Drink Poison and Smile: How I Arrived at My Position of Pro-Democracy

https://improve.hk/post/drink-poison-and-smile/

by improvehk • 7 years ago

63 53 7 years ago

fouc• 7 years ago

I was super confused by the initial "A letter to our brothers and sisters just north of the border." until I figured out it was a Hong Kong writer speaking to mainland China residents.

askmike16• 7 years ago

I agree that the things described are very bad. But I do want to point that many western democratic governments do things that might be just as bad (are the Uyghur Muslims treated worse than immigrants in many western places like US / EU / AUS?).

Though I have to admit I'm not well informed on exactly what type of "democracy" they are after. If you get the majority of people to not care about what happens to a minority, it doesn't really matter how a government is structured (when it comes to democracy we see see things like "Tyranny of the masses").

EDIT: everyone disliked this comment but I think because I used the wrong examples. So I quickly want to clarify what I mean:

He wants a different political system (democratic) and his arguments are that the current one did many bad things. My point is that changing the political system doesn't change the bad things he's talking about. As we can clearly see in many democratic systems in the world.

deogeo• 7 years ago

are the Uyghur Muslims treated worse than immigrants in many western places like US / EU / AUS?

For one, the Uyghur are not immigrants. As bad as you may think immigrants are treated in US/EU/AUS, China wouldn't even let them in in the first place.

Also given that China has to actively prevent the Uyghur from leaving, while the West has to prevent immigrants from entering, should tell you who's treated worse.

askmike16• 7 years ago

See my other comments, I shouldn't have picked immigrants as an example. There are many other example minority groups.

Also given that China has to actively prevent the Uyghur from leaving, while the West has to prevent immigrants from entering, should tell you who's treated worse.

I'm no expert on the matter, but a source on the top of Google says it's just as bad in the US ( https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/immigrants-free-leave-dete... ): Immigrants in "detention camps" near the US border are not allowed to leave either.

vnorilo2• 7 years ago

Western countries may not always live up to ideals with the pressures of migration, but it is disingenous to compare immigrants to a resident minority. Please note that in EU at least, a lot of the conflict is about who counts as an asylum seeker and who must immigrate normally.

askmike16• 7 years ago

Western countries may not always live up to ideals with the pressures of migration, but it is disingenous to compare immigrants to a resident minority

That's just one example that popped into my head. I can pick another example if you don't like this one. How about how black people are treated in the US? Not all of them are in concentration camps, but many of them are in jail for non violent "crimes" (for example for doing things that have since become legal in many states). Or how muslims are treated everywhere in the west?

I'm not defending China, I'm just saying many countries do terrible things - also democratic ones (sometimes it's the goverment, sometimes it's the people).

simonh6• 7 years ago

There has been abusive treatment of some illegal immigrants into some of these countries, particularly recently, but there had also been massive outcries about it.

In almost every case the law and public opinion has stopped or prevented the worst mistreatment. The Australian detention centres are winding down, the separation of children from their families ordered by Trump was successfully challenged in court. Massive public protests and press coverage worked.

Therefore it seems perfectly reasonable to hold China to the same standards of public accountability and legal due process that other countries are held to.

chillwaves• 7 years ago

My understanding of US detention centers is that their capacity is only expanding.

askmike16• 7 years ago

In almost every case the law and public opinion has stopped or prevented the worst mistreatment. The Australian detention centres are winding down, the separation of children from their families ordered by Trump was successfully challenged in court. Massive public protests and press coverage worked.

That's just because the people care now. If people in mainland China start caring for that minority we'll see change as well. There might be outside pressure as well like sanctions (or tariffs I guess) of course.

Maybe I shouldn't have picked immigrants. As I said in another comment: How about how black people are treated in the US (many are in jail for "crimes" that are now legal), how Muslims are treated everywhere in the west? I can come up with many examples of minorities being treated terrible in western democratic countries.

jahewson• 7 years ago

This kind of empty, backwards argument is known as a “whataboutism” and is commonly seen in propaganda.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism

askmike16• 7 years ago

I don't agree, that's part of an "us vs them" debate. I am saying that I don't think China's bad things have anything to do with them not being democratic. As we can see similar things happening in democratic countries.

coldtea• 7 years ago

It's also known as "putting things in perspective" and is commonly seen in rational, non-partisan, assessment of events...

People thinking (or pretending to think) their "shit doesn't smell" criticize only (or mainly) the other side, for things their side does as well, and demonize the Other, down to supporting policy implications, sometimes down to sanctions and even war.

And when someone points to their own shit they invoke "whataboutism" to continue to have their hands in the ears -- and they'd think unfair if they had the same policies/actions against them.

_iyig3• 7 years ago

(are the Uyghur Muslims treated worse than immigrants in many western places like US / EU / AUS?)

This question would be simpler to answer if China allowed foreign reporters access to the camps, cities, and provinces where (millions of) Uyghur Muslims are held, such as Xinjiang.

Could you imagine if Chinese reporters were denied to access to, for example, the state of Texas? What if plainclothes Texas Rangers stalked tourists visiting El Paso, and aggressively detained and deported anyone caught interviewing local Hispanics? That’s the type of media blackout which I understand is currently imposed on Xinjiang.

VICE News on the ground:

https://youtu.be/v7AYyUqrMuQ

Foreign Policy editor, “All of my Uyghur sources are gone”:

https://youtu.be/yQLliXOk1cM

askmike16• 7 years ago

That’s the type of media blackout which I understand is currently imposed on Xinjiang.

I personally think the UN human rights council is at least as important, as the international media's role in fixing human rights problems is debatable. In that light:

https://www.theguardian.com/law/2019/jan/04/trump-administra...

as the article states:

“They are sending a very dangerous message to other countries: that if you don’t cooperate with UN experts they will just go away. That’s a serious setback to the system created after World War II to ensure that domestic human rights violations could no longer be seen as an internal matter,” Dakwar said.

Maybe China received this message loud and clear?

roenxi• 7 years ago

are the Uyghur Muslims treated worse than immigrants in many western places like US / EU / AUS?

Yes, obviously. The immigrants are choosing to travel to the US / EU / AUS. Indeed, the west has a proud history of skimming the best and brightest from China because they'd rather live somewhere else. I'll stand to be corrected but I don't think the West has anything comparable to the exodus of Hong Kongers basically fleeing for political reasons, we in Australia have acquired a lot of good people from that. Nobody sane is choosing to go to Xianjing and be treated as the Uyghurs.

The west can always be more welcoming and there are ugly moments; but there is a vast reserve of people who look at western countries, think 'I want to migrate there, it is better than where I am' and act upon their thoughts.

The premise here is just a bit weird. Nobody would migrate if they expected to be treated worse afterwards than if they'd just stayed home. If they really didn't like it they'd probably even turn around and return. On an absolute scale, we'd expect migrants to be very satisfied with their migration.

askmike16• 7 years ago

How did the 6 year old migrant kids choose to go to the US, to be separated from their parents and put into solitary confinement?

The west can always be more welcoming and there are ugly moments; but there is a vast reserve of people who look at western countries, think 'I want to migrate there, it is better than where I am' and act upon their thoughts.

This has little to do with human rights violations and how to stop them.

MarkSweep• 7 years ago

Even if a liberal democracy was guilty of the same atrocities as totalitarian, the liberal democracy is still the superior system because. Freedom of press means people can learn about the problems. Democracy means there is some hope of fixing the problem.

Next time you see a post about some terrible thing in a liberal democracy on Weibo, try posting “Well that’s bad, but China has concentration camps for Muslims so therefore the Communist Party’s slogan ‘Serve the People’ is a farce.” I think your post turning grey will be the least of your worries.

Leary• 7 years ago

You should write this in Chinese so the Mainlanders could actually read it.

chrischen• 7 years ago

If he writes this in Chinese the mainlanders will not be able to read it anymore (it would get blocked).

hos234• 7 years ago

Good luck to protestors. Hard to see the reasons for China to compromise though.

nudpiedo• 7 years ago

Fine you say, you may not care for some religious leaders, as they are such a tiny percentage of the population.

This is a huge difference between western and eastern thinking. Group rights vs individual rights. Here in western culture we typically tried to develop a culture on which each single individual rights should be respected above the group if the case was necessary whereas Asian societies traditionally have put groups (or families) above individual rights and wishes.

And for those reasons we had several wars against fascism, communism and other totalitarian ideologies. Currently in the west we also have lobbies which try to segregate population in smaller groups and lobby against others, or communities as they say in the USA. I guess this herd behaviour is just part of human being's nature and this sort of events will be repeated forever.

koonsolo2• 7 years ago

Then it's ironic that everyone wants to join the individualistic countries/unions, and the group countries/unions have to force keeping things together because parts want to leave.

Mathnerd314• 7 years ago

The author seems to have left off his name, but I assume the Chinese or HK government could easily obtain his name/address from the domain registrar. So if the extradition bill was passed he might join the many people he lists in prison.

But the bill was declared "dead", so I guess he's probably OK besides the possibility of masked thugs.

Animats• 7 years ago

Legislative bodies is in trouble. Britain seems to have just had a coup. Look at how Boris Johnson became Prime Minister, not by popular election but by vote of Conservative Party members only. And now he's suspending Parliament.

The problems of the US Congress are well known. It used to run the country. Now it barely does anything.

avocado4• 7 years ago

It's intellectually dishonest to say that Congress barely does anything.

simonh6• 7 years ago

I think the argument is clear. A few people in the West have found ways to abuse the political system in a few marginal ways and get away with it for limited periods until independent journalism, public opinion and the courts stop them.

However they get away with it for a while. Therefore it's ok to have an entire political system in China, constructed entirely out of the abuse or elimination of the rights of it's people, with no way to challenge their leaders or hold them accountable.

I make no claims for the validity of the argument.

flukus• 7 years ago

The Britain situation is absolutely nothing like a coup, it's contentious but what's happened is nothing out of the ordinary in Westminster democracies that don't elect leaders directly (thank god).

Also, rightly or wrongly Johnson has suspended parliament to push through a democratic decision.

pimmen• 7 years ago

I don't really understand what point you're making here. These legislative bodies still are not even as remotely bad as the CCP at respecting human rights.

You don't need to have a perfect government to be better than the CCP, you just need to have check and balances not to commit the atrocities the CCP is committing.

And by the way, we Swedes are still waiting for Gui Minhai to either be released or get a real trial, and the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs would love to meet with him before such a trial in that case (I mean, this is a hit-and-run charge, not terrorism). To the UK and the US, this request would not be out of the ordinary and would've been handled years ago.

Drink Poison and Smile: How I Arrived at My Position of Pro-Democracy

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