Xinjiang
 

'Foreign plot'. http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...s/rolleyes.gif

That's always the first claim repressive governments make no matter what the truth is. Iran: "Our people aren't pissed off that we rigged elections and instead it is all a foreign plot!" China: "The Uighers aren't upset at our repressive policies towards them and that we promote han colonization of their lands so this must all be a foreign plot!"

What a load of horse ****.

Free Tibet

Seems they have already begun cooking up excuses for invading Bavaria:

http://germany.usembassy.gov/acs/wardenmessages/070209/

It's about time China takes its shares in fighting Muslims.

You forgot to mention "Saddam and bin Laden as allies" and "Iraq's WMDs justify a war". If tremulous political excuses are a hallmark of modern government, then those two nations are just studying from the American example.

Back on topic: The Chinese gov't is rapidly running out of options here. The true equitable solution would be to institute longterm policies that would ensure better economic treatment of Uighurs. But the fact that they've been shipping large numbers of Han Chinese to the area suggests a strong element of bad faith and an intent to rule by majority demographics-packing.

Now the fat's in the fire and Uighur patience for a peaceful solution seems exhausted. Much will depend on whether it's a vocal minority of Uighurs who led the violence, or the majority sentiment. If it's just a minority, Beijing may be able to reassert some modicum of peaceful coexistence through an immediate review of the controversial socioeconomic policies. If it's a majority of the Uighur who are intractably opposed, then diplomacy's time has passed.

Nothing the American government hasn't done, of course. The only problem here is that the Chinese are two centuries too late, when partitioning ethnic minorities and sticking them in reservations has gone out of vogue. Maybe they can give them some blankets infected with SARS, like in that South Park episode.

I was wondering when someone would mention the US in an attempt to mitigate China's behavior here. Gratz on being the first, AC. Double gratz on coming up with a way to apply it where it doesn't make sense.

No, it's closer to "the Americans did it 150 years ago and everyone appears to have forgotten because EVERYBODY WHO WAS ALIVE THEN IS DEAD." i.e. for the same reason nobody remembers that Nebuchadnezzar did it.

My take is they fully intended to count ethnic minorities as Chinese citizens, but screwed up along the way. In some provinces, it's worked. (Yunnan province has several ethnic minority groups that have continued in their cultural traditions without friction with the Han - including the Naxi matriarchy, where the women live in such privilege that the men have formed a liberation front demanding equal rights. Far out.)

In Tibet and Xinjiang, resources have been scarce and development has been uneven. From what BBC and western news services suggest, religion is also a major stumbling block in China's governance over Tibet. Specific to Xinjiang, the cause of the friction has been the influx of Han Chinese and the sentiment that the majority of the economic development in the region has favored them disproportionately.

I consider it unlikely that the Chinese government has intentionally targeted Uighurs for negative treatment. I'm not familiar with the statutes on the books, but most of their de jure treatment of minority groups is intended to be favorable to them. The problem appears to be that the Chinese government's policies end up favoring Han Chinese moreso.

One situation that happened in Tibet (which may well apply here in Xinjiang) is that citizens get a stipend allowance for relocating to Tibet, and also get some medical benefits, to deal with the altitude adjustment. Tibetans already live there, and they're already adjusted to the altitude, so if you get a Han Chinese and a Tibetan Chinese in the same post, the Han Chinese will end up with a fistful more money than the Tibetan. It doesn't take a genius to see that these laws can easily lead to resentment.

The more I study American jurisprudence, the more I come to respect it. In U.S. constitutional law, for example, the courts are skeptical of any affirmative action laws to positive-discriminate in favor of a minority. The reason being that many a well-intentioned law can backfire and actually end up disadvantaging an already minority group.

China's constitution facially ensures that minorities will receive equal (or possibly even slightly favorable) treatment. But you look at a) how the law has been interpreted by the local governments, and b) how the law is applied by the executive branches, and you can see clearly the Chinese have a lot of catching up to do - and they don't have much time to do it in. This isn't like the 1700s, where you can paper over interracial violence with theories of Manifest Destiny or spreading the light of civilization. People will find out very quickly if your laws or police forces screw up.

If you want to criticize 1870s USA for ethnic cleansing you're welcome to, but most responses will be something like "yes, we knew that already, there's nothing we can do about it, so what?"

So we'll wait a few years when all the Uighurs are dead and by your theory the Chinese won't have anything to regret.

Are you being deliberately obtuse?

Much like I wouldn't protest Greece's unfair trial of Socrates.

"it won't work because our precursors tried the same thing and it has created serious lasting problems"

We only have problems because they were incompetent and didn't finish the job. http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...milies/mad.gif

At the time genocide was a perfectly reasonable way to solve what they viewed as a problem.

(By the way, I'm still trying to parse out your statement about having "forgotten" the genocidal policies against Native Americans. I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt - maybe you meant it as an idiomatic flourish or maybe you meant it as a cynical explanation rather than an excuse - but as it stands, I'm trying very hard to see it in a way that isn't just a huge racial dismissal. Many Native Americans are living today in extremely limited socioeconomic situations brought about by precisely those policies, and I'm quite serious when I'm asking you whether it would be okay to blow off slavery merely because there are no survivors left. I don't mean to hold your feet to the fire publicly here, and if you like, I'm happy to delete this post and continue in private by PMs - but damn, if that post of yours was in earnest, I really have no common ground with you on this topic Kuci.)

Jesus. It was an obvious rhetorical device - I was paralleling your usage! Could you actually miss that?

The relevant point wasn't that there are no persisting consequences of the action, but that by now there's no meaningful remedy that can be applied, nor can any consequences be visited on the perpetrators.

Therefore the topic is irrelevant, because RIGHT NOW something bad is happening and RIGHT NOW we can, in some small measure, attempt to stop it. Even if the bad thing somehow is wholly completed, our actions RIGHT NOW to punish the perpetrators could serve as a deterrent to future bad things. But we cannot punish the perpetrators of American slavery [rather, a group of people that vaguely overlaps with their descendants] RIGHT NOW because no one will be deterred by a punishment that's 150 years late.

It's impossible not to anger him. Like most youths, he relies on imitation to develop his personality. Thus, he picks people like Krazyhorse, who are very smart but also very impatient, so get a bit snarky. So in an attempt to imitate (and completely screw it up), he gets angry at the slightest provocation and, as you've seen, won't even consider the otherside's argument or perspective. To him, this is what smart people do. And who doesn't want to be smart?

I agree with DD. While similar, the situation is not EXACTLY like anything that has occurred in American so they can't be compared. Oh wait, I don't agree, because I'm not retarded.

No, you are. http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...s/rolleyes.gif Like I'd expect anymore from you. You achieved the level of Sloww and Docwhateverhisnameis. Congratulations on the step up. Now, since I won't be able to read your inane insults anymore, there's no reason to reply. Ah, this will spare me your embarrassingly unfunny pictures as well. Thanks. :cheer:

Sorry but I cannot agree with the score.
Both American and Chinese authorities are right
Their words are backed by Atomic Weapons.

Insofar as it matters, my original statement (about how American foreign policy has also depended on concocted foreign plots) did not come straight out of the blue. It was posted in response to Oerdin's post which read, in relevant part:

'Foreign plot'. http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...s/rolleyes.gif

That's always the first claim repressive governments make no matter what the truth is. Iran: "Our people aren't pissed off that we rigged elections and instead it is all a foreign plot!" China: "The Uighers aren't upset at our repressive policies towards them and that we promote han colonization of their lands so this must all be a foreign plot!"
My point was that yes, Oerdin is correct - insofar as China and Iran are making rather spurious cases for their actions based on some abstract foreign justification. My post about America's own examples was meant to show that most nations do this too, including my own nation - not just "repressive" nations (and no, I do not consider America to be a repressive nation). I've stated this point more than once in this thread, but it doesn't appear to be doing much good. Not that that surprises me anymore.

Everything from there on has been a rather predictable snowball of increasingly shrill accusations aimed at posters rather than the substantive meat of the topic. Volume and vitriol does not equal merit, people. Let's keep our eyes on the ball here.

Back on topic, here are the points I've made, abbreviated down to their substance.

The Chinese gov't is rapidly running out of options here. The true equitable solution would be to institute longterm policies that would ensure better economic treatment of Uighurs. But the fact that they've been shipping large numbers of Han Chinese to the area suggests a strong element of bad faith and an intent to rule by majority demographics-packing.

Now the fat's in the fire and Uighur patience for a peaceful solution seems exhausted. Much will depend on whether it's a vocal minority of Uighurs who led the violence, or the majority sentiment. If it's just a minority, Beijing may be able to reassert some modicum of peaceful coexistence through an immediate review of the controversial socioeconomic policies. If it's a majority of the Uighur who are intractably opposed, then diplomacy's time has passed. And

My take is they fully intended to count ethnic minorities as Chinese citizens, but screwed up along the way. In some provinces, it's worked. (Yunnan province has several ethnic minority groups that have continued in their cultural traditions without friction with the Han - including the Naxi matriarchy, where the women live in such privilege that the men have formed a liberation front demanding equal rights. Far out.)

In Tibet and Xinjiang, resources have been scarce and development has been uneven. From what BBC and western news services suggest, religion is also a major stumbling block in China's governance over Tibet. Specific to Xinjiang, the cause of the friction has been the influx of Han Chinese and the sentiment that the majority of the economic development in the region has favored them disproportionately.

I consider it unlikely that the Chinese government has intentionally targeted Uighurs for negative treatment. I'm not familiar with the statutes on the books, but most of their de jure treatment of minority groups is intended to be favorable to them. The problem appears to be that the Chinese government's policies end up favoring Han Chinese moreso.

One situation that happened in Tibet (which may well apply here in Xinjiang) is that citizens get a stipend allowance for relocating to Tibet, and also get some medical benefits, to deal with the altitude adjustment. Tibetans already live there, and they're already adjusted to the altitude, so if you get a Han Chinese and a Tibetan Chinese in the same post, the Han Chinese will end up with a fistful more money than the Tibetan. It doesn't take a genius to see that these laws can easily lead to resentment.

The more I study American jurisprudence, the more I come to respect it. In U.S. constitutional law, for example, the courts are skeptical of any affirmative action laws to positive-discriminate in favor of a minority. The reason being that many a well-intentioned law can backfire and actually end up disadvantaging an already minority group.

China's constitution facially ensures that minorities will receive equal (or possibly even slightly favorable) treatment. But you look at a) how the law has been interpreted by the local governments, and b) how the law is applied by the executive branches, and you can see clearly the Chinese have a lot of catching up to do - and they don't have much time to do it in. This isn't like the 1700s, where you can paper over interracial violence with theories of Manifest Destiny or spreading the light of civilization. People will find out very quickly if your laws or police forces screw up.
So, there you go. Have at it!

Yes but the native peoples of Yunnan have been living with the Chinese for more or less several thousand years and should be used to it by now. It is incomparable to Turkestan.

I consider it unlikely that the Chinese government has intentionally targeted Uighurs for negative treatment. I'm not familiar with the statutes on the books, but most of their de jure treatment of minority groups is intended to be favorable to them. The problem appears to be that the Chinese government's policies end up favoring Han Chinese moreso. Well perhaps, but as you acknowledge "jure" is one thing and "facto" another. I'm not very familiar with the everyday living situation for the Uyghurs (and the other minorities), but I hardly think it unlikely that for instance the government, police and courts be disproportionately staffed by Han Chinese. Add language proficiency and familiarity with the system, wealth disparities (whatever the reason for them) and corruption to the mix and the deck appears stacked whatever's on the books.

And let's consider historical reality here. The presently incorrigible root of the conflict is that China has about as much claim to rule Turkestan/Uyghuristan as they have to Vietnam, or which Russia has to Kazakhstan, etc. "Xinjiang" is a foreign country that was invaded by China in 1949. Yes, it had been intermittently subject to imperial Chinese (actually Manchu) rule since the 18th century, but never the level of integration with China as was seen after the communist invasion.

Even if the "minority" occupied population was treated in an exemplary fashion fact remains the Chinese are occupiers and don't belong in the country. Making the natives learn Chinese language, go to Chinese schools and be ruled by Chinese laws (including China's stupid one time zone for the whole country) is oppression by itself quite separate from the matter of China being a brutal dictatorship. The settling of ethnic Han Chinese parallels Stalin's policies of settling ethnic Russians in the Baltic states.

It is striking how comparatively "considerate" (I only use that word rhetorically) the (justly) vilified government of Iran was in facing much more massive and destabilizing anti-regime protests than these. Hundreds of thousands, millions on some days, of people shouted "death to the dictator" on the streets of Tehran daily for two weeks before the regime's incremental response finally smothered them. In Xinjiang 140+ people were killed after just a few(?) days of riots/protests by much smaller crowds.

I wonder if the difference in brutality may well not be because the Iranian police and paramilitaries thugs as they are still recognized the people protesting as their own people, perhaps sometimes their friends and family, and empathized with them whether agreeing or not, while in Urumqi and Kashgar, etc. where the personal bonds between the government apparatus and the people seem much looser or non-existent the repression becomes lethal much sooner. It definitely points to the completely different nature of the protests.