http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7374864.stm Obviously, the above had a happy ending because the children were saved. However, things like this has been going on for years with local leadership knowledge and sometimes even involvement. Remember the brick factory slaves last year? It is amazing that they're still finding people all over China being kept under these conditions. Should the PRC government do more in putting a stop to this; or should it just consider this free enterprise? I mean, Pearl S. Buck wrote about selling Chinese girls as slaves back in 1931. Are we still living with a "Good Earth" mentality? Ralph
this is quite obviously wrong but its very hard to stop these things due to corruption by ppl for money. hopefully, in the future ppl will stop this and local authorities will do more.
its actually pretty sad, when i was in china, there were so much kids that didnt go to school and worked at shops or begged on the streets :( such a dark place
The dark side of the begging is that many of those crippled panhandling kids were purposely maimed by criminal gangs. They did this to elicit sympathy from passerby to increase the amounts that the kids could collect. Most of these kids were stolen from small towns and other surrounding areas, often with the knowledge and acquiescence of corrupt law enforcement officials. -nono Things like this was consider to be such common knowledge that more than a few TVB television series have hinted at and used such themes in their drama scripts. It is indeed a sad and heart breaking reflection of our world and what some are willing to stoop to in order to make money. Sadly, China doesn't have a monopoly on exploitation of children. Egypt used to be rife with armless or legless (again, purposely maimed by criminals) children that begged at the tourist locales. The subcontinent is replete with children chained to carpet looms because their tiny fingers have the needed manual dexterity to weave those high thread count silk carpets valued by westerners. And of course we can't forget about the child sex workers in poor countries all over south east Asia (notably in places like Thailand and Cambodia), frequented by sex tourists from their bettor off neighbors (eg Hong Kong, Korea, Japan, and Taiwan). :rant: Again, the exploitation of children is nothing new, and if you look carefully at the local background of wherever you're at, such things do rear its ugly head. But still, its nonetheless infuriating to know that people with whom you share ethnic or cultural kinship can also do this shit; I sincerely hope they hang the bastards. Ralph
A not so subtle reminder of what China really is. I'm not talking about her people or culture, but her politics and how she treats her own people (which frankly stinks): Its been nearly twenty years, that is, a full generation since those events. The focus of the young now is on making money and the latest Chinese hip hop. For kids today, the tragic events of those times is as far removed from their daily lives as any other dusty chapter of Chinese history. Still, the powers that be within the PRC would nonetheless suppress this history for fear of discussion and true revelation into the facts from that history. Foreign sources have suggested that upwards of three thousand protesting Chinese were killed by their own government. However, with the continued intransigence of the PRC in talking about those days, the true number will probably never be known. Its also telling that the reason why this picture was inadvertently printed had more to do with ignorance of the true nature of the events than an actual appreciation of the tragic history. Inotherwords, the suppression of the history by the PRC government seems to be working as not enough people know about the event to be able to recognize it immediately as being politically taboo. For anyone who has an even remote or passing interest in the history, some other pictures: Other sources in Videos reports or newscasts from those times (Warning the 4th video has some very graphic imagery): 1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyj-3S_ulvI&feature=related 2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hc9T10WLF3w&feature=related 3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O10_L8UvhtY&feature=related 4. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJlloj5Xams&feature=related For Other Pics (warning: some really graphic and gruesome): http://www.cnd.org/HYPLAN/yawei/june4th/ I Love China, but I hate its politics. For those that want to blindly support the PRC, just a word of cautionary advice; it really doesn't matter if you're Chinese (or whatever), the PRC government will treat you like a Tibetan when it comes to keeping themselves in power. Inotherwords, China, the people, matter very little to China, the government. Ralph
