In 1989, blowback was swift; alienation today is ‘systematic, progressive, long-term.’

China’s 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy activists sparked a seminal crisis in Beijing’s relationship with the West. On the massacre’s 35th anniversary, China’s leaders face familiar international blowback over their conduct.

Instead of gunfire, today’s sources of discomfort about China are a mix of its aggressive industrial policy and militarization toward neighbors, plus a national-security agenda from Chinese leader Xi Jinping that has curtailed personal freedoms at home and shaped affairs abroad.

  • Tryptaminev@lemm.eeEnglish
    737·
    5 months ago

    Obligatory reminder that the Tiananmen protests were against capitalist reforms that were crucial in shaping todays China and were very much welcomed by the Western countries.

    It is adding insult to the injury, that the western narrative keeps eluding this aspect to make it seem like the protestors died for the opposite of what they actually protested for.

    • DolphinMath@slrpnk.netOPEnglish
      393·
      5 months ago

      Why not let the students words speak for themselves? Wikipedia

      Students list seven demands of the government.

      1. Affirm Hu Yaobang’s views on democracy and freedom as correct.

      2. Admit that the campaigns against spiritual pollution and bourgeois liberalization had been wrong.

      3. Publish information on the income of state leaders and their family members.

      4. Allow privately run newspapers and stop press censorship.

      5. Increase funding for education and raise intellectuals’ pay.

      6. End restrictions on demonstrations in Beijing.

      7. Provide objective coverage of students in official media.

      • Tryptaminev@lemm.eeEnglish
        327·
        5 months ago

        You are just doing what i criticised. You are cherry-picking instead of acknowledging the protests as a whole.

        Freedom of expression was one of many goals. And the protests were caused by the capitalist reforms, which gave rise to people demanding freedom of expression to be able to express their anger over the consequences of those capitalist reforms.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests_and_massacre

        The protests were precipitated by the death of pro-reform Chinese Communist Party (CCP) general secretary Hu Yaobang in April 1989 amid the backdrop of rapid economic development and social change in post-Mao China, reflecting anxieties among the people and political elite about the country’s future. The reforms of the 1980s had led to a nascent market economy that benefited some people but seriously disadvantaged others, and the one-party political system also faced a challenge to its legitimacy. Common grievances at the time included inflation, corruption, limited preparedness of graduates for the new economy, and restrictions on political participation. Although they were highly disorganized and their goals varied, the students called for things like rollback of the removal of “iron rice bowl” jobs, greater accountability, constitutional due process, democracy, freedom of the press, and freedom of speech. Workers’ protests were generally focused on inflation and the erosion of welfare. These groups united around anti-corruption demands, adjusting economic policies, and protecting social security. At the height of the protests, about one million people assembled in the square.

        China was already state capitalist by then and people protested that.

        • KevonLooney@lemm.eeEnglish
          211·
          5 months ago

          I guess you missed the main section at the top:

          Goals

          End of corruption within the Chinese Communist Party, as well as democratic reforms, freedom of the press, freedom of speech, freedom of association, social equality, democratic input on economic reforms

    • DMBFFF@lemmy.worldEnglish
      112·
      5 months ago

      I figured they died because they protested in a Communist dictatorship.

      • Tryptaminev@lemm.eeEnglish
        418·
        5 months ago

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests_and_massacre

        The protests were precipitated by the death of pro-reform Chinese Communist Party (CCP) general secretary Hu Yaobang in April 1989 amid the backdrop of rapid economic development and social change in post-Mao China, reflecting anxieties among the people and political elite about the country’s future. The reforms of the 1980s had led to a nascent market economy that benefited some people but seriously disadvantaged others, and the one-party political system also faced a challenge to its legitimacy. Common grievances at the time included inflation, corruption, limited preparedness of graduates for the new economy, and restrictions on political participation. Although they were highly disorganized and their goals varied, the students called for things like rollback of the removal of “iron rice bowl” jobs, greater accountability, constitutional due process, democracy, freedom of the press, and freedom of speech. Workers’ protests were generally focused on inflation and the erosion of welfare. These groups united around anti-corruption demands, adjusting economic policies, and protecting social security. At the height of the protests, about one million people assembled in the square.

        China was already state capitalist by then and people protested that.

        • DMBFFF@lemmy.worldEnglish
          71·
          5 months ago

          I just pulled this out from WP:

          wp:Red August

          (my bold)

          Red August (simplified Chinese: 红八月; traditional Chinese: 紅八月; pinyin: Hóng Bāyuè) is a term used to indicate a period of political violence and massacres in Beijing beginning in August 1966, during the Cultural Revolution.[1][2][3] According to official statistics published in 1980 after the end of the Cultural Revolution, Red Guards in Beijing killed a total of 1,772 people during Red August, while 33,695 homes were ransacked and 85,196 families were forcibly displaced.[1][4][5] However, according to official statistics published in November 1985, the number of deaths in Beijing during Red August was 10,275.[5][6][7]

          This was back in Mao’s time.

          It seems that Communism killed those Chinese people.

          • Tryptaminev@lemm.eeEnglish
            313·
            5 months ago

            What kind of abstruse logic is this? Next thing you are going to say the people murdered in Gaza today are the victims of Christian crusaders.

            The victims under Mao were victims of communism. But it wasn’t Mao that committed the Tiananmen massacre. It was a state capitalist regime that was supported by the West.

            Why are you trying to spread disinformation about historical events?

            • DMBFFF@lemmy.worldEnglish
              5·
              5 months ago

              Presumably,

              Mao self-identified as a Communist (or something like it) and is today defended by such.

              Deng self-identified as a Communist (or something like it) and is today defended by such (at least by many Chinese).

              Palestinians, Gazans, and Jews were victims of the Crusaders.

              • Tryptaminev@lemm.eeEnglish
                39·
                5 months ago

                And the Nazis called themselves national socialists. Doesn’t mean their economic policies had anything to do with socialism (quite to the contrary).

                Advertisment labels are not what to judge these things on, but concrete policies. And those were state capitalist in China and the reason for the protests and massacre. And they continue to this day.

                • DMBFFF@lemmy.worldEnglish
                  31·
                  5 months ago

                  good point.

                  though I think they were a little bit more socialist in the earlier years.

                  ​

                  I don’t like any of them.

                  ​

                  might as well throw this in:

                  wp:Albanian–Chinese split

                  By the early 1970s, however, Albanian disagreements with certain aspects of Chinese policy deepened as the visit of Nixon to China along with the Chinese announcement of the “Three Worlds Theory” produced strong apprehension in Albania’s leadership under Enver Hoxha. Hoxha saw in these events an emerging Chinese alliance with American imperialism and abandonment of proletarian internationalism.

                  ​

                  The might have been the reasons, or some of the significant reasons, for the protest but I don’t think Mao would have tolerated them more than did Deng.

          • Tryptaminev@lemm.eeEnglish
            38·
            5 months ago

            Yes. But people dont want to acknowledge that because then they would need to acknowledge, that mass murder and massacres are nothing specific to any form of economy, but specific to authoritarianism and then they might have to face their own support of current authoritariansm.