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Wednesday, April 30, 2008

China Today

posted by on April 30 at 9:30 AM

The 19th Century is still here.


The children, from the ethnic Yi minority, came from poor families in Sichuan about 600 miles ( 960 km) away.

The China Daily said 167 children had been rescued from the factory in the industrial city of Dongguan so far, and several arrests had been made.

China announced a nationwide crackdown on slavery and child labour last year.

It emerged that hundreds of poor farmers, children and mentally disabled people had been forced to work in mines and kilns in Shanxi province and neighbouring Henan.

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China desperately needs a Dickens.

RSS icon Comments

1

Mao's little red book not doing enough to satisfy their Marxist leanings?

Posted by Mr. Echo | April 30, 2008 9:37 AM
2

chaz forgets the cultural revolution and the great leap forward.

Posted by Bellevue Ave | April 30, 2008 9:44 AM
3

Hold on a minute! Wait just a second here! Do you mean to tell me that cheap (i.e. free) labor is NOT a good reason to have kids?

Posted by DanFan | April 30, 2008 9:49 AM
4

China needs a revolution.

Posted by Will in Seattle | April 30, 2008 9:54 AM
5

A hot American dickens.

Posted by Giffy | April 30, 2008 9:56 AM
6

Marxist? There aren't many Marxists in China anymore. And the Cultural Revolution has long since been swept under the rug.

Mr. Echo and Bellevue Avenue seem to have slept through the past twenty years. Or they're neocon cold-warriors yearning for a Red Menace. Either way, they're clinging to outmoded characterizations of China's Communist party.

Enjoy your stimulus money, courtesy of the Chinese Communists! Be sure to do your part for the Communist Party and purchase lots of crap manufactured by Chinese peasant children!

Posted by povertyrich | April 30, 2008 10:04 AM
7

They don't need a Dickens: they need an Al Smith to push though labor reform like he did after the Triangle Shirt Factory fires in New York City in 1911.

They don't need literature Charles; THEY NEED FUCKING ACTION NOW!!!!!

Posted by Andrew | April 30, 2008 10:06 AM
8

povertyrich, China has liberalized their economy over the past 20 years. chaz is suggesting that they return to the cultural revolution and great leap forward modes of thinking. please try and keep up.

Posted by Bellevue Ave | April 30, 2008 10:07 AM
9

I agree. China needs a Dickens, and a Jonathan Swift, etc.

But my notion that China needs these things comes from my western-framed notion of how things should be... an outside perspective, which appears to be exactly what the Chinese are extremely tired of...

China will find its own way, and it will take as long as it takes. That is tremendously unfortunate, in a lot of ways, but it is true.

Posted by natopotato | April 30, 2008 10:17 AM
10

They should all read "The Secret".

Posted by It's Mark Mitchell | April 30, 2008 10:21 AM
11

the cultural revolution was anti-marxist. the cultural revolution's great leap forward was reactonary and anti marxist, and actually marxists were jailed and killed by chairma mao's murderous mobs. the cultural revolution had nothing to do with economic theory, only with terror, and mao's massive ego, if anything, it paved the way for the capitalist-totalitarian regime that you have in place in china today. which goes for savage capitalism while mantaining a totalitarian regime. china is many things, communist is not one of them. i dont think it ever was.

mao was never a marxist. if i remember correctly, marx argued that you couldnt go from a rural revolution to socialism because of the whole rural idiocy thang. he argued that you had to go trhough an industrial stage, so i guess the whole dickensian (sp?) shit charles is arguing somewhat makes sense.

Posted by SeMe | April 30, 2008 10:34 AM
12

@8

Ahh..that's not what I read in Charles's post.

Have you ever read Dickens, Bellevue Avenue? Do you know what the Cultural Revolution was? It appears I'm not the one who needs to keep up.

Charles's post doesn't suggest that China forcibly move people to the countryside to become farmers, it suggests that China needs a Charles Dickens to write about the plight of Chinese peasant children forced to work in factories, and thus raise the awareness of the Chinese middle class (and the world) to said plight.

Though I could be wrong. Charles does tend to be densee and elusive in his writing. Where you got this Cultural Revolution idea is a mystery.

Oh , and by the way, it's "try to," not "try and."

Posted by povertyrich | April 30, 2008 10:43 AM
13

I said this in another post, but for maximum annoyance I'll repeat it again.

Sure you can possibly eliminate slave labor in China but China's already realized the labor there is getting more expensive so to keep up with the demand for cheap goods they are moving production to countries like Vietnam and Cambodia. And the cycle starts over again.

How do you solve this?

Posted by PopTart | April 30, 2008 11:24 AM
14

China desperately needs an imperial overlord to civilize them. Silly little yellow people...

Posted by You_Gotta_Be_Kidding_Me | April 30, 2008 2:38 PM

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