this post was submitted on 27 Sep 2025
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https://en.prolewiki.org/wiki/Xinjiang_Vocational_Education_and_Training_Centers
The genocide narrative has thoroughly been debunked. I get where your partner is coming from and I assume they're not an ML from how you speak about it. In regards to white western leftists I mean all people I know are with Palestine (even the apolitical libs) and what took place in Xinjiang looks nothing like it. Most of the narrative around the genocide was crafted by white people in fact - they're named in the link. It's a clear example of manufacturing consent for later use. If I'm not mistaken Lebanon was part of signatories that defended china's policy in Xinjiang because like I said, the (western) alternative is to bomb them all. That's how we've been "fighting" terrorism.
There are other Muslim minorities in China and somehow these were never mentioned, because they weren't going through repression, but why would China only focus on uyghurs if the problem is religion? Why did the Hui not protest with their Uyghur ummah? If they did, we would have heard about it.
China is clear that the Chinese nation encompasses all of the ethnic minorities (37 or 57 are recognized because I think at some point they had to group some together. There's literally hundreds in China) and even historically China just was not racist. Buddhism spread in China through India and quickly took over the country, with emperors not trying to put a stop to it. When Christians came they were allowed in some port towns to proselytize, but that was more of a trade protectionism thing and every European had to stay in those ports - and they were right, for only a few years later the tea bush was stolen from China, then silk was stolen too, then opium was introduced because the UK was literally bankrupting itself buying from China.
There are so called Han people (I'm still not convinced it's an actual thing lol) right now that speak Tibetan better than Tibetans.
Were there excesses? I mean, possibly. I don't think they were widespread enough that Uyghurs would want to topple the regime over it. They are also not the masters or Xinjiang and the only ethnic minority that comes from Xinjiang. Carl Zha is documenting his trip through Xinjiang right now on twitter and nobody is being oppressed. Xinjiang is now safer - ETIM terrorists don't discriminate.
While I'm not Chinese, I've read that there have been instances, both modern and historical, of definite racism in China.
That all being said, while racism is always a horrible issue, I don't think China's issues of racism are NEARLY to the same extent or intensity as in the west.
While I'm sure that I'm generalizing, its truly remarkable how surprisingly multicultural that China is.
It seems like that Chinese people/citizens don't care where people come from (not in a malicious or arrogant way, I mean), they primarily care about who you are as a person and what your role in society is, which matters far more.
Also, I thought that China recognized roughly 57 different groups? But that might just be main ethnic groups, and I'm not doubting that there are 37 or more different minority groups, now that I think about it.
I think an important difference between how racism manifests in China vs. America is that the Communist Party almost always takes an anti-racist stance. Sure, China has race riots. The difference between China and America is that when the police and army take a side, they're defending the minorities from Han mobs, not the other way around.
57 might be possible! I always forget the number and the actual name they use in China for it. I think it also depends on how you count but for all intents and purposes the CPC's recognized number is probably 57
There's ethnic groups, cultural groups, language groups and I can never remember which is which and the terms keep getting translated differently.
https://youtu.be/vefEEG0WNUk
Every time it’s brought up I just think of the big butt sheep video and like “yes, this is definitely a people undergoing genocide. No doubt about it.”/s
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
I appreciate the effort you put into your replies to me. Genuinely. But this article is... not good. While it does make some good points about accusations of genocide being weaponized against China maliciously and about US hypocrisy, it's also riddled with arguments I'd expect from Zionists and conservatives. To give a few examples:
Has very much similar energy to western stereotypes about suicide bombers and 77 virgins.
This is such a weird and specific grievance that it comes off as not just prejudiced, but personally so.
Conservatives claim that trans, Black, etc people in the US are protected classes all the time despite severe prejudice - both systemic and social - against them existing at all levels of society, e.g. the recent refrains against DEI. One might even argue that assertions that a marginalized group is treated too well tend to be a feature of widespread prejudice. (Not saying that's necessarily the case IRT China, just that this is a very poor argument.)
I'll stop there, because I don't want to be obnoxious and turn this into an argument, but there's an abundance of issues like that. I think the writer(s) of this article have, to be blunt, probably spent too long exclusively circulating the same talking points to like minded people and have become completely oblivious as to how they sound to outsiders. I'm not trying to be insulting or mean when I say that. I personally believe that anti-China sentiment in the west currently cannot serve as anything but an excuse for western imperialism, regardless of whether or not it's justified, so I sympathize regardless - but the only thing this article has convinced me of is that I owe my partner an apology.
There is some useful information in it and in your replies, particularly about the US side of things, but I unfortunately do have to take even that with a grain of salt as well because I cannot overstate just how poor an impression that article leaves. It may have served its purpose a few years ago, but after almost two years of the world watching the genocide in Palestine and the justifications used for it, even the most obtuse of us are intimately acquainted with Islamophobia.
You must be joking. We straight up have Muslims in both ProleWiki and lemmygrad and co. If we are calling those muslims radicals we are not "parroting conservative rhetoric" ffs do some investigation into what they are. ProleWiki is a multinational project that is not at all americKKKa or west centric at all.
ETIM are a bunch of CIA goons and radical salafoids and this whole Uyghur debacle also started as a complete fabrication. We have a livestreamed genocide from under the most apartheid genocidal white supremacist regime possible and you think China magically kept their "genocide" under wraps? Do you engage in the art of thinking, even if occasionally? Just the inconsistencies alone are egregious
This is the oldest mosque in China, and possibly one of the oldest ones still existing in the world. The Huaisheng Mosque, in Guangzhou. It was built by an uncle of Muhammad around the year 627. Islam has been present in China since its inception.
The lines you quote come from a document from the State Council Information Office of the Chinese government. So when the document says that religious extremists (in the document) overgeneralize the halal concept, they mean overgeneralize. This is a document written by the Chinese government for their own conditions. Halal medication exists, and that medication is available in China. China even has a word for halal (Qingzhen), so the concept is not foreign to them.
China has a halal label:
And applying for the label happens at the local (provincial) level, and the company applying for it has to employ a representative who follows halal habits depending on which industry they are in. This page has more details.
Xinjiang does not belong to the Uyghurs or Islam; it is home to many native populations and since a long time ago (far before the PRC) has been an inseparable part of China. Uyghur extremists cannot claim that only their way goes, but this is what they tried to do through ETIM and other separatist movements. A part that you somehow did not quote from the prolewiki page, right before the halal sentence you quoted:
They [ETIM] are forcing people, Muslim and non-Muslim, to conform to their specific way of things. Muslims in China have evolved their own customs and practices. Some women veil, some don't. There is no obligation in Chinese law to do so. Uyghurs even traditionally produce wine.
I'm not sure how you can quote those lines above but completely gloss over the very next part which lists some of the deadly attacks that have happened between 1990 and 2014.
Does this look like genocide and repression to you?
It's not in any way comparable to what's happening to Gaza.
Again I don't know how you can read this:
And come away thinking:
Unless you are looking for a specific conclusion. the ProleWiki page (or the Information Office white paper) has examples of attacks in the very next section, just a bit further down: https://en.prolewiki.org/wiki/Xinjiang_Vocational_Education_and_Training_Centers#Examples_of_terrorist_attacks. ETIM is using people and convincing them to attack civilian centers at the cost of their own life, while the people who put them up to this safe in their mansions outside of China. Who benefits from this? Not the attacker or the people they killed. The only people benefiting from this are the ETIM leaders who will do it again with another poor sap. I hope we both agree this does not represent islam.
What should China do? Follow in "Israel's" footsteps? Bomb Urumqi, bomb Pakistan like the US has been doing (and then in 2020 Pompeo said "actually soz guys etim doesn't exist" which begs the question who have they been bombing for the past 15 years?) Or attack the causes of radicalization at the root. They chose the latter.
There have been no more terrorist attacks since 2016 since they started this vocational centers program by the way. It shows a model that effectively wins against at least one form of radicalization without killing anyone in the process.
Exactly, Gaza shows us the logical conclusion of islamophobia. Where are the refugees from Xinjiang? The journalists risking their lives to show the missile strikes or mass arrests in Urumqi and villages? The gofundmes for Uyghurs? There's new videos coming out of Gaza every hour of the day but Xinjiang, a place much more populated and much bigger, has none. These videos don't exist, because Uyghurs in China are not being genocided or repressed to a point that counts as being ethnically targeted. If we want to help muslims then we must focus on real problems, not invented ones for the purpose of regime change operations. Anyone harping on about Uyghur genocide after 2 years of Gaza is not focusing on the real issue and is distracting from an actual genocide - I'm not saying anyone here is, just in general. People like Mike Pompeo, for example.
ETIM is not Hamas, the two are completely different.