The Chinese call it the 6-4 Incident. In English we say, "Tiananmen Square Massacre."
It was an hysterical mass crackdown on the mourners keeping vigil for the dead communist reform-politician Hu Yaobang. The State-Machine in Beijing perpetrated violence and intimidation whose extent is still unknown to a world scarred by the imagery of unarmed civilians menaced by legions of armored tanks.
Yes, China has proven itself a weak government by its paranoia that any visible public movement (e.g. Fuln Gong, friends of the Dalai Lama, etc.) could spell its imminent sinking into the turbulent irrationality of the Un-Organized China. Not a very "harmonious" way of viewing the world.
It is also very significant to notice that the content of the June 4, 1989 incident was that of mourning.
Contemporary Right Wing forces around the world have shown themselves to be characteristically opposed to the healthy feeling of remorse. Consider the regressive American Republicans who denounce Obama as an "apologist" for the U.S.A. There was French president Nicolas Sarkozy who ran for office promising to avoid the "demagoguery of repentance." And Vladimir Putin in Russia who has consistently been concerning about the danger of "brooding over the past" and responding to "unjustified remorse inflicted upon a Great Nation to serve the purpose of Outside forces who wish to take advantage of its weakness."
Wow. Get those guys on the psychiatric couch, already. The late Russian dissident-novelist Alex Solzhenitszyn spoke in his last interview about the inability of a nation or a social system to advance in strength without adequate mourning and repentance. His own nation fairly recently slaughtered 6 million of its own citizens.
Grieving is a process.
"We should clearly understand that only the voluntary and conscientious acceptance by a people of its guilt can ensure the healing of a nation."
-Solzhenitsyn, The UK Independent News.
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