not only China. Vietnam, Indonesia, Philipines and probably others too.
Your article actually proves that it is VIETNAM that is acting like an “Imperial Power” (IF we use your IDIOTIC definition of “Imperialism” to begin with):
Look at this quote from the *very same* article you posted:
“Vietnam is one of the nations involved in the dispute over the South China Sea.
The country also asserts its sovereignty over Spratly Islands, an archipelago claimed and occupied by Malaysia, the Philippines, China and Taiwan.
Vietnam has recently raised tensions over the disputed waters with Indonesia too.
Last week, a coastguard boat bearing the Vietnamese flag rammed an Indonesian navy ship attempting to seize an illegal trawler.”
So, do you admit that Vietnam and the Philipines are acting like Imperial Powers, by your own definition of “Imperialism” ???
They are “against the laws and the wishes of the actual locals living in maritime ASEAN nations” as you put it above, are they not?
(NOTE: From my perspective, your definition is false, but let’s see if you have the moral and logical consistency to stick by your definitions)
Amusing:
Indonesia sinking a Vietnamese boat at Datuk Island for attempted ‘Imperialism’:
https://cdn.images.express.co.uk/img/dynamic/78/590x/secondary/south-china-sea-news-china-fishing-ban-vietnam-indonesia-rights-1856874.webp?r=1557087029097
The Vietnamese government acting ‘imperially’ in the SCS by ramming Indonesian Coast Guard ships:
An Indonesian patrol vessel was rammed by two Vietnamese coast guard ships after it intercepted an illegal Vietnamese fishing boat in its waters in the South China Sea, according to its navy.
Ref: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-04-30/indonesia-and-vietnam-ships-collide-in-south-china-sea/11056752
In fact, Indonesia has had to beat off not one but 3 bandits from it’s territorial waters:
“Indonesia, the world’s largest archipelagic nation, has sunk hundreds of illegal fishing vessels from Vietnam, the Philippines, China and other nations since 2014 as part of efforts to exert greater control over its vast maritime territory.”
By your absurd definition of Imperialism, you now have 3 or more ‘Imperial’ powers operating in the SCS: Philippines, Vietnam, China and “others”. Right?
So, either:
a)admit that there are multiple imperialistic powers currently attempting to enforce imperialism on each other in the SCS, or
b) admit that your definition of Imperialism is rubbish or
c) provide a precise definition of Imperialism, then revisit your defective argument.
Which will it be?
Posted by: Arch Bungle | Jan 26 2021 14:35 utc | 313
No, Xinjiang has not “been (unambiguously) ‘under Chinese control’ for 2,000 years.” Way to reduce all nuance of “China’s” historical relations w/ the region… morons
Also: “When, years ago, Han migrant workers came to Xinjiang to pick cotton and for other work ‘western’ media complained and used that to justify Islamist terrorism.”
[citation needed]
I find it HILARIOUS how you guys- the people who love this site and write for it- are probably the same crowd who (rightly) condemn a Western ‘War on Terror’ and overhyped “terrorist threats” from Muslim and Arabs but… then you’ll pretend like THE CHINESE GOVERNMENT would “never do that.” Right…
The Chinese government is “so full of angels and totally-honest actors” that it would “never overhype and play-up an alleged ‘terrorist threat’ in a hard-to-control region of its territory for political gain.”
Give. me. a. BREAK
You guys are partisan hacks w/ such an obvious double standard!
Hell, the Chinese government HAS OBVIOUSLY LIED on numerous occasions about the extent of this ‘terrorist threat’ from Uighurs and Xinjiang, like how, in a CGTN “documentary”, they ludicrously claimed that China was the victim of “thousands” of terrorist attacks over a 30-year (or so) period.
But… actual, objective data and analyses- such as from the Global Terrorism Database- show that that’s not *remotely* the case! Within that time period, it was more like 200, at best. In 2008, the Chinese security forces very-likely made-up a fake “thwarted terrorist plot” supposedly involving a ‘Uighur woman who was about to blow-up a plane”, a claim everyone else who comprehensively analyzed the situation found suspicious af.
In 2009, amidst the ‘Urumqi riots’, the Chinese government made it seem like it was this “random group of shit-disturbers who wanted to kill and murder Han and cause chaos.” In fact… the whole situation *was far more complex*! Yes, it’s very unfortunate that murder and death happened, but it *started out*, in fact, as a *peaceful protest* against what had happened in another part of China- angry Han workers, fed misinformation that a Uighur coworker “had raped a female Han coworker”, beat to death at least a few Uighurs working there. And, if memory serves, it took way longer than it “should’ve” to bring the Han murders to justice! *That*, reportedly, was the real reason the original demonstrations in Urumqi started. But… sadly, things got out of hand, quite possibly thanks to overzealous security forces ‘starting shit’ on their own.
Hell… the Chinese state and media even claimed that Rabiya Kadeer- a Uighur activist living IN GERMANY (thousands of miles away)- somehow “coordinated” (almost singlehandedly) the Urumqi riots!
The claim is just LAUGHABLE, on its face, to anyone w/ a brain, but… lots of people, including many “pro-China” folks, believed it on the surface. CCTV even (obviously) faked a couple of “letters” allegedly ‘written by relatives of Rabiya’, shortly after the riots, telling her to “stop meddling” and to “not ruin the good life we have here.” The latter just sounds creepy af. Like… were the gov’t fakers “threatening” the Uighur relatives of Rabiya (don’t you DARE get involved with Chinese internal politics, or we’ll harm/jail the rest of your family)?
One last thing, while we’re on the topic of RK: A few years back, CGTN made an obvious *propaganda video* where they showed a couple of RK’s granddaughters, supposedly, talking about “how much we enjoy our current life in Xinjiang and how economically prosperous it is.” The “socialist” state-run media in China even had them go to a LOCAL MALL (consumerism much?) and talk about how they could “shop at and buy all of this really-fancy stuff at these high-end shops”, if memory serves. rofl. How much you wanna bet that either they ‘threatened’ her daughters to coerce them to appear or… they ‘incentivized’ said daughters with, say, ‘extra cash or other material benefits’ to go on? Like… the notion that the daughters of this “big foreign diplomatic enemy of ours” (in China’s eyes) would “go on our media willingly to tell RK to ‘stop getting involved'” about a *decade* after Urumqi, is just laughable and so obviously transparent!
So much of this “article” is just laughably fallacious that only a dumb ideologue could believe it w/o question. Did you get your “Logic Degree” from the worst university around or something? lol
Say what you want about “imperialist media” and ‘Western media’, but… you guys need to learn REAL MEDIA LITERACY! It’s not JUST ‘calling out Western and corporate media’ but giving so-called “communist” countries’ *state media* a pass
Let alone Russian (capitalist) state-run TV (like RT) a pass, either
You can’t complain about ‘how bad’ media is “in the West” but then act like media abroad *outside the West*, esp. that which is *full of obvious state-benefiting propaganda of one sort of another*, is somehow “always telling the truth and has no ulterior motive whatsoever, or agenda.” ALL of them, to one degree or another, SUCK, and they all *lie* about this or that!
Posted by: Jack | Jan 31 2021 7:21 utc | 321
Just go on the “Terrorism in China” or similar Wikipedia pages about *Xinjiang and Uighurs’ relations with the Chinese state and Han*, and you’ll find out *just how contentious* the whole situation has been, at least for the last several decades! Yes, Hans and Uighurs have, at the least, historically, had a very *tense relationship*, and everyone who’s studied comprehensively the situation knows this.
Yet… it’s almost like the folks who wrote and approved this ‘article’ *truly think* that, like, the Hans have been “nothing but good and totally benevolent” to Uighurs and Xinjiang, esp. the state?? lmao
The XPCC, to some degree, has obviously been a *weapon of control* for the CCP to “finally get Xinjiang in line”- along w/ ‘snag’ and make use of a lot of its mineral resources- in a way perhaps no previous ‘Chinese administration/government’ had before. Yes, admittedly, it’s guaranteed *some* ‘economic development’ of the region, but… at what cost?
And yes, there does seem to be a fair share of discrimination against Uighurs- this is hardly disputed among actual experts
Read Sean Roberts, Darren Byler, Garden Bovingdon, and Dru Gladney, to name a few. ACTUAL experts who’ve been to the region and studied intensely! Stop wasting time on phonies like Adrian Zenz and pretending this “wholly debunks” any negative reporting about the CCP’s actions in China.
Also… your idiotic notion that, “Well, because SOME alleged aspects of ‘genocide’ aren’t being done in Xinjiang, it MUST NOT BE HAPPENING AT ALL” is LAUGHABLE! BadEmpanada already roundly-debunked this narrow view of “genocide” in a recent video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m316DcYhb8w
Yes, what’s happening to Uighurs may not be ‘genocide’, per se- at least, in some regards- but the notion that the CCP or PRC state leadership (or Hans in general in the area) “treat Uighurs w/ the utmost respect and dignity, and everything is GOING GREAT” is comical! The ‘relationship’ between Uighurs, Hans (in the region, esp.) and the Chinese state has *hardly* been “mutually beneficial”, esp. when the XPCC came into the fold and started getting tons of Hans to migrate. You’d know this if you’d bothered to do a little research.
Also… the notion that poverty produces “highly-ideological, goal-driven terrorists” is so nonsensical, ahistorical and anti-empirical. Terrorists, generally, are driven by a DESIRE TO RID THEIR LAND OF PERCEIVED “OCCUPIERS.” It’s not just some random grab-bag of “poor folks w/ no economic prospects or education who decided to start shit with the state and security forces just to ‘give their lives meaning.'” I mean, that *may* be the case for a few ‘terrorists’ in poor areas in places like Xinjiang, but… by and large, that just doesn’t fly. Hell, Alan Auerbach or a similar economist, in the mid-2000s, if memory serves, wrote a very-detailed book about, “Why people become terrorists”- esp. Islamic terrorists in the Muslim world- and he found that, in fact, most of them came from middle-class-or-higher econ. bgs *and* were well-educated on many things! Esp. things like, say, “Western imperialism or intervention in my region” or “the history of Islam”, to name a few…
So this notion that, “giving a bunch of random Uighurs extra schooling and/or ‘counseling’ will *get rid of terrorism for good*” is dubious, at best. It’s also… kind-of offensive, implying that most poor Uighurs, if not poor Chinese residents in general, are “too criminal” to stay away from “a life of blowing shit up” if they’re poor? I’m ‘sorry’, but the way people ‘become terrorists’ is hardly “random.” Sure, a relative handful of poor folks may ‘turn to a life of petty crime’, like drug dealing or burglary, but… that’s usually in a very individualistic (benefiting themselves and maybe their families, primarily), non-political way. It’s hardly ‘the same.’
We wouldn’t say that a black or brown gang member from Harlem, for example, who deals in drugs to escape a life of poverty “is just-as-likely to turn to blowing up their state or national capitol for obviously political reasons” just because, “poverty.”
Lastly… I find it *very disturbing* how, when it comes to CHINA, many so-called “leftists” suddenly *start parroting neoconservative and right-leaning-style talking points and ways of framing “counterterrorism” and “economic growth”*. How does this make any sense?? It’s “a-ok” to call-out the West’s “counterterrorist propaganda”, but we’re to believe that the CCP in the PRC, “don’t operate like every other heavy-handed state out there when fearmongering about a ‘big terrorist threat at home”?
I mean… does not the phrase “People’s War on Terror”, at the very least, make you a bit uncomfortable?? China, as we now know, *used the US’s ‘antiterrorism approach’, to some extent*, as a “model” from which to draw on, in terms of “fighting off suspected Uighur terrorism.” If I didn’t know better, I’d say that many CCP-butt-kissing “leftists” who LOVE the PRC’s current approach to ‘Uighur terrorists’ is just more of the same (hypocrisy).
The way many “leftists” talk about ‘Muslim terrorism’ is quite revealing and odd:
Alleged Muslim/Arab terrorists against Western powers and governments- “We’re anti-Western governments here!”
Any OTHER government- including one with a documented history of abuse toward many of its people, if not particular minorities or marginalized groups w/in the population- vs. “Suspected Muslim terrorists”?
“We TOTALLY stand on the side of that government fighting those ‘jihadists’, no matter what!” As if… NO OTHER government has “reason or ability to overhype terrorist threats at home”, esp. “jihadists” or “Islamists”??
It’s just very weird, ngl. You guys suddenly *take the state’s side almost 100%, w/ virtually no skepticism*, esp. if you can claim alleged ‘terrorists’- particularly Muslim- are “backed by the West”, or something. As if these states are, unlike ‘Western imperialists’, somehow, “INCAPABLE of lying, propagandizing and/or mistreating their people and making sh*t up when it comes to talk of terrorist threats and anti-government enemies.”
Like… say what you want about the ‘rebels’ in Syria, but what kind-of jagoff pretends like Assad- a neoliberal, far-right-wing, abusive authoritarian asshole who OBVIOUSLY rigs elections to stay in power (honestly, no one wins w/ “97%” in a ‘competitive election’… gimme a break)- is some kind of “communist” or “comrade”?? What do ‘leftists’ in, say, ‘the West’ get out of that, let alone fellow leftists, socialists, et al elsewhere?? I’m no fan of West-backed ‘regime change’, but the notion that *every foreign-gov’t enemy*, by default, is “good” is just a really-shitty version of “anti-imperialism” or “leftism”! You basically THREW OUT your “leftist values” to support some other governmental leader abroad because, “Well, at least they’re FIGHTING THE WEST.”
roflcopter. What a JOKE modern “leftism”- esp. online- in many respects, has become.
Posted by: Jack | Jan 31 2021 7:52 utc | 322
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