Tibet has historically been a part of China and is claimed by the ROC. It emerged briefly as an independent entity in the political instability in the early 20th century, along with countless little warlord states, and it never received international recognition. During the time when it was a de facto state, it was a backwards authoritarian theocracy with a caste system, serfdom, and a life expectancy of about 30. China ended these things and vastly improved the quality of life for the vast majority of Tibetans.
There are plenty of people in the US who would say that the changes in the South following the Civil War and the abolishment of slavery constituted a destruction of the Antebellum culture. "A civilization, Gone with the Wind," to quote the movie. The South did undergo many changes including culturally, as much of its culture was tied to the institution of slavery. If it's true that Southern culture was so tied to slavery that freeing the slaves destroyed that culture, then I say good riddance - and if freeing the serfs destroyed Tibetan culture then I'd say the same.
Organ harvesting
If you actually read that article, the evidence presented is laughable.
The authors qualified their report by noting the inherent difficulties in verifying the alleged crimes: no independent organizations are allowed to investigate conditions in China, eyewitness evidence is difficult to obtain, and official information about both organ transplantation and executions is often withheld or is contradictory. The initial report however received a mixed reception. In the US, a Congressional Research Service report by Thomas Lum stated that the Kilgour–Matas report relied largely on logical inference, without bringing forth new or independently obtained testimony; the credibility of much of the key evidence was said to be questionable.
In other words, nobody's actually collected any real evidence and it's all just speculation and inference. It's made up. Many of the people pushing the narrative have incentive to lie about China.
FLG
Falun Gong is a far-right political group funded by the CIA with made-up religious trappings so they can cry oppression when they aren't allowed to spread lies and bigotry with impunity. Just from the Wikipedia page on them, they oppose gay rights, feminism, and modern medicine and science and espouse QAnon and antivax conspiracy theories - this is the main source of "organ harvesting" claims btw. China Uncensored is directly affiliated with Falun Gong.
I wouldn't necessarily describe the TV Tropes page as white supremacist but that's the context for that stuff, and the page is definitely missing some disclaimers and context.
Thanks for the context on Tibet. The analogy helped, too, since I have a lot more familiarity with events related to e.g., the destruction of Confederate statues. I’ll have to go back and re-read the Tropes mention and so on but it makes sense to me now why mentioning the destruction of that culture without a disclaimer would be problematic / explicitly bigoted (still not sure “racist” is the right term but even if so my opposition would be solely pedantic and I’m not trying to police word choices like that).
FLG
I’ll be honest re the FLG - reading up on this yesterday was the first time I’d ever even heard of them. They’re not a very likable group.
Given what you’ve shared, it makes sense to me that their claims shouldn’t be taken at face value. That said, if people who haven’t harmed anyone are being imprisoned solely because of their beliefs, regardless of how poorly informed those beliefs are - which this New York Times article discusses - then it’s fair to criticize the state for those actions.
I still don’t see how it isn’t ignorant to hold the belief that “unironically mentioning the FLG means you’re a racist white edgelord,” when referring to someone talking about the subject matter of a show that has that subject matter, and given that as far as I can tell the imprisonment of those people is not even contested by the state.
China Uncensored is directly affiliated with Falun Gong.
That seems like pretty important context for the TvTropes article, and its omission is suspicious.
Organ harvesting
If you actually read that article, the evidence presented is laughable.
I didn’t read the whole article, though I read the counterpoints section in its entirety. From what I did read, the lines you cited were the least compelling. Importantly, there’s an entire “Evidence” section; the bit you quoted was from the section on Verdicts and Reporting.
Specifically, the following all have more merit IMO:
The ”Verdict by the China Tribunal” subsection
The rapid increase in organ transplants without attributable causes, with its timing aligned with the imprisonment of FLG practitioners.
Extremely low wait times for organ transplant recipients, which suggest something suspicious is going on.
There were multiple witnesses who described medical testing that strongly suggest those tests were intended to assess the health of organs rather than the person.
Posing as prospective transplant recipients or brokers, investigators called hospitals, prisons, etc., and were told they had FLG organs that could be available for transplant.
In Israel, several men involved in mediating organ transplants of Chinese prisoners were arrested
You’re right that none of this is definitive, especially given the bias of many of the sources, but as a whole it is clear that something other than the official account is or was happening. I’m not fully convinced one way or the other, but the arguments were compelling enough for several major governments to speak out against it and pass laws in response. Calling the evidence laughable feels shortsighted.
I’ve also been unable to find rebuttals to the specific evidence. As a contrast, the World Trade Center “jet fuel can’t melt steel beams so it must have been an inside job” conspiracy theories prompted government investigations and a ton of debunking articles that I can easily find via a web search. When I try to find debunkings of this, the best I can find is articles like this one, in which Chinese government officials admit that they used to harvest organs from prisoners, but state that they don’t anymore.
With what I’ve read so far, to believe that this is made up, I basically would have to say that the evidence itself was fabricated and ignore the discrepancies in the data, assuming that there’s some reasonable explanation for them but not seeking it out. I’m not interested in engaging in willful ignorance like that.
I can see why someone might be annoyed at an assertion of this as a fact, but to call such an assertion racist / white supremacist is nonsensical at best.
In other words, nobody's actually collected any real evidence and it's all just speculation and inference. It's made up.
Inference involves making a conclusion by taking evidence and applying logic and reasoning. Not sure why you think that’s “made up.”
Many of the people pushing the narrative have incentive to lie about China.
This seems to be the case, but unfortunately the opposite - that those rebutting the narrative have incentive to lie for China - also seems to be true.
Thanks again for all the extra info/context you’ve shared and for helping me to better understand this.
—-
Quotes below are from the wikipedia article - specifically the numbered list of evidence I mentioned above.
Tribunal:
In June 2019, the tribunal published their final judgment which unanimously concluded that crimes against humanity had been committed.[67] The tribunal's report said "forced organ harvesting has been committed for years throughout China on a significant scale and ... Falun Gong practitioners have been one—and probably the main—source of organ supply."[67] The tribunal estimated between 60,000 and 90,000 transplant operations occurred per year, much more than the official figures of 10,000 from the Chinese government.[1][68] The chair of the tribunal said "there is no evidence of the practice having been stopped and the tribunal is satisfied that it is continuing."[68]
Wait times:
Researchers and medical professionals have expressed concern about the implications of the short organ transplant wait times offered by Chinese hospitals. Specifically, they say these wait times are indicative of a pool of living donors whose organs can be removed on demand.[35] This is because organs must be transplanted immediately after death, or must be taken from a living donor (kidneys must be transplanted within 24–48 hours; livers within 12 hours, and hearts within 8 hours).[90]
Medical testing:
One man, Wang Xiaohua, was imprisoned in a labor camp in Yunnan in 2001 when he and twenty other Falun Gong detainees were taken to a hospital. They had large quantities of blood drawn, in addition to urine samples, abdominal x-rays, and electrocardiogram. Hospital staff did not tend to physical injuries they had suffered in custody. This pattern was repeated in several other interviews.
Hospital / prison / detention center statements:
In one such call to a police detention center in Mishan city, an official said that they had five to eight Falun Gong practitioners under the age of 40 who were potential organ suppliers. When asked for details on the background of these individuals, the official indicated that they were male Falun Gong prisoners from rural areas.[102]
Israel arrests:
Israeli authorities arrested several men involved in mediating transplants of Chinese prisoners' organs for Israelis. One of the men had stated in an undercover interview that the organs came from "people who oppose the regime, those sentenced to death and from prisoners of the Falun Gong."[138]
That said, if people who haven’t harmed anyone are being imprisoned solely because of their beliefs, regardless of how poorly informed those beliefs are - which this New York Times article discusses - then it’s fair to criticize the state for those actions.
"Haven't harmed anyone" - antivax conspiracy theories have led to the reemergence of all sorts of diseases, so that's already one reason already. But moreover, allowing CIA-backed organizations to operate in a socialist country is a recipe for disaster, and there have been countless cases of leftist projects that were defeated after failing to take the necessary steps to stop the CIA from operating with impunity and installing a fascist. Look at Mohammad Mossadegh of Iran and the CIA coup in the 50's if you want an example of what happens when you go against Western interests and refuse to crack down on foreign subversion because of your principles. Rule number 1 of good policy - you can't do good policy if you're not in power. If a policy results in fascists coming to power, then it's not good policy.
I’m not fully convinced one way or the other, but the arguments were compelling enough for several major governments to speak out against it and pass laws in response.
"Several major governments" will speak out about any random bullshit that makes China look bad. They're the ones who come up with it in the first place!
I’ve also been unable to find rebuttals to the specific evidence. As a contrast, the World Trade Center “jet fuel can’t melt steel beams so it must have been an inside job” conspiracy theories prompted government investigations and a ton of debunking articles that I can easily find via a web search.
Not exactly shocking that there's more articles debunking a claim that makes the US government look bad than there are debunking a claim that makes the Chinese government look bad.
Inference involves making a conclusion by taking evidence and applying logic and reasoning. Not sure why you think that’s “made up.”
Now you're just being a debatebro. Inference is a lower standard of evidence than hard proof. You obviously know this. Given the clear incentives people have to cast China in a bad light and to always assume the worst, and given a track record of made up bullshit in that regard, "inference" from these people is worth less than dogshit.
Let's say I'm at work and my lunch goes missing. If I think that one of my coworkers is the type of person who might steal my lunch, then I might infer that they probably did that. But let's say that any time anything goes wrong, or even when nothing goes wrong, I accuse that coworker of random bullshit that never turns out to be true. At what point do you start saying my so-called "inferences" about this person are just "made up?"
Tribunal:
What Tribunal? What organization was involved, why are they an authority on the topic? Let's see, the full name of that Tribunal was:
"The Independent Tribunal Into Forced Organ Harvesting of Prisoners of Conscience in China," known as the China Tribunal,[66] was initiated in 2018[67] by the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China."
I wonder what the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China is going to determine about whether transplant abuse is happening in China? Say, who's on this, anyway?
The China Tribunal was initiated by the charity ETAC, of which "a minority of its committee members are Falun Gong practitioners".[3]
Who would've guessed?
One man, Wang Xiaohua, was imprisoned in a labor camp in Yunnan in 2001 when he and twenty other Falun Gong detainees
Another source that's just "Falun Gong says this."
Israeli authorities arrested several men involved in mediating transplants of Chinese prisoners' organs for Israelis. One of the men had stated in an undercover interview that the organs came from "people who oppose the regime, those sentenced to death and from prisoners of the Falun Gong."
That said, if people who haven’t harmed anyone are being imprisoned solely because of their beliefs, regardless of how poorly informed those beliefs are
Falun gong was indeed hurting people, not the least of which being its own members, including a child, who immolated themselves (or in the kid's case was almost murdered) as an act of public demonstration -- to say nothing of the harm they try to do to the public by denying the science of vaccines in general and covid vaccines in particular, their opposition to interracial marriage (because apparently heaven is racially segregated), their belief in breathing exercises replacing real medicine, etc.
Tibet has historically been a part of China and is claimed by the ROC. It emerged briefly as an independent entity in the political instability in the early 20th century, along with countless little warlord states, and it never received international recognition. During the time when it was a de facto state, it was a backwards authoritarian theocracy with a caste system, serfdom, and a life expectancy of about 30. China ended these things and vastly improved the quality of life for the vast majority of Tibetans.
There are plenty of people in the US who would say that the changes in the South following the Civil War and the abolishment of slavery constituted a destruction of the Antebellum culture. "A civilization, Gone with the Wind," to quote the movie. The South did undergo many changes including culturally, as much of its culture was tied to the institution of slavery. If it's true that Southern culture was so tied to slavery that freeing the slaves destroyed that culture, then I say good riddance - and if freeing the serfs destroyed Tibetan culture then I'd say the same.
If you actually read that article, the evidence presented is laughable.
In other words, nobody's actually collected any real evidence and it's all just speculation and inference. It's made up. Many of the people pushing the narrative have incentive to lie about China.
Falun Gong is a far-right political group funded by the CIA with made-up religious trappings so they can cry oppression when they aren't allowed to spread lies and bigotry with impunity. Just from the Wikipedia page on them, they oppose gay rights, feminism, and modern medicine and science and espouse QAnon and antivax conspiracy theories - this is the main source of "organ harvesting" claims btw. China Uncensored is directly affiliated with Falun Gong.
I wouldn't necessarily describe the TV Tropes page as white supremacist but that's the context for that stuff, and the page is definitely missing some disclaimers and context.
Thanks for the context on Tibet. The analogy helped, too, since I have a lot more familiarity with events related to e.g., the destruction of Confederate statues. I’ll have to go back and re-read the Tropes mention and so on but it makes sense to me now why mentioning the destruction of that culture without a disclaimer would be problematic / explicitly bigoted (still not sure “racist” is the right term but even if so my opposition would be solely pedantic and I’m not trying to police word choices like that).
I’ll be honest re the FLG - reading up on this yesterday was the first time I’d ever even heard of them. They’re not a very likable group.
Given what you’ve shared, it makes sense to me that their claims shouldn’t be taken at face value. That said, if people who haven’t harmed anyone are being imprisoned solely because of their beliefs, regardless of how poorly informed those beliefs are - which this New York Times article discusses - then it’s fair to criticize the state for those actions.
I still don’t see how it isn’t ignorant to hold the belief that “unironically mentioning the FLG means you’re a racist white edgelord,” when referring to someone talking about the subject matter of a show that has that subject matter, and given that as far as I can tell the imprisonment of those people is not even contested by the state.
That seems like pretty important context for the TvTropes article, and its omission is suspicious.
I didn’t read the whole article, though I read the counterpoints section in its entirety. From what I did read, the lines you cited were the least compelling. Importantly, there’s an entire “Evidence” section; the bit you quoted was from the section on Verdicts and Reporting.
Specifically, the following all have more merit IMO:
You’re right that none of this is definitive, especially given the bias of many of the sources, but as a whole it is clear that something other than the official account is or was happening. I’m not fully convinced one way or the other, but the arguments were compelling enough for several major governments to speak out against it and pass laws in response. Calling the evidence laughable feels shortsighted.
I’ve also been unable to find rebuttals to the specific evidence. As a contrast, the World Trade Center “jet fuel can’t melt steel beams so it must have been an inside job” conspiracy theories prompted government investigations and a ton of debunking articles that I can easily find via a web search. When I try to find debunkings of this, the best I can find is articles like this one, in which Chinese government officials admit that they used to harvest organs from prisoners, but state that they don’t anymore.
With what I’ve read so far, to believe that this is made up, I basically would have to say that the evidence itself was fabricated and ignore the discrepancies in the data, assuming that there’s some reasonable explanation for them but not seeking it out. I’m not interested in engaging in willful ignorance like that.
I can see why someone might be annoyed at an assertion of this as a fact, but to call such an assertion racist / white supremacist is nonsensical at best.
Inference involves making a conclusion by taking evidence and applying logic and reasoning. Not sure why you think that’s “made up.”
This seems to be the case, but unfortunately the opposite - that those rebutting the narrative have incentive to lie for China - also seems to be true.
Thanks again for all the extra info/context you’ve shared and for helping me to better understand this.
—-
Quotes below are from the wikipedia article - specifically the numbered list of evidence I mentioned above.
Tribunal:
Wait times:
Medical testing:
Hospital / prison / detention center statements:
Israel arrests:
"Haven't harmed anyone" - antivax conspiracy theories have led to the reemergence of all sorts of diseases, so that's already one reason already. But moreover, allowing CIA-backed organizations to operate in a socialist country is a recipe for disaster, and there have been countless cases of leftist projects that were defeated after failing to take the necessary steps to stop the CIA from operating with impunity and installing a fascist. Look at Mohammad Mossadegh of Iran and the CIA coup in the 50's if you want an example of what happens when you go against Western interests and refuse to crack down on foreign subversion because of your principles. Rule number 1 of good policy - you can't do good policy if you're not in power. If a policy results in fascists coming to power, then it's not good policy.
"Several major governments" will speak out about any random bullshit that makes China look bad. They're the ones who come up with it in the first place!
Not exactly shocking that there's more articles debunking a claim that makes the US government look bad than there are debunking a claim that makes the Chinese government look bad.
Now you're just being a debatebro. Inference is a lower standard of evidence than hard proof. You obviously know this. Given the clear incentives people have to cast China in a bad light and to always assume the worst, and given a track record of made up bullshit in that regard, "inference" from these people is worth less than dogshit.
Let's say I'm at work and my lunch goes missing. If I think that one of my coworkers is the type of person who might steal my lunch, then I might infer that they probably did that. But let's say that any time anything goes wrong, or even when nothing goes wrong, I accuse that coworker of random bullshit that never turns out to be true. At what point do you start saying my so-called "inferences" about this person are just "made up?"
What Tribunal? What organization was involved, why are they an authority on the topic? Let's see, the full name of that Tribunal was:
I wonder what the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China is going to determine about whether transplant abuse is happening in China? Say, who's on this, anyway?
Who would've guessed?
Another source that's just "Falun Gong says this."
Source is a book I don't have access to.
Falun gong was indeed hurting people, not the least of which being its own members, including a child, who immolated themselves (or in the kid's case was almost murdered) as an act of public demonstration -- to say nothing of the harm they try to do to the public by denying the science of vaccines in general and covid vaccines in particular, their opposition to interracial marriage (because apparently heaven is racially segregated), their belief in breathing exercises replacing real medicine, etc.
Here's a fun little podcast thing about some of their projects