Date: Sun, 28 Jun 1998 22:55:35 -0600 (MDT) From: Wes Peters <wes@softweyr.com> To: grog@lemis.com Cc: freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Tiananmen square (was: Does it's true?) Message-ID: <199806290455.WAA23018@softweyr.com> In-Reply-To: <19980629105035.E897@freebie.lemis.com> References: <19980629105035.E897@freebie.lemis.com>
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My hidden microphone recorded Greg Lehey (grog@lemis.com) saying:
% > only to find that the police killed your wife for commiting the
% > heinous crime of having a second child.
%
% How often does that happen? I've never heard of it. Even if it does,
% it's not the norm. I'd guess (based only on my own patchy observation
% of news media) that it's about as likely to happen as getting shot on
% the highway in the US.
Not according to the state social worker who applied for asylum in the USA
several weeks ago, and was interviewed on one of the "news magazine" shows
here last week. She had an epiphany when one of the illegal young mothers
brought into her clinic and locked up for "correction" was some sort of
relative, and decided to leave the country with her case files. It appears
that policy dictated the clinic abort the first unauthorized child, forcibly
if necessary, and sterilize the mother after aborting the second. Several
women during her years of service were simply killed outright because they
physically resisted their "treatment." If you want quotes of the report, I'll
see if I can find which show it was reported on.
% In any case, I was talking about *me*. I have been offered jobs both
% in Beijing and in large US cities (though not in India or Russia), and
% I have a fair idea of what my living conditions would have been like.
% Note that I turned them all down.
I've never been offered a job in Beijing (although they'd probably be
delighted if they knew much of my background), but have been offered jobs in
many major cities in the USA, and a couple in Europe. I didn't take any of
the European jobs because I have absolutely no wish to live there, although I
would like to visit a few countries.
I have lived in many of the larger US cities, and have found none of them to
be frightening, even after dark. I've been held up at gunpoint once, in
Indianaplis, and at knifepoint once, in Seattle, neither of which would make
most people's list of the scariest cities in the USA. I consider both
experiences an anomoly, and felt less threatend by either of them than I did
by the man who threw a cinder block through my school bus window to "protest"
the forced bussing of children when it started in the south.
% ... The real question to ask (and one for which I have no obvious
% answer) is: who lives a happier life, the slum-dwellers in the US, in
% India, in China or in Russia? I certainly don't see any particular
% reason to decide for the US or against China, especially after you
% remove the problem of overpopulation (against which the Chinese
% Government, unlike the Indian Government, is doing something).
That is probably the most intelligent point brought up in this entire thread.
Between you and I, a more important question would be, in which place are we
most likely to find happiness for ourselves and our families?
If I thought that was more likely in China or Russia or Australia or South
Borneo, I'd be living there today. I see the quality of life in the Salt Lake
Valley diminishing rapidly, and have been looking for an upgrade path for
several years now. While I try to be as open-minded as possible, I certainly
won't be moving my family to some totalitarian dunghole with zero respect for
human rights like China.
% > Let's not forget where the criminals in China are - the government
% > itself.
%
% I think that claim needs a little justification.
See the above-mentioned report by the Chinese "welfare worker."
--
"Where am I, and what am I doing in this handbasket?"
Wes Peters Softweyr LLC
http://www.softweyr.com/~softweyr wes@softweyr.com
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