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Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

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131–140 of 198 posts

Re: Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

#131

It really bothers me how people foam at the mouth about this when there is far more direct evidence of much worse abuses in Israel/Palestine than Xinjiang, but somehow Xinjiang is the next holocaust and China is Nazi Germany. CIA and State Department propaganda at work.

Give me a break. Just because people point out that something is not good, it isn't invalid because worse things exist. Take off the conspiracy hat.

Oh but you can absolutely see hypocrisy in what people care about by what they spend most of their time discussing. There is no conspiracy hat, it's just obvious.

Re: Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

#132
post #26

It feels like the history is repeating itself. The people of Nazi Germany probably thought they were doing the "right thing". These Chinese students have been brainwashed enough to believe everything their government says. Or may be even paid well enough to act like that!

Comparing what is happening in Xinjiang to the Holocaust is Holocaust trivialization. They are not engaging in the organized murder of 11 million people. Not even close.

Wish these gross comparisons for obvious political reasons (because we feel a rivalry with China) would end.

Re: Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

#133
post #63

I know this way of thinking is horrible, but let me play devil's advocate for a while: What if the CCP puts Uyghurs into prison simply because the majority of Chinese citizens want Uyghurs in prison? 1. That would explain the behavior in the article. 2. That would explain why studies report that people in China feel like a democracy. Their government works in the way that benefits the majority of its people, so for s…

I am not sure what your point is... Your example is the same as treatment of black people in the U.S. at the time when they did not have equal rights. Your example is the same as treatment of Jews in the Nazi Germany. Things like that happened and happen. Sometimes the majority of population wants to do horrible things to a minority. That's true. Still not sure why you brought that up.

This is the ongoing treatment of black people in the US.

Re: Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

#134
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a lot simpler than that. PRC's XJ security architecture is publically about counter terrorism and deradicalization through forced reeducation (with mass interment) and poverty alleviation. While forced sterilzation for women with 3+ kids is XJ catching up to family planning policies with rest of PRC. Years of consistent Uyghur terrorist attacks stopped in exchange for repressing minority consisting 0.02% of popu…

>They don't mean for crimes they personally did not commit, but alleged "genocide" that the global political UN community majority states PRC did not commit. The "majority" of UN are poor countries on China's payroll; facts are not a matter of majority opinion. >And in fact the opposite position is true, to them PRC has found a relatively "humane" method of eliminating radical terrorism versus US bombing the shit out…

There is no annihilation of an ethnicity and Uyghur birth rates are still higher than Han.

Re: Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

#135
post #89

While I do sympathize with this student, you have to be careful when criticizing a hostile government you are a citizen of. Only in the United States do we have such protections in place to prevent the government from retaliating against the individual for voicing a critical opinion.

> Only in the United States do we have such protections in place to prevent the government from retaliating against the individual for voicing a critical opinion. I'm sorry, but were you educated in the US? That's just blatantly false, and on the level of a Russian praising their army's success in Ukraine. In the EU, Canada, Australia, UK, New Zealand and some other countries individuals are protected from retaliatio…

You can absolutely get legal action pursued for voicing an opinion (probably a bad one, but an opinion nonetheless) in most of the countries you named.

Re: Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

#136
post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Only in the United States do we have such protections in place to prevent the government from retaliating against the individual for voicing a critical opinion. I'm sorry, but were you educated in the US? That's just blatantly false, and on the level of a Russian praising their army's success in Ukraine. In the EU, Canada, Australia, UK, New Zealand and some other countries individuals are protected from retaliatio…

You can absolutely get legal action pursued for voicing an opinion (probably a bad one, but an opinion nonetheless) in most of the countries you named.

From an individual for defamation? Yes.

From the state for some very specific opinions (we should gas all the Jews)? Yes.

But that's literally the same everywhere with free speech. The specifics vary slightly, e.g. in the US being a woman and topless, or saying you want to murder the US president is a crime, in France insulting Jews is a crime. There is no place on earth with absolute free speech.

Re: Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

#137
post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can absolutely get legal action pursued for voicing an opinion (probably a bad one, but an opinion nonetheless) in most of the countries you named.

From an individual for defamation? Yes. From the state for some very specific opinions (we should gas all the Jews)? Yes. But that's literally the same everywhere with free speech. The specifics vary slightly, e.g. in the US being a woman and topless, or saying you want to murder the US president is a crime, in France insulting Jews is a crime. There is no place on earth with absolute free speech.

You are drawing a false equivalence.

1. Being topless is both legal in plenty of states and also not a matter of speech.

2. There's a difference between directly saying you are going to kill someone or incite violence and expressing support for a political ideology. For instance, in Germany, the Communist Party is illegal - it is banned. In Germany, expressing an (awful) opinion that the Holocaust did not occur is illegal and you will be charged. In Germany, video games that even included the Nazis in any way were banned.

The approaches to speech are very different, I am not sure why you are trying to draw an equivalence that does not exist.

Re: Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

#138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, but the same group also do this > Some Chinese international students at universities in the U.S. and Canada have reported anti-Beijing speech to university authorities as a form of anti-Chinese racism, or they reported Uyghurs and Chinese dissidents on campus to Chinese diplomatic officials. Can you have freedom of speach while trying to take it away from others?

This links to an article about Chinese students at GW. Do you mean to say this group of students transferred en masse from GW to Cornell or are you just saying they are the same group because they are both Chinese?

There is a connection, the article discusses it.

Please read it again :)

Re: Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

#139

It really bothers me how people foam at the mouth about this when there is far more direct evidence of much worse abuses in Israel/Palestine than Xinjiang, but somehow Xinjiang is the next holocaust and China is Nazi Germany. CIA and State Department propaganda at work.

In response to your other comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31691085 claiming that "No concrete evidence has ever been released that there is mass incarceration in Xinjiang."

https://web.archive.org/web/20180921114505/http://www.xj.jcy...

> 五年来,全区检察机关共批准逮捕各类刑事犯罪嫌疑人330918人

https://web.archive.org/web/20210811151913/https://www.spp.g...

> 2013年至2017年,全国检察机关共批捕各类刑事犯罪嫌疑人453.1万人

Of 4.5 million arrests in all of China during five years, more than 7% were in Xinjiang according to Chinese government sources, even though less than 2% of the population live there.

If you focus on 2017 alone, more than 20% of all arrests were in Xinjiang https://www.nchrd.org/2018/07/criminal-arrests-in-xinjiang-a...

Re: Chinese students at Cornell “taunt” Uyghur classmate

#140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is where I find myself as well. You are free to say things, you are not free of the consequences. I expect someone to deck me for saying certain things. Growing up in Texas we had a saying- 'Them's fightin' words.' ie if someone said something out of bounds, they were headed for a scrap, or at least that wad a very real possibility. Having said that I would still defend their right to talk shit. edit- screw canc…

> Growing up in Texas we had a saying- 'Them's fightin' words.' ie if someone said something out of bounds, they were headed for a scrap, or at least that wad a very real possibility. From a legal viewpoint, even if said speech meets the Chaplinsky definition of "fighting words", that does not exonerate or justify one man's violence against another. I have a hard time seeing that most would accept hitting a person as…

Even if someone is hurling a monstrous slew of verbal insults at you, hitting them is both morally wrong and illegal.

Today's awareness of mental trauma and triggers is a good thing, but it blurs the line a bit between physical and verbal attacks. Personally, I strongly believe that words should be treated fundamentally differently than physical violence. Sticks and stones, etc.

That said, if you're the one hurling insults, you're intentionally trying to evoke an emotional response, and you should not be surprised if the person you're insulting responds emotionally and violently.

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