Here is a few hard truths about China in the 21st century:
The only thing communist about China is the name of the ruling party.
That’s right. China long since shed any semblance of socialism or communism. It is, in fact, very nearly a state run as a corporation. The best way of describing China is as a Totalitarian Capitalist state.
The CCP is not going anywhere.
Unless this depression stretches into a decade long affair the CCP isn’t about to be overthrown or to stand aside. It is, in fact, stronger today than it was twenty years ago. There is really no actual pressure applied by other nations against the totalitarianism of the CCP. They can’t apply the pressure to China because they depend on China to be the world’s factory; low labour standards and poor environmental regulations are all that have allowed Capitalism to continue to function.
:)Quick. Wonder if ever the West will be a factory for the East? Eventually maybe they are going to want to buy mass produced cheap shiit at wholesale too. You know? Don’t know how they could buy it any cheaper but.
Fact is China is one F’d up place with severe human rights abuses. It’s a place where you can’t breathe the air or drink the water. It’s also a place where you die if you protest.
Actually, with regards to the air, Bolderdawg isn’t far off. Respiratory illness is freaking common over there.
However protesters don’t usually die. There is a battery of bad things that happen to them but execution isn’t one.
Being drugged up and jammed into a mental hospital… that might happen.
Getting roughed up a bit and hurried off the street… common.
Getting killed… rare.
So now you specify. You said protesters. Not protesters at T Square, or at factories. The Square is a bit much for me. As for factories, nah. Consulted for a few before. Talking to Big Bosses, or bosses, everywhere, sucks. I prefer watching paint dry.
The cool thing about the air there is that one constantly has a reason to hock and snot up a nasty greeny.
i agree situation in china is a problem
but i think for poor people, in america is more sad
in china many people poor and got problems thats life
but in america poor people see the super rich everyday walk by them ,and see how their life could have been seeing all those rich things dangled in front of them but just out of reach
[QUOTE=TAO YIN;922436] So now you specify. You said protesters. Not protesters at T Square, or at factories. The Square is a bit much for me. As for factories, nah. Consulted for a few before. Talking to Big Bosses, or bosses, everywhere, sucks. I prefer watching paint dry.
The cool thing about the air there is that one constantly has a reason to hock and snot up a nasty greeny.[/QUOTE]
Go anywhere and stage a public protest against the government. Doesn’t matter.
I guess the only thing that probably would not get you in trouble would be protesting a new MacDonald’s opening.
why dont you go wave a eeslam flag at new york memorial and shout all hu akba
see how long u live
before telling people about wood speck in their eye pull the plank out of your ass
u better wipe your mouth with some tiolet paper with all those diarhea spewing out your mouth
boulderbich
[QUOTE=bawang;922437]i agree situation in china is a problem
but i think for poor people, in america is more sad
in china many people poor and got problems thats life
but in america poor people see the super rich everyday walk by them ,and see how their life could have been seeing all those rich things dangled in front of them but just out of reach[/QUOTE]
It’s the same in China now Bawang.
I’ve seen the up-market shopping districts in Beijing, Hangzhou, Taiyuan. And I’ve seen the poor who live elbow-to-elbow with the rich people who shop in those shrines to the almighty yuan.
And bolderdawg I would like to reiterate: the Chinese government does not make a policy of killing protesters. The closest you get to that sort of thing in this day and age is when private factory owners kill journalists to cover up their misconduct.
That DOES happen.
But not with government sanction.
Other than that the stories of killed protestors are either regurgitated 20 year old stories of T-Square or they are the daffy lies of cultic religious zealots who prey on western sympathy with apocryphal tales of repression.
i was walking down a crowded shopping center road in halifax, cool hip people walking everywhere laughing, and a guy in tatters standing in a corner, eyes wide staring out at nothing singing gibberish while everyone just walked by like hes not there
i remember it to this day
there are much more poor peopl ein china but the contrast between poor and rich in north america disturbs me much more
i didnt know i was poor in china, i was jsut living my life. when i came to canada i KNEW i was poor
and knowing makes all the difference
yeah i know simon its happening in the big cities too but at least people in the countryside can still pretend
In Canada it’s sadly semi-common practice for police in the prairie provinces to round up aboriginal men in the winter and drive them out into the middle of the sticks without proper winter clothing and then drop them off.
And that’s guys who are literally doing nothing.
So, yes, attrocities and abuses of power happen everywhere, even in the bastions of ‘freedom’. But I think nobody would deny that China is a totalitarian state at the moment.
My point (and Bawang’s for that matter) is that life in a totalitarian state isn’t actually THAT different from life in a ‘free’ state. And not because of some secret consipiracy. Rather because even totalitarian states really can’t be bothered regulating every aspect of an ordinary person’s life.
The #1 word I’d use to describe China’s government is this: Pragmatic.
And it does not benefit them to massacre protesters. It’s so much easier to keep them quiet and alive.
