Tiananmen Square and controlling what you can see (and think)

[FloralBunting]

I've been watching much of the coverage of the anniversary of what happened in China. Much talk of how the Chinese government is still controlling what people are allowed to read about it in the country.

It got me thinking about the way certain sectors of western society are clamouring for censorship and state control of various means of communication, and how much it seems like free people willingly offering up their throats to the wolves.

And also, fascinating to see the cognitive dissonance of people pointing out the horrors of totalitarian oppression, while we keep seeing groups demanding women be forbidden from speaking or using various media to organize or discuss their rights.

How stupid is it possible for humans to get? One part of the world still fighting massive, murderous oppression, another eager to embrace the boot.

I’ve had the same feelings while watching Chernobyl. There’s a wonderful speech in the final episode by Jared Harris’s character when he talks about the importance of facing up to the truth. I wish I’d jotted it down.

I had someone on another thread tell me China isn't a totalitarian state and Chinese people would be very offended at the the thought it is.

People do not want to think of bad things. It's better to shoot the critic (female truth teller) than it is to confront the reality of male power and how it operates (too many horrible conclusions to be drawn).

On a related note, just watching the programme on BBC 4 with Kate Adie talking about the night she got the footage of the massacre and was so determined to get it out of China. That is one inspiring woman.

People do not want to think of bad things.

Major issue in the western world at present in adults not being able to tolerate, never mind deal with uncomfortable feelings, and those uncomfortable feelings being seen as so scary and intolerable that people should be protected from them rather than helped to deal with them.

Rather like the findings that child mental health is at an all time crisis point, where as in the 1900s-1940s wars when children were dealing with separation from families, being bombed, mass and frequent bereavements, the destruction of the towns and areas they lived in, food rationing, violent discipline in schools, somehow those children had far higher levels of mental health and wellbeing.

I’ve had the same feelings while watching Chernobyl. There’s a wonderful speech in the final episode by Jared Harris’s character when he talks about the importance of facing up to the truth. I wish I’d jotted it down.

I put it on the Pronouns are Rohypnol thread last night! Here you go:

When the truth offends, we lie and lie until we can no longer remember it is even there. But it is still there. Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth. Soon or later, that debt is paid.

No healthy society has a load of people walking around speaking what they know to be untrue and what everyone hearing it knows to be untrue, all due to the threat of denunciation.

No platforming is censorship and it seems there is a dearth of critical thinking skills in society right now, we need to get this stuff taught in schools. "Kind" and "nice" should not supersede logic, common sense and the needs of the many.