From: ygu@eve.eng.uci.edu (Yifan Gu)
Subject: Re: when china wakes
Newsgroups: soc.culture.china
Organization: University of California, Irvine
Date: 3 Jan 93 21:23:43 GMT
Distribution: soc


 v999qx29@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu  writes:

In article <2B454B84.23191@news.service.uci.edu>, ygu@balboa.eng.uci.edu (Yifan Gu) writes...

>>>    pros and cons? I believe in the 60s most of the people in mainland
>>>    China supported Cultural Revolution , don't they?
>> 
>>They not only supported it, they participated in it. Almost 100% of city and 
>>Town people (over age 13) did participate because, guess what, they had
>>"freedom of speech"!  Don't be surprised!  The chinese paraphrase for
>>"freedom of speech" at the time was "Da Ming, Da Fong, Da Zhi Boa, 
>>Da Bian Leng" (sorry, I forgot Pin Yin already). It roughly means that
>>"let all the opinions be heared, let your piece of mind be given 
>>to others, use big posters, and let us have big debates". It was a
>>really big "democracy". And the result was violence. 
>> 
>> 

>What was the class of your family? I guess it was red. Had you been the so
>called class enemy , I really doubt you had the freedom of speech. The only
>thing you could do would have been confess over and again to the so called 
>people . That was by no means "Democrocy".

You are making a point here. That was why I put " " around freedom of speech and
democracy. There are so many people speaking of democracy and meaning different
things.   

As for my family background, it was all "black" without a bit of "red".

 lix@thames.bu.edu (Xiaowen Li) writes:


>>> "micky wong" <micky.wong@canrem.com> writes:

>>>The number of Chinese people died of starvation caused by Mao's
>>>wrong policies, far exceeds the thousands, it was in many millions.
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

>>50 -60 million is undoubtedly untrustworthy.

>Why? It may well be very close to truth. According to "70 years of CCP",
>(Hu Shueng, 1991), p369, the population net decrement in 1960 is 10 million.

>The accurate number probably we never know, but 50-60 million won't be
>that untrustworthy.

Still, your number is 10 million. Not 50 - 60 ....
Numbers from books that I read by noted U.S historians put the estimate
of deaths caused by starvation and startvation related illnesses at 10-20...
Depending on their inclinations, some say more and some less.


>>>    pros and cons? I believe in the 60s most of the people in mainland
>>>    China supported Cultural Revolution , don't they?
>> 
>>They not only supported it, they participated in it. Almost 100% of city and 
>>Town people (over age 13) did participate because, guess what, they had
>>"freedom of speech"!  Don't be surprised!  The chinese paraphrase for
>>"freedom of speech" at the time was "Da Ming, Da Fong, Da Zhi Boa, 
>>Da Bian Leng" (sorry, I forgot Pin Yin already). It roughly means that
>>"let all the opinions be heared, let your piece of mind be given 
>>to others, use big posters, and let us have big debates". It was a
>>really big "democracy". And the result was violence. 
>> 
>> 

>I'd rather say they were involved, rather than they supported the CR. Even
>college students, far less than 100%, supported the CR. In my class of 25
>classmates, no more than 5 actively participated. Well, free traveling
>is not counted here as active participation.:-)

I should have put " " on supported. But on the surface, you couldn't tell,
could you? It seemed every one was lending himself/herself to "supporting
and protecting Mao's revolutionary line", whatever that was. Few could sustain
midground when it became factional; voluntarily or involuntarily, actively or
inactively, seriously or just "taking a free ride", most "participated" one time 
or anther. Now think about it, it wasn`t just pain; a lot of fun too. :-)


>I don't think freedom of speech should be blamed for the violence, but
>deep-rooted desire for power. Mao only used such desire as a vehicle
>to move mass. Without desire for power, freedom of speech won't yield
>violence, like on SCC.

Freedom of speech in limited range is OK. Not the kind of "Mass democrcy".
I am not so sure about this power thing. Fists can not fly electronically, you know.
But you are right about power's big role in those years.

I once went to a political science class on its first day, and the teacher showed
a film of a hypothetical case of freedom of speech, whereby a Neo-Nazi youth went to
a jewish community and started praising Hitler on his(Hitler) birthday on the sidewalk.
Soon he was surounded and beaten the hell out of him, so he took it to court to sue
for the violation of his constitutional first amendment right. Two lawyers went on 
with exccellent speeches for and aginst the young man, respectively. The film stopped
there, and the teacher asked the students, 50 strong, to raise their hands to give the
verdict. About half voted for quilty, less than that not quilty, 6, me included were
undecided. Then the teacher separated the class into three groups according to their
vote, and asked the class ready for arguments.

Fearful that a CR was about to happen, with the full knowledge that the midground 
could be the most dangerous place, I sneaked out before the debate started. :-)




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