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China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

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Re: China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

#161
post #34

When I was younger, maybe five years ago or so, I was living in Boston and I'd consistently see a pack of Chinese protestors outside the public library at Copley (very popular area) holding up signs, looking to gain attention for this very issue. They spoke to me as best as they could, handed me a pamphlet with hard-to-parse English but nonetheless gruesome descriptions, and asked for my signature along with any othe…

Had this experience while growing in NYC, near chinatown and the flushing area. It's not that I didn't believe them, I simply found their information to be ridiculous and theres no way the chinese government actually engages in that kind of behavior. Oh boy, was I wrong.

Re: China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

#162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Abortion is itself a breach of Universal Declaration of Human Rights, including articles 3 (right to life), 6 (recognition as a person before the law), 7 (equality before the law).

You are equating a fetus with a fully developed human being. That is not medically verifiable.

An adolescent isn't a fully developed human being, aka an adult. That's medically verifiable.

Re: China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

#163

Will this be added to Google's Project Dragonfly censorship engine?

"Like, I know harvesting organs of prisoners is bad, but can we just talk about Google products for a second"

Well, it's relevant. If Google delivers projects like Dragonfly that means it has no problems supporting practices like these.

Re: China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

#164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US talks about respecting human rights, but has no problem with 1 million dead Iraqi civilians. Individual Americans may respect human rights. Just like individual Chinese do as well. But when you challenge them as a nation, well, then the needs of the stong outweigh the needs of the weak.

>> The US talks about respecting human rights, but has no problem with 1 million dead Iraqi civilians. So you took a poll, "do you give a rats @ss that 1 Million Iraqis were killed by USA" and most people didn't care? Let's tone it down, USA did not go there to kill a million people, it happened because of the war, and Saddam might have killed 2 mil if he was alive for Arab Spring. Not saying that Iraq war was justif…

> So you took a poll, "do you give a rats @ss that 1 Million Iraqis were killed by USA" and most people didn't care?

The war had bipartisan support and the leader that started it was re-elected in the ultimate poll, so I'd say the majority are fine with it.

Re: China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

#165

So it's worth noting that allegations about organ harvesting have been circulating since at least the 2000s. There is likely (almost certainly) credibility in the claims that political prisoners (mostly Falun Gong practitioners) were harvested for organs in the early 2000s. From what I can tell, the tribunal is validating that these abuses occurred. However, there is not any hard evidence (that I know of - I'd be hap…

China agreed to stop using prisoners as forced organ donors many times before 2015. They didn't even say "we really mean it this time", so I'm not sure how much credibility you can take from their statement.

The big problem is that the provinces and local governments aren't really that great at following the central government's direction unless the latter is really serious (who can't focus their attention on some many things).

Re: China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

#166
post #27

The false dichotomy of comparing the “evils” of USA whenever horrifying news comes out of China is worrying. Stretched to the extreme it’s the equivalent of bringing up Obama droning killing innocents when comparing The Nazis and Hitler. Our minds conflate the 2 things as bad and we compartmentalize them as such together. There is a world of difference between the 2. Imagine if the world order was not created by US a…

I think you are being downvoted for being off-topic. >It seems nationalist but I agree with trump to bring our economic industries home. It's worth a try although the chance of it happening given the complexity of modern industrial good is near zero. I don't think Trump actually wants this and if he does his actions are having the opposite effect. To seriously grow an industrial base in the US would require very open…

It would require very open borders on BOTH sides, or at least on the side that the USA doesn't directly control.

With the heavy tariffs imposed by China and others on goods from the USA, manufacturing naturally moves there unless the USA retaliates.

Re: China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

#167
post #74

Why does the west continue to tolerate China as a trading partner? China is pretty obviously building their empire. They, as a government, appear to have almost no regard whatsoever for human life. They, as a government, appear to have absolutely no regard whatsoever for national sovereignty. They, as a government, appear to have absolutely no regard for the environment. It just seems completely inevitable to me that…

Unfortunately (for our cognitive load and moral comfort) the situation is much more complex:

* It's hindsight to say China' embrace of authoritarianism, nationalism, and expansionism was inevitable. Even around ten years ago it was a much different place, with much more freedom of expression (you could find fascinating discussions of democracy by leading figures on Weibo, for example) [0] and a slow process of liberalization. And if it was an error of foresight at the time to assume that the then-current trend of liberalization would continue, it's an equal error to assume the trend of today will continue. By far the best outcome for the people of China, the region, and the world is for China to liberalize; a global contest would be very damaging and expensive; a war could destroy several civilizations, including the U.S. While it would be foolish to ignore current trends, it has proven equally foolish to accept them as an inevitable future and to let the bad guys dictate your values and the future.

* The people of China are not the government of China; it's difficult to oppose the latter without hurting the former. The people deserve freedom, human rights, food, shelter, and prosperity and the things that go with it. China's economic growth arguably has lifted more people from perilous levels of poverty than any event in human history, and they still have a ways to go. If the West didn't trade with China, that never would have happened.

* Of course, the West has profited immensely from China joining the global economy.

[0] China Digital Times (CDT) used to carry many of them, possibly still available in their history/archives. https://chinadigitaltimes.net/

Re: China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

#168

So it's worth noting that allegations about organ harvesting have been circulating since at least the 2000s. There is likely (almost certainly) credibility in the claims that political prisoners (mostly Falun Gong practitioners) were harvested for organs in the early 2000s. From what I can tell, the tribunal is validating that these abuses occurred. However, there is not any hard evidence (that I know of - I'd be hap…

China agreed to stop using prisoners as forced organ donors many times before 2015. They didn't even say "we really mean it this time", so I'm not sure how much credibility you can take from their statement. The big problem is that the provinces and local governments aren't really that great at following the central government's direction unless the latter is really serious (who can't focus their attention on some ma…

China has mass surveillance. The amount of money that would change hands for organs would raise red flags, as well as the likelihood of using a known broker.

Re: China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

#169
post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Buenos Aires is packed with these protests. I had the same skepticism you had, but my main obstacle is that its such a distant reality that is hardly meaningful to act on.

That's very true, and I had the same thought. With that in mind, what do you think is their end goal? Is it just out of desperation they create petitions and such? It seems clear that China doesn't care much about the West's disapproval.

At a minimum, they want the world to know what is going on.

Re: China harvested organs from political prisoners, says tribunal

#170
post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>We (the U.S) tolerate their disrespect for human rights because we also do not respect human rights I'm sorry but this statement is just absolutely and completely ridiculous. I don't know if you've either never been to The United States, or you've never left The United States, but the difference between the respect that we have for human rights, and the respect that much of the rest of the world has, is stark.

The US talks about respecting human rights, but has no problem with 1 million dead Iraqi civilians. Individual Americans may respect human rights. Just like individual Chinese do as well. But when you challenge them as a nation, well, then the needs of the stong outweigh the needs of the weak.

> has no problem with 1 million dead Iraqi civilians

And how many Kurds were killed by Saddam Hussein? How many Shias? I think the Iraq war was a terrible mistake but that doesn't mean that supporting it means you don't care about Iraqis.

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