[Wikipedia-l] Re: Chinese Wikipedia

[Craig Franklin]

Scríobh Jiong Sheng:

>Is this a humiliation or prejudice against all Chinese? A bunch of
>robbers? If you have no understanding of real China, and only got all
>your false impressions of China from newspapers or magazines, then you
>better shut up.
>
>Look back on history, though China had the most powerful navy and army
>since the 10th century, we did not want to conquer the whole world.
>Only the whites would go all around the world robbing and killing.

Yup.  I'm white, and my people back in the tenth century were most certainly
going about the world looting and robbing every poor non-white nation that
we could get our hands on.

Except, whoops, no we didn't, we just sat on our island and eventually got
conquered by the British.  Thanks for putting us all in the one basket
though!

Also, the status of Tibet 100 years ago is irrelevant.  What matters is that
right now, the PRC (not "the Chinese") are embarking on a campaign of
repression against the Tibetan people and way of life, including but not
limited to, acts of violence, ethnic cleansing, and trying to breed out the
natives.  At the same time, they pursue blustery threats against the
democratically elected government of Taiwan, they set up quasi-democracies
in Hong Kong and Macau, and unfortunate things happen to people who express
opposition to their rule.  No matter what their other economic successes
(and I do agree, the economic growth in China recently has been phenomenal),
these things will forever overshadow it.

None of this is criticism of the "Chinese" as a people - it's criticism of
the Chinese government as an institution, and I don't think that Wikipedia
give in to the demands of such a bunch of thugs and brutes.  Free, unbiased
information is a threat to the Chinese government, and it's understandable,
if disappointing that they want to attempt to smother it.  I reject strongly
the implication that we should try to satiate them, however.  The people of
China really deserve better than us becoming another mouthpiece of the PRC
government, masquerading as a source of unbiased information.

Regards,
- Craig Franklin

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Craig Franklin
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