Behind Cry for Help From China Labor Camp

[Bonobo]

Source: New York Times

Scrawling in wobbly English on a sheet of onionskin paper, the writer said he was imprisoned at a labor camp in this northeastern Chinese town, where he said inmates toiled seven days a week, their 15-hour days haunted by sadistic guards.

The letter drew international news media coverage and widespread attention to China’s opaque system of “re-education through labor,” a collection of penal colonies where petty criminals, religious offenders and critics of the government can be given up to four-year sentences by the police without trial.

“Sometimes the guards would drag me around by my hair or apply electric batons to my skin for so long, the smell of burning flesh would fill the room,” said Chen Shenchun, 55, who was given a two-year sentence for refusing to give up a petition campaign aimed at recovering unpaid wages from her accounting job at a state-owned factory.

According to former inmates, roughly half of Masanjia’s population is made up of Falun Gong practitioners or members of underground churches, with the rest a smattering of prostitutes, drug addicts and petitioners whose efforts to seek redress for perceived injustices had become an embarrassment for their hometown officials.



Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/12/world/asia/man-details-risks-in-exposing-chinas-forced-labor.html?pagewanted=all

[MADem]

1. This is the Great Wall that Young Mister Snowden might duck behind if he can't get any

play from his dreamland-Iceland?

"Forced labor" or "re-education" ain't technically "prison." It's just like summer camp, only longer, with arduous conditions....and ya can't leave.

Yay, China--they will 'save' him!!! What a charming display of freedoms in that letter! What's not to love?

I'll add one of these for the irony-impaired:

[freshwest]

6. That was my first thought. I figured things had improved a lot. Still on my Adelson CT, though.

[fasttense]

11. And to think we in the US still have more prisoners per population size

than they do.

[MADem]

12. We don't kill ours by the many thousands, like they do.

They'd probably be overrun with prisoners if:

1. They counted the people in the forced labor and re-education camps and called them what they are, prisoners;

2. They didn't kill them by the thousands each year.

[catnhatnh]

15. "What a charming display of freedoms"

....but I DO notice they have a fixed term to serve unlike detainees at Guantanamo-be careful what you call the Kettle, Mr. Pot.

[cheapdate]

2. I've got leftists friends who say China is a shining example for the US - and they're serious.

[awoke_in_2003]

5. I am a "leftist"...

and know that China is not a shining city on the hill.

[freshwest]

7. We have some members who live in or have recently lived in China. Try the Asia forum, too, for info.

[quakerboy]

9. I find this hard to believe.

In what respect? China is an Authoritarian Capitalist paradise. What part of that would a leftist be drawn to? Please be specific.

[David__77]

10. I wouldn't go that far, but I suppose I'm a "pro-China leftist."

I think that China's economic development and social stability is progressive force on the world stage. It helps maintain peace and development throughout Asia. China's foreign trade policy is definitely more progressive than the World Bank/IMF regime, acting as a counterpoint in Africa and Latin America.

At home, the Chinese government is a secular entity with a decent record on women's rights, including abortion rights. Gay people are gaining greater acceptance (still a long way to go). Economic policy is akin to FDR's New Deal, focusing massive resources on works projects in the poorer interior regions.

China's economic growth is real, and is transforming the lives of hundreds of millions. A needed shift away from export-oriented growth is occurring, allowing wages to rise an the workforce becomes more skilled and oriented toward technology-intensive production.

Falun Gong is a hateful anti-gay cult that is completely right-wing and backward. I do not sympathize with it at all.

[cheapdate]

16. These friends of mine are former philosophy and political science majors

from our local university. One of them works at a bank now, the other one I met through his community activism. He's working odd jobs and going to graduate school. They are both committed Marxists. They take positions all the time that are awfully hard to swallow unless you're in their mindset.

[quakerboy]

20. Again, I find it hard to believe. I would like specifics

What exactly would a Marxist find admirable about Capitalist Authoritarian China?

[Left Coast2020]

3. The locals call them "li gao"

I believe thats the translation for prison camp.

[ReRe]

4. Reminds me of a "letter in a bottle"

One wonders if the USA and China are going to change places one of these days.

[freshwest]

8. They won't have to. They are moving into the West Coast fast enough it won't be any different.

Whether that's good or bad, I don't know. I have a lot of Chinese neighbors of all ages and I find them great people. Some have just come to retire, others run businesses. They are not changing their culture to live here, just locations.

[Hubert Flottz]

13. I'll bet that guy wishes he had a union to protect him on the job.

His working conditions are what the GOP has in mind for Americans.

[duhneece]

14. But the only recognition of 'workers' rights worldwide' was organized by commies

And they were vilified. Child labor, prison labor...and yet we still buy their products. Damn that says alot about us...and none of it good.

[Sunlei]

17. never forget how my online friends from Formosa disappeared one day and never returned.

Not to long ago people from china were in a lot of the online communities. China cut them off and that was that

I guess if you're a Gov leader there or a city/town leader- you can do what you want. Any lower class or a person without leadership lines and contacts..your life is in their hands.