Like Paul Handley's book The xxxx Never Smiles the banning now becomes a badge of honour and must a read if you are going to live in Thailand.Quote:
Originally Posted by gaymandenmark
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Like Paul Handley's book The xxxx Never Smiles the banning now becomes a badge of honour and must a read if you are going to live in Thailand.Quote:
Originally Posted by gaymandenmark
With respect, economics played only a relatively small role in that event. I was in Beijing in May and July of that year and spoke to quite a number of people - although none was directly involved in any of the demonstrations. The initial spark that resulted in the Tiananmen student movement was a memorial service in April 1989 to mark the death two years earlier of the popular reformist leader Hu Yaobang whom Deng Xiaoping had made General Secretary of the Party. Hu had sided with earlier student protests about the need for greater democracy. He was forced to resign in 1987. The memorial service two years later resulted in 50,000 students marching to Tiananmen Square to protest the low profile given to that service. The fire had started.Quote:
Originally Posted by kommentariat
A few years after the madness of the Cultural Revolution had left the country a total basket case, Deng finally re-assumed power and was determined to reform the system to allow much faster growth and pull vast numbers out of dire poverty. To do that he had to loosen the reigns of state control. He permitted some freedom of speech, for example, through the opening of the democracy wall in 1978. Here thousands came with crude posters espousing the need for greater democracy and a more transparent rule of law until it was closed the following year. Hu had wanted to move a number of reforms faster than Deng and some of his colleagues would allow. Students especially admired Hu for his stands against corruption, the need for greater freedoms and at least a degree of democracy, the continuing rigidity of China's economic system, and government secrecy. On Hu's death, there were student demonstrations in universities around much of the country.
By 1989, student grievances had grown, notably about their own conditions within the universities, especially the lack of adequate university accommodation. Eventually Beijing students joined a strike and refused to attended classes. In late April they marched to Tiananmen Square to protest their grievances and join those already there. Similar student demonstrations in the Square had occurred throughout the earlier part of the 20th century. So it was initially nothing unusual. But as had happened in the Cultural Revolution, they were soon joined by their contemporaries from other parts of the country.
This was no organised movement. It just happened. The students as a whole had no specific agenda, merely a series of grievances they wanted discussed and aired. It was only on May 4, the 70th anniversary of an earlier student-led protest, that the movement gelled into one for greater democracy and political reforms to parallel the economic reforms. But the core of the movement was political, not economics.
The tragedy which ensued had a somewhat bitter irony in that not only Hu but also his successor, Zhao Ziyang - also put in place by Deng, were in total sympathy with the students' aims. Zhao, perhaps aware of the growing anti-protest influence of the hardliners in the leadership, even went to the Square on 19 May begging them in tears to return home. He was stripped of his post after June 4 and spent the rest of his life under house arrest.
Asiancorrespondent.com will be posting articles all this week, 28 weeks post-coup Thailand. Here are the The Intro and the Economy.
http://asiancorrespondent.com/128290/st ... -thailand/
http://asiancorrespondent.com/128311/ec ... ary-junta/
Continuation of post above, Part 2,
http://asiancorrespondent.com/author/siamvoices/
I had always thought that Pa Kettle was born in America but now we find he's actually an Australian and named after a brand of beerQuote:
Originally Posted by Up2U
Protests plan derails showing of the Hunger Games. 5 student protesters challenge the General in Khon Kaen.
http://m.utsandiego.com/news/2014/nov/1 ... t-thai-pm/
Student activists not charged in Khon Kaen but Rajprasong News reports arrests in Bangkok (Paragon) of Thais when leaving theater after viewing Hunger Games.
http://prachatai.org/english/node/4508? ... um=twitter
I admire those young people. It can't be easy for them when their right to education is being threatened by the military morons who have taken over Thailand. Their time will come.
More parts to the week long series from asiancorrespondent.com.
Part 3. An education fit for a zombie.
http://asiancorrespondent.com/128354/th ... tion-coup/
Part 4. Are the Thai people really happy after the coup?
http://asiancorrespondent.com/128390/28 ... -the-coup/
Part 5. Thailand's junta and the war on corruption.
http://asiancorrespondent.com/128345/28 ... orruption/
Part 6. PDRC myths and Thailand's privileged "new generation".
http://asiancorrespondent.com/128417/28 ... eneration/
Part 7. Thailand tourism down, but not out.
http://asiancorrespondent.com/128429/28 ... t-not-out/
I found the part 6 video of the girl disturbing and shallow, full of mistruths. Buddha help Thailand if she represents Thailand's future. Compare her with Khon Kaen student activist who was detained and released.
http://www.prachatai.com/english/node/4505
From the General..... don't ask for democracy.
http://www.khaosodenglish.com/detail.ph ... section=11