• ztpq@slrpnk.net
    53·
    11 hours ago

    I’ve seen a lot of pictures from the day both before and after the military intervention. I haven’t seen evidence characterising it as anything other than student-led protests, which of course were joined by other civilians. Do you have any?

    BTW I find it disheartening when other leftists don’t seem to understand the concept of critical support, and act like they have to justify anything and everything a government does simply because they otherwise support it. This only drives away others who are open to e.g. opposition of NATO, but not willing to deny human rights abuses in support of that goal. Just seems hypocritical and like you don’t actually stand for any values instead of another flavor of tribalism and nationalism.

    • 挂路灯人@lemmy.ml
      8·
      9 hours ago

      I’ve seen a lot of pictures from the day both before and after the military intervention. I haven’t seen evidence characterising it as anything other than student-led protests, which of course were joined by other civilians. Do you have any?

      Cowbee has already provided a wealth of information I would recommend starting with the article by Sun Feiyang and Roderic Day and delving into the sources provided.

      BTW I find it disheartening when other leftists don’t seem to understand the concept of critical support, and act like they have to justify anything and everything a government does simply because they otherwise support it. This only drives away others who are open to e.g. opposition of NATO, but not willing to deny human rights abuses in support of that goal. Just seems hypocritical and like you don’t actually stand for any values instead of another flavor of tribalism and nationalism

      This is a completely nonsensical and ridiculous reply to me simply pointing out that the protest was more complex than simply a student protest and that the violence was not so one sided and cartoonish but rather the result of clashes between rioters with such peaceful calls as

      Don’t let any soldiers escape! Kill them all!

      and the peaceful thoughts of CIA operative and student leader Chai Ling:

      The students keep asking, “What should we do next? What can we accomplish?” I feel so sad, because how can I tell them that what we are actually hoping for is bloodshed

      Who when asked:

      Are you going to stay in the Square yourself?

      Replied:

      No, I won’t. Because my situation is different. My name is on the government’s hit list. I’m not going to let myself be destroyed by this government. I want to live

      and the soldiers acting in place of riot police.

      I am not at all against criticism of the handling of the events surrounding Tiananmen square in 1989 however that is not what you were doing rather you were merely obscuring the reality to allow yourself to apply easy blanket condemnation in place of real analysis and thought.

    • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
      111·
      11 hours ago

      I recommend the Tian’anmen Protests Reading List. It was far more muddy than a student protest. There were workers protesting Deng’s reforms, liberal students protesting the socialists system, and CIA-backed operatives sparking discontent. On the day of June 4th, riots around Beijing clashed with the PLA, while the square itself was later evacuated peacefully.

      • ztpq@slrpnk.net
        33·
        11 hours ago

        I’ll take a look regardless - but “peacefully evacuated”? Oh come on.

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
          91·
          11 hours ago

          Wikipedia agrees with the communists on that part:

          Government officials have long asserted that no one died in the square in the early morning hours of 4 June, during the “hold-out” of students’ last batch in the south part of the square. Initially, foreign media reports of a “massacre” on the square were prevalent, though subsequently, journalists have acknowledged that most of the deaths occurred outside of the square in western Beijing. Several people who were situated around the square that night, including former Beijing bureau chief of The Washington Post Jay Mathews[i] and CBS correspondent Richard Roth[j] reported that while they had heard sporadic gunfire, they could not find enough evidence to suggest that a massacre took place on the square.

          Student leader Chai Ling claimed in a speech broadcast on Hong Kong television that she witnessed tanks arrive at the square and crush students who were sleeping in their tents, and added that between 200 and 400 students died at the square.[269] Ling was joined by fellow student leader Wu’er Kaixi who said he had witnessed 200 students being cut down by gunfire; however, according to Mathews, it was later proven that he had already left the square several hours before the events he claimed to have happened.[212] Taiwan-born Hou Dejian was present in the square to show solidarity with the students and said that he did not see any massacre occurring in the square. He was quoted by Xiaoping Li, a former China dissident to have stated: “Some people said 200 died in the square, and others claimed that as many as 2,000 died. There were also stories of tanks running over students who were trying to leave. I have to say I did not see any of that. I was in the square until 6:30 in the morning.”[270]

          In 2009, human rights activist Robin Munro, stated that he was present during the clearance of Tiananmen Square and that, according to his account, there were ten Western reporters near the Monument to the People’s Heroes at the time. He also reported a Spanish television crew that recorded footage of the event. Munro disputed Wu’er Kaixi’s claims of mass killings inside the square, stating that he did not witness fighting there and instead observed students peacefully complying with the soldiers’ demands to leave the square in an orderly manner. He further noted that the Spanish TV crew reported not seeing killings within the square during the final clearance.[271][272]

          In 2011, three secret cables from the United States embassy in Beijing from the time of the events were leaked and published by WikiLeaks, all of which stated that there was no bloodshed inside Tiananmen Square itself.[195] Instead, they said Chinese soldiers opened fire on protesters in Beijing outside the square, around Muxidi station, as they fought their way from the west towards the centre.[195] A Chilean diplomat who had been positioned next to a Red Cross station inside the square told his US counterparts that he did not observe any mass firing of weapons into the crowds in the square itself, although sporadic gunfire was heard. He said that most of the troops who entered the square were armed only with anti-riot gear.[195][217]

          It’s important that we take study of allegations like this seriously and don’t fall for bourgeois mythos.