University students sent home as China tries to end protests

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP

By JOE McDONALD, DAKE KANG, and HUIZHONG WU an hour ago

BEIJING (AP) — Chinese universities sent students home and police fanned out in Beijing and Shanghai to prevent more protests Tuesday after crowds angered by severe anti-virus restrictions called for leader Xi Jinping to resign in the biggest show of public dissent in decades.

Authorities have eased some controls after demonstrations in at least eight mainland cities and Hong Kong — but showed no sign of backing off their larger “zero-COVID” strategy that has confined millions of people to their homes for months at a time. Security forces have detained an unknown number of people and stepped up surveillance.

With police out in force, there was no word of protests Tuesday in Beijing, Shanghai or other major cities that saw crowds gather over the weekend. Those widespread demonstrations were unprecedented since the army crushed the 1989 student-led pro-democracy movement centered on Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.

Tsinghua University, where students rallied, and other schools in Beijing and the southern province of Guangdong said they were protecting students from COVID-19 by sending them home.



Protesters hold up blank papers and chant slogans as they march in protest in Beijing, Sunday, Nov. 27, 2022. Protesters angered by strict anti-virus measures called for China's powerful leader to resign, an unprecedented rebuke as authorities in at least eight cities struggled to suppress demonstrations Sunday that represent a rare direct challenge to the ruling Communist Party. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)


Read more: https://apnews.com/article/health-beijing-xi-jinping-shanghai-covid-5e6340710ba8b273b3be88d8844feed0?utm_source=homepage&utm_medium=TopNews&utm_campaign=position_01

[Ray Bruns]

1. I really don't understand the Chinese government. They have a monopoly on power.

Just force everyone to get vaccinated. The only thing that will stop Covid is herd immunity.

[WA-03 Democrat]

2. The Sino Vax is poor

The mRNA is the way to go and China does not have it. If we gave them the mRNA their government gets credit. I think we need China and cannot have them sealed off. I’d give it to them but trust President Biden to do the best thing.

[Irish_Dem]

3. China is the one refusing to authorize better vaccines, they want to protect Chinese vaccines.

Which are less effective.

It is Beijing, not the US, who is stopping more effective vaccines being used in China.

[WA-03 Democrat]

5. Totally agree. I think they don't want to admit

Everything they said was great about their vax was BS.

Xi would be humiliated and it would look bad for the CCP. Let them call our mRNA Sinovax 2 or something.

The global economy without China does not work.

[Irish_Dem]

9. It is about saving face, and power and control.

Xi wants to show the world that China is superior.
In every way.

And he can get better control over the Chinese population.

But Xi is finding that capitalism and giving people more freedom can be a bumpy road.

China's economy doesn't work without global support.
It is a two way street.

[Irish_Dem]

4. Some say the Chinese are deliberately not mandating vaccines.

They need Covid deaths to justify their lockdown policies.

Xi doesn't want to lose face, he is doubling down on his lock down.
Also the lock down policy gives him a lot of control over the populace.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

7. Their vaccines are not very effective, esp w only one dose

After 3 doses they mostly close the gap with western MRNA vaccines but not entirely.

[Irish_Dem]

10. The research keeps pointing to lower efficacy in Chinese vaccines.

Even in some countries with high vax rates, using the Chinese vaccines, their Covid death rate is troubling.

In China, some groups are not getting vaccines, and that includes the elderly.

We know China could make the vaccine mandatory, but it refuses to do so.

[catsudon]

8. yep

just 2-3 days ago, on reddit r/translators, we came across a clip of The CCP's COVID-19 stormtroopers grabs a woman, to forcefully take an anal swab for a PCR test

Rape, it's not just for tennis players anymore in China.

in the clip you can hear another woman saying "is this how the laws are enforced?"

edit: here is the link https://www.reddit.com/r/translator/comments/z6tvk7/unknown_english_forced_anal_swab_test_people/

[Irish_Dem]

11. China started giving people more freedom.

They stopped the red hat storm trooper constant and brutal presence on every street corner.
Enforcing the most trivial of laws all the time. If a red hat storm trooper came near a Chinese
citizen, it was terrifying.

The people loved having "more space" as one Chinese person I talked with said.
The politically correct way of saying the storm troopers everywhere, every day, were gone.

Police were still there, but in plain clothes and low key. Most evident in Beijing.
The other cities had a freedom that was unheard of just a couple of decades ago.

So for the storm troopers to descend once again on the populace is going to feel very very bad for the people.

Xi has boasted that he is going to redefine what democracy means.

Perhaps it is the Chinese people who will explain what the word democracy means to him.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

6. Send students home to infect democracy/freedom virus in towns all over China. Brilliant. nt

[Irish_Dem]

12. Students sent home, college grads cannot find jobs, factories shut down.

People cannot leave their homes, or get medical care for anything other than covid.

The storm troopers have descended upon them once again.

Both Putin and Xi have been so emboldened with their very successful plan to weaken western democracies.
But they seem to have overplayed their hand in terms of their own internal affairs.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

13. The Chinese social contract was loss of freedom for economic gain. The latter is in peril now. nt

[Irish_Dem]

14. Many Chinese lost their life savings in the housing scandal.

Factories are shut down, unemployment for Chinese youth is at 20%.
The economy is in trouble.

Along with economic prosperity, Xi gave the people more freedom.

The Chinese people were living lives that would have seemed impossible two decades ago.

Now they see their gains being ripped away.

Many Chinese are in effect under house arrest, storm troopers terrifying them again,
fewer jobs, tanked economy.

Xi is getting a good lesson in capitalism and democracy.
He thought he had it all figured out, how China would beat the US at its own game.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

15. "Xi gave the people more freedom" nope. Xi brought in "social credit" monitoring. Very authoritarian

I have no idea what you mean by "more freedom".

Dissidents abroad are being hunted by "Chinese police stations" in what is it now, 30 countries?

You can't post a "Winnie the Pooh" message in China without being investigated.

More Uigurs are in concentration camps than ever before.

There is no vital new music coming out of China and capturing the world's imagination, not like KPop or hiphop.

Chinese cinema is not flourishing with thoughtful disruptive dramas about 2020s or 2010s problems.

Chinese people have less freedom in China and less freedom outside China because of pressure on family back home and pressure to engage in low level espionage and reporting.

[Irish_Dem]

16. I have spent time in China and seen it myself.

The terrifying, brutal conditions replaced by a something better.

If I tried to explain what it used to be like in China, Americans would not be able to wrap their heads around it.
It is something that Americans simply could not fathom.

People who were starving, in abject poverty, the world was dull, gray, terrifying.
Red hat police everywhere terrorizing the populace. Everything was strictly controlled to the nth degree.

That has dramatically changed in the past 20 years. Red hats gone, food everywhere.
People have some space to live their lives.

But yes of course, the control and subjugation is still there.
No doubt about that.

But greatly improved from 20 years ago.

And yes the brutal treatment of minorities in China is still there.

The point I am making is that the Chinese people have experienced a marked improvement in their lives.
And I wonder how they are feeling to see it all taken away.

Maybe now they will push back against Xi's control over them.