Comment by dade_ | Hacker News Reader

Comment by dade_ | Hacker News Reader

Karl Marx on religion “Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.“

A popular song: Imagine there's no countries It isn't hard to do Nothing to kill or die for And no religion, too

The CCP is simply following a core tenant of communism. From the perspective of the ideology, they are freeing people from religion.

A much more important quote, a warning about accepting new ideas that too few heed today as always: “Let us keep our minds open, by all means, as long as that means keeping our sense of perspective and seeking an understanding of the forces which mould the world. But don’t keep your minds so open that your brains fall out! There are still things in this world which are true and things which are false; acts which are right and acts which are wrong, even if there are statesmen who hide their designs under the cloak of high-sounding phrases.”. — Walter Kotschnig November 8, 1939

Chinese oppression of the Uighurs is not really a religious issue. Yes, the Chinese authorities would be happy to eradicate Islam because it is part of some Uighurs' identity, but China has cracked down on secular Uighur movements as well. There were even Uighur communists who were anti-religion, but still imprisoned in China or forced into exile in Turkey or Europe because they insisted on using their own language and not assimilating to the Han.

It is clearly about religion. Read the UN report or the first sentence of the linked article:

“China has secretly built scores of massive new prison and internment camps in the past three years, dramatically escalating its campaign against Muslim minorities”

On a separate issue, the CCP is also rounding up trouble makers, and people that refuse to follow along and learn Mandarin would definitely qualify.

The "Muslim minorities" line is a trope used in Western media for the last couple of decades, especially in the wake of more interest in the Muslim world following 1990s and early 21st-century Islamist terrorism, but it obscures the fact that many Uighurs are non-religious or outright anti-religious. China is pleased at this "Muslim minority" angle that the Western media and NGOs use, because it can spin oppression of the Uighurs as a crackdown on Islamism. However, as I said, religion per se is not the issue here. The problem for Beijing is that Xinjiang has been too independent-minded, because the Uighurs (unlike most of China's minorities) only came under Han domination recently.

Kazakh, Kyrgyz and Hui Muslims in Xinjiang are subject to the same policies; the thing they have in common with Uyghur Muslims is that they're, well, Muslim, and that Kazakh and Kyrgyz speak Turkic languages.

Meanwhile, the Chairman of Xinjiang is Shohrat Zakir, an Uyghur politician and (of course) Communist Party member. Being non-religious or anti-religious is a good way for Uyghurs to make career in service of the Chinese state.

I also doubt that Uyghurs are somehow more independent from Chinese rule than other people in China, especially with respect to history, considering the supporting role of Uyghur troops in the genocide of Dzungars (who used to live in modern Xinjiang) by the Chinese Qing army.

What Kazakh, Kyrgyz and Hui Muslims have in common with the Uighur here is that they are fellow minorities from Xinjiang who were also subjected to Han domination only recently. Moreover, the Kazakh population is often seen as a fifth column due to a titular republic for their own people being located right next door.

Citing Shohrat Zakir is disingenuous. In the Soviet Union it was common for people to point to members of the ethnic minorities placed in official roles and say "See, there is no discrimination or oppression”, and the exact same phenomenon holds for contemporary China though it is much less talked about. But those ethnic-minority bureaucrats or politicians invariably made compromises: they did not particularly insist on using their own language in officialdom or defending the rights of their ethnic kin to do the same, and when they did publicly use their native language it was merely in the service of propaganda initiatives directed by the central government. But those Communist Party members who have insisted on the dignity of China’s minority languages and called for resisting Han assimilation have, as I said, suffered persecution for it.

The Uighur definitely have been independent-minded. Regardless of military collaboration with the Qing, the average Uighur would not have had so much exposure to Han culture and language until recent decades.

EVERY religious group in China and recent policy changes have seen this escalating.

https://bitterwinter.org/chinas-new-measures-for-religious-g...

> core tenant of communism

Yes, that is why Lennin and especially Stalin were made into godlike figures. Mao is a prophet/father of the china also painted as infallible. And lets not forget about North Korea... ummm Peoples Republic that is Celestial Dictatorship.

Marx was rolling in his grave when 'communism' was implemented across the world's nations.

Easier to take Absolute control if you promise equality for everyone.

    Some people are just more equal than others.
    - Animal Farm

You know that animal farm ends with comparison of soviet communism and modern capitalism.

“The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.”

Funnily that line was cut out of american version... go figure.

Ah yes, it was never "true communism", the favourite excuse of the more extreme left.

It kinda matches the "everything I don't like is communism" of the most extreme right.

No, it matches the "it's not true capitalism" of the extreme-right libertarian in being absolutely true according to the ideology that they follow. It's not an excuse, but something you can verify by reading the thinkers they follow. If I change my name to "Mr. Real Democracy," people who believe in democracy aren't forced to take responsibility for my crimes.

The "everything I don't like is communism" isn't even extreme right, it's the entire right. It has nothing to do with beliefs, it's a pretense to use violence to suppress political disagreement. It's akin to the "everything I don't like is fascism" of the woke liberal.

Religion is mainly used as opium for the masses China puting people in concentration camps is evil, but has nothing to do with religion. Also the CCP days as ideological communism are long gone. And pretty sure Marx wouldn't condone any of the stuff you are implying.

See, easy, kept my mind open, and my mind didn't fall out.

Well an atheist scientists perspective that "the big bang came out of nothing" makes as much sense as any religious text to be honest.

Very true. Big bang was actually first formulated by a Belgian Catholic priest: https://www.amnh.org/learn-teach/curriculum-collections/cosm...

It's also likely wrong, see dr robitaille's work, sky scholar on YouTube.

Stop with this bable.

We have evidence supporting theory of big bang. This theory best conforms with what we can observe.

The moment there is better theory, or new evidence that is contradictory we throw it out of the window.

> "the big bang came out of nothing" makes as much sense as any religious text to be honest.

Statements like this are so improportionally biased, it makes my head hurt.

Religions have solutions/answers so you don't need facts, science is the opposite and never absolute.

That said i don't give a flying f* in what other believe as long as they don't try to push it on me.

What china is doing is beyond despicable. And the comparisons to the holocaust are starting to be more and more apt.

Though it seems that they are more like reeducation (read brainwashing) camps with forced labor.

Correct me if I am wrong please, are there evidence of systematic ethnic cleansing?

I though that the hun chinese are imported from mainland and being used to displace the locals and treating them like 2nd class citizens.

That isn’t related to the point I am trying to make, and it isn’t an appropriate discussion on HN as it will only burn in flames.

Let me try again:

Idea - Religion is suffering. In a better world religion is unnecessary.

CCP - We are creating a better world by ridding it of religion.

Reality - Organized religion is a major threat to governments and their narrative.

The situation is that the CCP has high sounding ideals from Marx and other communist works. Reality is that religion is a threat to their power. That a narrative that rounding up these troubled people and re-educating them is necessary for the better world to happen.

This outrage is good, but I am simply pointing out that what is happening in China shouldn’t be surprising. The ideas of Karl Marx are only dangerous because people accept ideas without critical thought, and others use his ideas to further their own real agenda under such cover. It’s all straight out of ‘Animal Farm’.

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