What has always puzzled me, and continues to, is if The Party is so convinced it did the right thing on 6/4/89 why does it stifle all mention of it? Seems if it were so proud of its actions the date would be celebrated. Instead it is ignored. That defies logic.
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Calling the institution that controls political power in China a "government" misses the point that the "leaders" of China are really a very small group of people who have formed a single-party system made up of ruthless, corrupt and murderous individuals whose lack of legitimacy and popular regard can be directly measured by the scale of attention, suppression, repression, harassment, indignity and pain they focus on a small group of elderly women just because they embody the truth about the utter failure and criminality of the Chinese communist party or CPC. The ashcan of history awaits this "organization"(or gangsters as they are referred to in China) and the warmest place in this ashcan awaits the 20-25 ruling members of the CPC. Imagine 1.4 billion people of different languages, customs and ideas being ruled by so few people, it can't possibly endure forever. Tiananmen Square tore the scab off the CPC for all to see their true policies of corruption and fear of their own people.
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This is 6/3 in China the date the PLA was ordered to clear Tiananmen Square and the battles began in Beijing and in other cities. If you Google BBC and this subject you can see extensive coverage of the Beijing conflict most likely. The citizens had erected barricades of buses and such to stop the troops. An interesting point seldom mentioned is when earlier the politburo order the troops to clear TS the resident general of the troops in Beijing refused – you do not use the army that way – and so indoctrination of rural regiments began – your country is under attract by revolutionaries. These simple folk thought they were being patriotic in the resulting battle that killed Ding Zilin’s son and unknown totals of others.
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May be a duplicate – VPN unpredictable.
The hue and cry that should arise worldwide from the encounter of a army against its own citizenry is as hard to find as apologies in the PRC. June 4, 1989 is well into the Opening of China under Deng Xiaoping, who order the army action, and while a USA Sanction was instigated under President G.W. Bush it was as quickly abandoned when Trade relation matters were being effected. Surprised? How does it do? Business is Business.
The list of demands the student activist submitted for reform and openness of the CCP reads, if you were to see it, very similar to the same theme proposed in the latest Party Congress by priminister Li Keqiang. It too seems to have run into some hurdles. History has its bite.
The hue and cry that should arise worldwide from the encounter of a army against its own citizenry is as hard to find as apologies in the PRC. June 4, 1989 is well into the Opening of China under Deng Xiaoping, who order the army action, and while a USA Sanction was instigated under President G.W. Bush it was as quickly abandoned when Trade relation matters were being effected. Surprised? How does it do? Business is Business.
The list of demands the student activist submitted for reform and openness of the CCP reads, if you were to see it, very similar to the same theme proposed in the latest Party Congress by priminister Li Keqiang. It too seems to have run into some hurdles. History has its bite.
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Should read: G.H. Bush
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Liu Xiaobo, Xu Zhiyong and Pu Zhiqiang are in jail today because they wanted to make China a better place to live. For sure Liu Xiaobo was in Tiananmen in ’89. I have the picture of him with a little doll on his shoulder on my computer screen. He was young and strong then. The same goes for Xu and Pu and thousands of others who wanted or want a modern government. Let people be free to think what they want to think. Let people have recourse to justice if they feel an injustice has been done. The Tiananmen Mothers suffer with the Tibetans, the Uighurs, and all those repressed and marginalize by the Party. Xi Jinping and the others Party members are true patriots. But it is the regime that has grown to be such a powerful monster. Mao’s communist vision of equality captured the heart of the Chinese. Mao wanted to make China a better place to live. The painful lesson is that a government needs checks and balances otherwise; corruption seduces even the strongest man or women.
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While a mother's grief is understandable, it is clear that her son was killed for participating in a riot that killed dozens of unarmed policemen (students in Tiananmen Square were unharmed and left peacefully).
It is difficult to summon much empathy for such people regardless of how much their families mourn them.
It is difficult to summon much empathy for such people regardless of how much their families mourn them.
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You know that about her son, eh? The students were unharmed? Who the hell killed hundreds of them, then?
50 cents just isn't enough for your post.
50 cents just isn't enough for your post.
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So you are saying that only Chinese police were killed/injured and not one student was wounded or killed, and they all left peacefully. No students were ever arrested and everyone lived happily ever after?
Nothing to see here, just everyone move along.
Well the CCP propagandists apparently forgot to tell the families of all the students who actually died about how they planned to cover the massacre of 6/4/1989. They also forgot that those outside China have reams of documentation that directly refutes every claim you made.
Thankfully here in the US its easy to look up what actually happened. We know who the real killers are.
Nothing to see here, just everyone move along.
Well the CCP propagandists apparently forgot to tell the families of all the students who actually died about how they planned to cover the massacre of 6/4/1989. They also forgot that those outside China have reams of documentation that directly refutes every claim you made.
Thankfully here in the US its easy to look up what actually happened. We know who the real killers are.
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@PeterScriabin
Do you have any proof he is a 50¢ army or 50¢ army exists? I have been accused by people for being a 50¢ army for China, Russia, Syria, big corporations, etc. and if that's all the proof 50¢ exists: baseless, anonymous accusation, then I suppose 50¢ don't exist at all.
You didn't try to refute his claim the students attacked the police (they did) or most students left the square unharmed (they did. The crackdown was next morning after all the peaceful students left), instead, you try to discredit him by levy a baseless accusations of his motive.
Do you have any proof he is a 50¢ army or 50¢ army exists? I have been accused by people for being a 50¢ army for China, Russia, Syria, big corporations, etc. and if that's all the proof 50¢ exists: baseless, anonymous accusation, then I suppose 50¢ don't exist at all.
You didn't try to refute his claim the students attacked the police (they did) or most students left the square unharmed (they did. The crackdown was next morning after all the peaceful students left), instead, you try to discredit him by levy a baseless accusations of his motive.
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Let's salute this brave woman and her movement for those who no longer have a voice. I also salute The New York Times for reporting this story. Your persistent reporting of these June 4, 1989, Tiananmen Square massacre-related incidents has restored my respect for your newspaper as a voice for the voiceless.
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This is very upsetting to read and also that no one is writing in about this. Governments should enhance people's lives not suppress people. I like open discussions of ideas not suppression of ideas. Open debate is good for everyone and is crucial to policy making. I for one love to hear what everyone has to say. Open discussion makes the world richer and more vibrant and Ding Zilin should be allowed to be interviewed for the benefit of all of us.
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People at Ding Zilin's age do not worry about their own welfare. It is the around her that is being threatened.
It speaks volumes about a government when it considers a near-octogenarian widow a threat.
For shame, China.
For shame, China.
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@NorthernVirginia
The Public Security and Propaganda Bureaus in the People's Republic have a larger combined budget than the People's Liberation Army. Writers and researchers both Western and Chinese assert that this is evidence enough that the ruling party correctly sees -- and puts the money where it needs to be -- that the real threat to their power lies not outside the country's borders but within the population of citizens itself.
This article gives us yet another glimpse: the police (Public Security) have the phone, the internet, and the front door of Ms. Ding under tight control; the man in Chengdu was detained because his pictures got past the internet censors.
A source told me that in Shanghai alone (a city with between 22 and 32 million residents) there are over 3,000 people employed just to monitor and shut down internet traffic and social media blooms that go counter to government story lines (Propaganda Ministry).
The Public Security and Propaganda Bureaus in the People's Republic have a larger combined budget than the People's Liberation Army. Writers and researchers both Western and Chinese assert that this is evidence enough that the ruling party correctly sees -- and puts the money where it needs to be -- that the real threat to their power lies not outside the country's borders but within the population of citizens itself.
This article gives us yet another glimpse: the police (Public Security) have the phone, the internet, and the front door of Ms. Ding under tight control; the man in Chengdu was detained because his pictures got past the internet censors.
A source told me that in Shanghai alone (a city with between 22 and 32 million residents) there are over 3,000 people employed just to monitor and shut down internet traffic and social media blooms that go counter to government story lines (Propaganda Ministry).
The students were a bunch of hardline far-left radicals that don't want to see Dong's economic reform take China off the anti-capitalist platform. They were singing Mao-era red guard songs and encourages the soldiers sent to guard them to join in on the revolution. Dong was right to crush this socialist coup in view of how much China has transformed in the following 27 years.
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However you characterize them, the students who were killed by the 'People's Army" were unarmed. They were protesting corruption within the CCP and had gained a huge following not only of students but common working class people all across China.
I watched it all unfold on TV and it wouldn't be at all hard for anyone to Google "6/4/1989 Tiananmen Square" to see what really happened.
If the Chinese government was so right about what they did on 6/4/89, then why don't they open their books and reveal all the facts? Why the need to silence and harass middle aged and elderly people whose sons or daughters were killed by their own government?
I watched it all unfold on TV and it wouldn't be at all hard for anyone to Google "6/4/1989 Tiananmen Square" to see what really happened.
If the Chinese government was so right about what they did on 6/4/89, then why don't they open their books and reveal all the facts? Why the need to silence and harass middle aged and elderly people whose sons or daughters were killed by their own government?
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So that is why the army arriving in force at entrance to Tiananmen Square negotiated with Liu Xiaobo and another student leader to allow the protesters to leave the Square unharmed.
Gordon Thomas’s Chaos Under Heaven: The Shocking Story of China's Search for Democracy gives this account of student demands.”The students were calling for the separation of Party and state, the decentralization of power, the streamlining of bureaucracy, and the introduction of “full legal standards.” They wanted “a channel for their demands and the voice of the masses to constantly reach the higher levels.” A threat to the party apparatus not to Deng’s reforms as such.
Gordon Thomas’s Chaos Under Heaven: The Shocking Story of China's Search for Democracy gives this account of student demands.”The students were calling for the separation of Party and state, the decentralization of power, the streamlining of bureaucracy, and the introduction of “full legal standards.” They wanted “a channel for their demands and the voice of the masses to constantly reach the higher levels.” A threat to the party apparatus not to Deng’s reforms as such.
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It's probably not a wild assumption that someone like you would be voting for Trump. These students along with the citizens of Beijing and around China were not some far-left radicals as you describe. They were ordinary people who wanted a better China with democracy and basic human rights. China has been transformed for sure since 1989. But is it for the better? The negative impact of your so called "transformation" affects the whole world negatively and profoundly!
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