Post by Josh on Aug 7, 2008 12:01:52 GMT -8
I was just watching the news and they mentioned that someone from Idaho was arrested (?) in China for protesting in Tiannemen Square. The anchor said the protester was arrested for protesting against “abortion and other spiritual issues”.
Wow. That description made me laugh. First off, talk about dismissive. I love how he just assumed that the question of abortion was a “spiritual issue”. What exactly is a spiritual issue anyway? Is it different than “real issues”, “political issues”, “humanitarian issues”?
Anyway, I haven’t checked it out, but I’ll venture a guess that the issue wasn’t abortion but infanticide. (Why travel all the way to China to protest abortion when you can do it just fine right here?) And I’ll venture a further guess that some of the protest had to do with government violence and injustice toward religious groups.
All this to say, what do you guys think is the best way for either a) Christians b) The United States/ Europe to interact with China, considering their human rights violations?
Is protest, boycott, ultimatums, and stand-offishness the best way to encourage change in China? Or is working with them via the road of slow compromise the better way?
Of course I’m sure different folks have different opinions about what may or may not be “wrong” with Chinese governmental policies (let alone our own governments). And we might differ in what improvements we’d like to see (freedom of religion, freeing Tibet, etc..) All reasons why this could be an interesting discussion.
I’ll start off.
I was originally more inclined toward the US taking a hard-line against China due primarily to their aggressively anti-religious injustices. However, the more I read about the Christian perspective in China, I am inclined toward the idea that one of the best ways to combat injustice in China toward Christians or Buddhists, etc.. is to encourage capitalism’s erosion of traditional communism in China*. I’ve even read that Chinese Christians consider Western protests counter-productive in that they promote the Chinese government’s defensive stance against religion and perhaps protests even put Chinese believers in harm’s way.
Any thoughts on any of this (from any perspective)?
* At the same time, this makes me uneasy because along with that capitalism comes some of the worst things about US/ European culture.
Wow. That description made me laugh. First off, talk about dismissive. I love how he just assumed that the question of abortion was a “spiritual issue”. What exactly is a spiritual issue anyway? Is it different than “real issues”, “political issues”, “humanitarian issues”?
Anyway, I haven’t checked it out, but I’ll venture a guess that the issue wasn’t abortion but infanticide. (Why travel all the way to China to protest abortion when you can do it just fine right here?) And I’ll venture a further guess that some of the protest had to do with government violence and injustice toward religious groups.
All this to say, what do you guys think is the best way for either a) Christians b) The United States/ Europe to interact with China, considering their human rights violations?
Is protest, boycott, ultimatums, and stand-offishness the best way to encourage change in China? Or is working with them via the road of slow compromise the better way?
Of course I’m sure different folks have different opinions about what may or may not be “wrong” with Chinese governmental policies (let alone our own governments). And we might differ in what improvements we’d like to see (freedom of religion, freeing Tibet, etc..) All reasons why this could be an interesting discussion.
I’ll start off.
I was originally more inclined toward the US taking a hard-line against China due primarily to their aggressively anti-religious injustices. However, the more I read about the Christian perspective in China, I am inclined toward the idea that one of the best ways to combat injustice in China toward Christians or Buddhists, etc.. is to encourage capitalism’s erosion of traditional communism in China*. I’ve even read that Chinese Christians consider Western protests counter-productive in that they promote the Chinese government’s defensive stance against religion and perhaps protests even put Chinese believers in harm’s way.
Any thoughts on any of this (from any perspective)?
* At the same time, this makes me uneasy because along with that capitalism comes some of the worst things about US/ European culture.
