If you enjoyed this video, check out the additional episode where I shared what inspired me to discuss Xinjiang and my other thoughts on this political dilemma: Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/33wmMQ5pA1uOofRpoPYYyI (Just search 'My Xinjiang Problem') Essay version: 'My Xinjiang Problem' - siminglan.home.blog/2023/08/05/my-xinjiang-problem/
Dear Siming ... you didn't mention who're the manufacturers of Halal utensils and toiletries (Han or Uyghur) ? Was it the provincial government or Central government that ordered the Muslim-only/Uyghur only public regulation ?
China has been a unified state far longer thean the nation states of europe & the territory has been part of China for more than a 1,000 years. CaptainCool07 was right.
I think it's quite telling that you cite Machiavelli as an authority on good governance. Unfortunately, doing so reinforces every negative stereotype of Chinese people in terms of dishonesty and manipulation. I find it hard to admire that type of "cunning" and think the disinfectant of truth is a virtue that is inherent in genuinely good governance.
Hello, your channel is a must. I lived 10 years in China and now back in France, I try to fight the many misinformations about your country. I wrote a series of articles about it on my blog and I share a lot of views with you. Thank you.
Thank you for your contributions in informing the world. I must, however, say that the mainstream media of the west is not "misinformed" in a literal sense; the western media benefits from displaying foul information about China (political, financial, or popular favors).
You're understanding of Uyghur history doesn't include critical facts like non-Uyghur ethnics ALREADY residing as the majority in Xinjiang BEFORE the Uyghurs existed there. Hans and Mongols were resident in large numbers over a thousand years before them. During the late Tang Dynasty, the Turkic ancestors of the present day Uyghurs migrated from both Central Asia, Dyungaria and Mongolia which resulted in the ethnic mix of what we today call the "Uyghurs".
I wouldn't call 3% of the han population of Xinjiang in 30-s a "large number". And if we are going to talk about the "thousand years" deep in the history than chinese will have to give their territory to the mongols.
@@LalaLa-ze7kv The Mongols, as a member of China, owns Chinese land, just like the rest of the 55 ethnic groups, so how can we talk about "giving it back" to them?
The "two narrative" or "two different views of history" summary suggest that Xinjiang is a "Chinese vs Uyghur" problem - which happens to fall in line with the Washington Consensus. I would argue, Xinjiang is a "US vs China" problem : For the past two decades (from 2001), the Washington-led western powers, have been on one massive Holy War against Islam and Muslims. In those 20 years, Islamophobia, allegations of Islamic terrorists and terrorism were our daily bread, daily diet with supercharged steroids. Then, without warning, the same western powers suddenly became "Defenders of the Islamic Faith" - BUT only for Xinjiang's Uyghur muslims. How strange is that! Christian nations (that massacred 2 million Muslims over two decades) accused Beijing of persecuting Xinjiang Uyghur Muslims. Meanwhile, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (57 Muslim or Muslim-majority countries), having carried out their own fact-finding missions in Xinjiang, defended Beijing's handling of Muslim Uyghurs. It'd have been good if these verifiable factual points were at least mentioned in this video.
This would probably be an extremely long topic to cover thoroughly. But one of the things that should be mentioned is what China does to address radicalism, such as giving people legal education to let them know the rights they are entitled to and their obligations as citizens, so that people have a legal recourse instead of resorting to violence. Secondly, teaching the common tongue and vocational skills of their choice to increase employability. People who live a productive and fulfilling life are generally going to be less discontent so you won't have a fertile breeding ground for terrorism bc people are destitute with nothing better to do with their lives. So literally giving people a good life decreases the recruitment pool for extremists. Thirdly, literally just teach them about the consequences of extremism and how it affects the people around them and who it harms. Like how their actions affect their families and why extremism is wrong. It's a remarkably simple thing but somehow these radicals don't really think through their actions, so making them conscious of their choices is critical. And the reason why I know all of this is of course bc I'm a Wumao. Just kidding. Politics is like drugs, not even once, or you get lost in it. There is also stuff America/West does to promote terrorism against their enemies/competitors (funding, arming, and training terrorists) to encourage separatism. Global politics is dark.
Btw, Mao was exactly right. I don't know why anyone thinks it is a good idea to give malicious elements the power to undermine, disrupt, distort, decay, and destroy normal society. Bringing harm to your own civilization, hurting countless innocents just to signal your own moral superiority? That is ridiculous.
The problem is not teaching the common tongue but suppressing the Ughyrus tongue. Like what Sinming mentioned it’s also about political identity whether a liberation or independence movement is considered terrorism.
@@skydragon23101979 The Uyghur tongue is not suppressed. Children are taught in their mother tongue for the first few years of school. The signs are in Uyghur, the Uyghur language is even printed on their currency. I guess maybe you don't have context, but for me English is not my first language, however in school our lessons were in english and teachers would tell students to talk in english. So for me it's not hard to understand why teachers in China would do something similar for what is believed to be an essential skill. If you've ever taken an elective language, it's the same thing, the teacher will try to get you to communicate in the said language. But don't confuse that as "suppressing the Uyghurs tongue". There is a lot of other stuff to consider as well including all the stuff China does to ensure equal opportunities for ethnic minorities in education, employment and other areas. But besides that, China also does not allow hate speech, so it does actively censor hate speech against Uyghurs, or Muslims. The West celebrates burning the Quran as "Free Speech" but anyone with a brain knows that is hate speech and you would go to jail in China for doing something like that. Imagine if America did a sliver of what China does to protect the rights of minorities and to protect their culture and heritage. Westerners/Americans want to criticise China but they'd be better served reflecting on their own atrocious human rights record first.
Very well presented. Situations like this are always more complicated than politically-motivated critics make them out to be. As a religious person, I can partly understand the Chinese government position. They don't want people mixing religion with politics, and then using their religion as an excuse to foment rebellion. I strongly believe in the separation of religion and state. True religion should be about moral improvement, so that a person lives by godly principles, and not selfish motives. It has nothing to do with setting up a kingdom on this earth. In fact, religious kingdoms on this earth tend to be very oppresive. Consider the persecutions in the middle ages of Europe, under the Catholic domination, for example. But many religions, such as Islam, Catholicism, and even some Protestant groups, seem to have the idea that God wants to rule the world through them. This can put them directly in conflict with civil rulers.
@anglohan5428 a free HK is not economically viable. This was the whole reason the Brits returned it to China. They didn't have to. Not all of HK was on a 99 year lease. Britain held HK island in perpetuity. But if China decided to stop trading with HK, what were the people there going to do? It only exists to provided services to China. There is no other economic activity.
Totally agree with this. There no need to immediately sympathise with people when they want ‘ independence’, even though you want to respect human rights. Some separatist movements won’t bring more prosperity and individual freedoms to the people. And trying to stop the spread of separatist has 2 means, political educations and economic integration, and war when actual extreme Islamic state is formed. A lot of those separatists were trained by the jihadist and sent back to Xinjiang
China try prevent another Libya or Syria, where Terrorists funded by CIA in Syria start trying to spread their influence into China. Uniquely...in Muslim countries, like Indonesia, they really do cultural Genocide of Chinese, even many real genocide take place in Indonesian history.Do you ever heard Western media saying this?
Like many people, one easy mistake to make is to talk as if Xinjiang has only Uyghurs. Xinjiang's population is very diverse with Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Hans, Kyrgyzs, Huis, Pamiris, Tajiks, Mongolians, Russians, Tibetans, Sibe, etc. China wants to safeguard the rights of each group. If the militant Uyghurs had their way, they would impose their fundamentalist Islamic lifestyle on all. Diversity would be stamped out as we see in other places ruled by Islamic fundamentalists. In fact, the ordinary Uyghur does not want that. They are by nature not fundamentalist in their religion and are tolerant.
I agree. There is no acceptable place for fundamentalism anywhere. And propper Muslims would agree with that. We have to respect our nieghbors and live peacefully. And the militant fundamentalists are an issue to society. They cant be given special treatment because of their religion. If they are creating political unrest instability and divisiveness then the government needs to do something about that. Anyone committing crimes should be jailed. I dont believe that China is oppressing the Uighur people. I think that there are groups of separatist extremists that the Chinese government is suppressing.
I think there is plenty of evidence showing the Uygur activists/terrorists had associations with Al Qaeds, ISIS and others, trained by US and Saudi Arabia.
This has been one of the best explanations of the Uyghur situation and definitely more valuable than most of the videos on the subject. The only thing I find weird about the situation is that in the United States is that people on the right will constantly blame China for persecuting against Uyghur Muslims in China. I am not saying that China is entirely innocent, but what I am saying is that the people that speak out in support of Uyghur Muslims would otherwise be anti Muslims in other circumstances. People who would otherwise be Islamaphobic are all of the sudden in support of the Uyghur Muslims when they can blame China for something once again. I am not in agreement with most, if not all of China's decisions, but some in the west (not all) are so anti China that they seemingly look for excuses to blame China for things.
Well, as they say, the west hates Muslims and they hate the Chinese. But for some reason, they are so concerned about Chinese Muslims. They recently tried it with the Hui, but that plan went south.
I don't get the sense that the majority of the right is anti muslim, nor do I get the sense that the right is the only group criticizing china about this issue. However you could say that people on the right were the first to bring this up.
@@jamirajamira7303 yes, it's actually usually the "left" that uses issues like Xinjiang to criticize China, the 'right' usually just come out and say we don't like China because they're a threat to us.
You are right, and I agree. The US and China are in the cold war started by the US, obviously. CIA's role is to dis-stabilize the enemy's internal affairs. A playbook of the CIA for decades, if not a century, under a different named. America's ideal is a democracy, but democracy is not stable and needs a lot of marketing effort using Hollywood and changing history books like slave practice. The final judgment is prosperity for all people has to be there. In the practical matter, once a country is in democracy. There will be more than two opinions to run a country, two parties, and two financial backing on two ideologies. When there are two, the CIA can support one against the other as the sponsored Party becomes the US puppet. That is how the US stays on the top in a rough draft at the national level. So the US evening news only broadcasts the bad of China, not the good of China; even this News network has freedom of the press. But they are not accessible realistically because they want to be profitable. They have to bias to get an audience. So far, China is less to do that, but it will increase the polarization between the two people. Each tries to market their system as a better one for their people. That would make sense to me. How often will you tell your wife or girlfriend that you are bad? After all, you can't have too much disagreement for a country to advance, especially in a cold war. So those Muslim attacks in China are good for the US, and those attacks in the US are bad from an American point of view. A blatant double standard is, by the way, a widespread human behavior.
You are a brave young lady who dares to tilt at a giant windmill, as I'm sure that all the China haters can't be moved or have the tolerance to follow your narrative.
People are often set in their thinking. It is not the people in the West that she needs to be afraid of saying the things she says. How long will she be able to travel by not repeating the party line? How many work opportunities will disappear for her and her family? If she becomes influential enough, she will just disappear.
@@deanthroop8054 You mean if she makes trouble for the law and the authority to a sufficient degree then she should be in trouble? I agree. It's for certain in any country or a small town when you challenge their local law or ethical rules that you dislike.
@@deanthroop8054 Understandable. In some regions marital infidelity or blasphemy against God/Allah could be heinous crime. As some videos of this channel well explained, you may take the strong sense of unity as a big family (political stability) as that kind of a collective code in many areas in China. As you may not be aware, criticizing the government for their mistakes or corruption is quite a norm in every aspect of China, e.g., things like inconvenient transportation, soaring prices, scandals, etc. You are only supposed not to kick over the table, challenge the system and break the collective code.
I have friends from both the Palestinian occupied territories and from Xingjiang - China is using the Israeli playbook, but they are very smart to do it in a very "clean way" compared to Israel
Appreciate this content. You brought up a lot of things few in the West know. Thank you for your effort and exposing yourself to gte negative side of the Internet. Positive thoughts for you and your family.
There's actually more than this. Most of Uyghur diasporas are exiled community who would never set their foot in their homeland anymore. Even their children will never see Xinjiang for the rest of their life due to their ancestors did something bad that Chinese govt considered as subversion motive. That's why the such the blue flag white crescent movement only loud in western countries. One of them is Rebiya Kadeer, one of founders of World Uyghur Congress (WUC). Based in Munich, this so called diaspora community was reported instigating the migrant Uyghurs and Han Chinese riot in a toy factory in Shaoguan, Guangdong, June 2009. This 'small' friction would later sparked bigger to the horrendous riot in Urumqi, July 2009. The WUC was behind this by orchestrating group of people in separate parts of Urumqi to do vandaIism act. Most of the victims were Han people, but western media twisted the f a ct told that the Uyghurs suffered the most as if it was a gen0cide toward the Uyghurs. Well, I have collected myself the RAW video of that bIoody riot since 4 years ago in my personal GDrive. But p a ste a Iink here would be considered as s p am.
1) The Xinjiang region was either conquered by different Chinese or non-Chinese empires, or occupied by a bunch of independent city states during its history. The Chinese have only established episodic control from time to time. 2) "Zhong hua min zu" (the umbrella term for the Chinese nation composed of various ethnicity) is a social construct created more than 100 years ago. All these ethnic groups were unified under the Qing and other previous Chinese empires before. 3) A nation state is a modern concept. The question is for a region and their occupants who were ruled by different empires, do they have a say on what they want? Do we just transfer their colonial citizenship to the nation state citizenship? 4) China was an empire. Similar to her western counterparts, the Chinese conquered and occupied other peoples' lands, and other people conquered and occupied her land. This was how the east and west civilizations developed. We need to understand that it was the way to do business back in the day. The danger is to use modern standards to gain victim righteousness. It was the century of humiliation for the Chinese, and in the same vein, it was the millennium of humiliation for the Vietnamese becoz of Chinese occupation.
That said, Zhong Guo, or the term of the Middle Kingdom was used many many centuries ago, I think since the Han Dynasty, firstly brought by the Han Wu Emperor, the difference is ancient Chinese phrased it as dynasty, instead of nation.
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#4 stands out to me. From outside, the stuff about Xinjiang, Tibet and Taiwan look like an empire trying to hang onto its colonies. Meanwhile, I live in a former British colony, where the vast majority of the colonies have won self-rule and had independence recognised by the head country. It still tries to manipulate affairs, but there's no direct control. The whole thing is a recognition of the belief the independence movements had that it wasn't right for their lands to be in the empire. People grow up in these countries without the belief that the old empire has a right to exist. In China, people seem to take a different view. In the end, rights belong to people, and the rights of states only exist where they protect the rights of people. Self-determination and territorial integrity sometimes compete. So I wonder what's best for the people in this situation. When should an empire keep a territory and when should it lose it?
@@Deschutron I don't know. You need a consensus from the state and the people to get to independence. Some fortunate groups could continue their movement openly, like Quebec, Scotland and Greenland. Others are banned or outright denied like Catalonia. It takes two to tango. I guest people just need to do whatever they can do safely and wait for things falling into place.
@@storage4539 I was wondering how to determine the right moral position. Like, for example, if Spain blocks every possible way for the people of Catalonia to let the world know if they want to be an independent country, should the rest of the world then pressure Spain into allowing them a pathway into independence? Does the rest of the world have a duty to investigate the true will of the Catalonians? Or to discover why they might not want to live in Spain, so the issue can be addressed? Does the rest of Spain need Catalonia so badly that it would be a net negative for Catalonia to be freed? What if the easiest way to free Catalonia was to send arms to Andorra but Andorra has been meaning to attack Spain and control its affairs for a while now?
Screw it, we don’t need to be apologetic or defend Chinas policies. All people have to do is take a look at the differences in quality of life between Uyghurs vs black Americans vs Palestinians and it’s easy to see who is really committing genocide.
Aren't Palestinians an analogue of the Uyghurs? China/Israel is just settling in the place to take its old land back. Some of the locals resist and the government takes special measures to overcome that.
@@Deschutronyes but Israel is definitely not trying to improve the lives of the Palestinian arabs. Its contrast is significant. edit: Otherwise i would argue 3000 years vs 100 years is a big difference.
I appreciate your analysis, and you present the Uyghur nationalist narrative fairly and without a negative bias. But you imply that the PRC has been consistent in its treatment of Xinjiang, not only since 1949, but with centuries or millennia of tradition before. In fact, the policy of Sinicization of Uyghurs is a very recent, unprecedented development. When I first visited Xinjiang in the 1980s, there was a lot more accommodation of Muslim cultural identity, religious practice and language use, and the establishment of the correctional camps (an apt term, as you might know that in the US, prisons are called "correctional facilities"), the removal of the most non-Chinese architectural features of mosques (not to speak of the destruction of some mosques altogether) goes far outside the pluralistic "autonomous region" model initially set up by the PRC. There is a fundamental contradiction between the concept of "autonomy" 自治 and what you call "loyalty to the Chinese." Also, when you put "heavy-handedness" in quotation marks, you are signaling that China is in fact not being heavy handed, while on the other hand, your quotation from Machiavelli at the end justifies the use of brutality in the maintenance of social order. Rather than quote Machiavelli, you might quote Confucius or Mencius, where they point out that virtuous rule naturally leads to people being happy to live in a place, and even to move there from neighboring states suffering from despotism.
Do you know that the Uyghurs language is printed on every single Chinese yuan dollar bills and on all public signs in XinJiang? I bet most people don't know because they can't read Chinese nor Uyghurs. Only foolish people who can't read Chinese nor Uyghurs will believe the lies about Uyghus being oppressed in China.
If one is going to quote Machiavelli, they would better honor him by quoting from his Discourses on Livy and note that he was a true republican. He was also a realist, yet the Prince was written for the conditions that prevailed at that particular time and he was trying to persuade particular rulers at that time to hire him. He would be embarrassed that people thought that work was ever meant to be applied universally. He would be appalled by how his real magnum opus has been ignored.
Great video, once again! A video like this can really help those outside of the issue to see a more comprehensive view to what is clearly a very complicated situation. Having lived in China for a few years, I often struggled with my feelings/opinions over certain issues and pieces of culture so foreign to my own -- this topic being one of them. In most cases, I discovered a vast majority of these topics are extremely complicated, way more so than I originally presumed. Thank you for exploring your thoughts on this issue, it's truly food-for-thought for both those who have strong ties to China and for those who have no ties, yet only hear one narrative. Thanks for taking the time to welcome us to the table and for putting in the effort to make such videos.
Thank you for another thought-provoking video. You are providing me with numerous examples of "How the News Makes Us Dumb" (an excellent book, BTW) about China. One of the antidotes to "the news" is in-depth analysis of current issues, and you have given us a strong dose.
Hopefully after the in-depth knowledge, one can reach their own conclusion that this is a government that will by no way change its way of dealing with its people, whether they are terrorists, separatists, Uyghur, or any "common people" with different opinions. And that is a fact. Hope everyone at least keeps that in mind when carefully viewing biased news. For the benifit of Chinese people. Speaking from a Chinese that has seen way too much suffering, brutal, unjust, caused by the unfettered power.
You are right to point out at the outset that this situation is not an example of genocide, nor is it comprable to The Holocaust. As a Westerner from the US, I see a great deal of hypocrisy in the relentless condemnations of Chines policies in Xianjing. While I don't condone those policies, they are far from being historically unusual and that includes recent history of the US and European powers. There's no comparison between the utter disregard for the lives of innocent Iraqis in the 2010s, for example, and this. I could add Libyans, Syrians, Afghans (many who helped the US forces yet now face possible deportation and lack asylum with a path to citizenship). Now the US gov't has decided to simultaneously fight a proxy war against Russia and prepare for war over Taiwan-- a quasi-autonomous part of 'one China' with no US embassies, no seat at the UN and no recognition as a sovereign nation-state by any but 5 marginal states (e.g. Beliz,Haiti, Guatemala and Vatican City). Nevertheless, Biden says if CCP decided to use military means to directly control Taiwan, then it would be "the equivalent of Ukraine, or maybe worse, and we'd put boots on the ground." A country like mine, with at least 800 military bases around the world, and which has known not even one full year of peace in this century, and which has engaged in "nation building" and attempts to alter culture in various parts of the world (e.g. Afghanistan) with terrible results, should examine its own record before stridently denouncing China's approach to regions it has long claimed as part of itself. This does not mean that I personally agree with the "heavy-handed" approach. But it's not a Hitlerian scenario, and in fact, as geopolitics go, not terribly unusual. This is NOT like the ethnic cleansing that occurred in the Balkans in the 90s; it's NOT like Nazi's "Final Solution" and Camps; and it isn't even half as bad as the many overthrows of actual sovereign nation state by outright war (Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan) or CIA-backed coups (Pinochet in Chile, Argentina (elected Pres. Isobel Peron's gov't), and many others. Is this "whataboutism?" If that means an instance of hypocrisy, of the pot calling the kettle black, then I guess so. It's worth stressing that right now the US admin considers itself to be the sole legitimate leader of the "international rules based order." The rules it imposes on others do not appear to be binding on the US itself. I love the US and the freedoms we still have here at the domestic level (even though these have come under attack by extremists on the Right here). I have also studied Chinese history and culture, and as a College Instructor, I've gotten to know several of the Chinese students (i.e. Chinese nationals or recent immigrants studying here). I think peaceful coexistence is not only possible but necessary to global stability and sustainability in the 21st C and beyond. I recommend renowned economist, Keyu Jin's book, The New China Playbook. She's from China but was educated in the US for High School and College and now teaches at the London School of Economics. Worth a look. Most people here just reflexively vilify all things Chinese with little or no background knowledge due to the constant onslaught of fear mongering propaganda that began around 2015. Interesting to hear your thoughts. Much respect. Thanks.
Agreed. I was in Yosemite last week and I was so disturbed upon learning the California genocide committed by U.S. and California government backed Mariposa battalion. Comparing the degree of genocide committed by the U.S., I think China did terrible job doing genocide just like children play. The Xinjiang genocide would have became a non-issue today just like California genocide if China did the same. Of course many countries may have moral grounds blaming what China did in Xinjiang but Anglo-Saxson nations are definitely not among them.
Indeed, I seem to recall quite a few years ago, couple or few states wanted to leave the Union and the Federal Government sent the army in and there was something called a civil war Federal Government will only tolerate a certain amount of state independence and states rights.
The term concentration camp does not necessarily mean an extermination camp, it's just a place where people are placed there against their will without committing any actual crime. Which is what China did (and is still doing) with the Uyghur people. So, using this term is not wrong when talking about the situation about Uyghurs. Especially when they cannot leave such places in the first place.
@@martiddyyou are only talking about the literal meaning to the phrase "concentration camp" while this term carries so much more sentimental meaning in the majority of Western citizens because of the horrific history of Holocaust. To disregard that component is to force objectivity on an non objective topic.
0:18 Would I want my identity to be scrutinized by the state? If you don't like to be scrutinized by your own state, how about another state coming to your state to scrutinize it? BBC or CNN going around Xinjiang and making negative, nevermind false or not, documentary is already offensive. Would some Chinese media go to Northern Ireland and make a documentary about Irish independence or IRA? Or maybe a documentary about Guantanamo Bay?
Recently I saw someone summing up this "situation" very a simple and easy way to understand. After "they" stirred terrorism in the region, bothered by the political and economical influence of China coming earlier than expected, "they" got mad that China avoided the Afghan Trap building schools and vocational programas e invested more in the region instead of simple sending in the People's Liberation Army, like the Soviets did in the 80's.
Ahuh and is this supposed to justify throwing people into prison for 15 years for reading the Qu’ran? People are acting like China is just rational actor when they’re going overkill for no good reason whatsoever. Yeah man all those 10s of thousands of diaspora who can’t see their families are totally just making it up for money or because they’re successionists.
all im seeing in the comment section is either, Chinese bots, Chinese nationalists, people that understand the situation but explaining it badly, and people who are just agreeing because 'the west has fallen'. what utter tripe
Good quote. Now lets apply it. Which country has hegemony over most of the world and has been making people believe in absurdities for a long time now? As so many China commentators have pointed out: "the U.S. doesn't care about Muslims, and they don't care about the Chinese, but what they really care about are Chinese Muslims."
Questions for Siming Lan, 1- Why do you never address any criticisms in your comment section? 2- When people point out the blind spots, obvious misdirection, and blatant omissions in your arguments, why do you not address them? 3- Not sure if you live in China, but intellectual honesty requires you to address the elephant in the room. How do you have access to YT without CCP blessings? 4- You hint at possible biases you might have for being Han Chinese, but you keep repeating CCP talking points, making long winded elaborate apologies for it by strawmaning any arguments against CCP mischief. Are you a new breed of better paid apologists and propagandist? 5- Why are you inconsistent in applying your moral stance? Uygur desire for preserving own culture is “medieval” but the Sinicization of non-Han population is somehow benign and “modern”. Not sure how you see minimizing CCP oppression and overplaying “the world is out to get us Chinese” as morally acceptable. 6- Why do you never address cognitive dissonances central to Chinese psyche? Chinese worship of modern materialism, but ignorance and abhorrence of modern values like freedom of choice, human rights, respect for cultural differences, openness of marketplace of ideas, support for robust debates among differing opinions. Like the Russians and Iranians, the Chinese elite park their wealth, educate their kids, buy houses for their mistresses in the “decadent” West, and common citizen would emulate that behaviour if they could. Is this fear and loathing of West a coping mechanism? A projection? Or just a means to save “face”?
The problem is that China forces these uyghur women to marry han chinese men and forces uyghir men to drink alcohol and eat pork during the holy month of ramadan which is strictly forbidden. Re-education would be fine if they let them practice their religion without trying to rebel against China. They should be allowed to love in their homes at the same time the uyghur people should not be involving themselves in protesting and politics.
If you’re ending with a quote from Machiavelli, you might need reevaluate what you’re really saying. The world isn’t what it once was. Nowadays cruelty reeks of weakness and insecurity, because it’s the measure that makes sense when you think nothing else will work.
Of course I stayed until the end. Very few TH-cam videos have the ability to moderate my views on a subject because very few are of this quality. You combine intelligence, depth, and a sense of balance with succinct and elegant presentation. Congratulations.
Hi Siming! First of all, I want to say that I really admire your journey of self-development and the articulate way you’ve presented your experiences to us. It must take a lot of resilience to move to a new country and to expose yourself, for the first time, to some new information that makes you see the nation you’ve grown up in in a different light. And in addition to this, I really admire the way you’ve gone back and searched for the “other side” to the story - the one that the western narrative often evades or simply doesn’t have time to talk about - in order to reconcile the warm, supportive China you grew up (and no doubt the one you experience while you’re there) with the much colder, antagonistic one you hear about in the west. I understand and deeply share your desire to not be ashamed of who you are, to not feel lesser to people in the west, and to take pride in your family, your culture, and ultimately yourself. I do, however, have some questions that I would be interested to hear your perspective on. As a bit of background, I was born and raised in New Zealand. One half of my family are Māori (indigenous New Zealanders). The other half of my family are descended from British immigrants (the dominant group in NZ society today). I’m in my late-20s so I suspect not too different in age to yourself. I say all this because I think it is relevant - for the most part I’m interested in our internal politics, but my experience living in NZ obviously informs the way I see politics overseas. Also, for much of the past four years, I have lived in Taiwan and studied 中文. Your videos that address Xinjiang and Taiwan do a great job of adding to the conventional (one-sided) western narrative by presenting the Chinese government’s rationale for intervention in these regions - i.e. suppression of extremism and maintaining sovereignty/territorial integrity so as to not lose face amongst the Chinese public. However, I feel like while you’ve done a great job at explaining the *rationale* of the Chinese government, you haven’t really provided much of a counter/critique to it. Take, for instance, Xinjiang. As you’ve acknowledged, the issue faced by the separatists is that they’re under the rule of a government they never consented to ruling over them. And the issue faced by the government is terrorist attacks by said separatists (on civilians and said government). And I think “consent” is the key word here. Fortunately, we’re at an age where consent is well-understood at the level of individuals. If a man were to try to force himself on a woman without consent, we would (correctly, I believe) tell him not to do so - the obvious solution to this issue is to simply ask the woman “do you want to be with this man?”, and if she doesn’t then most would agree that the man should back away, let the woman live her life, and not try to claim the woman as his own. Of course, no one has asked the Uyghur people of Xinjiang if they consent to be paired with the Han-majority China, despite the desire of the latter. This could be easily achieved by having a free and fair referendum on independence for the region. However, this has not happened, and as such, this rule is not by consent. It seems clear to me, then, that the Chinese government is consequently the aggressor in this situation. China may claim that they have the “right” to rule over Xinjiang due to some constitutional documents (that they wrote), but how ethical is resorting to this justification if the Uyghur people themselves did not choose to be in this position? To me, this seems akin to man claiming he has eternal right to a woman simply because he has over-powered her in the past (see the Dzungar-Qing wars) - something anyone in their right mind surely wouldn’t agree with. ANYWAY, I guess the question I pose to you is twofold - 1) If you believe this analogy is an unfair way to conceptualise the situations in Xinjiang and Taiwan (noting that Taiwanese people *have* been polled and that they strongly oppose unification with China) - why are they different? And 2) If you can justify these contexts as different, how then does this result in greater justification of the actions taken by the Chinese government against these territories and their people? Sorry for the long message, I just want to say I’m really impressed by your videos so far, and I support you fully on your personal journey!
I won't throw you a wall of text, but let me give you back your example, the consent, So have the Uyghur people ever asked the other Chinese people for "consent"? Yes, not only Uyghur living in Xinjiang, ever think about it? It was a mixed region from the very beginning, and guess who was the first that settled there? Ruled there? Built the government there? Mate ,you will need to burn all the Chinese museums down. Then Taiwan, did the KMT government, or its followers ask the other Chinese people for "consent" when they retreated there? Did they ask the Chinese? People for the "consent" of taking all the gold, silvers, and national treasures, robbing the people clean, when they were retreating to Taiwan? Consent............. Have you or your politicians or your journalist ever asked the Chinese people, the ORDINARY CHINESE PEOPLE! For consent when you were throwing tons upon tons of lies, misinfo and hatred campaigns against them? Consent...sigh...
@@CodeMeat 100% I have. I really respect and support Siming’s journey to take pride in her family, history, nation and identity as a Chinese person. As I mentioned in my original comment, this is something close to my own heart, growing up facing all the stigma and bad press aimed at myself and my family (indirectly) as an indigenous person in New Zealand. I’ve personally gone through a very similar journey of self-acceptance (and taking pride in my history and who I am) so I find it inspiring seeing Chinese people stand up to the west in the same kind of way. I really just have a couple of qualms around a couple of specific issues, and am interested in hearing her viewpoints on them.
If you look back, since 1949 government has been trying various policy over this region and make Uyghurs like han. Sometimes with softer way, sometimes in harder way. As host mentioned, it has to be “unified” identity and culture in the eye of government. But Uyghur has very strong connection to their root and culture, they are proud of their past. On top of that, Han and Uyghur culture are totally different in many ways. In short, all these agenda government has been pushing so hard recent years will be wasted. This kind of strict policy would only create more hate and isolation. It’s impossible to fully control the mind of people nowadays. For sure we are going to witness another wave of resistance in near future.
Thank you for explaining this in a very clear and precise manner. Also, no country can stand by and allow someone to commit terrorist acts against their people. America is a prime example of this we would not stand for it in our country we cannot expect less of another country.
During the Republic of China period, 9 out of 10 Chinese people, or even more, were slaves from generation to generation, oppressed by millions of warlords, landlords, and evil gentry, who were cruel and anti human generations, almost never able to turn over, without food or clothing. The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army led by Mao Zedong launched a magnificent Chinese People's Democratic Revolution for the liberation of humanity, fighting against the very few anti human slave oppressive organizations that oppressed the slave people. In the end, they defeated the government of the Republic of China, allowing the Chinese people, who accounted for one fourth of the world's population, including the people of Xinjiang and Tibet, to turn around and completely liberate themselves. This human right alone is unprecedented in human history. He saved the human rights of the entire Chinese people and completely changed their fate of being enslaved and oppressed for generations. And, on the other hand, wholeheartedly serving the people, and even providing free medical insurance, free housing, and free education for all, The Chinese people are no longer the slaves and oppressed objects of the Republic of China and previous generations, but the service objects of the Chinese government and the CPC. Everyone is equal and the people are united. This is also the main reason why, in Mao Zedong's words, billions of Chinese people are willing to go through fire and water for him. The United States is shouting about democracy and human rights, but what it does behind its back is anti human rights and anti democracy. The disasters they have caused to humanity, including the American people, are countless.
@@watchonjar US is genocide them by sanction products produced by them, not China. US is trying to make their life hard while China provides happy life for them for hundreds of years. US is bombing them in Middle-East.
Miss Lan, as a non-Chinese who has taken an interest in Chinese history and also this subject, please allow me to say that I very largely agree with your assessment, but I think I can add something further enlightening. During the Han Dynasty, the Chinese (who were sedentary farmers) were repeatedly raided, murdered, robbed, raped, etc. by the nomadic Xiongnu, who occupied the territory which is now Xinjiang. This continued for hundreds of years. After trying to appease the Xiongnu many times over by giving them gifts and wives, the Chinese generals realised that appeasement was never going to work as a long term strategy to stop the Xiongnu from repeatedly attacking the Chinese farmers and that, unfortunately, the only way to stop the Xiongu was to kill them all - every man, woman and child, i.e. genocide. But first they had to devise military strategies to enable them to defeat the Xiongnu in war - they did this essentially by copying the manner of Xiongnu fighting, i.e. largely on horseback, which was foreign to the Chinese military at the time. So tl;dr they did that, then when ready they pursued the Xiongnu and they genocided them, or almost all of them, except for a group that fled to the west and joined some Mongol groups. So now, 1. Xinjiang was Chinese territory, and 2. it was empty, all of the Xiongnu having been killed or fled further into Central Asia. The Uyghurs, another nomadic Turkic people, lived in the land to the north of Xinjiang, so the Han invited the Uyghurs to go and settle down in part of Xinjiang, and become part of the Chinese people, which they did. So note: Xinjiang was never the Uyghurs' ancient homeland, this is a fabrication. It was gifted to them by China on condition that they settled the country as peaceful sedentary farmers and good Chinese citizens. East Turkestan has never existed in reality. It is a fabrication; imaginary. It is what the Uyghur diaspora Islamic extremists wish for - an extremist Islamic state of their own creation on land that, since the Han Dynasty, has belonged to China. Fast forward to the Chinese civil war, which was won by the Communists, who then closed China to the outside world. Fast forward again to Deng Xiaoping and the opening up of China, and Chinese citizens became permitted to travel outside of China, first in controlled tourist groups, and subsequently by themselves with individual visas. So then it became possible for Chinese Muslims such as the Uyghurs and the Hui to go on the pilgrimage to Mecca, which subsequently many have done. No harm there. Unfortunately, a minority (and it is a minority - maybe 10%) have lingered for a while in the Middle East mixing with fundamentalists, and they have become radicalised. So it is this radicalised minority who have become extremists and who have committed acts of terrorism, and are demanding that every single thing should be Halal, and who wish to separate from China and establish their own extremist state. I hasten to add that they are a small minority, and most Chinese Muslims have not followed this route, and so have continued to live happily and undisturbed. It is the radicalised minority who have needed to be "re-educated" (which I think is actually not a bad word for the process). Sorry for being such a long winded old man, Miss Lan. But I think this actually fits with what you have said.
@@RafQueiroz1 Thanks, Raf. It is difficult to recommend good books in English on ancient Chinese history because most non-Chinese are not interested in delving into it in such depth. And the people today who just want to criticise and attack China are certainly not interested in trying to understand China the way it is in an objective way; at most they are trying to tell China how to behave without understanding it, which if you think about it is supreme arrogance. But it is absolutely necessary to go that far back in Chinese history, or even further to the Zhou Dynasty, because it was the Zhou Dynasty that shaped the way that China has become today. And people in the West need to understand this - China developed as a continuous unbroken civilisation going back at least as far as 30,000 years (yes, they were invaded multiple times and ruled by other peoples, but it was those people who were changed by China - Chinese civilisation continued unbroken). Genetically they can be traced back to someone who lived 40,000 years ago and whose DNA looks remarkably similar to the DNA of modern Chinese people. In that respect China and the Han are unique, and no one should expect that China and the Han people will see the world the way that anyone else does - they really are different, including in their mental processes. But sorry, I should stop waffling. I think the best book I can recommend to you is The Early Chinese Empires: Qin and Han by Mark Edward Lewis. The further back you can go, the better. There was another very good book on the Shang and Zhou Dynasties by an excellent Chinese historian, but I am unable now to find it and suspect that it is no longer in print.
@@RafQueiroz1 There are many videos of History of Xinjiang produced by Chinese and Taiwanese on yt, including the massacre of the Junggar tribes in Xinjiang by the Qing Empire in 1750. Unfortunately, most of them have no English subtitles. To be precise, the Uighurs in Xinjiang today are Nomad who moved into Xinjiang after 1760.
Thank you for another fine video. I think the bottom line is, that all religions must not be allowed to mix with political management of any state. They sow more division and disruption of everything from human values to industry. Sure you can have your faith, but it cannot be allowed to dictate, or we would still be stuck in the Dark Ages.
The problem with this is that it's not always possible to disentangle the 2 things. For most of human history they were the same. I believe we are living in a new dark age now anyway, where ideologies take the place of religion, and you speak against them at your peril.
I like your explanation of the situation in Xinjiang. Compare to what is happening in Gaza. The situation of Ugher people in xinjiang is a million times better than Palestinian people living in Gaza. Western media and politician who are acting in a very double standard with regards to Israel and China.
I hope the Scottish and people of Wales will also get their independence, and the people of Falkland Island, Gibraltar and so will the Afro-Americans, Californians, Texans, Hawaiians, and Puerto Ricans. The people of Kashmir, the people of Sikkim, and the people of Nagaland and Mizoram.
@@hongqi5734 Yes, all people should have the right to freedom and to be independent. It seems like you think westerners that support Xinjiang wouldn’t support western groups wanting independence, which is strange but very common from Chinese nationalists. If California wants to become its own country, or Scotland, good for them and they have our support. All people should have the right to self-determination. All countries were created by people and if new countries are created then that is just continuing the history of humanity.
@@hongqi5734 You haven’t seen support for who? Scottish people had a vote not that long ago and chose to stay in the UK. Now after Brexit it seems like there is a lot more support for independence. Obviously the UK government would be against it but many Scottish people are openly working for it. Calling for Scottish independence is not a crime and there are no reeducation camps to force them to be more British. California does not have an independence movement; I just used it as an example. So again, who are you referring to? I don’t know why it seems so hard to understand that open minded liberals around the world support independence movements of all kinds. There is no ani-China conspiracy singling it out. Yes politicians do that, politics is corrupt and evil in every country to some extent. But whether it’s Tibet or Palestine, Xinjiang or Northern Ireland, many people around the world support their right to self-determination without prejudice. My friends were attacked by police on the streets of Barcelona after they voted to separate from Spain, that is not lip service. That is just one of many localism movements around the world. Nationalism is outdated and backwards. Every human being shares the same origin in Africa. All counties are concepts that just exist in our minds. If a bird flies from Vietnam to China there is no change, there is no physical boundary, there is no physical reality to countries. So if one group of people wants to create a new country, why not? Who cares? Things change. National integrity is like a man saying his wife is his property. That's so 18th century, grow up and get over it.
Love how you apply "Explore Narratives" process from different perspective to invite critical thinking. Unfortunately not many people get the importance of such appropriate processes. Well done, absolutely enjoyed listening to your critical thinking + narative exploration 🤗👍
To say Mongol is a Chinese minority just shows how little you know about Mongols. Also you can't compare it to Asian Americans who actually choose and immigrate to become American. As you know, the minorities you mention are actually struggling to get free from the enforced the control / colony. It boils down to not robbing people from their #1 right to say who they are.
"These minority groups in China are victims of brutal measures such as mass deportation, political indoctrination, and family separation, restrictions of religious freedom, cultural destruction and extensive use of surveillance. The systematic, brutal and arbitrary repression has been documented in Xinjiang police files, which the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) was able to examine. MEPs state that evidence of Uyghur children being separated from their families, government-sponsored programmes of mass forced sterilisation and forced labour amount to crimes against humanity and constitute a serious risk of genocide." The European human Rights court Not to mention the mass rape, trorture we can't get evidence for beyond thousands of victims testifying because the CCP blocks access. What is your stance on that?
The west has used false rape accusations in the past before. Remember the rape squads by Khaddafi mentioned by Amnesty International which turned out to be false that were merely an excuse to topple Khadafi for wanting to get rid of the USD in Africa.
It's also easy to say that this is not an abuse of human rights but if your sister and daughter got raped and tortured at these facilities, would you still call it re-education? So this reasoning goes both ways. History has shown that force is not the best way to subjugate a group of people. Especially, in this modern era where individuals have a greater voice (through social media) as well as access to more information, and a better idea of what they feel they are entitled to. If China can show the Uyghurs that life is better as part of China, they will want to be a part of China. This will garner respect from around the world and China will strengthen it's global position. Unfortunately, the current method is having the opposite effect.
Kudos to you, a young person brought up in the West, for having the intelligence and courage to see for yourself the truth and not fall in line with the often false and insidious narratives from the MSM. Your nuance attempt to explain the situation is indeed commendable and much more closer to the reality than any report from the West I have seen.
Thank you for your inside view. There's a saying in Germany: "The most dangerous view is that of those who haven't viewed the world." So thank you so much for your insights.
An extraordinarily well presented video. This sort of content is invaluable as it is increasingly difficult to find less radical opinions on the Xinjiang struggle that leave no room for consideration of the other side. This did a good job of highlighting China's perspective without dismissing criticisms.
The three evils of separatism, terrorism and extremism are not tolerated by any nation. Why would China do otherwise. The UK didn't tolerate the IRA. Spain didn't tolerate the ETA. The US didn't tolerate the Confederacy (for a while at least.) Uyghurs in Xinjiang were sorely tempted to follow the same path, pushing for 'nation' that never existed historically. Two brief warlord regimes do not count. The 'ethnicity' didn't exist until it was fabricated by Soviet ethnographers in the 1920s (along with the other Central Asian 'nations'.) Before then, tribes identified with their town or village at most, and never considered themselves a distinct identity, but part of the broader Turkic culture that stretched from the Bosphorus to Manchuria. It was (and remains) definitely in the interest of European powers to push for the fractured identity of these Turkic peoples than to see them unite into a Greater Turkestan. An East Turkestan nation is pushed not by any 'freedom fighters' but extremists that would suppress all non-Uyghurs in Xinjiang such as the Kazakhs, Mongols, Uzbeks, and several others who do not have an 'ethnic' state. A nation that would push an extremist anti-humanist, misogynist, and belligerent form of Islam closer to the Taliban or Daesh than the more tolerant forms practiced in most Islamic countries. An extremism pushed by Wahabists that fund 'madrassahs' which are educational facilities like a Jesuit school, but indoctrination centers. People forget how prevalent the Islamic extremists were in the 1990s. None of them were trying to 'liberate' anyone, but trying to impose what the Taliban finally succeeded in establishing or what the Daesh are still fighting for in Syria and Iraq. They have led insurgencies from the Philippines and Indonesia to the west coast of Africa. The Uyghurs have crafted their own identity since it was handed to them by the Soviets. The nature of that identity is not that proclaimed by a small extremist sect that has been more than willing to use terrorism and accept financing and other support from foreign powers who want to destroy the PRC. It is an identity that will continue to evolve by the several million Uyghurs - of various religions (or none), of various political persuasions, from.Communists to reactionaries. It surely will not be decided by Western liberals and State Department bureaucrats. Yet faced with the three evils (that have substantial backing by imperial powers), China didn't declare a global war, sending troops from the Philippines to Nigeria and everywhere in between. It didn't set up a Guantanamo Bay or an Abu Ghraib torture facilities. They didn't practice extraordinary renditions to 'black op' sites, or blow up their citizens with drones (along with the rest of the wedding party, or order a second strike once emergency responders arrived). China built facilities, that unlike the 'correctional facilities' in the US which never corrects behavior and only punishes and dehumanizes prisoners and guards alike, actually provided education and vocational skills so they would not be trapped in generational poverty in some backwater village, and other useful things like the national language so they could read something more than just the Koran, and participate in the national dialogues about culture, religion, politics, et al, as equals. The PRC is the leading example of how to build a cosmopolitan communitarian commonwealth. Yet rather than support their initiatives, certain powers push false narratives to disrupt their progress, especially since it is getting more and more difficult to claim any of their own.
"Love the party, love the country" Doesn't get more Orwellian than this. Also interviewing terrified oppressed people on the streets when you're Han, pushing a camera in their faces and asking if things have gotten better under the CCP isn't exactly unbiased journalism. Of course these poor people will say they love the party. 1984.
Thank you for this excellent video. It was very informative and enlightening. It gave me a much better understanding of the situation in Xinjiang. Here's my take... Throughout China's long history, the Chinese have struggled to build a nation. It was very challenging with so many tribes and ethnic groups fighting with each other. Finally, China had united enough of these warring peoples to form what we recognize today as China. It was a hard-won unity and understandably China wants to keep it altogether as much as possible. So while there are Uyghurs with separatist leanings, China must guard against disunity and the fracturing of the nation. Failing to do this will result in the disintegration of China. The measures China has taken in Xinjiang may be considered heavy-handed, but if you were leading China, how else might you deal with the problem? Are you prepared to second guess Beijing? Westerners rail against China's measures, but they have no understanding of China and her history. Their perspective is based on ignorance and arrogance. Moreover, they would like nothing better than to witness China's disintegration, because above all else, Westerners are bigots and racists. They fear losing their global hegemony. They are jealous of China's rise. They resent the Chinese. Labelling China's re-education facilities as "concentration camps" is most obviously racist and inflammatory. Labelling China's efforts to unite the Uyghur people with the rest of China as "cultural genocide" is also racist and inflammatory. And all the other nonsense about forced labour, organ harvesting, sterilization, etc. are propaganda lies meant to demonize and vilify China. We need to stop examining China through the Western lens. China is not America. China is not Europe. China has unique circumstances that require unique measures to ensure her unity, integrity and strength. _Leave China alone!_
while I agree with you I don’t know why this is framed as something that only China is doing. Deradicalization and reeducation practices to prevent religious extremism exist all over the world, including the west.
I was in Yosemite last week and I was so disturbed upon learning the California genocide committed by U.S. and California government backed Mariposa battalion. Comparing the degree of genocide committed by the U.S., I think China did terrible job doing genocide just like children play. The Xinjiang genocide would have became a non-issue today just like California genocide if China did the same. Of course many countries may have moral grounds blaming what China did in Xinjiang but Anglo-Saxson nations are definitely not among them.
@@nanjiang1953 Exactly. Westerners interpret China's actions as human rights abuses through the Western lens, but they do not have the moral authority to do so. Westerners are hypocrites. America, Canada, Australia, Britain, France, Belgium, and many other European countries are guilty of *real* human rights abuses. Until recently, for example, my home country of Canada abused - and murdered! - thousands of indigenous children in "residential schools." This is a very dark stain on Canada's reputation. America is much worse. Australia is much worse. China has always treated its ethnic minorities with care and respect.
as a Chinese, I think the problem might be the fact that China isn't a democracy. So Uyghurs have no choice but to be forced to identify themselves as China, they know that they will never have a chance to get a referendum. If the UK tells Scots they won't have that chance, they will also protest. And besides, Uyghur is Uyghur, Han is Han, different in culture and ethnicity, but when facing strong foreign power, intellectuals create a narrative of "nation of Chinese" to fight against foreign countries. But the actual meaning is if the minorities don't obey, we will treat them as traitors and use power to force them to obey.
@@ziyu8061 China treats all of its ethnic minorities very well, in fact, better than Han Chinese! This is a fact. As I stated very clearly in my comment, China's unity was hard-won and China won't allow this unity to be upset. Any Chinese who would allow the possibility of disunity is a traitor.
This might sound weird but the best comparison to what China is facing regarding the crisis in Xinjiang is what lead to the American Civil War and its aftermath. As we all know, the North wanted to abolish slavery, the South wanted to keep slavery, Britain and France abolished slavery in their own countries but relied on cottons produced by workforce made up of slaves in the South. Because of this tension between the North and the South with slavery as a major factor, a war eventually erupted when South Carolina declared secession from the U.S. And during this war, Britain and France did their best to maintain good relations with both sides of the conflict with the elites of both countries are sort of being pro-South while the civilians are pro-North. Heck, Britain even deployed warships from the Royal Navy in putting up a blockade around Africa to put an end to the slave trade. But what important here is the aftermath. Just because the South lost the war, it did not mean it will go down so easily. Some riots broke out in the Southern States in response against the military occupation, resulting the deaths of many African Americans and European Americans from the Northern States by lynching. Also, some of the White Southerners even accused the Union for having too much foreign influences in their domains due to migration from Europe, making them no longer Americans in the eyes of these extremists. Some generations later, they even created this myth about the South wanted to protect its rights about whether to abolish slavery on its own like the central government from the North demanded or not. The point here is that before and after the American Civil War ended, getting rid of the other side's narrative or finding a way to compromise with such narrative is still going to be hard and there will always be those from the outside looking in that will claim that this side is right or that side is right either our of morality, political agendas or economic interests.
Let’s be pragmatic, Xinjiang and Tibet are so much more prosperous and better under the leadership of Communist Party of China, just compare with Nepal or the northern state of India or Afghanistan or Pakistan. Women’s rights, education, infrastructure, etc.. I observe some Uyghur activist in the US and Australia, I mean they are not really look like a "good" muslim, the women are not using hijab, the men shave their beard, not to mention they have a good understanding of Islam when it comes to Tauhid, Aqidah, hudud law, etc..
To say they are prosperous is a lie. You are brainwashed. Whether or not they are good Muslims has nothing to do with their right to be free. Your comment is absolute BS!
Well done. Good try. Im chinese in ethic but from a different country. We also have multi racial, multi religions. Having to learn an unified language to communicate in the same language does not reflect oppression or suppression. It in facts liberates us because with additional languages we can see the outside world differently. For those Uyghurs so obsess to gain its independence, they need to ask a question themselves. Who will then be the leader of that liberated nation to gain prosperity and peace? Or is this just a group of nonsensical defiant individuals coming together trying to break the bond of the said nation? Western ideologies are always to sabotage others to shine light on themselves. This is evident in many cases by using medias to intoxicate liberal ideas into our minds. Example the so called “woke” culture when this word “woke” is essentially not meant for the current situation. Same for this accusation of genocide. Go and fix our dear state of Palestine first before trying to deflect issues back on Asians. ❤ thank you for your effort to do this video.
xinjiang has been part of china for many years. so why now ? the xinjiang human rights and ...etc..USA would like to tear china apart.Tibet and Xinjiang makes up of about 40% of china territory! Tibet and xinjiang are aggressively supported by USA . embracing these two territories and hoping that they can secession is the objectives ... Fortunately, chinese leaders are calm and strategic ;they will not fall into such western trap easily.....chinese are not stupid and ignorant! Just look at the conflict of ukraine and russia, USA is enjoying the weakening of russia without firing a shot ! slavic killing each other , what a sham!
The same strategy of "Divide & Conquer" is also being used in Indonesia, esp in regions rich with natural resources. They want to break and weaken the country from within. The smaller the country, the weaker it is. Basically this is the strategy always used by the western imperialist anywhere in the world. When the country is weak and unstable, they can exploit the country easily.
Ethnic nationalism and self-determination are really convenient ideologies for a divide and conquer strategy. The only countries that can't be pushed around are multi-ethnic empires.
We cannot criticize China for trying to preserve its territorial integrity. Centuries ago, long before the United States even existed, China was a fully-formed nation that included Taiwan, Tibet and Xinjiang. So China has the sovereign right to prevent territorial secession. Whether or not China has been heavy-handed in its approach is not for us in the West to judge. How China governs itself is none of our business.
I would love to see you do a video on the Tieneman Square massacre where the CCP killed thousands of peaceful student protestors who were seeking more democratic representation. Would love your perspective on this atrocity. Is there any chance of a video on the topic?
The protesters were not peaceful, the crackdown started after attacks on cars and people, the army attacked back after one was killed when they were moving back from the rioters.
There is an old Chinese saying called "covering one's ears while stealing a bell(掩耳盜鈴)", which China has vividly demonstrated in creating the Xinjiang issue. Uyghur is a concept of a cultural community based on language. In fact, Uyghurs can be divided into dozens of categories. From the perspective of race, the Y chromosome proves that the Tocharians who lived in the Central Asia are obviously one of the ancestors of the Uyghurs and have nothing to do with the Han Chinese. In other words, the Uyghurs are the descendants of many ancient ethnic groups who have lived on their land. They have thousands of years of history on the land where their ancestors lived. Of course, the Chinese nationalists who own the voice of course would never talk about this, since they got a bell to steal. On the contrary, the China-centric narrative has always simplified the origin of the Uyghurs to the descendants of the "Gaochang Uighurs(高昌回鶻)" of the Tang Dynasty, so that they seem to have migrated from the Mongolian plateau and have only a history of a thousand or so years, and then used the fact that the Han Dynasty had a brief exchange with the locals to prove that the Han people "existed and ruled" in the local area prior to these indigenous people. Nonetheless, "Xinjiang(新疆)" literally means "new territory(新的疆土)", as clearly stated in the dictionary of the Manchu-ruled Qing Dynasty, which conquered this land. and lamely interpreted by China as a “new return to the homeland(故土新歸)” now, which doesn't even fit in the context. Before 1930, Han Chinese made up less than 4% of the population in "Xinjiang", but after 1980 they made up more than 40%. They named the area the "Uighur Autonomous Region", then took control of the local government, monopolized the minerals, and flooded the labor resources with large numbers of Han immigrants. Kazakh herders were driven from the mountains and forests where they had lived for generations, and even the land and water resources that Uyghur farmers depended on for their livelihoods were squeezed out of the best parts by "Production and Construction Corps(生產建設兵團)". The massive land reclamation by the Han Chinese reclamation groups even caused Lop Nur and Aydin Lake to dry up in the 70s. Now they are throwing a large part of these "minorities" into "re-education" camps. And ask again why the local Turk people are unhappy? Oops, ears to cover.
Another enticing and informative video. This video really helped shed some additional light as to what China's Uyghur policy actually is. I think the West fails (and sometimes refuses to) understand why other countries do the things they do, hence the terms used like "genocide" and "concentration camps". China on other the hand isn't particular great at communicating their message across without coming off as thin-skinned, but they do what they feel is needed regardless of what others say. This is the 2 realities of the West and China. Great job expressing your thoughts on the issue, looking forward to your next video (from a fellow Cantonese)
They don’t just “not understand”, they understand but purposely misinterpret and misrepresent for their own propaganda. China is not doing anything the west hasn’t done.
Because there are so many biases from media of both sides, it's still not clear to me what actually happens in Xinjiang.I tend to avoid discussing sensitive topics because I just love Chinese culture without having any political opinions on China but I appreciate your balanced and honest analysis on the problem.
Well, you can always visit Xinjiang and find out for yourself if you're really concerned, unlike Guantanamo Bay, Xinjiang is actually open to tourists from all over the world.
@@SunnySzetoSz2000 I am surprised they haven't renamed Guantanamo as "Freed0m Center", just like how U$ reverse everything else, right is wrong, white is black, man is woman etc etc etc.
I spent the last 3 years during the pandemic researching about China and US. My conclusion is China is peaceful and hardly give out any biased information while US/UK lies everything about China and oppressing any country which disagrees with it. China has regained its strength and is standing up straight, fighting against the bully by US/UK/west. Learn the hundred years of humiliation of China. China is a multi-ethnic country since its birth more than 5000 years. Racism is not Chinese culture but that of US/UK/west. Minorities in modern China have more benefits than the majority Hans and everyone get to keep their dialects/languages, religions and cultures. If you really love Chinese culture, then you should know that China is a peaceful country but it won't allow any more bully by US/west.
Firstly, please allow me to commend you on your intelligence and wisdom. IMHO, your thoughts are profound, and your nuanced articulation of them is exquisite. I agree very much with your view on the "Xinjiang controversy". Thank you!
Compare Xinjiang to Palestine, which way would the western countries go? No prize for guessing it right! To say, the western countries are interested in the welfare of the Uyghur people, is utterly unthinkable. What are they doing in Palestine?
forced to "learn how to sew clothes" is the narratives by the western media driven by their political agenda. in my view, providing job opportunities so that people would not be swayed by religious extreme to become jihadists is a far better way to advance human rights
I was in Yosemite last week and I learned a lot on California genocide committed by U.S. and California government backed Mariposa battalion. Comparing to U.S., I think China did terrible job doing genocide. The Xinjiang genocide would have became a non-issue just like California genocide if China did the same.
In Islamic country Turkiye, they prohibit Arabic letter sign in public area, if found they destroy it more strictly than China gov did in Xinjiang, even theres still Uyghur 'Arabic' letter printing in Reminbi bank note since decades ago
That is patently false guys. Since you can verify it no explanation is needed. Simple example: The Quran is printed in Arabic in Turkey. And Arabic is thought freely.
Arabic is not prohibited in any place in Türkiye. We used to use Arabic letters more than 1000 years. I hope we turn back to it soon. Because Latin letters are not suitable for us.
@@Khosann1 i said Arabic letters in public area not in Quran, in Turkiye Arabic sign in public area are banned In China has more freedom, theres let Uyghur 'Arabic' letter in Quran, also Uyghur 'Arabic' sign in their shop even in airports, trainstation, etc
Kim Iversen has talked about wahabi - extreme Islam that is behind IS from Saudi Arabia - infuence. I'm not saying that China is going about fighting this the best way, but maybe that's what is behind the tension?
It's definitely part of the reason yes. What happened there is not as good as China described, but certainly not as bad as it appeared in the media. It all comes from the correlation to the failed ethnic policy in China with the premise that the failed policy itself couldn't be modified due to governing inertia.
I really enjoyed the video! Thank you for sharing your perspective! However, I think the fundamental question here is to what extent the state has the right to enforce its control over people who don't want it. It's understandable that some see this as an integral territory, but many living there disagree. Can they truly be "taught" to alter their views on the state?
The real question is how do you define and from what stance can you define "who don't want it"? according to some narratives by western mainstream media? or are you willing to go to talk to local people by yourself and see with you own eyes? BTW, Xinjiang's never been a place only for Uyghur Chinese (44.96%), instead, it is also the homeland for Han Chinese (42.24% living there from ancient time) and other ethnic groups (12%, including Kazakhs, Mongols, etc.).
@@WeiLyu-lw2krI think OP is trying to refer to the reeducation camps; can the Chinese government install people in those facilities if they don't want to as a protective measure, even if they have never commited a crime? In my opinion, that should not be allowed. Not in China, but also not in the US or any other country. Someone has to be guilty to be put in a correctional facility
@@josha136 I agree with your idea that no one should be put into any correctional facility if he/she doesn't commit a crime. However, the reeducation camp is not a correctional facility as a punishment for guilt. Instead, it's a necessary measure to save those people who are brainwashed by extreme religious propaganda. These are just ordinary less educated people, farmers, street vendors, house wives, but they are one step closer to becoming another extremist if the government just let them go. Any responsible government should take measures to save them from doing harm to society and themselves.
Even if taken through a chinese narrative, the fact is that in the present days the Han have quickly populated the province and at the end of the day forcely assimilate the Uyghur. In the past, like said, those regions were not forced to adjust culturally. In the past, they were more like vassals. Being under an empire's sphere of influence doesn't give the right to assimilate. I'm from Europe, I wouldnt' let americans decide our first language taught in school should be english, neither which history class I should take !
Thank you so much for offering non-Chinese English speakers your special in-depth vision of China. If ever our different cultures are to survive on an increasingly smaller planet, we must understand each other, for naturally, without understanding, there will be no cooperation. It is my sincere hope that such cooperation could lead to peace and prosperity for everyone in multi-polar world. I am shocked daily by the arrogance of the Western press freely spewing Asian hate in a quagmire of clichés. Laws against provoking hate are only enforced in a very discretionary manner closely in line with the official narrative. The ignorant rage continues as temperatures rise. US citizens for the most part have no knowledge of China's history. Comments by even high-ranking officials display a dearth of knowledge that is inexcusable for officials of such high rank. Worse yet, they don't even want to know anything more about China than the bargains they can pick up at Wal-Mart. They pay for them with funds provided by public welfare assistance and complain that China produces everything before going back home to wallow in an opiate-induced haze promoted by their captains of industry. All of this has been expressly created by an elite of cynical leaders who continue to fan the flames of media hatred that leads the drunken chauvinist to bite the hand that feeds him. Fortunately, time is running out for that game. We'll see what Uncle Sam does with the thousands of homeless when bankruptcy comes knocking at the Federal Reserve's door. Those in the US concerned about the Uyghurs would best review their own private prison system before criticising China. Operated for profit, it reinforces inequality and injustice by design. hir.harvard.edu/us-uk-prison-privatization/ time.com/5405158/the-true-history-of-americas-private-prison-industry/ onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/spol.12766 Keep up the good work!
Difference is there's no pressure to prevent speaking Uyghur at home. The Philippines and much of Africa is similar in that schools universally teach in English but leave home tongue untouched, creating a population that ends up largely bilingual and famously expressive.
@@doujinflip You obviously have never traveled to XingJiang. Uyghur language is everywhere, at shop front and on street. Uyghurs typically speak Uyghur language to other Uyghurs like how Cantoneses speak to each other but speak Mandarin to Chineses from other ethnics background.
8:10 Halal food is understandable, but if you put halal buses and etc is plain religious hypocrisy. Even Muslim majority countries frown upon religious hypocrisy.
Waw great way to show your ignorance, Machiavelli was not evil or bad, he wrote about how to govern with pragmatism but never was machiavellic himself.
Absolutely. I find it interesting that Siming is jumping straight to Machiavelli for inspiration and in the process is overlooking very different viewpoints from Chinese political philosophy. 孟子 (Mencius) advocated for light-handed governance, believing that a ruler must first justify his position by acting benevolently to all his subjects before he can expect reciprocation from them. Of course Confucianism supports hierarchy, but 孟子 believed that while a ruler is above a commoner, he is actually subordinate to the masses - and therefore it is morally right for a population to dissent against a ruler when they believe they are being treated unfairly. I'd be interested to to hear what Siming's views would be on the Xinijang separatism movement (and the PRC's response to it) if she viewed it through a Confucian lens, not a Machiavellian one.
I have been looking forward to another video from you. I like to approach propositions as a devil's advocate so you have given me much to think about. Is it time for a Chinese federation so differences can be preserved and even tolerated in a regulated way? I am also in awe of your grasp of English. It certainly does not sound like your subsequent language. It is so good I am uncomfortable even mentioning it.
I highly doubt it, but I do hope that there can be other better ways at handling differences in opinions and ideas then heavy handed means. Why I highly doubt a federation would work is because stability and unity is one of the top few concerns of leaders in China. Those two values come above any forms of freedom and liberty.
@@skydragon23101979 At considerable cost to the citizens, they don't seem to realise stability and unity can best be achieved by "freedom and liberty" (the same thing). At what stage do they ask: how best can we serve our citizens-it should be about the citizens, not about those in power.
@@listohan Why do you see stability and unity as equals to freedom and liberty? It is almost always at odds. That’s because to ensure stability you need strict rules for a densely populated country and unity means that you need a collective mindset and obey rules that you can only have very limited liberty and freedom within those framework
Decades ago, the socialist-paradise-to-be Singapore adopted many of the strong-handed, "dictatorial" policies that the Chinese have used for decades - to great effect and with magnificent results. Under the benevolent dictatorship of Lee Kwan Yew, Singapore rapidly progressed from a 3rd-world backwater into a 1st-world country. Singapore is now the peak of civilization. While quite a few of Mao's policies were generally dictatorial and not always benevolent, one can argue that many of his policies benefited the populace more than the policies of the KMT (GMD) had. But one can hardly argue with China's fruitful development policies over the past 2-3 decades, including its policies in Xinjiang. The welcoming assimilation of the Uighurs and other ethic groups into the fold of "China," while allowing them to retain their culture and while promoting higher standards of living for all, is truly commendable.
I have just subscribed to your channel. "very refreshing" is the short comment I shall give. I am pro-China and not ashamed to admit it. But I do feel embarrassed when I see CGTN when they harped the party line once too often. I do hope there are more open minded discussions on the internet. It is used too much by people with agenda, that becomes an abuse. The world has never been balck and white, we just need to be smart enough to read thru it. Thank you Siming
Excellent. Your take is very similar to mine. 1 - it's a separatist issue. Not an ethnic one, and not a religious one, unless when these elements are being used in order to push a separatist agenda. 2 - there's no "genocide", "concentration camps" or "oppression". This is absurd. Uyghur people are not being denied their language, customs or religion. I would argue the other way around, these are being promoted, but within a framework of a culture within a culture, that reassess their belonging to a multicultural, multinational China. This is how my Uyghur friends identify themselves. And unlike other minorities in the world, in China minorities have all kinds of benefits and usually live better lives than the ordinary han (minus the occasional discrimination from other people, of course, but the Chinese government is trying to curb that). 3 - obviously, "reeducation" is an euphemism for "correction" here. While it's very likely that abuses may have happened (and these must be investigated), it's also very clear that the intent here is to identify and counter elements that promote a separatist mentality, NOT to erase cultural aspects per se. The Chinese are smart enough to understand that oppressing cultural identities would only lose support from those that see themselves as both Muslim Uyghurs and Chinese at the same time. Which are the majority of people living there now (and who are not being taken to any facility whatsoever). 4 - the chinese and East Turkestan positions are irreconcilable. China would be criticized by the diaspora one way or another. Having that in mind, even tho it may have seen heavy handed at times, I feel the policy was "necessary" to curb a separatist threat that was getting out of control (considering the Urumqi riots in 2009 and the train station attack in 2014, for example). 5 - as a foreigner with no horses in this race, I can also understand and feel sympathetic to the point of view from the East Turkestan crowd. Honestly. But from my personal experience with the Uyghurs in Xinjiang for many years, China's approach has been very successful. Period. I know people may be unhappy to hear this, but the separatist mindset has been reduced to a very small minority within the Uyghurs in China nowadays. This position may continue to grow out of China, but I feel it is, at this point, a futile endeavour.
This is the most objective comment in this comment section. Separatism and evil forces will never win. They may continue on but they'll never win, be it for the 100 years or 1000 to come or more. Carry on 😏😏
I am pretty sure that you are one of them: Wei’s mother knew of her son’s side hustle and encouraged him to continue because it could lead to a future job in the Chinese government.
Young ,callow woman .... You should visit Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan to understand Xinjiang problems. You would then comprehend big picture, which you lack now.
Hi Siming! Hope you are doing fine... What is your take on the complicit "genocide" of the Palestians in Gaza by the US government, in comparison with the "genocide" in Xinjiang?
If you enjoyed this video, check out the additional episode where I shared what inspired me to discuss Xinjiang and my other thoughts on this political dilemma:
Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/33wmMQ5pA1uOofRpoPYYyI (Just search 'My Xinjiang Problem')
Essay version: 'My Xinjiang Problem' - siminglan.home.blog/2023/08/05/my-xinjiang-problem/
Dear Siming ... you didn't mention who're the manufacturers of Halal utensils and toiletries (Han or Uyghur) ?
Was it the provincial government or Central government that ordered the Muslim-only/Uyghur only public regulation ?
Have you read xingjiang police files? Google it if you have not.
China has been a unified state far longer thean the nation states of europe & the territory has been part of China for more than a 1,000 years. CaptainCool07 was right.
The comment you loved was your own one!☺️
I think it's quite telling that you cite Machiavelli as an authority on good governance. Unfortunately, doing so reinforces every negative stereotype of Chinese people in terms of dishonesty and manipulation. I find it hard to admire that type of "cunning" and think the disinfectant of truth is a virtue that is inherent in genuinely good governance.
Thanks! For the new video 📹. It's been a while.
Hello, your channel is a must. I lived 10 years in China and now back in France, I try to fight the many misinformations about your country. I wrote a series of articles about it on my blog and I share a lot of views with you. Thank you.
Thank you for your contributions in informing the world. I must, however, say that the mainstream media of the west is not "misinformed" in a literal sense; the western media benefits from displaying foul information about China (political, financial, or popular favors).
@@the-programing Well, I don't think they make much effort to correct that. Even correspondents seems to write their papers on a sofa.
@@ob2862thank u for the effort,love from china❤
wow, 10 years is a long time for ccp to brainwash your mind
You are not Muslim and trying to defend the government that is directly attacking their faith
9:45 that's one of way to suppress faith
You're understanding of Uyghur history doesn't include critical facts like non-Uyghur ethnics ALREADY residing as the majority in Xinjiang BEFORE the Uyghurs existed there. Hans and Mongols were resident in large numbers over a thousand years before them. During the late Tang Dynasty, the Turkic ancestors of the present day Uyghurs migrated from both Central Asia, Dyungaria and Mongolia which resulted in the ethnic mix of what we today call the "Uyghurs".
I wouldn't call 3% of the han population of Xinjiang in 30-s a "large number". And if we are going to talk about the "thousand years" deep in the history than chinese will have to give their territory to the mongols.
the han you are talking about is already mixed with mongols, manchuria and a lot of other ethnicity.
@@LalaLa-ze7kv The Mongols, as a member of China, owns Chinese land, just like the rest of the 55 ethnic groups, so how can we talk about "giving it back" to them?
твоя территория за твоей - ,,Стеной"Ферштейн ?! а басни кпк пиши для себя и др. китайцм ши ми дур шима?
@@qdhfhwiwiir1:09 y
The "two narrative" or "two different views of history" summary suggest that Xinjiang is a "Chinese vs Uyghur" problem - which happens to fall in line with the Washington Consensus. I would argue, Xinjiang is a "US vs China" problem :
For the past two decades (from 2001), the Washington-led western powers, have been on one massive Holy War against Islam and Muslims. In those 20 years, Islamophobia, allegations of Islamic terrorists and terrorism were our daily bread, daily diet with supercharged steroids. Then, without warning, the same western powers suddenly became "Defenders of the Islamic Faith" - BUT only for Xinjiang's Uyghur muslims. How strange is that!
Christian nations (that massacred 2 million Muslims over two decades) accused Beijing of persecuting Xinjiang Uyghur Muslims. Meanwhile, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (57 Muslim or Muslim-majority countries), having carried out their own fact-finding missions in Xinjiang, defended Beijing's handling of Muslim Uyghurs.
It'd have been good if these verifiable factual points were at least mentioned in this video.
This would probably be an extremely long topic to cover thoroughly. But one of the things that should be mentioned is what China does to address radicalism, such as giving people legal education to let them know the rights they are entitled to and their obligations as citizens, so that people have a legal recourse instead of resorting to violence.
Secondly, teaching the common tongue and vocational skills of their choice to increase employability. People who live a productive and fulfilling life are generally going to be less discontent so you won't have a fertile breeding ground for terrorism bc people are destitute with nothing better to do with their lives. So literally giving people a good life decreases the recruitment pool for extremists.
Thirdly, literally just teach them about the consequences of extremism and how it affects the people around them and who it harms. Like how their actions affect their families and why extremism is wrong. It's a remarkably simple thing but somehow these radicals don't really think through their actions, so making them conscious of their choices is critical.
And the reason why I know all of this is of course bc I'm a Wumao. Just kidding. Politics is like drugs, not even once, or you get lost in it. There is also stuff America/West does to promote terrorism against their enemies/competitors (funding, arming, and training terrorists) to encourage separatism. Global politics is dark.
Btw, Mao was exactly right. I don't know why anyone thinks it is a good idea to give malicious elements the power to undermine, disrupt, distort, decay, and destroy normal society. Bringing harm to your own civilization, hurting countless innocents just to signal your own moral superiority? That is ridiculous.
Amazing comment that provides feedback and another point of view.
@anglohan5428 We in Hong Kong are already free, thank you, but I appreciate your truly genuine concern for our welfare (cough).
The problem is not teaching the common tongue but suppressing the Ughyrus tongue. Like what Sinming mentioned it’s also about political identity whether a liberation or independence movement is considered terrorism.
@@skydragon23101979 The Uyghur tongue is not suppressed. Children are taught in their mother tongue for the first few years of school. The signs are in Uyghur, the Uyghur language is even printed on their currency.
I guess maybe you don't have context, but for me English is not my first language, however in school our lessons were in english and teachers would tell students to talk in english. So for me it's not hard to understand why teachers in China would do something similar for what is believed to be an essential skill.
If you've ever taken an elective language, it's the same thing, the teacher will try to get you to communicate in the said language. But don't confuse that as "suppressing the Uyghurs tongue".
There is a lot of other stuff to consider as well including all the stuff China does to ensure equal opportunities for ethnic minorities in education, employment and other areas. But besides that, China also does not allow hate speech, so it does actively censor hate speech against Uyghurs, or Muslims. The West celebrates burning the Quran as "Free Speech" but anyone with a brain knows that is hate speech and you would go to jail in China for doing something like that.
Imagine if America did a sliver of what China does to protect the rights of minorities and to protect their culture and heritage. Westerners/Americans want to criticise China but they'd be better served reflecting on their own atrocious human rights record first.
Thanks; that was a very enlightening explanation!
thank you!!❤️
Very well presented. Situations like this are always more complicated than politically-motivated critics make them out to be. As a religious person, I can partly understand the Chinese government position. They don't want people mixing religion with politics, and then using their religion as an excuse to foment rebellion.
I strongly believe in the separation of religion and state. True religion should be about moral improvement, so that a person lives by godly principles, and not selfish motives. It has nothing to do with setting up a kingdom on this earth. In fact, religious kingdoms on this earth tend to be very oppresive. Consider the persecutions in the middle ages of Europe, under the Catholic domination, for example.
But many religions, such as Islam, Catholicism, and even some Protestant groups, seem to have the idea that God wants to rule the world through them. This can put them directly in conflict with civil rulers.
@anglohan5428But yeah, of course it’s not absolutely the same.
@anglohan5428 is this a bot?
@anglohan5428 a free HK is not economically viable. This was the whole reason the Brits returned it to China. They didn't have to. Not all of HK was on a 99 year lease. Britain held HK island in perpetuity. But if China decided to stop trading with HK, what were the people there going to do? It only exists to provided services to China. There is no other economic activity.
Totally agree with this. There no need to immediately sympathise with people when they want ‘ independence’, even though you want to respect human rights. Some separatist movements won’t bring more prosperity and individual freedoms to the people. And trying to stop the spread of separatist has 2 means, political educations and economic integration, and war when actual extreme Islamic state is formed. A lot of those separatists were trained by the jihadist and sent back to Xinjiang
China try prevent another Libya or Syria, where Terrorists funded by CIA in Syria start trying to spread their influence into China. Uniquely...in Muslim countries, like Indonesia, they really do cultural Genocide of Chinese, even many real genocide take place in Indonesian history.Do you ever heard Western media saying this?
Like many people, one easy mistake to make is to talk as if Xinjiang has only Uyghurs. Xinjiang's population is very diverse with Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Hans, Kyrgyzs, Huis, Pamiris, Tajiks, Mongolians, Russians, Tibetans, Sibe, etc. China wants to safeguard the rights of each group. If the militant Uyghurs had their way, they would impose their fundamentalist Islamic lifestyle on all. Diversity would be stamped out as we see in other places ruled by Islamic fundamentalists. In fact, the ordinary Uyghur does not want that. They are by nature not fundamentalist in their religion and are tolerant.
Unity and stability is the most priority of any nation.
@@hyc1266никогда не будет Единства между всеядными безбожниками и уйгурами-мусульманами...это наше стальное Кредо...АМИИИНЬ..
I agree. There is no acceptable place for fundamentalism anywhere. And propper Muslims would agree with that. We have to respect our nieghbors and live peacefully. And the militant fundamentalists are an issue to society. They cant be given special treatment because of their religion. If they are creating political unrest instability and divisiveness then the government needs to do something about that. Anyone committing crimes should be jailed. I dont believe that China is oppressing the Uighur people. I think that there are groups of separatist extremists that the Chinese government is suppressing.
I think there is plenty of evidence showing the Uygur activists/terrorists had associations with Al Qaeds, ISIS and others, trained by US and Saudi Arabia.
Good video with a fresh perspective. Thanks!
This has been one of the best explanations of the Uyghur situation and definitely more valuable than most of the videos on the subject. The only thing I find weird about the situation is that in the United States is that people on the right will constantly blame China for persecuting against Uyghur Muslims in China.
I am not saying that China is entirely innocent, but what I am saying is that the people that speak out in support of Uyghur Muslims would otherwise be anti Muslims in other circumstances. People who would otherwise be Islamaphobic are all of the sudden in support of the Uyghur Muslims when they can blame China for something once again.
I am not in agreement with most, if not all of China's decisions, but some in the west (not all) are so anti China that they seemingly look for excuses to blame China for things.
Well, as they say, the west hates Muslims and they hate the Chinese. But for some reason, they are so concerned about Chinese Muslims. They recently tried it with the Hui, but that plan went south.
I don't get the sense that the majority of the right is anti muslim, nor do I get the sense that the right is the only group criticizing china about this issue. However you could say that people on the right were the first to bring this up.
It's not just the "right".
@@jamirajamira7303 yes, it's actually usually the "left" that uses issues like Xinjiang to criticize China, the 'right' usually just come out and say we don't like China because they're a threat to us.
You are right, and I agree. The US and China are in the cold war started by the US, obviously. CIA's role is to dis-stabilize the enemy's internal affairs. A playbook of the CIA for decades, if not a century, under a different named.
America's ideal is a democracy, but democracy is not stable and needs a lot of marketing effort using Hollywood and changing history books like slave practice. The final judgment is prosperity for all people has to be there.
In the practical matter, once a country is in democracy. There will be more than two opinions to run a country, two parties, and two financial backing on two ideologies. When there are two, the CIA can support one against the other as the sponsored Party becomes the US puppet. That is how the US stays on the top in a rough draft at the national level.
So the US evening news only broadcasts the bad of China, not the good of China; even this News network has freedom of the press. But they are not accessible realistically because they want to be profitable. They have to bias to get an audience. So far, China is less to do that, but it will increase the polarization between the two people. Each tries to market their system as a better one for their people. That would make sense to me. How often will you tell your wife or girlfriend that you are bad? After all, you can't have too much disagreement for a country to advance, especially in a cold war.
So those Muslim attacks in China are good for the US, and those attacks in the US are bad from an American point of view. A blatant double standard is, by the way, a widespread human behavior.
You are a brave young lady who dares to tilt at a giant windmill, as I'm sure that all the China haters can't be moved or have the tolerance to follow your narrative.
People are often set in their thinking. It is not the people in the West that she needs to be afraid of saying the things she says. How long will she be able to travel by not repeating the party line? How many work opportunities will disappear for her and her family? If she becomes influential enough, she will just disappear.
@@deanthroop8054 You mean if she makes trouble for the law and the authority to a sufficient degree then she should be in trouble? I agree. It's for certain in any country or a small town when you challenge their local law or ethical rules that you dislike.
@@bin.s.s. just so you are aware. In the West, saying the government is doing something wrong or unethical is not grounds for punishment.
@@deanthroop8054 I feel sad for it, but what you mentioned is true
@@deanthroop8054 Understandable. In some regions marital infidelity or blasphemy against God/Allah could be heinous crime.
As some videos of this channel well explained, you may take the strong sense of unity as a big family (political stability) as that kind of a collective code in many areas in China. As you may not be aware, criticizing the government for their mistakes or corruption is quite a norm in every aspect of China, e.g., things like inconvenient transportation, soaring prices, scandals, etc. You are only supposed not to kick over the table, challenge the system and break the collective code.
I have friends from both the Palestinian occupied territories and from Xingjiang - China is using the Israeli playbook, but they are very smart to do it in a very "clean way" compared to Israel
Care to elaborate?
because china really really isolated their country and internet
Appreciate this content. You brought up a lot of things few in the West know. Thank you for your effort and exposing yourself to gte negative side of the Internet. Positive thoughts for you and your family.
Thanks for offering this perspective and very brave to cover this topic. Keep up!
There's actually more than this.
Most of Uyghur diasporas are exiled community who would never set their foot in their homeland anymore. Even their children will never see Xinjiang for the rest of their life due to their ancestors did something bad that Chinese govt considered as subversion motive.
That's why the such the blue flag white crescent movement only loud in western countries.
One of them is Rebiya Kadeer, one of founders of World Uyghur Congress (WUC).
Based in Munich, this so called diaspora community was reported instigating the migrant Uyghurs and Han Chinese riot in a toy factory in Shaoguan, Guangdong, June 2009.
This 'small' friction would later sparked bigger to the horrendous riot in Urumqi, July 2009.
The WUC was behind this by orchestrating group of people in separate parts of Urumqi to do vandaIism act.
Most of the victims were Han people, but western media twisted the f a ct told that the Uyghurs suffered the most as if it was a gen0cide toward the Uyghurs.
Well, I have collected myself the RAW video of that bIoody riot since 4 years ago in my personal GDrive.
But p a ste a Iink here would be considered as s p am.
The same as the rohingya people in miyanmar.
1) The Xinjiang region was either conquered by different Chinese or non-Chinese empires, or occupied by a bunch of independent city states during its history. The Chinese have only established episodic control from time to time.
2) "Zhong hua min zu" (the umbrella term for the Chinese nation composed of various ethnicity) is a social construct created more than 100 years ago. All these ethnic groups were unified under the Qing and other previous Chinese empires before.
3) A nation state is a modern concept. The question is for a region and their occupants who were ruled by different empires, do they have a say on what they want? Do we just transfer their colonial citizenship to the nation state citizenship?
4) China was an empire. Similar to her western counterparts, the Chinese conquered and occupied other peoples' lands, and other people conquered and occupied her land. This was how the east and west civilizations developed. We need to understand that it was the way to do business back in the day. The danger is to use modern standards to gain victim righteousness. It was the century of humiliation for the Chinese, and in the same vein, it was the millennium of humiliation for the Vietnamese becoz of Chinese occupation.
That said, Zhong Guo, or the term of the Middle Kingdom was used many many centuries ago, I think since the Han Dynasty, firstly brought by the Han Wu Emperor, the difference is ancient Chinese phrased it as dynasty, instead of nation.
..именно время- от- времени устанавливали(3-4)раза устанавливали частичный контроль над Уйгурией...и это сейчас закат желтой безбожной империи...агония кпк продолжается☝️😡
#4 stands out to me. From outside, the stuff about Xinjiang, Tibet and Taiwan look like an empire trying to hang onto its colonies. Meanwhile, I live in a former British colony, where the vast majority of the colonies have won self-rule and had independence recognised by the head country. It still tries to manipulate affairs, but there's no direct control. The whole thing is a recognition of the belief the independence movements had that it wasn't right for their lands to be in the empire. People grow up in these countries without the belief that the old empire has a right to exist.
In China, people seem to take a different view.
In the end, rights belong to people, and the rights of states only exist where they protect the rights of people. Self-determination and territorial integrity sometimes compete.
So I wonder what's best for the people in this situation. When should an empire keep a territory and when should it lose it?
@@Deschutron I don't know. You need a consensus from the state and the people to get to independence. Some fortunate groups could continue their movement openly, like Quebec, Scotland and Greenland. Others are banned or outright denied like Catalonia. It takes two to tango. I guest people just need to do whatever they can do safely and wait for things falling into place.
@@storage4539 I was wondering how to determine the right moral position. Like, for example, if Spain blocks every possible way for the people of Catalonia to let the world know if they want to be an independent country, should the rest of the world then pressure Spain into allowing them a pathway into independence? Does the rest of the world have a duty to investigate the true will of the Catalonians? Or to discover why they might not want to live in Spain, so the issue can be addressed? Does the rest of Spain need Catalonia so badly that it would be a net negative for Catalonia to be freed?
What if the easiest way to free Catalonia was to send arms to Andorra but Andorra has been meaning to attack Spain and control its affairs for a while now?
Been waiting for a new video for ages. And finally it is here.
Screw it, we don’t need to be apologetic or defend Chinas policies. All people have to do is take a look at the differences in quality of life between Uyghurs vs black Americans vs Palestinians and it’s easy to see who is really committing genocide.
Aren't Palestinians an analogue of the Uyghurs? China/Israel is just settling in the place to take its old land back. Some of the locals resist and the government takes special measures to overcome that.
This is the real answer.
@@DeschutronChina doesn’t bomb Uyghurs or lock them in overcrowded strips of land.
@@Deschutronyes but Israel is definitely not trying to improve the lives of the Palestinian arabs. Its contrast is significant.
edit: Otherwise i would argue 3000 years vs 100 years is a big difference.
@@leonc4653 Where have you heard China is trying to improve the lives of Uyghur people?
I appreciate your analysis, and you present the Uyghur nationalist narrative fairly and without a negative bias. But you imply that the PRC has been consistent in its treatment of Xinjiang, not only since 1949, but with centuries or millennia of tradition before. In fact, the policy of Sinicization of Uyghurs is a very recent, unprecedented development. When I first visited Xinjiang in the 1980s, there was a lot more accommodation of Muslim cultural identity, religious practice and language use, and the establishment of the correctional camps (an apt term, as you might know that in the US, prisons are called "correctional facilities"), the removal of the most non-Chinese architectural features of mosques (not to speak of the destruction of some mosques altogether) goes far outside the pluralistic "autonomous region" model initially set up by the PRC. There is a fundamental contradiction between the concept of "autonomy" 自治 and what you call "loyalty to the Chinese." Also, when you put "heavy-handedness" in quotation marks, you are signaling that China is in fact not being heavy handed, while on the other hand, your quotation from Machiavelli at the end justifies the use of brutality in the maintenance of social order. Rather than quote Machiavelli, you might quote Confucius or Mencius, where they point out that virtuous rule naturally leads to people being happy to live in a place, and even to move there from neighboring states suffering from despotism.
To normalise kids in prison orphanage and forced sterilisation and erase most aspects of culture and religion is very close to genocide.
always nice to see debating voices
@nickrao6891 Yeah, i got a feeling that no one's is debating on this channel. It gives the wrong impressions.
Do you know that the Uyghurs language is printed on every single Chinese yuan dollar bills and on all public signs in XinJiang? I bet most people don't know because they can't read Chinese nor Uyghurs. Only foolish people who can't read Chinese nor Uyghurs will believe the lies about Uyghus being oppressed in China.
If one is going to quote Machiavelli, they would better honor him by quoting from his Discourses on Livy and note that he was a true republican. He was also a realist, yet the Prince was written for the conditions that prevailed at that particular time and he was trying to persuade particular rulers at that time to hire him. He would be embarrassed that people thought that work was ever meant to be applied universally. He would be appalled by how his real magnum opus has been ignored.
Great video, once again! A video like this can really help those outside of the issue to see a more comprehensive view to what is clearly a very complicated situation. Having lived in China for a few years, I often struggled with my feelings/opinions over certain issues and pieces of culture so foreign to my own -- this topic being one of them. In most cases, I discovered a vast majority of these topics are extremely complicated, way more so than I originally presumed. Thank you for exploring your thoughts on this issue, it's truly food-for-thought for both those who have strong ties to China and for those who have no ties, yet only hear one narrative. Thanks for taking the time to welcome us to the table and for putting in the effort to make such videos.
What no Taiwan LOL
U.S. OUT OF NORTH AMERICA!!!
@@davidchou1675 U.S out of the world. Our world will have NO PEACE unless U.S. is "down" or gone.
Always saying "it's complicated" (!) is only a way for hiding atrocities committed by the Cinese governement
hot take: genocide is bad.
Why do people think Xnjian is such a complex topic. It's not. Genocide is bad. The nuance is just noise.
It's also genocide !! @@dariang4725
Thank you for your research and sharing your point of view. I really enjoy it. :)
Thank you for another thought-provoking video. You are providing me with numerous examples of "How the News Makes Us Dumb" (an excellent book, BTW) about China. One of the antidotes to "the news" is in-depth analysis of current issues, and you have given us a strong dose.
Hopefully after the in-depth knowledge, one can reach their own conclusion that this is a government that will by no way change its way of dealing with its people, whether they are terrorists, separatists, Uyghur, or any "common people" with different opinions.
And that is a fact.
Hope everyone at least keeps that in mind when carefully viewing biased news. For the benifit of Chinese people.
Speaking from a Chinese that has seen way too much suffering, brutal, unjust, caused by the unfettered power.
You are right to point out at the outset that this situation is not an example of genocide, nor is it comprable to The Holocaust. As a Westerner from the US, I see a great deal of hypocrisy in the relentless condemnations of Chines policies in Xianjing. While I don't condone those policies, they are far from being historically unusual and that includes recent history of the US and European powers. There's no comparison between the utter disregard for the lives of innocent Iraqis in the 2010s, for example, and this. I could add Libyans, Syrians, Afghans (many who helped the US forces yet now face possible deportation and lack asylum with a path to citizenship). Now the US gov't has decided to simultaneously fight a proxy war against Russia and prepare for war over Taiwan-- a quasi-autonomous part of 'one China' with no US embassies, no seat at the UN and no recognition as a sovereign nation-state by any but 5 marginal states (e.g. Beliz,Haiti, Guatemala and Vatican City). Nevertheless, Biden says if CCP decided to use military means to directly control Taiwan, then it would be "the equivalent of Ukraine, or maybe worse, and we'd put boots on the ground." A country like mine, with at least 800 military bases around the world, and which has known not even one full year of peace in this century, and which has engaged in "nation building" and attempts to alter culture in various parts of the world (e.g. Afghanistan) with terrible results, should examine its own record before stridently denouncing China's approach to regions it has long claimed as part of itself.
This does not mean that I personally agree with the "heavy-handed" approach. But it's not a Hitlerian scenario, and in fact, as geopolitics go, not terribly unusual. This is NOT like the ethnic cleansing that occurred in the Balkans in the 90s; it's NOT like Nazi's "Final Solution" and Camps; and it isn't even half as bad as the many overthrows of actual sovereign nation state by outright war (Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan) or CIA-backed coups (Pinochet in Chile, Argentina (elected Pres. Isobel Peron's gov't), and many others. Is this "whataboutism?" If that means an instance of hypocrisy, of the pot calling the kettle black, then I guess so. It's worth stressing that right now the US admin considers itself to be the sole legitimate leader of the "international rules based order." The rules it imposes on others do not appear to be binding on the US itself.
I love the US and the freedoms we still have here at the domestic level (even though these have come under attack by extremists on the Right here). I have also studied Chinese history and culture, and as a College Instructor, I've gotten to know several of the Chinese students (i.e. Chinese nationals or recent immigrants studying here). I think peaceful coexistence is not only possible but necessary to global stability and sustainability in the 21st C and beyond. I recommend renowned economist, Keyu Jin's book, The New China Playbook. She's from China but was educated in the US for High School and College and now teaches at the London School of Economics. Worth a look. Most people here just reflexively vilify all things Chinese with little or no background knowledge due to the constant onslaught of fear mongering propaganda that began around 2015. Interesting to hear your thoughts. Much respect. Thanks.
Agreed. I was in Yosemite last week and I was so disturbed upon learning the California genocide committed by U.S. and California government backed Mariposa battalion. Comparing the degree of genocide committed by the U.S., I think China did terrible job doing genocide just like children play. The Xinjiang genocide would have became a non-issue today just like California genocide if China did the same. Of course many countries may have moral grounds blaming what China did in Xinjiang but Anglo-Saxson nations are definitely not among them.
Indeed, I seem to recall quite a few years ago, couple or few states wanted to leave the Union and the Federal Government sent the army in and there was something called a civil war
Federal Government will only tolerate a certain amount of state independence and states rights.
Don't forget U.S. treats Hispanic immigrants like trash in their own detention centers.
The term concentration camp does not necessarily mean an extermination camp, it's just a place where people are placed there against their will without committing any actual crime. Which is what China did (and is still doing) with the Uyghur people. So, using this term is not wrong when talking about the situation about Uyghurs. Especially when they cannot leave such places in the first place.
@@martiddyyou are only talking about the literal meaning to the phrase "concentration camp" while this term carries so much more sentimental meaning in the majority of Western citizens because of the horrific history of Holocaust. To disregard that component is to force objectivity on an non objective topic.
0:18 Would I want my identity to be scrutinized by the state? If you don't like to be scrutinized by your own state, how about another state coming to your state to scrutinize it? BBC or CNN going around Xinjiang and making negative, nevermind false or not, documentary is already offensive. Would some Chinese media go to Northern Ireland and make a documentary about Irish independence or IRA? Or maybe a documentary about Guantanamo Bay?
Recently I saw someone summing up this "situation" very a simple and easy way to understand.
After "they" stirred terrorism in the region, bothered by the political and economical influence of China coming earlier than expected, "they" got mad that China avoided the Afghan Trap building schools and vocational programas e invested more in the region instead of simple sending in the People's Liberation Army, like the Soviets did in the 80's.
@anglohan5428 Sai do fake Rainha Elizabeth!
@anglohan5428 If you're gonna spew propaganda at least pronounce it right.
Ahuh and is this supposed to justify throwing people into prison for 15 years for reading the Qu’ran? People are acting like China is just rational actor when they’re going overkill for no good reason whatsoever. Yeah man all those 10s of thousands of diaspora who can’t see their families are totally just making it up for money or because they’re successionists.
Anglosaxons are very concern about muslims in the uygur región but they don’t care about muslims in Palestina, Syria, Irán, Libia, Líbano, etc,
我姐姐在新疆工作，她的上司就亲手把她丈夫送进再教育营了，因为在伊斯兰文化里女性地位非常低，她丈夫不上班还经常打她还要她辞职回家多生孩子，后来被逼急了找自己的朋友和同事把她丈夫送进去了。我姐姐说再教育营里好多人都是被自己家人送进去的，因为他们被恐怖分子洗脑让他们家里的钱都偷出去
all im seeing in the comment section is either, Chinese bots, Chinese nationalists, people that understand the situation but explaining it badly, and people who are just agreeing because 'the west has fallen'. what utter tripe
that's every china video for you
Great Machiavelli quote. Here is some Voltaire: " truly, whoever can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities "
Yeah like the long and still ongoing history of Western hypocrisy LOL
I know that when Western press found "eye witnesses" claiming to have seen public caning conducted at the public square in Singapore.
@user-ze3bd9ub9t. Similarly, "a tree is known by the fruit it bears". Seems like we are comment about the founder of a toxic faith.
Good quote. Now lets apply it. Which country has hegemony over most of the world and has been making people believe in absurdities for a long time now? As so many China commentators have pointed out: "the U.S. doesn't care about Muslims, and they don't care about the Chinese, but what they really care about are Chinese Muslims."
The Mao years are not so long ago and there was heavy handed denial of ethnic customs and language at the time.
Questions for Siming Lan,
1- Why do you never address any criticisms in your comment section?
2- When people point out the blind spots, obvious misdirection, and blatant omissions in your arguments, why do you not address them?
3- Not sure if you live in China, but intellectual honesty requires you to address the elephant in the room. How do you have access to YT without CCP blessings?
4- You hint at possible biases you might have for being Han Chinese, but you keep repeating CCP talking points, making long winded elaborate apologies for it by strawmaning any arguments against CCP mischief. Are you a new breed of better paid apologists and propagandist?
5- Why are you inconsistent in applying your moral stance? Uygur desire for preserving own culture is “medieval” but the Sinicization of non-Han population is somehow benign and “modern”. Not sure how you see minimizing CCP oppression and overplaying “the world is out to get us Chinese” as morally acceptable.
6- Why do you never address cognitive dissonances central to Chinese psyche? Chinese worship of modern materialism, but ignorance and abhorrence of modern values like freedom of choice, human rights, respect for cultural differences, openness of marketplace of ideas, support for robust debates among differing opinions. Like the Russians and Iranians, the Chinese elite park their wealth, educate their kids, buy houses for their mistresses in the “decadent” West, and common citizen would emulate that behaviour if they could. Is this fear and loathing of West a coping mechanism? A projection? Or just a means to save “face”?
The problem is that China forces these uyghur women to marry han chinese men and forces uyghir men to drink alcohol and eat pork during the holy month of ramadan which is strictly forbidden. Re-education would be fine if they let them practice their religion without trying to rebel against China. They should be allowed to love in their homes at the same time the uyghur people should not be involving themselves in protesting and politics.
If you’re ending with a quote from Machiavelli, you might need reevaluate what you’re really saying. The world isn’t what it once was. Nowadays cruelty reeks of weakness and insecurity, because it’s the measure that makes sense when you think nothing else will work.
Of course I stayed until the end. Very few TH-cam videos have the ability to moderate my views on a subject because very few are of this quality. You combine intelligence, depth, and a sense of balance with succinct and elegant presentation. Congratulations.
Hi Siming!
First of all, I want to say that I really admire your journey of self-development and the articulate way you’ve presented your experiences to us.
It must take a lot of resilience to move to a new country and to expose yourself, for the first time, to some new information that makes you see the nation you’ve grown up in in a different light. And in addition to this, I really admire the way you’ve gone back and searched for the “other side” to the story - the one that the western narrative often evades or simply doesn’t have time to talk about - in order to reconcile the warm, supportive China you grew up (and no doubt the one you experience while you’re there) with the much colder, antagonistic one you hear about in the west.
I understand and deeply share your desire to not be ashamed of who you are, to not feel lesser to people in the west, and to take pride in your family, your culture, and ultimately yourself.
I do, however, have some questions that I would be interested to hear your perspective on.
As a bit of background, I was born and raised in New Zealand. One half of my family are Māori (indigenous New Zealanders). The other half of my family are descended from British immigrants (the dominant group in NZ society today). I’m in my late-20s so I suspect not too different in age to yourself. I say all this because I think it is relevant - for the most part I’m interested in our internal politics, but my experience living in NZ obviously informs the way I see politics overseas.
Also, for much of the past four years, I have lived in Taiwan and studied 中文.
Your videos that address Xinjiang and Taiwan do a great job of adding to the conventional (one-sided) western narrative by presenting the Chinese government’s rationale for intervention in these regions - i.e. suppression of extremism and maintaining sovereignty/territorial integrity so as to not lose face amongst the Chinese public.
However, I feel like while you’ve done a great job at explaining the *rationale* of the Chinese government, you haven’t really provided much of a counter/critique to it.
Take, for instance, Xinjiang. As you’ve acknowledged, the issue faced by the separatists is that they’re under the rule of a government they never consented to ruling over them. And the issue faced by the government is terrorist attacks by said separatists (on civilians and said government).
And I think “consent” is the key word here. Fortunately, we’re at an age where consent is well-understood at the level of individuals. If a man were to try to force himself on a woman without consent, we would (correctly, I believe) tell him not to do so - the obvious solution to this issue is to simply ask the woman “do you want to be with this man?”, and if she doesn’t then most would agree that the man should back away, let the woman live her life, and not try to claim the woman as his own.
Of course, no one has asked the Uyghur people of Xinjiang if they consent to be paired with the Han-majority China, despite the desire of the latter. This could be easily achieved by having a free and fair referendum on independence for the region. However, this has not happened, and as such, this rule is not by consent. It seems clear to me, then, that the Chinese government is consequently the aggressor in this situation.
China may claim that they have the “right” to rule over Xinjiang due to some constitutional documents (that they wrote), but how ethical is resorting to this justification if the Uyghur people themselves did not choose to be in this position? To me, this seems akin to man claiming he has eternal right to a woman simply because he has over-powered her in the past (see the Dzungar-Qing wars) - something anyone in their right mind surely wouldn’t agree with.
ANYWAY, I guess the question I pose to you is twofold - 1) If you believe this analogy is an unfair way to conceptualise the situations in Xinjiang and Taiwan (noting that Taiwanese people *have* been polled and that they strongly oppose unification with China) - why are they different? And 2) If you can justify these contexts as different, how then does this result in greater justification of the actions taken by the Chinese government against these territories and their people?
Sorry for the long message, I just want to say I’m really impressed by your videos so far, and I support you fully on your personal journey!
I won't throw you a wall of text, but let me give you back your example, the consent,
So have the Uyghur people ever asked the other Chinese people for "consent"? Yes, not only Uyghur living in Xinjiang, ever think about it? It was a mixed region from the very beginning, and guess who was the first that settled there? Ruled there? Built the government there? Mate ,you will need to burn all the Chinese museums down.
Then Taiwan, did the KMT government, or its followers ask the other Chinese people for "consent" when they retreated there? Did they ask the Chinese? People for the "consent" of taking all the gold, silvers, and national treasures, robbing the people clean, when they were retreating to Taiwan?
Consent.............
Have you or your politicians or your journalist ever asked the Chinese people, the ORDINARY CHINESE PEOPLE! For consent when you were throwing tons upon tons of lies, misinfo and hatred campaigns against them?
Consent...sigh...
And I can simplify all your problems for you:
Have you ever reckon the Chinese people, are people too? No, you never.
@@CodeMeat 100% I have. I really respect and support Siming’s journey to take pride in her family, history, nation and identity as a Chinese person.
As I mentioned in my original comment, this is something close to my own heart, growing up facing all the stigma and bad press aimed at myself and my family (indirectly) as an indigenous person in New Zealand. I’ve personally gone through a very similar journey of self-acceptance (and taking pride in my history and who I am) so I find it inspiring seeing Chinese people stand up to the west in the same kind of way.
I really just have a couple of qualms around a couple of specific issues, and am interested in hearing her viewpoints on them.
美国德州可以独立嗎？夏威夷 可以独立嗎？美国南北戰爭是為何？
@@billyhsi397 I support self-determination.
If the people of Hawai'i or Texas want to be independent, then yes, USA should allow it.
What you just described sounds like a collective punishment, which is universaly condemned. Also it doesn't address the issue of forced labour...
If you look back, since 1949 government has been trying various policy over this region and make Uyghurs like han. Sometimes with softer way, sometimes in harder way. As host mentioned, it has to be “unified” identity and culture in the eye of government. But Uyghur has very strong connection to their root and culture, they are proud of their past. On top of that, Han and Uyghur culture are totally different in many ways. In short, all these agenda government has been pushing so hard recent years will be wasted. This kind of strict policy would only create more hate and isolation. It’s impossible to fully control the mind of people nowadays. For sure we are going to witness another wave of resistance in near future.
Thanks
That's so kind of you, thank you!!❤️
Siming we have been missing you for a long time. Welcome back. 👍👍👍
I also missed talking to you guys too. It's good to be back! 😊
A study about the number of juvenile girl child marrying adult men before and after the reeducation would illustrate how effective the camps were.
Thank you for explaining this in a very clear and precise manner. Also, no country can stand by and allow someone to commit terrorist acts against their people. America is a prime example of this we would not stand for it in our country we cannot expect less of another country.
They're already free, thank you very much -- free from Western color revolutions.
You're right.But your gov't are promoting hates and creating war around the world.
During the Republic of China period, 9 out of 10 Chinese people, or even more, were slaves from generation to generation, oppressed by millions of warlords, landlords, and evil gentry, who were cruel and anti human generations, almost never able to turn over, without food or clothing.
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army led by Mao Zedong launched a magnificent Chinese People's Democratic Revolution for the liberation of humanity, fighting against the very few anti human slave oppressive organizations that oppressed the slave people. In the end, they defeated the government of the Republic of China, allowing the Chinese people, who accounted for one fourth of the world's population, including the people of Xinjiang and Tibet, to turn around and completely liberate themselves. This human right alone is unprecedented in human history. He saved the human rights of the entire Chinese people and completely changed their fate of being enslaved and oppressed for generations.
And, on the other hand, wholeheartedly serving the people, and even providing free medical insurance, free housing, and free education for all, The Chinese people are no longer the slaves and oppressed objects of the Republic of China and previous generations, but the service objects of the Chinese government and the CPC. Everyone is equal and the people are united.
This is also the main reason why, in Mao Zedong's words, billions of Chinese people are willing to go through fire and water for him.
The United States is shouting about democracy and human rights, but what it does behind its back is anti human rights and anti democracy. The disasters they have caused to humanity, including the American people, are countless.
bro they are litterally genociding them
@@watchonjar US is genocide them by sanction products produced by them, not China. US is trying to make their life hard while China provides happy life for them for hundreds of years. US is bombing them in Middle-East.
Miss Lan, as a non-Chinese who has taken an interest in Chinese history and also this subject, please allow me to say that I very largely agree with your assessment, but I think I can add something further enlightening. During the Han Dynasty, the Chinese (who were sedentary farmers) were repeatedly raided, murdered, robbed, raped, etc. by the nomadic Xiongnu, who occupied the territory which is now Xinjiang. This continued for hundreds of years. After trying to appease the Xiongnu many times over by giving them gifts and wives, the Chinese generals realised that appeasement was never going to work as a long term strategy to stop the Xiongnu from repeatedly attacking the Chinese farmers and that, unfortunately, the only way to stop the Xiongu was to kill them all - every man, woman and child, i.e. genocide. But first they had to devise military strategies to enable them to defeat the Xiongnu in war - they did this essentially by copying the manner of Xiongnu fighting, i.e. largely on horseback, which was foreign to the Chinese military at the time. So tl;dr they did that, then when ready they pursued the Xiongnu and they genocided them, or almost all of them, except for a group that fled to the west and joined some Mongol groups.
So now, 1. Xinjiang was Chinese territory, and 2. it was empty, all of the Xiongnu having been killed or fled further into Central Asia. The Uyghurs, another nomadic Turkic people, lived in the land to the north of Xinjiang, so the Han invited the Uyghurs to go and settle down in part of Xinjiang, and become part of the Chinese people, which they did. So note: Xinjiang was never the Uyghurs' ancient homeland, this is a fabrication. It was gifted to them by China on condition that they settled the country as peaceful sedentary farmers and good Chinese citizens. East Turkestan has never existed in reality. It is a fabrication; imaginary. It is what the Uyghur diaspora Islamic extremists wish for - an extremist Islamic state of their own creation on land that, since the Han Dynasty, has belonged to China.
Fast forward to the Chinese civil war, which was won by the Communists, who then closed China to the outside world. Fast forward again to Deng Xiaoping and the opening up of China, and Chinese citizens became permitted to travel outside of China, first in controlled tourist groups, and subsequently by themselves with individual visas. So then it became possible for Chinese Muslims such as the Uyghurs and the Hui to go on the pilgrimage to Mecca, which subsequently many have done. No harm there. Unfortunately, a minority (and it is a minority - maybe 10%) have lingered for a while in the Middle East mixing with fundamentalists, and they have become radicalised. So it is this radicalised minority who have become extremists and who have committed acts of terrorism, and are demanding that every single thing should be Halal, and who wish to separate from China and establish their own extremist state. I hasten to add that they are a small minority, and most Chinese Muslims have not followed this route, and so have continued to live happily and undisturbed. It is the radicalised minority who have needed to be "re-educated" (which I think is actually not a bad word for the process).
Sorry for being such a long winded old man, Miss Lan. But I think this actually fits with what you have said.
Good comment. Please, can you suggest me some books to mention these historical facts?
@@RafQueiroz1 Thanks, Raf. It is difficult to recommend good books in English on ancient Chinese history because most non-Chinese are not interested in delving into it in such depth. And the people today who just want to criticise and attack China are certainly not interested in trying to understand China the way it is in an objective way; at most they are trying to tell China how to behave without understanding it, which if you think about it is supreme arrogance. But it is absolutely necessary to go that far back in Chinese history, or even further to the Zhou Dynasty, because it was the Zhou Dynasty that shaped the way that China has become today. And people in the West need to understand this - China developed as a continuous unbroken civilisation going back at least as far as 30,000 years (yes, they were invaded multiple times and ruled by other peoples, but it was those people who were changed by China - Chinese civilisation continued unbroken). Genetically they can be traced back to someone who lived 40,000 years ago and whose DNA looks remarkably similar to the DNA of modern Chinese people. In that respect China and the Han are unique, and no one should expect that China and the Han people will see the world the way that anyone else does - they really are different, including in their mental processes. But sorry, I should stop waffling. I think the best book I can recommend to you is The Early Chinese Empires: Qin and Han by Mark Edward Lewis. The further back you can go, the better. There was another very good book on the Shang and Zhou Dynasties by an excellent Chinese historian, but I am unable now to find it and suspect that it is no longer in print.
@@RafQueiroz1 There are many videos of History of Xinjiang produced by Chinese and Taiwanese on yt, including the massacre of the Junggar tribes in Xinjiang by the Qing Empire in 1750. Unfortunately, most of them have no English subtitles. To be precise, the Uighurs in Xinjiang today are Nomad who moved into Xinjiang after 1760.
@@tbbonline You mean the Dzungar Khanate. Better to get history from books written by serious historians rather than from TV shows.
Thank you for another fine video. I think the bottom line is, that all religions must not be allowed to mix with political management of any state. They sow more division and disruption of everything from human values to industry.
Sure you can have your faith, but it cannot be allowed to dictate, or we would still be stuck in the Dark Ages.
The problem with this is that it's not always possible to disentangle the 2 things. For most of human history they were the same. I believe we are living in a new dark age now anyway, where ideologies take the place of religion, and you speak against them at your peril.
你说的很对，中国是允许有宗教自由的（700万天主教徒，2300万基督教徒以及更为庞大的穆斯林教徒），但宗教不能凌驾于政权之上。
I like your explanation of the situation in Xinjiang. Compare to what is happening in Gaza.
The situation of Ugher people in xinjiang is a million times better than Palestinian people living in Gaza. Western media and politician who are acting in a very double standard with regards to Israel and China.
Thank you very much for this information. Hopefully the Chinese Muslims get there freedom and continue to resist.
I hope the Scottish and people of Wales will also get their independence, and the people of Falkland Island, Gibraltar and so will the Afro-Americans, Californians, Texans, Hawaiians, and Puerto Ricans. The people of Kashmir, the people of Sikkim, and the people of Nagaland and Mizoram.
@@hongqi5734 Yes, all people should have the right to freedom and to be independent. It seems like you think westerners that support Xinjiang wouldn’t support western groups wanting independence, which is strange but very common from Chinese nationalists. If California wants to become its own country, or Scotland, good for them and they have our support. All people should have the right to self-determination. All countries were created by people and if new countries are created then that is just continuing the history of humanity.
@@OldOnes666
So far I have not seen any Western support for their independence. You guys are good at lip service when being criticized.
@@hongqi5734 You haven’t seen support for who? Scottish people had a vote not that long ago and chose to stay in the UK. Now after Brexit it seems like there is a lot more support for independence. Obviously the UK government would be against it but many Scottish people are openly working for it. Calling for Scottish independence is not a crime and there are no reeducation camps to force them to be more British. California does not have an independence movement; I just used it as an example. So again, who are you referring to? I don’t know why it seems so hard to understand that open minded liberals around the world support independence movements of all kinds. There is no ani-China conspiracy singling it out. Yes politicians do that, politics is corrupt and evil in every country to some extent. But whether it’s Tibet or Palestine, Xinjiang or Northern Ireland, many people around the world support their right to self-determination without prejudice. My friends were attacked by police on the streets of Barcelona after they voted to separate from Spain, that is not lip service. That is just one of many localism movements around the world. Nationalism is outdated and backwards. Every human being shares the same origin in Africa. All counties are concepts that just exist in our minds. If a bird flies from Vietnam to China there is no change, there is no physical boundary, there is no physical reality to countries. So if one group of people wants to create a new country, why not? Who cares? Things change. National integrity is like a man saying his wife is his property. That's so 18th century, grow up and get over it.
@@hongqi5734 Scotland and Wales can choose to leave the UK if the people want it. This s the difference. In China there is no chance.
Love how you apply "Explore Narratives" process from different perspective to invite critical thinking.
Unfortunately not many people get the importance of such appropriate processes.
Well done, absolutely enjoyed listening to your critical thinking + narative exploration 🤗👍
It’s so good to see your video again😊
To say Mongol is a Chinese minority just shows how little you know about Mongols. Also you can't compare it to Asian Americans who actually choose and immigrate to become American. As you know, the minorities you mention are actually struggling to get free from the enforced the control / colony. It boils down to not robbing people from their #1 right to say who they are.
Most Uyghur are came from Turkey are Migrating to Xinjiang for trading with Chinese people through the silk Road
"These minority groups in China are victims of brutal measures such as mass deportation, political indoctrination, and family separation, restrictions of religious freedom, cultural destruction and extensive use of surveillance.
The systematic, brutal and arbitrary repression has been documented in Xinjiang police files, which the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) was able to examine. MEPs state that evidence of Uyghur children being separated from their families, government-sponsored programmes of mass forced sterilisation and forced labour amount to crimes against humanity and constitute a serious risk of genocide."
The European human Rights court
Not to mention the mass rape, trorture we can't get evidence for beyond thousands of victims testifying because the CCP blocks access.
What is your stance on that?
Please provide evidence
@@ckwong1533 Please don’t hide the evidence 🇨🇳.
The west has used false rape accusations in the past before. Remember the rape squads by Khaddafi mentioned by Amnesty International which turned out to be false that were merely an excuse to topple Khadafi for wanting to get rid of the USD in Africa.
Thanks!
easy to say that the stabbing incident is not terrorism but what if your family becomes the victim? can you still call it liberation.
Not just stabbings but suicide attacks and police murders
But the state kills their family then they are liberators
It's also easy to say that this is not an abuse of human rights but if your sister and daughter got raped and tortured at these facilities, would you still call it re-education? So this reasoning goes both ways.
History has shown that force is not the best way to subjugate a group of people. Especially, in this modern era where individuals have a greater voice (through social media) as well as access to more information, and a better idea of what they feel they are entitled to.
If China can show the Uyghurs that life is better as part of China, they will want to be a part of China. This will garner respect from around the world and China will strengthen it's global position. Unfortunately, the current method is having the opposite effect.
@@andrewferrier3351 never heard of/seen this.
@@leafsnation82 any proof？
Kudos to you, a young person brought up in the West, for having the intelligence and courage to see for yourself the truth and not fall in line with the often false and insidious narratives from the MSM. Your nuance attempt to explain the situation is indeed commendable and much more closer to the reality than any report from the West I have seen.
Thank you for your inside view. There's a saying in Germany: "The most dangerous view is that of those who haven't viewed the world." So thank you so much for your insights.
An extraordinarily well presented video. This sort of content is invaluable as it is increasingly difficult to find less radical opinions on the Xinjiang struggle that leave no room for consideration of the other side. This did a good job of highlighting China's perspective without dismissing criticisms.
I really love your videos. I love the way you put both sides into perspective and not only a biased pov.
Very well explained, thank you. I think some countries in the west are losing their cultural identity by trying to appease
The three evils of separatism, terrorism and extremism are not tolerated by any nation. Why would China do otherwise. The UK didn't tolerate the IRA. Spain didn't tolerate the ETA. The US didn't tolerate the Confederacy (for a while at least.)
Uyghurs in Xinjiang were sorely tempted to follow the same path, pushing for 'nation' that never existed historically. Two brief warlord regimes do not count. The 'ethnicity' didn't exist until it was fabricated by Soviet ethnographers in the 1920s (along with the other Central Asian 'nations'.) Before then, tribes identified with their town or village at most, and never considered themselves a distinct identity, but part of the broader Turkic culture that stretched from the Bosphorus to Manchuria. It was (and remains) definitely in the interest of European powers to push for the fractured identity of these Turkic peoples than to see them unite into a Greater Turkestan.
An East Turkestan nation is pushed not by any 'freedom fighters' but extremists that would suppress all non-Uyghurs in Xinjiang such as the Kazakhs, Mongols, Uzbeks, and several others who do not have an 'ethnic' state. A nation that would push an extremist anti-humanist, misogynist, and belligerent form of Islam closer to the Taliban or Daesh than the more tolerant forms practiced in most Islamic countries. An extremism pushed by Wahabists that fund 'madrassahs' which are educational facilities like a Jesuit school, but indoctrination centers.
People forget how prevalent the Islamic extremists were in the 1990s. None of them were trying to 'liberate' anyone, but trying to impose what the Taliban finally succeeded in establishing or what the Daesh are still fighting for in Syria and Iraq. They have led insurgencies from the Philippines and Indonesia to the west coast of Africa.
The Uyghurs have crafted their own identity since it was handed to them by the Soviets. The nature of that identity is not that proclaimed by a small extremist sect that has been more than willing to use terrorism and accept financing and other support from foreign powers who want to destroy the PRC. It is an identity that will continue to evolve by the several million Uyghurs - of various religions (or none), of various political persuasions, from.Communists to reactionaries. It surely will not be decided by Western liberals and State Department bureaucrats.
Yet faced with the three evils (that have substantial backing by imperial powers), China didn't declare a global war, sending troops from the Philippines to Nigeria and everywhere in between. It didn't set up a Guantanamo Bay or an Abu Ghraib torture facilities. They didn't practice extraordinary renditions to 'black op' sites, or blow up their citizens with drones (along with the rest of the wedding party, or order a second strike once emergency responders arrived).
China built facilities, that unlike the 'correctional facilities' in the US which never corrects behavior and only punishes and dehumanizes prisoners and guards alike, actually provided education and vocational skills so they would not be trapped in generational poverty in some backwater village, and other useful things like the national language so they could read something more than just the Koran, and participate in the national dialogues about culture, religion, politics, et al, as equals.
The PRC is the leading example of how to build a cosmopolitan communitarian commonwealth. Yet rather than support their initiatives, certain powers push false narratives to disrupt their progress, especially since it is getting more and more difficult to claim any of their own.
the big problem is that you do not aware to differentiate between government from its ruling party, nor China from Chinese.
You are so brave. You have my respect.
"Love the party, love the country" Doesn't get more Orwellian than this. Also interviewing terrified oppressed people on the streets when you're Han, pushing a camera in their faces and asking if things have gotten better under the CCP isn't exactly unbiased journalism. Of course these poor people will say they love the party. 1984.
Thank you for this excellent video. It was very informative and enlightening. It gave me a much better understanding of the situation in Xinjiang.
Here's my take...
Throughout China's long history, the Chinese have struggled to build a nation. It was very challenging with so many tribes and ethnic groups fighting with each other.
Finally, China had united enough of these warring peoples to form what we recognize today as China. It was a hard-won unity and understandably China wants to keep it altogether as much as possible.
So while there are Uyghurs with separatist leanings, China must guard against disunity and the fracturing of the nation. Failing to do this will result in the disintegration of China.
The measures China has taken in Xinjiang may be considered heavy-handed, but if you were leading China, how else might you deal with the problem? Are you prepared to second guess Beijing?
Westerners rail against China's measures, but they have no understanding of China and her history. Their perspective is based on ignorance and arrogance. Moreover, they would like nothing better than to witness China's disintegration, because above all else, Westerners are bigots and racists. They fear losing their global hegemony. They are jealous of China's rise. They resent the Chinese.
Labelling China's re-education facilities as "concentration camps" is most obviously racist and inflammatory.
Labelling China's efforts to unite the Uyghur people with the rest of China as "cultural genocide" is also racist and inflammatory.
And all the other nonsense about forced labour, organ harvesting, sterilization, etc. are propaganda lies meant to demonize and vilify China.
We need to stop examining China through the Western lens. China is not America. China is not Europe. China has unique circumstances that require unique measures to ensure her unity, integrity and strength. _Leave China alone!_
while I agree with you I don’t know why this is framed as something that only China is doing. Deradicalization and reeducation practices to prevent religious extremism exist all over the world, including the west.
I was in Yosemite last week and I was so disturbed upon learning the California genocide committed by U.S. and California government backed Mariposa battalion. Comparing the degree of genocide committed by the U.S., I think China did terrible job doing genocide just like children play. The Xinjiang genocide would have became a non-issue today just like California genocide if China did the same. Of course many countries may have moral grounds blaming what China did in Xinjiang but Anglo-Saxson nations are definitely not among them.
@@nanjiang1953 Exactly. Westerners interpret China's actions as human rights abuses through the Western lens, but they do not have the moral authority to do so. Westerners are hypocrites. America, Canada, Australia, Britain, France, Belgium, and many other European countries are guilty of *real* human rights abuses. Until recently, for example, my home country of Canada abused - and murdered! - thousands of indigenous children in "residential schools." This is a very dark stain on Canada's reputation.
America is much worse. Australia is much worse. China has always treated its ethnic minorities with care and respect.
as a Chinese, I think the problem might be the fact that China isn't a democracy. So Uyghurs have no choice but to be forced to identify themselves as China, they know that they will never have a chance to get a referendum. If the UK tells Scots they won't have that chance, they will also protest.
And besides, Uyghur is Uyghur, Han is Han, different in culture and ethnicity, but when facing strong foreign power, intellectuals create a narrative of "nation of Chinese" to fight against foreign countries. But the actual meaning is if the minorities don't obey, we will treat them as traitors and use power to force them to obey.
@@ziyu8061 China treats all of its ethnic minorities very well, in fact, better than Han Chinese! This is a fact.
As I stated very clearly in my comment, China's unity was hard-won and China won't allow this unity to be upset. Any Chinese who would allow the possibility of disunity is a traitor.
This might sound weird but the best comparison to what China is facing regarding the crisis in Xinjiang is what lead to the American Civil War and its aftermath. As we all know, the North wanted to abolish slavery, the South wanted to keep slavery, Britain and France abolished slavery in their own countries but relied on cottons produced by workforce made up of slaves in the South. Because of this tension between the North and the South with slavery as a major factor, a war eventually erupted when South Carolina declared secession from the U.S. And during this war, Britain and France did their best to maintain good relations with both sides of the conflict with the elites of both countries are sort of being pro-South while the civilians are pro-North. Heck, Britain even deployed warships from the Royal Navy in putting up a blockade around Africa to put an end to the slave trade. But what important here is the aftermath. Just because the South lost the war, it did not mean it will go down so easily. Some riots broke out in the Southern States in response against the military occupation, resulting the deaths of many African Americans and European Americans from the Northern States by lynching. Also, some of the White Southerners even accused the Union for having too much foreign influences in their domains due to migration from Europe, making them no longer Americans in the eyes of these extremists. Some generations later, they even created this myth about the South wanted to protect its rights about whether to abolish slavery on its own like the central government from the North demanded or not. The point here is that before and after the American Civil War ended, getting rid of the other side's narrative or finding a way to compromise with such narrative is still going to be hard and there will always be those from the outside looking in that will claim that this side is right or that side is right either our of morality, political agendas or economic interests.
Let’s be pragmatic, Xinjiang and Tibet are so much more prosperous and better under the leadership of Communist Party of China, just compare with Nepal or the northern state of India or Afghanistan or Pakistan. Women’s rights, education, infrastructure, etc..
I observe some Uyghur activist in the US and Australia, I mean they are not really look like a "good" muslim, the women are not using hijab, the men shave their beard, not to mention they have a good understanding of Islam when it comes to Tauhid, Aqidah, hudud law, etc..
To say they are prosperous is a lie. You are brainwashed. Whether or not they are good Muslims has nothing to do with their right to be free. Your comment is absolute BS!
@@nonrepublicrat It seems to me that you're the one who's brainwashed, less western media would be better for you.
@benjaminabdullah3289 Are you on hashish bro ?
@@nonrepublicrat They can be free in the countless of Muslim majority countries with Sharia law, China is secular.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Well done. Good try. Im chinese in ethic but from a different country. We also have multi racial, multi religions. Having to learn an unified language to communicate in the same language does not reflect oppression or suppression. It in facts liberates us because with additional languages we can see the outside world differently. For those Uyghurs so obsess to gain its independence, they need to ask a question themselves. Who will then be the leader of that liberated nation to gain prosperity and peace? Or is this just a group of nonsensical defiant individuals coming together trying to break the bond of the said nation? Western ideologies are always to sabotage others to shine light on themselves. This is evident in many cases by using medias to intoxicate liberal ideas into our minds. Example the so called “woke” culture when this word “woke” is essentially not meant for the current situation. Same for this accusation of genocide. Go and fix our dear state of Palestine first before trying to deflect issues back on Asians. ❤ thank you for your effort to do this video.
xinjiang has been part of china for many years. so why now ? the xinjiang human rights and ...etc..USA would like to tear china apart.Tibet and Xinjiang makes up of about 40% of china territory! Tibet and xinjiang are aggressively supported by USA . embracing these two territories and hoping that they can secession is the objectives ... Fortunately, chinese leaders are calm and strategic ;they will not fall into such western trap easily.....chinese are not stupid and ignorant! Just look at the conflict of ukraine and russia, USA is enjoying the weakening of russia without firing a shot ! slavic killing each other , what a sham!
Uyghurs are thriving more than Native Americans, no?
Of course. They are talented. Hosts, actors and actress, government officials, scientists, football and basketball players...
This is has nothing to do with how terrible the CCP abuses the Uyghurs. All oppression and abuse are very evil.
@@nonrepublicrat*some Uyghurs, that’s the point.
So? That's setting a very low inhumane bar.
@@zetristan4525 not really, considering they are thriving and having an accelerating GDP in the region.
There are 56 minority groups inside China. The host forgot to mention this important fact!
The same strategy of "Divide & Conquer" is also being used in Indonesia, esp in regions rich with natural resources. They want to break and weaken the country from within. The smaller the country, the weaker it is. Basically this is the strategy always used by the western imperialist anywhere in the world. When the country is weak and unstable, they can exploit the country easily.
Ethnic nationalism and self-determination are really convenient ideologies for a divide and conquer strategy. The only countries that can't be pushed around are multi-ethnic empires.
We cannot criticize China for trying to preserve its territorial integrity. Centuries ago, long before the United States even existed, China was a fully-formed nation that included Taiwan, Tibet and Xinjiang. So China has the sovereign right to prevent territorial secession.
Whether or not China has been heavy-handed in its approach is not for us in the West to judge. How China governs itself is none of our business.
I would love to see you do a video on the Tieneman Square massacre where the CCP killed thousands of peaceful student protestors who were seeking more democratic representation. Would love your perspective on this atrocity. Is there any chance of a video on the topic?
I mean… how’d gonna talk about something that never even happened as you said
The protesters were not peaceful, the crackdown started after attacks on cars and people, the army attacked back after one was killed when they were moving back from the rioters.
There is an old Chinese saying called "covering one's ears while stealing a bell(掩耳盜鈴)", which China has vividly demonstrated in creating the Xinjiang issue.
Uyghur is a concept of a cultural community based on language. In fact, Uyghurs can be divided into dozens of categories. From the perspective of race, the Y chromosome proves that the Tocharians who lived in the Central Asia are obviously one of the ancestors of the Uyghurs and have nothing to do with the Han Chinese. In other words, the Uyghurs are the descendants of many ancient ethnic groups who have lived on their land. They have thousands of years of history on the land where their ancestors lived. Of course, the Chinese nationalists who own the voice of course would never talk about this, since they got a bell to steal.
On the contrary, the China-centric narrative has always simplified the origin of the Uyghurs to the descendants of the "Gaochang Uighurs(高昌回鶻)" of the Tang Dynasty, so that they seem to have migrated from the Mongolian plateau and have only a history of a thousand or so years, and then used the fact that the Han Dynasty had a brief exchange with the locals to prove that the Han people "existed and ruled" in the local area prior to these indigenous people.
Nonetheless, "Xinjiang(新疆)" literally means "new territory(新的疆土)", as clearly stated in the dictionary of the Manchu-ruled Qing Dynasty, which conquered this land. and lamely interpreted by China as a “new return to the homeland(故土新歸)” now, which doesn't even fit in the context.
Before 1930, Han Chinese made up less than 4% of the population in "Xinjiang", but after 1980 they made up more than 40%. They named the area the "Uighur Autonomous Region", then took control of the local government, monopolized the minerals, and flooded the labor resources with large numbers of Han immigrants. Kazakh herders were driven from the mountains and forests where they had lived for generations, and even the land and water resources that Uyghur farmers depended on for their livelihoods were squeezed out of the best parts by "Production and Construction Corps(生產建設兵團)". The massive land reclamation by the Han Chinese reclamation groups even caused Lop Nur and Aydin Lake to dry up in the 70s.
Now they are throwing a large part of these "minorities" into "re-education" camps.
And ask again why the local Turk people are unhappy? Oops, ears to cover.
this is insightful
Another enticing and informative video. This video really helped shed some additional light as to what China's Uyghur policy actually is. I think the West fails (and sometimes refuses to) understand why other countries do the things they do, hence the terms used like "genocide" and "concentration camps". China on other the hand isn't particular great at communicating their message across without coming off as thin-skinned, but they do what they feel is needed regardless of what others say. This is the 2 realities of the West and China.
Great job expressing your thoughts on the issue, looking forward to your next video (from a fellow Cantonese)
My sentiments too.
They don’t just “not understand”, they understand but purposely misinterpret and misrepresent for their own propaganda. China is not doing anything the west hasn’t done.
The west is a direct competitor with China in providing goods to undeveloped nations
Sometimes?
Cultural genocide is still genocide, and China has openly admitted to suh policies after denying them.
Thanks!
That's so kind of you, thank you ❤️😊
Because there are so many biases from media of both sides, it's still not clear to me what actually happens in Xinjiang.I tend to avoid discussing sensitive topics because I just love Chinese culture without having any political opinions on China but I appreciate your balanced and honest analysis on the problem.
Well, you can always visit Xinjiang and find out for yourself if you're really concerned, unlike Guantanamo Bay, Xinjiang is actually open to tourists from all over the world.
@@mabelaero there are lots of foreign vloggers vlogging about XJ but I can't find any about Guantanom0
@@barkobummer Guantanamo Bay is the US thing
@@SunnySzetoSz2000 I am surprised they haven't renamed Guantanamo as "Freed0m Center", just like how U$ reverse everything else, right is wrong, white is black, man is woman etc etc etc.
I spent the last 3 years during the pandemic researching about China and US. My conclusion is China is peaceful and hardly give out any biased information while US/UK lies everything about China and oppressing any country which disagrees with it. China has regained its strength and is standing up straight, fighting against the bully by US/UK/west. Learn the hundred years of humiliation of China. China is a multi-ethnic country since its birth more than 5000 years. Racism is not Chinese culture but that of US/UK/west. Minorities in modern China have more benefits than the majority Hans and everyone get to keep their dialects/languages, religions and cultures. If you really love Chinese culture, then you should know that China is a peaceful country but it won't allow any more bully by US/west.
So good to see your videos again!
Firstly, please allow me to commend you on your intelligence and wisdom.
IMHO, your thoughts are profound, and your nuanced articulation of them is exquisite.
I agree very much with your view on the "Xinjiang controversy".
Thank you!
Compare Xinjiang to Palestine, which way would the western countries go? No prize for guessing it right! To say, the western countries are interested in the welfare of the Uyghur people, is utterly unthinkable. What are they doing in Palestine?
we all know if our mothers and fathers were held in those camps forced to "learn how to sew clothes" we'd be singing a different tune, wouldn't we?
you're right indeed!
forced to "learn how to sew clothes" is the narratives by the western media driven by their political agenda. in my view, providing job opportunities so that people would not be swayed by religious extreme to become jihadists is a far better way to advance human rights
I was in Yosemite last week and I learned a lot on California genocide committed by U.S. and California government backed Mariposa battalion. Comparing to U.S., I think China did terrible job doing genocide. The Xinjiang genocide would have became a non-issue just like California genocide if China did the same.
Well said Siming. With this sort of understanding hopefully we can bring harmony to the disputing forces.
In Islamic country Turkiye, they prohibit Arabic letter sign in public area, if found they destroy it
more strictly than China gov did in Xinjiang, even theres still Uyghur 'Arabic' letter printing in Reminbi bank note since decades ago
That is patently false guys. Since you can verify it no explanation is needed. Simple example: The Quran is printed in Arabic in Turkey. And Arabic is thought freely.
So? How does that make CCP abusing Uyghurs any less evil?
@@nonrepublicrat by comparing what the Western world has been doing to Muslim nations over the last two decades.
Arabic is not prohibited in any place in Türkiye. We used to use Arabic letters more than 1000 years. I hope we turn back to it soon. Because Latin letters are not suitable for us.
@@Khosann1 i said Arabic letters in public area not in Quran, in Turkiye Arabic sign in public area are banned
In China has more freedom, theres let Uyghur 'Arabic' letter in Quran, also Uyghur 'Arabic' sign in their shop even in airports, trainstation, etc
Kim Iversen has talked about wahabi - extreme Islam that is behind IS from Saudi Arabia - infuence. I'm not saying that China is going about fighting this the best way, but maybe that's what is behind the tension?
All are about the "color revolutions" backed by US in many countries including China and Saudi Arabia.
It's definitely part of the reason yes. What happened there is not as good as China described, but certainly not as bad as it appeared in the media. It all comes from the correlation to the failed ethnic policy in China with the premise that the failed policy itself couldn't be modified due to governing inertia.
There are slaves in Xinjiang. They are all named John Deere and each one was born in Illinois.
I really enjoyed the video! Thank you for sharing your perspective! However, I think the fundamental question here is to what extent the state has the right to enforce its control over people who don't want it. It's understandable that some see this as an integral territory, but many living there disagree. Can they truly be "taught" to alter their views on the state?
The real question is how do you define and from what stance can you define "who don't want it"? according to some narratives by western mainstream media? or are you willing to go to talk to local people by yourself and see with you own eyes? BTW, Xinjiang's never been a place only for Uyghur Chinese (44.96%), instead, it is also the homeland for Han Chinese (42.24% living there from ancient time) and other ethnic groups (12%, including Kazakhs, Mongols, etc.).
Don't you think you are making a big assumption that Uyghurs don't want to be in China? Can you back that up with data?
@@Giles20I mean there is clear separationist sentiment through what info there is in this video.
@@WeiLyu-lw2krI think OP is trying to refer to the reeducation camps; can the Chinese government install people in those facilities if they don't want to as a protective measure, even if they have never commited a crime?
In my opinion, that should not be allowed. Not in China, but also not in the US or any other country. Someone has to be guilty to be put in a correctional facility
@@josha136 I agree with your idea that no one should be put into any correctional facility if he/she doesn't commit a crime. However, the reeducation camp is not a correctional facility as a punishment for guilt. Instead, it's a necessary measure to save those people who are brainwashed by extreme religious propaganda. These are just ordinary less educated people, farmers, street vendors, house wives, but they are one step closer to becoming another extremist if the government just let them go. Any responsible government should take measures to save them from doing harm to society and themselves.
Even if taken through a chinese narrative, the fact is that in the present days the Han have quickly populated the province and at the end of the day forcely assimilate the Uyghur. In the past, like said, those regions were not forced to adjust culturally.
In the past, they were more like vassals. Being under an empire's sphere of influence doesn't give the right to assimilate. I'm from Europe, I wouldnt' let americans decide our first language taught in school should be english, neither which history class I should take !
Thank you so much for offering non-Chinese English speakers your special in-depth vision of China. If ever our different cultures are to survive on an increasingly smaller planet, we must understand each other, for naturally, without understanding, there will be no cooperation. It is my sincere hope that such cooperation could lead to peace and prosperity for everyone in multi-polar world.
I am shocked daily by the arrogance of the Western press freely spewing Asian hate in a quagmire of clichés. Laws against provoking hate are only enforced in a very discretionary manner closely in line with the official narrative. The ignorant rage continues as temperatures rise. US citizens for the most part have no knowledge of China's history. Comments by even high-ranking officials display a dearth of knowledge that is inexcusable for officials of such high rank. Worse yet, they don't even want to know anything more about China than the bargains they can pick up at Wal-Mart. They pay for them with funds provided by public welfare assistance and complain that China produces everything before going back home to wallow in an opiate-induced haze promoted by their captains of industry. All of this has been expressly created by an elite of cynical leaders who continue to fan the flames of media hatred that leads the drunken chauvinist to bite the hand that feeds him.
Fortunately, time is running out for that game. We'll see what Uncle Sam does with the thousands of homeless when bankruptcy comes knocking at the Federal Reserve's door.
Those in the US concerned about the Uyghurs would best review their own private prison system before criticising China. Operated for profit, it reinforces inequality and injustice by design.
hir.harvard.edu/us-uk-prison-privatization/
time.com/5405158/the-true-history-of-americas-private-prison-industry/
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/spol.12766
Keep up the good work!
It’s a worthless perspective from a savage tyrant worshiping barbarians.
@@rhetoric5173 Rhetoric - Definition: "Language that is elaborate, pretentious, insincere, or intellectually vacuous: "
Indeed, barbarian@@ClaySuddath
@@rhetoric5173You poor dear...
Short life, eternal pit of hellfire. See if emperor saves then@@ClaySuddath
Not war like usa did in afghan ,vietnam ,iraq ,syria ,libya ....but china's management of terror
Similar in US, even you are in a very large Latino community, the language used in school to teach is still predominantly English not Spanish.
Difference is there's no pressure to prevent speaking Uyghur at home. The Philippines and much of Africa is similar in that schools universally teach in English but leave home tongue untouched, creating a population that ends up largely bilingual and famously expressive.
@@doujinflip You obviously have never traveled to XingJiang. Uyghur language is everywhere, at shop front and on street. Uyghurs typically speak Uyghur language to other Uyghurs like how Cantoneses speak to each other but speak Mandarin to Chineses from other ethnics background.
8:10 Halal food is understandable, but if you put halal buses and etc is plain religious hypocrisy. Even Muslim majority countries frown upon religious hypocrisy.
"One of my favorite political philosophers, Niccolo Machiavelli" -> sums up a lot of things about the perspective presented here.
Waw great way to show your ignorance, Machiavelli was not evil or bad, he wrote about how to govern with pragmatism but never was machiavellic himself.
Absolutely. I find it interesting that Siming is jumping straight to Machiavelli for inspiration and in the process is overlooking very different viewpoints from Chinese political philosophy.
孟子 (Mencius) advocated for light-handed governance, believing that a ruler must first justify his position by acting benevolently to all his subjects before he can expect reciprocation from them.
Of course Confucianism supports hierarchy, but 孟子 believed that while a ruler is above a commoner, he is actually subordinate to the masses - and therefore it is morally right for a population to dissent against a ruler when they believe they are being treated unfairly.
I'd be interested to to hear what Siming's views would be on the Xinijang separatism movement (and the PRC's response to it) if she viewed it through a Confucian lens, not a Machiavellian one.
Thank you for making this excellent video. You are now on the list of my favourite TH-camrs.
I have been looking forward to another video from you. I like to approach propositions as a devil's advocate so you have given me much to think about. Is it time for a Chinese federation so differences can be preserved and even tolerated in a regulated way? I am also in awe of your grasp of English. It certainly does not sound like your subsequent language. It is so good I am uncomfortable even mentioning it.
I highly doubt it, but I do hope that there can be other better ways at handling differences in opinions and ideas then heavy handed means. Why I highly doubt a federation would work is because stability and unity is one of the top few concerns of leaders in China. Those two values come above any forms of freedom and liberty.
@@skydragon23101979 At considerable cost to the citizens, they don't seem to realise stability and unity can best be achieved by "freedom and liberty" (the same thing). At what stage do they ask: how best can we serve our citizens-it should be about the citizens, not about those in power.
@@listohan Why do you see stability and unity as equals to freedom and liberty? It is almost always at odds. That’s because to ensure stability you need strict rules for a densely populated country and unity means that you need a collective mindset and obey rules that you can only have very limited liberty and freedom within those framework
@@skydragon23101979 It's not what I said. I said freedom and liberty are the same thing.
@@skydragon23101979 I said "freedom" and "lberty" are the same.
Decades ago, the socialist-paradise-to-be Singapore adopted many of the strong-handed, "dictatorial" policies that the Chinese have used for decades - to great effect and with magnificent results. Under the benevolent dictatorship of Lee Kwan Yew, Singapore rapidly progressed from a 3rd-world backwater into a 1st-world country. Singapore is now the peak of civilization.
While quite a few of Mao's policies were generally dictatorial and not always benevolent, one can argue that many of his policies benefited the populace more than the policies of the KMT (GMD) had. But one can hardly argue with China's fruitful development policies over the past 2-3 decades, including its policies in Xinjiang. The welcoming assimilation of the Uighurs and other ethic groups into the fold of "China," while allowing them to retain their culture and while promoting higher standards of living for all, is truly commendable.
I have just subscribed to your channel. "very refreshing" is the short comment I shall give. I am pro-China and not ashamed to admit it. But I do feel embarrassed when I see CGTN when they harped the party line once too often. I do hope there are more open minded discussions on the internet. It is used too much by people with agenda, that becomes an abuse. The world has never been balck and white, we just need to be smart enough to read thru it. Thank you Siming
中国的文宣部门简直太烂了。
Excellent. Your take is very similar to mine.
1 - it's a separatist issue. Not an ethnic one, and not a religious one, unless when these elements are being used in order to push a separatist agenda.
2 - there's no "genocide", "concentration camps" or "oppression". This is absurd. Uyghur people are not being denied their language, customs or religion. I would argue the other way around, these are being promoted, but within a framework of a culture within a culture, that reassess their belonging to a multicultural, multinational China. This is how my Uyghur friends identify themselves. And unlike other minorities in the world, in China minorities have all kinds of benefits and usually live better lives than the ordinary han (minus the occasional discrimination from other people, of course, but the Chinese government is trying to curb that).
3 - obviously, "reeducation" is an euphemism for "correction" here. While it's very likely that abuses may have happened (and these must be investigated), it's also very clear that the intent here is to identify and counter elements that promote a separatist mentality, NOT to erase cultural aspects per se. The Chinese are smart enough to understand that oppressing cultural identities would only lose support from those that see themselves as both Muslim Uyghurs and Chinese at the same time. Which are the majority of people living there now (and who are not being taken to any facility whatsoever).
4 - the chinese and East Turkestan positions are irreconcilable. China would be criticized by the diaspora one way or another. Having that in mind, even tho it may have seen heavy handed at times, I feel the policy was "necessary" to curb a separatist threat that was getting out of control (considering the Urumqi riots in 2009 and the train station attack in 2014, for example).
5 - as a foreigner with no horses in this race, I can also understand and feel sympathetic to the point of view from the East Turkestan crowd. Honestly. But from my personal experience with the Uyghurs in Xinjiang for many years, China's approach has been very successful. Period. I know people may be unhappy to hear this, but the separatist mindset has been reduced to a very small minority within the Uyghurs in China nowadays. This position may continue to grow out of China, but I feel it is, at this point, a futile endeavour.
This is the most objective comment in this comment section. Separatism and evil forces will never win. They may continue on but they'll never win, be it for the 100 years or 1000 to come or more. Carry on 😏😏
I am pretty sure that you are one of them:
Wei’s mother knew of her son’s side hustle and encouraged him to continue because it could lead to a future job in the Chinese government.
Young ,callow woman ....
You should visit Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan to understand Xinjiang problems.
You would then comprehend big picture, which you lack now.
@@se88 Darling , I did , I do.
I personally know, meet , interact with Xinjiang people regularly.
Hi Siming! Hope you are doing fine... What is your take on the complicit "genocide" of the Palestians in Gaza by the US government, in comparison with the "genocide" in Xinjiang?