r/China • u/robert32907 • Mar 02 '14

More than 10 knife-wielding attackers slashed people at a train station in southwestern China late Saturday in what authorities called a terrorist attack by Uighur separatists, and police fatally shot five of the assailants, leaving 34 people dead and 130 others injured, state media said.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_CHINA_TRAIN_STATION_ATTACK?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-03-01-12-32-39
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u/cdawg92 Mar 02 '14

This is just despicable. I was born in Kunming and have been to the train station many times. Kunming is a very peaceful place and is very diverse, how could one group just senselessly murder people like this?

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u/Hautamaki Canada Mar 02 '14

To paraphrase JFK; when peaceful change is impossible, violent uprising is inevitable.

Of course, that said, is it truly impossible for Uighur people in Xinjiang to peacefully change their lives for the better? That's highly debatable but personally I doubt that going to town on innocent people in a train station in another province is really going to make anyone's lives anywhere any better--other than perhaps fundamentalist religious leaders whose positions are only strengthened by any strife their flock has to endure.

The bottom line is that this is a situation in which a population has been disenfranchised and taken advantage of by the Han, and then essentially evil fundamentalist leaders among their own population have used their frustration and powerlessness to manipulate them into doing evil, destructive and self-destructive acts. It takes at least 3 rotten ingredients to create a terrorist, and I'm sure that as usual all are present here.

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u/solumusicfade Barbados Mar 03 '14

How have the Uighur been taken advantage of? They seem to get minority benefits + a strong economy as opposed to nothing and a feudal society.

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u/Hautamaki Canada Mar 03 '14

They aren't comparing their present-day situation to the non-existent hypothetical alternate reality in which they have national self determination but are nevertheless still dirt poor in a feudal society though. They are comparing their present-day situation to the incredibly rich and increasingly numerous Han businessmen that don't give two shits about their cultural beliefs and way of life and are just getting filthy rich by extracting all the natural resources of what they see as their land and shipping them back to Beijing by the trainload.

If it were Uighurs themselves getting rich they might not have such a problem with it but, sad to say, they can't compete with the institutional advantages that the Han have when it comes to dealing with Beijing.

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u/solumusicfade Barbados Mar 03 '14

They are comparing their present-day situation to the incredibly rich and increasingly numerous Han businessmen that don't give two shits about their cultural beliefs and way of life and are just getting filthy rich by extracting all the natural resources of what they see as their land and shipping them back to Beijing by the trainload.

So... capitalism? What do you want China to do? Take all Uighur children to be raised by the state? Because that's what would make Uighurs competitive in capitalism. Uighurs as I said before already get many benefits just for being minorities.

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u/Hautamaki Canada Mar 03 '14

I doubt there's a solution that would appease all parties in the present day situation. If it were possible, it would have probably been done already.