• China lawyer recounts torture under Xi's 'war on law'
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[QUOTE]For Xie Yanyi it was not the physical abuse that was the hardest to endure - although his list of the deliberate cruelties inflicted upon him is long. He was kept in a stress position, crouched on a low stool, from 06:00 in the morning until 22:00 at night. After 15 days like this, he tells me, his legs went numb and he had difficulty urinating. At times he was denied food and was subjected to gruelling interrogations for "dozens of hours" on end. He was beaten. And he was watched while he slept, with his guards insisting that he kept the same sleeping position all night. But harder to bear than all of this, Mr Xie insists, was the time spent in solitary confinement. "I was kept alone in a small room and saw no daylight for half a year. I had nothing to read, nothing to do but to sit on that low stool." "People could go mad in that situation. I was isolated from the world. This is torture - the isolation is more painful than being beaten." Although impossible to verify, his account tallies with other reports of the suffering endured under the so-called "war on law", launched during the Chinese Leader Xi Jinping's first five years in office. Only in Mr Xie's case it is a rare, first-hand account. Like the [URL="http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-china-blog-39893359"]other lawyers[/URL] involved, Mr Xie was, upon his release, warned not to speak to the foreign media but it is a prohibition he has chosen to ignore. "It might be risky to do this interview," he tells me. "But I feel it's my responsibility to speak out. I have no choice. I can't accept a society that arrests people for what they think and what they say." [/QUOTE] [QUOTE]The crackdown on China's already beleaguered human rights field began in mid 2015, halfway through Xi Jinping's first term. Now, anointed in office for a second term by the Communist Party Congress that ended this week, it stands as one of his most gloomy legacies. In total, more than 300 lawyers, legal assistants and activists have been brought in for questioning, with more than two dozen pursued as formal investigations. Two years on, some have been given [URL="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-36972206"]long jail terms[/URL], others still [URL="http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-china-blog-40920495"]await sentence[/URL] and at least one appears to have [URL="http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-china-blog-39974953"]disappeared completely[/URL]. [/QUOTE] [QUOTE]Xie Yanyi, like the others targeted by the campaign, has spent much of his legal career representing clients involved in sensitive cases - victims of official corruption, police violence or religious persecution - and harassment and [URL="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/03/world/asia/03china.html"]abuse[/URL] have always been part of the job. He was also a bold advocate for peaceful democratic reform, once having filed a lawsuit against the former Chinese Leader Jiang Zemin for refusing to step down from the Central Military Commission at the end of his presidency. But it is under China's current president that things have taken a dramatic turn for the worse. Shortly after Xi Jinping came to power, at the last Communist Party Congress in 2012, a [URL="http://www.chinafile.com/document-9-chinafile-translation"]leaked document[/URL] began circulating online that outlined seven key ideological concepts that posed a threat to Communist Party rule and forbade the promotion of them in China's universities or in the media. Issued by an office close to the senior Communist Party leadership, the list of forbidden ideologies included "Western constitutional democracy", "universal values" and "civil society". In hindsight, the document now appears to have set the tone for much of what has followed. Mr Xi has presided over a [URL="http://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/sentencing-04122017111054.html"]narrowing of the room for public discussion[/URL], tighter [URL="http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-china-blog-35638005"]control over the media[/URL], new [URL="https://www.ft.com/content/fab2de32-ce53-11e6-864f-20dcb35cede2"]restrictions on foreign organisations and charities[/URL], a [URL="http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-china-blog-40872486"]clampdown on the internet[/URL], and of course, the campaign against the human rights lawyers. [/QUOTE] [url]http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-china-blog-41661862[/url]
The Chinese Government is a fucking authoritarian bag of shit. It's sad to see this going on in one of the largest nations on Earth.
On the surface it may look like China has changed drastically since the Mao days but in reality it is the same turd with several layers of coats of turd paint. And with the newest coat of paint they're bringing back aspects of the cult of personality too.
At least China is trying to fix pollution and climate change more than the US is doing. But I wonder if China is doing it for the good of the world, or if they're doing it for some sort of personal gain? Like national security.
[QUOTE=matt000024;52822510]The Chinese Government is a fucking authoritarian bag of shit. It's sad to see this going on in one of the largest nations on Earth.[/QUOTE] We apparently cheer on torturing here too since Gitmo has become synonymous with patriotism and defending the nation thanks to the GOP. We can't credibly attack china for human rights violations when we do it ourselves and are proud of it ya Xi and the chinese government are authoritarians and I wish that would change to, its sad that the majority of the world still lives under essentially fiefdoms [editline]26th October 2017[/editline] [QUOTE=Stolons;52823110]At least China is trying to fix pollution and climate change more than the US is doing. But I wonder if China is doing it for the good of the world, or if they're doing it for some sort of personal gain? Like national security.[/QUOTE] its always national security. political dissidence is the enemy of nationalist governments
[QUOTE=UnknownDude;52822519]On the surface it may look like China has changed drastically since the Mao days but in reality it is the same turd with several layers of coats of turd paint.[/QUOTE] No, it really is not. China may be a highly authoritarian hellhole at worst, but Mao's power was far more centralized and despotic than anything in modern China. There have been no modern Chinese equivalents of the Cultural Revolution or struggle sessions and cultlike adherence to violent 'self criticism', nor the extreme personality cult, which was so pervasive in society that a dentist was supposedly executed for disgracing Mao's name by comparing a mango to a sweet potato.
[QUOTE=SuperPlamz;52823437]No, it really is not. China may be a highly authoritarian hellhole at worst, but Mao's power was far more centralized and despotic than anything in modern China. There have been no modern Chinese equivalents of the Cultural Revolution or struggle sessions and cultlike adherence to violent 'self criticism', nor the extreme personality cult, which was so pervasive in society that a dentist was supposedly executed for disgracing Mao's name by comparing a mango to a sweet potato.[/QUOTE] Can confirm having experienced China myself it's not at all as bad as people think it is. No country is perfect, but China is not that bad.
[QUOTE=Stolons;52823110]At least China is trying to fix pollution and climate change more than the US is doing. But I wonder if China is doing it for the good of the world, or if they're doing it for some sort of personal gain? Like national security.[/QUOTE] [t]https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/660/media/images/58016000/jpg/_58016604_013739691-1.jpg[/t] They're doing it for the good of themselves because the air quality in the cities are so atrociously bad and they've realized that it will actually kill them at its current rate of growth. 31% of it comes from car emissions alone. This move also makes them look better than the US in the world's eye so there's plenty of incentive to do it.
Air qualities around the world in major cities can be exceptionally disgusting [t]http://rouencitejeunes.free.fr/IMG/jpg/pollution09-capitales.jpg[/t] this is a before/after from Beijing [t]http://i.imgur.com/Qvm1z.jpg[/t]
Quite strange to see "civil society" listed as an evil in China, home to arguably the oldest tradition of civil society in the world. Just look at Confucianism's focus on a bureaucratic state, or the whole philosophy of Legalism. I suspect there's some translation weirdness. An adversarial justice system isn't (to my limited knowledge) part of traditional Chinese legal philosophy - maybe that's what's being referred to by "civil society"?
[QUOTE=matt000024;52822510]The Chinese Government is a fucking authoritarian bag of shit. It's sad to see this going on in one of the largest nations on Earth.[/QUOTE] [I]THE[/I] Largest Nation on Earth.
[QUOTE=Quark:;52824546]Air qualities around the world in major cities can be exceptionally disgusting [t]http://rouencitejeunes.free.fr/IMG/jpg/pollution09-capitales.jpg[/t] this is a before/after from Beijing [t]http://i.imgur.com/Qvm1z.jpg[/t][/QUOTE] I wonder how it is in Seoul. I spent six months in Korea and the air quality got so bad at times that when I went out for fifteen minutes without a mask one day, I ended up getting sick for a week.
[QUOTE=gman003-main;52824716]Quite strange to see "civil society" listed as an evil in China, home to arguably the oldest tradition of civil society in the world. Just look at Confucianism's focus on a bureaucratic state, or the whole philosophy of Legalism. I suspect there's some translation weirdness. An adversarial justice system isn't (to my limited knowledge) part of traditional Chinese legal philosophy - maybe that's what's being referred to by "civil society"?[/QUOTE] Ancient China and modern china share too many similarities though, both used extensive bureaucracies to give the false illusion of social mobility through civil service examinations, both have pretty authoritarian governments with effective bureaucracy, legal codes, and traditions that kept them stable enough, and both use platitudes like 'national unity' or 'safety' to justify horrible authoritarian shit. Not 1 for 1 but China's communism is somewhat rooted in their ancient heritage which is remarkably well documented and never really went away like other ancient cultures
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