Tuesday, June 2, 2009

20 Years

June 4, 1989. Tomorrow is the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Massacre in Beijing and the CCP is commemorating the event by blocking Tweeter, Flickr, Hotmail, and others in addition to the usual list. I'm not sure why they even bother. Most of the younger generation in China don't know or don't care anyway, having grown up in a media blackout about the incident.

Here is an article from Richmond Times-Dispatch:
"Well, it happened before I was born," the 19-year-old said as the crowd shuffled out of the vast expanse of concrete on a balmy evening. "In any case, it's history. Why should we dwell on the past?"

It was 20 years ago that hundreds of unarmed civilians were killed by an army making its final push to crush a pro-democracy demonstration in Tiananmen Square, and the Chinese government has fortified its information blockade on the bloody crackdown. Anybody trying to search the Internet here for information about the square, one of Beijing's most popular tourist attractions, is likely to get the message, "This page cannot be displayed."

But the efforts may be overkill: Apathy as much as censorship has pushed the events of June 4, 1989, into the dark recesses of history.

The young Chinese, whom one graying activist calls "the stupid generation," remain willfully ignorant about the past.

...

"Our generation doesn't feel so much pressure as our parents. Even the global recession hasn't hit us much. It shows what a good country China is," said Hou Jue, 26, who is studying to be a bartender.

Although he lives only a few blocks from Tiananmen Square, he admits that he is "not too clear" about 1989's events and doesn't feel a need to learn more.

"If the government tells us as Chinese citizens we should not know about something and shouldn't be searching material, we should be responsible and obey," Hou said.

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. -George Santayana

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Apparently they scheduled exams throughout the country on that day too. Pretty sneaky.

Anonymous said...

reminds me of a college student being interviewed by a cable channel. the student was studying environmental engineering and the questioner asked what he thought about some environmental activist being jailed. he said, " if they are in jail, the probably did something wrong. people shouldn't get carried away and speak against the government". this is supposedly the best and brightest and they have no urge to find out what is really going on. yes, the government is banning access to history about 06/04. still it seems like this generation doesn't even want to spend any effort to care. i always felt that USA was going to hell-in-a-handbasket with the new generation. however, what hope is there for china with these mindless robots. i guess they will start to care when there is no drinkable water, their hair starts to fall out, they are sterile and can't get that prized male heir, and their stomach starts to ache from hunger.