flanerie

Barbarous and inhuman

Alternative Beijing Olympics logo, by Beau Bo D'Or (click to go to his excellent site)

I realise it’s quite a tall order to completely boycott Chinese products, given that nobody else seems to bloody well make anything these days, but the sheer inhumanity of China’s totalitarian so-called communist¹ government requires a response that goes beyond hand-wringing and toothless criticism.

I’ve been trying to avoid Chinese-made products for years, because I don’t want poor quality stuff made by wage-slaves which has been shipped halfway across the world, but in the light of this morning’s execution of a seriously mentally ill man who was duped into smuggling some drugs into the country, I’m going to redouble my efforts not to buy anything made there.

According to Jiang Yu, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson, “nobody has the right to speak ill of China’s judicial sovereignty”. Yes they do. You can’t gag people outside your own country, however much you’d like to do so.

As I’m sure you’re aware, there’s no shortage of appalling acts perpetrated by the Chinese authorities (unless you happen to live in China, in which case they’ll make sure you don’t hear about it). Human Rights Watch highlights many such examples:

Twenty years after the army killed untold numbers of unarmed civilians in Beijing and other cities on and around June 3-4, 1989, the Chinese government continues to victimize survivors, victims’ families, and others who challenge the official version of events.

Video featuring commentary by Wang Dan, a student leader of the 1989 Tiananmen protests, and Dr. Sophie Richardson and Carroll Bogert, Human Rights Watch.

1. eradicating the exploitation of the workforce doesn’t seem to be very high on their list of priorities [↩]

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