https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests_and_massacre
The protests lasted over a month; the massacre ended them in a flood of state-sponsored murder.
Dear Tankies, Wumaos, and assorted apologists:
If you want to be banned that badly, you can just ask instead of writing several paragraphs denying easily verified atrocities of historical note.
Not trying to be banned or anything, just genuinely confused about the topic. We are reading online articles about something that happened ‘long’ ago, far away, that can be pointing to one way or the opposite. For me is very difficult to trust one article more than other… It looks like people that want to believe one side will find something to back their opinion and vicecersa. I don’t agree when you say this is ‘easily’ verifiable. At least I don’t find it easily to verify. Happy to be pointed to some source/direction to investigate more.
I think you are correct that there are parts of the protests that are difficult to verify.
Some parts are easy to verify. There are videos and photos. People were killed brutally in the crackdown.
But the reporting and sources from that time (and now) can be a bit lacking. Information was spotty, and of course anything official can’t be taken at face value.
We went through some of this in a Chinese Government class I took. This about 10-15 years ago at a U.S. university. We were looking specifically at how many people died. The Chinese government said a couple hundred. Some western media said over 10,000. Hospital records were like 500. The true answer is difficult to know. We sort of have to interpret the claims based on other information that we can verify (photos, different accounts of the events) and make a best guess to what the true range might have been.
Like anything that’s been turned into online propaganda these days, a lot of extreme claims are thrown around to support an unrealistic interpretation of facts. For example, western media claiming over 10,000 deaths turns into “western media was lying to make China look bad” turns into “it didn’t happen”.
If I have time later I’ll try to revisit this thread and point you to some of the better sources I found.
TL;DR: good faith skepticism of specifics can help us learn. However, tankie/wumao skepticism is not really grounded in fact
My friend, you should breathe a bit deeper and self reflect on what’s bothering you. I doubt a person asking an honest question is it.
Funny, just yesterday I had an .ml insisting to me that the protests ended peacefully and that any hint of violence is western propaganda.
Edit: just had another one saying the same crap but the mods nuked it.
These are disproved very fast by the fact that the chinese government doesnt want you to talk about it. Governments dont usually create whole censor campaigns around things that never happened. And before you say us this and us that, the us is also trying to cober things up and we also know a lot of those things because they get leaked. Talking about the us is a classic tankie move because it diverts your attention from the actual thing you were talking about, china. Just move to europe if you can and help in making a place that isnt an absolute shithole because sadly, currently europe is getting really close to that status.
There was a reddit post of pictures of the massacre that were very detailed and graphic. Came out a few years ago. These were never before seen pictures that the redditor had kept for years and decided to release them. I wish I had had the for thought to save them cause I can’t find that post again at all. Only things there now are the same pics you see everywhere else.
I have to say though, it is amazingly annoying that nearly any search for Tiananmen Square usually just returns the “tank man” pictures, as if that’s all there was to it.
It’s very likely that I saw a repost, but I also remember that imagery on Reddit too, so you aren’t alone (on Lemmy at least) in coming across that post. Wish I had a link or something to help you find it.
I’ve never really given any credibility to the Tiananmen Square denials but that post cemented any possible doubt I could have had.
I hate putting this tin hat on but I think that reddit admin obliterated it. They went public and deleted a lot of content that would not make certain governments happy.
In the 90s, I found a second-hand book published in English by the PRC (can’t remember which ministry) giving the then-official line: that the brave soldiers of the PLA resolutely faced down the forces of a foolhardy counter-revolution and saved Socialism.
Only later came the complete memory-holing.
I don’t know if you know this but there’s a link in the post to a Wikipedia article about it, with sources at the bottom
Have always been curious what happened to those two dancing.
Post about China.
4 comments about China.
6 comments about the US.
TIN SOLDIERS AND NIXON’S COMING
WE’RE FINALLY ON OUR OWN
THIS SUMMER I HEAR THE DRUMMING
FOUR DEAD IN OHIO 🎵
…I wonder if there’s a Chinese equivalent of CSNY who wrote a song about Tiananmen Square…?
Never paid much mind to the second line, seeing it in writing is somehow so much more chilling.
Gotta get down to it, soldiers are cutting us down
Shoulda been done long ago
The sense of resignation, the combination of slaughter and starting a long-overdue chore.
What if you knew her and found her dead on the ground?
How can you run when you know?
How indeed? Beyond chilling.
I mean, given the climate, feels a little prophetic about where the US is heading.
Just make a new post then. It wasn’t even an equivalent comparison. They could have used an image of the Bonus Army or an artist’s impression of the Whiskey Rebellion.
What protest? There was no protest. That was clearly a popular demonstration of support for glorious leader. You lose 85,000 social credit!!
