Migrants to China’s West Bask in Prosperity – NYTimes.com

Demographics have always been a tactical element of the campaign to pacify the region. In 1949, when the Communists declared the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, there were just 300,000 Han Chinese in Xinjiang. Today, the number of Han has grown to 7.5 million, just over 40 percent of the region’s population. The percentage of Uighurs has fallen to 45 percent, or about 8.3 million.

But any sense of bitterness has faded. “We were serving the motherland,” he said, waving off the adulation of a visitor. “The glory belongs to the party. I’m just one drop of water in the ocean.

via Migrants to China’s West Bask in Prosperity – NYTimes.com.

I know it can be interpreted as successful brainwashing by government propaganda, but when such words are  from a 94-years old, who fought the war, left his hometown, and have helped built an oasis out of nothing, it is more than just reiteration of what the government has instilled. The soul has been tested and the words make a resounding voice in me. The kind of dedication and submission of oneself to a higher good is something my generation can hardly understand. Everyone lives for a purpose, and for him, the party is the higher purpose. He certainly fulfilled that purpose well.

Green Dam

When I was setting up my first website justluck.cn with 512j.com back in 2005, I had to get a license from the Ministry of Information Industry (now the Ministry of Industry and Information), even though it is just for personal use. According the agreement, the license has to be placed in a place easy to be seen. I don’t feel much trouble at that time then, except that the Ministry’s website is poorly designed that it is not very easy to navigate around.

For the past a few days, I have been keeping track of the demonstration in Iran. And the Iranian postdoc in my lab told me yesterday during lunch time that he couldn’t even contact his parents because all means of communication to the outside world are shut. I asked why so. He said that the government installed a software in every cell phone which was initally for tracking child pornograph, but is now used for tracking any communication among demonstrators. As soon as they locate one demonstrator’s home, they will go to his/her place, tortue him/her and then force him/her to log into the computer and find all his frineds on social networking website such as facebook and twitter (which are being used heavily for demonstrators to get organized) to locate more protesters. He was apparently emotionally charged when he told me about it.

And what he said deeply troubles me. Blocking pornography seems just a smoke screen for keeping the mass from getting the information. Such measures bears the appearance of righteousness and indeed create a delightful ignorance. But it may be dangerous if used in the wrong hands, and even if correctly used, it creates an over-protection that might eventually indulge the next generation. Also troublesome is its apparent hypocrisy: You say what you want to do is blocking pornography, but actually what you want to achieve is something else. This obvious manipulation insult the intelligence of those who have sound judgment.

防民之口,甚于防川。