When you live on government land, what’s yours isn’t really, since it can be taken away in a whim. Of course, all land in China technically belongs to the government, so no one, in effect, can claim for him or herself that most basic of Maslow’s needs, shelter. Which is perhaps why the issue of demolition in China is such a tinderbox, ready to explode with cries about fairness, justice, and — forbid — a government’s scope of power.
With that in mind, Hug China relays this recent story from Tianmen, Hubei province:
Chinese Government officials allegedly enforced law violently in Tianmen city, Hubei province in central China, hiring tens of thugs to carry out forced demolition of local villager’ house and beat any trying to prevent them from doing so with bricks and sticks.
One microblogger’s response:
“If you have never met bandits and would like to know how they look like, please rush to watch how the Tianmen city planning bureau officials in Hubei province violently enforced law. There is only something you have not imagined but nothing they dare not do. You can see sticks and clubs were flying, bricks and stones were raining. And cars were smashed, residents were beaten wherever they went.” Chinese Weibo microblogger @杜楠爆料 wrote on June 1, 2013.
It’s all too easily imaginable, alas. We’ve seen it before. Again and again. And we’ll see it again, likely sooner than later, until someone in a position of authority decides that a few extra bucks in an official or real estate mogul’s pockets isn’t worth this social turmoil.
Are they government officials or actually hired mafia thugs?… (Hug China)
And without the actual background leading up to this, given the reputation of idiots for making shit up, I take it with a grain of salt.
A mob of guys in white shirts beating people up and destroying anything in the way of a demolitions process. I’ll take that with a grain of salt.
You can take a lot of things with a grain of salt but forced demolition isn’t pretty and is very real.
Well, we should give the local government or developer the benefit of the doubt, because its not like local governments have been doing this constantly for the last two decades or anything. I would prefer people wait for the evidence to come out before making a judgment, and if the evidence does not come out that must mean that nothing happened.
See? Harmonious society in 2 sentences!
I’m with the earlier commenter, without any background knowledge to the event we don’t know what caused this. However, I will say one thing that whether its the government wishing to repossess land for a development, or whether its a private corporation its never normally a pretty site as nobody wants to give up their land, especially when the value of the land is higher than the compensation. In a socialist system land, not only has to be repossessed by the government, but also at a slandered rate, which quite often can be lower than the value of the land. Clearly for this reason its makes it very easy to politicise the event, especially when private corporations do the same they have very wealthy PR organizations to counteract any opposition.
Media organizations such as VOA, NTD and RFA love to broadcast these land repossessions in Asia, as a political tool to demonize the government in China, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos and Burma. It always acts as good propaganda against any socialist, or communist government, especially in geographical regions in which America has key opportunity in developing political opposition and regime change. However, what you find they don’t politicize, or even mention is all the brutal land repossessions in so-called democratic and pro-US nations. Whether its Africa, India, or Latin America they all have land repossessions either through corporations, or governments which not only have resulted in armed opposition, but also are turned a blind eye to by foreign media. The difference is these land repossessions happen in countries which the US has majority control, are none-socialist, and either democratic, or crony dictatorships, in which the citizens are poor and voiceless. And that’s not going into the crony economic system of Western government’s which not only refuse to give mineral rights to land owners, but are trapped in an economic system which ensures the majority of people never obtain the legal right to own their own property.
Even though these land repossessions are not nice, they happen in the majority of countries, whether its the bank repossessing a home in the US, or the repossession of Indigenous land in Brazil by an oil corporation, or the repossession of land in India for a mining corporation, or the repossession of land by the Chinese government 99% of people will put up opposition.
With an event like this, there is three questions that need to be asked:
1) Was the compensation enough?
2) Was the repossession necessary?
3) What was the reason for the violence?
All three of these we don’t know, and unless there was no reason for the violence, it does not change the situation from any other land repossession throughout the world.
I’m not saying the government is a saint. But from my own experience dealing with local government (on land issues and money even), It’s rarely as simple as one side wishes to present it to be. Sure, sometimes it is just that, money and greed, but it’s honestly pretty rare for government goons to get involved on any level in shit like this for no real reason.
A whole lot of em in the past is: compensation is agreed to, then those who were compensated discover that what is going to be built is going to jack up land values and they feel cheated, like they should have gotten that future speculative money instead.
Ok, so the goon squad was sent in to move some cars around and to remove people from the scene and there was a good beat down. They’re not gonna just show up day one like that, there’s a backstory here that’s missing entirely, and the exclusion of it is suspicious.
The other thing to remember, is that not everyone has to agree to compensation for it to become binding. Once a supermajority has decided, that’s it, done deal.
Fred, you mentioned some points of law. What about the law which explicitly states that violent means are not allowed to be used to expropriate land?
Do you think it’s OK for the local government to hire thugs to beat people up? I hope one day you too get the chance to be on the receiving end and someone with a club caves in your skull.
Again, get back to me on this when there’s a full backstory to what happened. I’m pretty sure there are laws about attacking workers as well.
Yes Fred, Im sure when “workers” bust down your door to do some “work” with sticks you would sit by…
You seem to have little clue as to how the State here can exercise power in unrestrained ways, but feel free to site and wait for the full “backstory” to appear in Xinhua.
Have you ever been to China?
Again, no backstory, and your assumptions make zero logical sense. ie. you’re talking out of your ass.
And yes,China, I’ve been here for over a decade and seen more than your squinty little FOB eyes ever will. Now go back to preparing for your little english teachy thing, and then fuck off in a year like your ilk does… those burgers ain’t gonna flip themselves afterall.
Said by someone who knows the backstory will be suppressed by the state-controlled media. Good job 50 sent Fred!
Let’s wait for the backstory….
Lol, Fred…the arrogance. Threatened by the influx of other expats. Turns out your balding scalp and bulging belly aren’t as sexy as before.
Well done Fred, you get it. If there is no backstory then this means it didnt happen, right? The key to this is preventing the backstory getting out, thats the only thing that matters!
Is that Sean Reins cum I can see dribbling off your chin?
RhZ, shut up you stupid asshole. Get a new catchphrase, will ya?
Well, someone is quite sensitive! I wonder why??
But, i do need a new catchphrase. How about, “Suck my 50 cents loser” or, “How do you live with yourself you scumbag apologist”?
What do you think, Mr. Smokin? Which do you prefer?
its not so hard to see how you live with yourself: painting the world in two colors – Agrees With Me White and Disagrees Black, and bullying and insulting everyone in the latter so you can feel smart
But I thought you were pro-bully? You certainly don’t like anyone condemning these thugs, now do you. There is two sides to every beat down, right? Its probably the villagers’ own fault, the compensation they were offered was probably much more than the property is worth. We should wait for a full accounting before making any judgment.
yes we should wait for a full account before making any judgements you goddamn idiot. shit happens in the world every day that is a lot more complicated than black and white or ccp = evil. no one here likes ppl getting beat up yet anyone who raises this point isnt a government spy you fucking loser
What we need is a full accounting of why you are so fucking retarded. Do you see the headline at the top of the page? “Officials send thugs”. Your beef, no matter how stupid, (and boy is it stupid) is not with me.
Now tell me again why you should be so terribly offended that I called Fred a 50 center? Are you Fred’s common-law bitch or something?
Local governments do this shit all the time, and a “full accounting” never appears, because the local government doesn’t want everyone to know what evil scumbags they are. I am writing slowly so that maybe you will be able to understand. We…are…not…waiting…for…what…will…never…happen…
Now feck off home feeb. And say hi to Fred while you are sucking his dick tonight.
Yes Fred, Im sure when “workers” bust down your door to do some “work” with sticks you would sit by…
You seem to have little clue as to how the State here can exercise power in unrestrained ways, but feel free to site and wait for the full “backstory” to appear in Xinhua.
Have you ever been to China???
Oh, and same for you Matt. And if someone ponders why the shit was beaten out of you we can shrug our shoulders and tell them “we dont know, but there are questions needing to be asked”
Matt and Fred: Please link to posts that you have posted on aggressively pro-China fora such as People’s Daily English, Hidden Harmonies or Chinadaily where you have called on the rabid nationalists to cease-and-desist their anti-foreign bias and consider that there are two sides to a story when they jump on any misdemeanor as further evidence of the decadence, brutality and savagery of the West.
These posts should be dated prior to your posts here to prove that you are sincere in your objectivity.