Comments

2
Thanks for bringing this up Jonathon. I remember being in University in the midwest when this happened, and CNN pretty much being the only video news outlet in town who was able to transmit and watching this all in the student union with many other Chinese students who were desp trying to get through on the phones to their relatives...the young Chinese here now seem to have little knowledge on the event and care mostly not of it--I often think I care more than they do--my folks said it reminded them of the violent and murderous crackdown in Mexico city in the late 60s.

I often think that if a large multi-day peaceful demonstration like this happening in multiple places across the country (as it was then) at the same time when a foreign dignitary (in this case Gorbachev) visited our own government would not hesitate to use similar tactics against us. We got snippets of the whole story in FRONTLINE's "Tank Man" story a few years ago but there is still much we do not know about...but it did reveal US companies such as Boeing and GE selling more hi-tech surv gear to China than anywhere else in the world.
3
Horrendous, it seems so distant though. Thankfully the things that those people were fighting, for have been achieved now that the Chinese society is a relatively wealthy one and that's why the new generation of Chinese feel almost apathetic to what happened so many years ago.
4
Don't kid yourself Loveschild. They got a taste and that made em even more blind than a lot of the people here are. They wanted Democractic rule and they did not get it--they got death and destruction and a mostly intensified police state. They cannot go out on the street, say what they want, go where/when they want, do what they want. The Chinese Communist Party is one of the most corrupt, scary, and rough operations in the far East. I lived there for 1 year in the middle 90s on exchange and I never want to go back, never buy products made there and feel pity for the generation who has had historical amnesia imposed on it. And anger at those of us who should know better than to belittle the aftermath as you just did.
5
"Now been achived"???!!! @3, are you out of your fucking mind? There is no democracy in China! They're not apathetic - they're prevented from learning about what's really going on! China has blocked Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, lots of other sites, on this anniversary.

Who the hell are you, really? The depth of your ignorance about so many issues is just astounding.
6
# Loveschild would you please wake up and smell the fucking coffee you retard? They weren't fighting for material wealth they were fighting for freedom and basic fucking human dignity. The right to speak their mind without their head getting bashed in.

Way to miss the point entirely, Mrs. Potatohead.

I'm telling you, Loveschild has to be a stranger staffer fucking with us. A person this stupid couldn't possibly be real.
7
Thanks for the post and pics... I was 10 when this happened, and remember very clearly seeing the famous picture on the cover of Time (and reading the article). It was probably the first time I was really faced with comprehending why a government would kill it's own people, and why someone would sacrifice their life for a principle.
8
#3 Maybe there's some hidden sarcasm in your comment? I just can't imagine that any rational human could believe that wealth = freedom. Or that this wealth is some how magically shared amongst all of the people. Or that the perceived apathy is born out of contentment and not misinformation.
9
6 I'm not saying that all is rosy now but to deny that there has been progress and that one of the undermining causes that brought about the The Tienanmen Massacre (discontent with the anti-capitalist atmosphere) has now not been achieved is false. The Chinese society is now one that engages heavily on the market and is has become more affluent because of it, regardless of some human rights abuses that still go on, people in China today (specially the youth) enjoy now greater freedoms than those in 1989.
10
#3, ha ha ha, hilarious troll once again, "Loveschild"
11
@9 Man, I just can't figure if your are just tragically misinformed or one of the greatest trolls to ever haunt the Internets.

12
#9 Ah! I get it..you are a Chinese "historian".
13
At the risk of feeding a troll... @ Loveschild:

You're missing one the key points of the Tiananmen protests. The protesters weren't seeking democracy as an ends or a goal. The protesters were seeking democracy as a means--as a way of ferreting out corruption and nepotism, of ensuring that the fruits of the imminent economic boom of China were going to be fairly shared.

It was, at the core, an anti-corruption movement. Democracy was just a way of getting there. The protesters lost. The same corrupt party officials, who ordered the assault in 1989, became the business tycoons of today, the monsters swimming upon the frothing pile of ill-gotten wealth.

The last twenty years of economic growth in China is one of the more remarkable accomplishments in human history. It's also a social, environmental and economic disaster unraveling before out eyes. It didn't have to play out this way. Without the cleansing mechanisms of democracy, it did.
14
China has not "blocked Twitter, Facebook, etc" - a friend of mine in China just posted opinions about Tiananmen on all these sites in exasperation at (what he alleges is) misinformation about the state of play out there.

Honestly, I'm not pro-Chinese-government, but it'd be nice to weigh up the pros and cons of the actual facts rather than just getting constant hysterical, anti-Commie hype. Tiananmen was a pretty black stain on China's copybook. On the other hand, I think as Americans we'd have a right to be pissed off if a foreigner refused to listen to anything we had to say, merely shouting "MY LAI! MY LAI!" in our faces by way of justification.
15
I'm just going to say one thing - Who Cares.

Because the reality is the Chinese people don't appear to, and if they want to destroy their country with pollution that impacts even Seattle, then ain't nothing gonna change over there.
16
the student protesters didn't even understand the concept of democracy which they were asking for. i agree with Golob that it was more of a response as an anti-corruption movement.
17
Loveschild, you stupid piece of shit, China is a one-party state where all political discourse is brutally controlled. They have prisons full of dissenters. They routinely block access to web sites around the world, including respected news sites, when bad news about China is being broadcast.

You think this was about economics? China's boom was already well underway in 1989. People don't revolt over economics when times are IMPROVING.

You obviously know nothing about China except what they showed during the Olympics. You have read no books, no articles, seen no documentaries about it. Christ on a bike! You have NOTHING to inform your opinion.

Jesus fucking christ...
18
@9, that is it. Is it not possible you are real. NOT POSSIBLE. If someone was as actually as stupid and misinformed as you pretend to be, they would not have the mental capacity to learn how to use a computer.
19
@18 I'm telling you, Loveschild is a Stranger staffer. I'm leaning towards David Schmader.
20
those olympic opening ceremonies last summer were SWEET, huh?

Please wait...

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