NEWS: Shengyou, China: Riot Suppression Turns to Massacre

Originally posted by Odium
May Day Riots: 2004 and 2003 (1st of May) the Police attacked protestors and then blamed them for starting the violence. (Was there) This has happened in both Germany and Britain. In 2000 about 10 German people were so seriously injured due to Police violence they were in a critical condiction.

I kind of meant America, but okay, I see your point. However, it is Germany... who, let's face it, also have a rather unsavory history regarding treatment of the masses. And Britain... well... not much excuse can be made for Britain, they don't even have guns.

However, it doesn't appear anyone was actually killed. Hospitalization is one thing, rubber bullets, riot prods, PR-24's, and even tear gas can do that. But killing is another entirely. Killing on purpose, in cold blood, against an unarmed opponent, without due process or sanction (such as legal execution or military fighting a war) is illegal in any civilized country. Even "legal" killing has serious rules of engagement or humane considerations to go by. I can even forgive an out-of-control riot that results in an accidental death from a rubber bullet to a temple or a fit of rage by a riot cop who got a little too stick happy. But what occurred in China is outright premeditated and paid murder.

Originally posted by Odium
Problem is China has what 1/5th the population of the world? It's going to have corrupt aspects of it and the gangs will be a lot larger as will there be more corrupt politicians as there are more of them.

True. Very true. Still, it does not excuse what happened.

Originally posted by Odium
But still I've yet to see one bit of this link back to the National Government, only a small region and still the National Government are getting the blame for it.

This may be better investigated in the conspiracy forum, as technically the news article itself is about the murders and not the link to the government.

Originally posted by Hamburglar
I am not sure that 6 people qualifies as a massacre. A terrible loss of life to be sure, but a massacre? Zimbabwe is experiencing massacres now, Rwanda experienced massacres...this is not a massacre. This is ugly for sure, but not a massacre.

Actually, it is technically, a massacre. I'm not sure how familiar you are with U.S. History, but the most famous massacre is the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, where only 6 people (same as in China) were killed directly (another died later at the hospital).

www.infoplease.com...

What's going on in Rwanda and Zimbabwe is genocide. A far larger scale number of murders. I think massacre simply means a large number of people. The fact that you would think six immediate deaths isn't a massacre speaks more for the media desensitising than the word's perceived overuse.

Originally posted by Hamburglar
Why do we have to create a circus-like superlative atmosphere for everything. It's always, "the worst since...," or, "the biggest since..." Who cares?

Simply put, because it sells. And the readers/watchers care. Trust me, producers are very careful about wording, and the way things are phrased in the media nowadays are that way on purpose. Perhaps the more intellectual of the audience may take issue with the usages of such phrases, but the majority audience eats it up with a ladel. That's the news business.

Originally posted by Hamburglar
It is usually not relevant to the situation and it really serves to diminish the event. As in, "this riot/massacre wasn't nearly as bad as the last time."

But, remember, at the same time, it reminds us that it happened before, and is continuing to happen. It educates the listener, in a way. For instance, those not born in the right timeframe may have no idea what happened in The Square back in the 80's. They see "worst since..." and might go look it up.

Originally posted by Hamburglar
I say we get over the superlatives, stop going for the shock value in EVERYTHING, and try to keep a little bit of perspective on things when we read about this stuff.

In Happy Bunny land, that'd be great. I would LOVE to see the media stop focusing constantly on all the negative, and focus on some of the good in the world. But the sad fact of the matter is that people love to watch other people in situations worse than themselves, and they want to feel like what they are watching is the most important event to date.

In a nutshell, there were ties found linking crime lords, power bosses, and local government officials. The police had been harassing the people for months, and they had testimony from one of the captured thugs that he and others were paid $12 by them to beat up the villagers.

As to why they didn't just choose to use the Army, my guess is "Plausible Deniability". If they aren't in official police or army uniforms, the government isn't BLATANTLY responsible to the world.

This kind of uninformed guessing, tenuous conjecture, extrapolation and gross generalization only comes from a misunderstanding of the internal workings of China as a nation. You state that local officials are to blame, and then you go on to describe a theory of how the central government is behind it all. In Chinese there is a saying, "yi pian gai quan", which means to take one side of a situation and stretch it to cover everything. I reiterate - the actions of corrupt local officials does not incriminate the national government. And local officials have absolutely no control over the PLA. The CCP, bunch of crooks though they are, do not order these kind of actions willy-nilly. This kind of uprising is a thorn in the side and an embarrassment to the party. Where the CCP's criminality lies is in covering up these sort of incidents to protect their image, not in ordering them to be carried out. There are plenty of criminal and inhumane actions that the CCP do commit, without having to clutch at straws by blaming them for every little violent episode that occurs in China.

What, just because it happens in Botswana, or Zaire, or some other god-forsaken place, it's okay for China to do this?

The reason the article is a shot at China is because China should know better!

What sweeping rhetoric is this? Thelibra, I'm surprised at you. 'China this', and 'China that'. Replace these words with 'America this' and 'America that' and not only will you have an uproar, but you will have put your finger on exactly why lately this forum has become a bi-partisan farce, whereby you either take a stance to defend America, or attack America, or you are simply ignored. "China should know better"? What the hell are you talking about? These are the actions of corrupt, local officials in a country of 1.3 billion people, not the actions of the CCP kingpins, and not of the Chinese people in general. If Bush attacks Iran, or the ATF burns children at Waco, should I then say, "America should know better"? Or, "Thelibra should know better"? I see the new cold war propaganda with mainland China is affecting even the more astute members here. Score one for Lockheed-Martin's coffers.

The article quoted is a blatant anti-China piece and shows no professionalism of reporting at all.

Dominic Waghorn, Sky's Asia correspondent, said: "These are the pictures China does its best to stop the rest of the world from seeing.

"But this time they have got out.

"It looks like a medieval battle but this is Chinese protest control in the 21st century."

Is this an Opinion/Editorial Piece or what? Since when do reporters throw their opinion and criticisms in to an article? Not once reading the Quran toilet-flushing reports or Abu Ghraib abuse reports did I read, "Joe Bloggs, Daily Telegraph UK's Middle-East correspondent, said, 'These are the abuses America does its best to stop the rest of the world from seeing.' "

As one who has an agenda to see the CCP removed and democracy installed in China, I can spot a similar agenda a mile away, and the author of this propaganda-shaded article has such an agenda, but he has little understanding of how to write a news story, how to conduct investigative journalism, or even how to camouflage feeble conjecture and accusation. As long as the sky.com article is the quoted piece, this belongs in P@ATS as a "West good, China bad" smear-job, not in ATSNN.

[edit on 2005/6/17 by wecomeinpeace]

Originally posted by Hamburglar
First, thanks for the good story libra.

That said, I wonder if anyone else takes issue with our culture of superlatives. Instead of just calling this a riot where a few (6) people were killed, we call it

worst massacre in China since the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989

.

I am not sure that 6 people qualifies as a massacre. A terrible loss of life to be sure, but a massacre? Zimbabwe is experiencing massacres now, Rwanda experienced massacres...this is not a massacre. This is ugly for sure, but not a massacre.

Also, the article itself didn't actually say that it was the worst massacre. instead, it said it was the

worst footage of violence to emerge from the secretive country since the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989.

Big difference there if you ask me. Careful with that thelibra.

Honestly though, why can't we be content to say this is a terrible thing and let's not let it happen again? Why do we have to create a circus-like superlative atmosphere for everything. It's always, "the worst since...," or, "the biggest since..." Who cares? It is usually not relevant to the situation and it really serves to diminish the event. As in, "this riot/massacre wasn't nearly as bad as the last time."

I say we get over the superlatives, stop going for the shock value in EVERYTHING, and try to keep a little bit of perspective on things when we read about this stuff.

I feel the exact same way. Over use of those words have all but erased the meaning.

6 people is awful but not a massacre. The use of Nazi is bandied around so much that it doesn't have the meaning that it once did (and should still!)

It's sad that sensationalism sells more than truth. :-(

Okay wecominpeace, first off, I'm surprised at your response. From your previous posts, you've rarely gone off on this kind of an unsupported tangent. You're reading way too much into something that isn't there.

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
This kind of uninformed guessing, tenuous conjecture, extrapolation and gross generalization only comes from a misunderstanding of the internal workings of China as a nation.

Okay for one thing, I didn't make up anything about the links to government officials. That's in the source and supporting material. Secondly, the next statement began with "my guess is", and then I offered a guess. Thirdly, the part you just quoted wasn't even in the article, it was in the replies. And last I checked, on every news story, people were allowed to GUESS what happened, and to have an opinion.

So you can get right off your high horse, right now, and calm down. I did nothing wrong, and I don't even think my one guess, which I plainly state, was even that out of line.

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
You state that local officials are to blame, and then you go on to describe a theory of how the central government is behind it all.

I do? Let me go back and read my own piece...

Okay. I've reread my article three times now. Not once do I provide a theory or even state that the Central Government was behind it all.

The only places I come close are references to what was already reported in other news media, or what is later guessed at in the replies section. So you want to tell me what it is that grasped your grunion??

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
In Chinese there is a saying, "yi pian gai quan", which means to take one side of a situation and stretch it to cover everything. I reiterate - the actions of corrupt local officials does not incriminate the national government.

However, it does provide more evidence, among a long history of abuses and slaughters by the Chinese government. It was not exactly a stretch to arrive at such a guess. Do I need to provide a list of all the known times when the Government has slaughtered inhabitants of their own domain, for less than ethical ends?

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
And local officials have absolutely no control over the PLA. The CCP, bunch of crooks though they are, do not order these kind of actions willy-nilly. This kind of uprising is a thorn in the side and an embarrassment to the party. Where the CCP's criminality lies is in covering up these sort of incidents to protect their image, not in ordering them to be carried out. There are plenty of criminal and inhumane actions that the CCP do commit, without having to clutch at straws by blaming them for every little violent episode that occurs in China.

I agree with two things: that it is criminal in covering up these sorts of incidents, and that they don't need to be blamed for every little violent episode.

However, I am not blaming them for every little violent episode. I am repeating what a credible news source reported, and I hazarded a quite reasonable guess about ununiformed soldiers and plausible deniability.

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
What sweeping rhetoric is this? Thelibra, I'm surprised at you. 'China this', and 'China that'. Replace these words with 'America this' and 'America that' and not only will you have an uproar, but you will have put your finger on exactly why lately this forum has become a bi-partisan farce, whereby you either take a stance to defend America, or attack America, or you are simply ignored.

I'm rather surprised at you as well. You're raising a flag against something that isn't there, and now tying it into a completely unrelated situation as well to try and support a moot point. Bravo! What exactly are you trying to accomplish here?

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
"China should know better"? What the hell are you talking about? These are the actions of corrupt, local officials in a country of 1.3 billion people, not the actions of the CCP kingpins, and not of the Chinese people in general.

Okay, who is now making broad generalizations? You are stating three things as fact that are yet to be proven.

1.) You stress that "these are the actions of corrupt local officials" - No. They were the actions of uniformed men, in camo, armed with shotguns, and at the time of the quoted articles, ties had been found to local police and government officials. This does not mean that those local officials were to blame, nor does it mean that the chain of command that caused it stopped with them. It could have come from much higher up, or it could have come from someone else completely. What I reported were the ties. Then I offered a guess, later on, and stated it as a guess.

2.) You said "not the actions of the CCP kingpins" - We don't know that yet. I'm sure it's being investigated by several parties around the world, but we may never know the results because diplomacy requires silence in certain areas. Perhaps it wasn't, but you cannot state it as fact, and you should know better.

3.) Most striking, you say "and not of the Chinese people in general". - This is outright wrong. The attackers were Chinese. The captive thug was Chinese. These are the actions of Chinese against Chinese. Perhaps, if one went high enough up through the chain of command for the incident, one might find the eventual puppeteers weren't Chinese, but what is known as of this moment, is that the attackers against the Chinese villagers were Chinese.

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
If Bush attacks Iran, or the ATF burns children at Waco, should I then say, "America should know better"? Or, "Thelibra should know better"?

Yes, in the case of Waco, America SHOULD have known better. I have no idea at all how you arrive at "Thelibra should know better". While I admit to having a large amount of followers in my quest for World Domination, I had absolutely nothing to do with either Waco or Iraq, and the inference that I did is ludicrous. America, however, had everything to do with both, and YES, they/we, should have known better.
However, this thread is not about the mistakes of America, it is about a human rights abuse that took place on Chinese soil, by Chinese, against Chinese, with ties to the the government. So my opinion stands that China should have known better. Just because similar incidents happened elsewhere does not excuse it. Especially not in a 1st world superpower.

I see the new cold war propaganda with mainland China is affecting even the more astute members here. Score one for Lockheed-Martin's coffers.

No, it has nothing to do with propaganda, and I have no idea WTF you are talking about with LM, or how they enter into this. It doesn't take propaganda of any sort to piss me off when I see people murdered in cold blood.

What I am reading, over and over, is "anti-Chinese" this, and "anti-Chinese" that, and "You blame China for everything." If I ever gave this impression, I apologize for the misunderstanding.

I do not, however apologize for anything that I have stated. A first-world superpower should not by their actions, or inaction, allow their citizens to be slaughtered. That, in my book, is true whether it is China, the U.S., or the E.U. And that doesn't mean it happening in a 2nd or 3rd world country is excusable, either. However, 2nd and 3rd world countries don't always have the resources to do so. I hope this clarifies my position somewhat.

Yeah, sorry mate. I had a bad day that day and was a little drunk. Perhaps I misconstrued some of your meanings, and I didn't mean to react so harshly. Out of character for me and my bad. Let me try again.

Often incidents within China are used as a launch pad for broad, black-and-white anti-Chinese rhetoric and bash 'evil China', without focusing on the specific culprits of any particular incident. Instead, as I stated, the reaction is "China this, China that." I object to the generalization inherent in such use of language. Contrary to popular assumption, China is a country of 1.3 billion culturally, economically, socially, and yes, racially diverse people. If some local officials do something terrible, that is not China's fault, it is the fault of those individuals, or the fault of the system. If I see a policeman brutalize a protester in the United States, I do not then make sweeping statements about how America should know better. The policeman involved should know better, and the police force should be better trained. This is a natural reaction for me, because I know that every individual in America is a different person and has differing opinions on acceptable methods of police enforcement. However, to my eyes, statements such as "China should know better" stem from a misunderstanding of China and lumping all of China and all of its people into one single entity.

thelibra said
Yes, in the case of Waco, America SHOULD have known better. I have no idea at all how you arrive at "Thelibra should know better". While I admit to having a large amount of followers in my quest for World Domination, I had absolutely nothing to do with either Waco or Iraq, and the inference that I did is ludicrous.

My "thelibra should know better" comment was out of line, and I apologize. I was being sarcastic, and maybe you missed it. My intent, as you neatly expressed yourself, was to illustrate how ridiculous it is to use the actions of the few to deride the many, or those that have no connection to those actions. I personally do not blame America for the incidents at Waco. I blame the ATF/FBI and the higher-ups who organized and ordered the manner in which the compound was taken. I also do not blame America for the actions of George Bush and Co. - I blame George Bush & Co. It is that kind of thinking that makes terrorists want to attack innocent Westerners and Western interests overseas because of the actions of our countries' leaders. Perhaps our difference of views here is a function of semantics and crossed wires, but I guess for now we'll have to agree to disagree on this one.

thelibra said
As to why they didn't just choose to use the Army, my guess is "Plausible Deniability". If they aren't in official police or army uniforms, the government isn't BLATANTLY responsible to the world.

If you mean the local government officials, then no, they have no control over the PLA. They don't have that option at their disposal, so they can't "choose" to not use the army. If you mean the central government, then such a theory would arise from not understanding the culture and how the government tree works over here. This country is huge, and the local officials are like little lords in their respective regions; they have replaced the Triads in many respects. The corrupt fat cats up in the central government have little control over the actions of these regional thugs, and if an investigation is ever launched, the answers of those questioned is always, "I didn't see anything." The ineffectual CCP is losing the battle against corruption and thuggery among local party officials and police - in fact they are desperate yet lazy and are using the death penalty in more serious cases, still with no measurable change. When it comes to regional protests, the CCP's usual means of ending them is to send in mass riot police and arrest everybody. The ringleaders get imprisoned indefinitely, and the rest are released but kept under regular police observation.

wecomeinpeace said
China this', and 'China that'. Replace these words with 'America this' and 'America that' and not only will you have an uproar, but you will have put your finger on exactly why lately this forum has become a bi-partisan farce, whereby you either take a stance to defend America, or attack America, or you are simply ignored.

thelibra said
I'm rather surprised at you as well. You're raising a flag against something that isn't there, and now tying it into a completely unrelated situation as well to try and support a moot point. Bravo! What exactly are you trying to accomplish here?

Sorry, you perhaps weren't here for the whole What's The Deal With Subz? and America Bashing: National Sociologism episodes, in which I raised the point that many on this forum make the (IMO) mistake of verbally attacking America and Americans because of the actions of the U.S. government. What was I trying to accomplish? Perhaps a little "when the tables are turned" perspective.

thelibra said
You stress that "these are the actions of corrupt local officials" - No. They were the actions of uniformed men, in camo, armed with shotguns, and at the time of the quoted articles, ties had been found to local police and government officials. This does not mean that those local officials were to blame, nor does it mean that the chain of command that caused it stopped with them. It could have come from much higher up, or it could have come from someone else completely. What I reported were the ties. Then I offered a guess, later on, and stated it as a guess.

Again we come back to the semantics. After explaining your guess, you stated "China should know better". I was objecting to that generalization, stating that the actions are those of corrupt officials hiring thugs, not "China".

btw, do the other articles mention shotguns? Unfortunately I can only view the sky.com article, the others are blocked courtesy of the CCP.

thelibra said
They were the actions of uniformed men, in camo...

No, not uniformed men. Cheap, imitation camouflage gear is the favorite wear of laborers and construction workers here, because the fabric is hardy, and because of a fashion throwback from the "Mao uniform" days. The helmets are construction safety helmets. Even the majority of the laborers in large cities like Shanghai wear the same camouflage gear and plastic safety helmets. The reporter has either made an assumption based on ignorance of China, or he is trying to spin the observed camo gear into the impression of miltary involvement. These were not military personnel. They were likely unemployed laborers hired form other regions who would happily beat and kill others for RMB100 or so if it means they could eat well for a few weeks.

wecomeinpeace said
Score one for Lockheed-Martin's coffers.

thelibra said
No, it has nothing to do with propaganda, and I have no idea WTF you are talking about with LM, or how they enter into this. It doesn't take propaganda of any sort to piss me off when I see people murdered in cold blood.

I think that's the first time the always eloquent thelibra has said "WTF" on this forum, and it's all my fault. Sorry. Any incident that occurs within China is used to attack the Chinese government - often with due cause, sometimes without, but often it is also anti-Red China propaganda. Why? Because painting China as the big, bad Communist nation means more military spending, and thus more more cash for the favored recipient of military contracts - Lockheed-Martin; as does propaganda painting all Muslims as extremists. This is not to say that the Chinese government is not deserving of attention and criticism, or that Islamic extremists do not exist, but scratching at every little incident, keeping the media flooded with it, and spinning it for an agenda amounts to propaganda IMHO. I apologize for the obscurity of the LM reference.

As I stated earlier, I'm not defending the CCP, and things are definitely heating up in rural China. There are plenty of brutal incidents, imprisonments and injustices endorsed by the CCP that could be pointed to. I'm simply a) trying to clarify a single situation that seems to have some misunderstanding or spin put on it, and b) stating my personal objection to blanket terms. If I'm a little over-sensitive to such, perhaps you can excuse me after having lived 7 of the best years of my life here with the locals.

Anyway, for an increased understanding of how these sort of incidents arise, who the power players are behind them, and how regional political and business corruption works, I recommend you read Mr. China: A Memoir by Tim Clissold. And to really understand how the upper echelons of the Chinese Communist Party work and the power structure down through the ranks, read The Tiananmen Papers, a collection of internal party documents relating to the massacre, smuggled out of China by Zhang Liang (pseudonym).

I apologize again for my tone and for maybe misreading your intent, and I hope we can continue to debate amicably in the future.

[edit on 2005/6/18 by wecomeinpeace]

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
Yeah, sorry mate. I had a bad day that day and was a little drunk.
...(snip)...
I apologize again for my tone and for maybe misreading your intent, and I hope we can continue to debate amicably in the future.

No apologies neccesary, I've done the same thing myself a few times.

It sounds like we understand each other pretty well then. Like I said, I really don't have anything against the Chinese, and while I do have a few problems with the way their government operates, it's better than what it could be.

I guess my main issue is that they should be more accountable for what happens within the confines of the country. Just as with the Waco, TX fiasco, the chain was heavily investigated under public scrutiny at the top until some heads rolled. The first and foremost duty of a government is to protect its citizens. That is the whole concept behind Social Compact. And while I understand this is very difficult in China, it is made more so by a misunderstanding of how the national budget should be allocated. The same can be said of America, but less so, as we have a heck of a lot of institutions who at least nominally keep human rights abuses in check.

Good to see we're still friends though. I enjoy our discussions too much to lose that. I never knew you lived in China. I bet the scenery is breathtaking.