troelsjust.dk

“A Chinese teacher has been detained for posting images on the internet of schools that collapsed in the Sichuan earthquake, a rights group has said.”

Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7532813.stm

The Chinese dictatorship is up to it’s old tricks again. During the earthquake in May, a bunch of schools collapsed (And I bitch Danish school buildings were getting bad! 😛 ) resulting in the deaths of many children. A teacher gets upset that the government have not maintained these buildings, publishes pictures of it, and is sent to a labour camp for “re-education”, take a wild guess at what that means …

Why the hell was this asshole government allowed to host the Olympic Games in the first place!! Makes absolutely no sense.

The comment made to my post FARC… A big farce!, can be seen in full here: http://www.troelsjust.dk/?p=231#comments.

” … Indeed they have killed a lot of civilians by accident in their actions against the paramilitary and governmental repression they have been met with, …”

Do you really see people dying in captivity as an “accident” ?

“Let me say this straight: the whole regime of Colombia is corrupt and based upon cocaine production from both sides – even FARC! The national economy and one’s social rights in the country are a disaster, and due to what I have heard, the constantly liberal and conservative governments since the beginning of elections have been preventing socialistic parties from taking active part of the national parliament (= unfree elections for socialist parties!). Furthermore the paramilitary groups in direct coorporation with the government are responsible for murders of central persons of the trade-union and directly terrorizing the movement and its struggle for better social policies and worker’s rights (read more about such kind of murders on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Violencia).”

I completely agree, and during the documentary I saw, that was mentioned over and over again. This is definitely not democracy. In fact, I generally don’t like bipartisan systems of government, where you only have two major parties that can govern, such as in the United States, the United Kingdom etc. etc. I won’t say they undemocratic, but they’re worlds from what I would call “a true democracy”.

“What a lie! Legal attempts have been tried – a party called Unión Patriótica (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uni%C3%B3n_Patri%C3%B3tica_(Colombia)) once contested a few decades ago, but 5000 of their members were killed during that time, and so FARC gave up peaceful behavior and reentered the armed conflict. Sounds like a very wimpish way of leading a democracy by killing members of the opposition, if you ask me!”

If you consider murder and kidnapping of innocent people and holding them for ransom, drug trafficking and other crap to be legitimate “armed conflict”, then so be it, but it’s simply terrorism if you ask me. And yes, I wholeheartedly agree, killing members of the opposition is not only a tremendous human rights violation, it’s dictatorish behavior. It’s something Russia and China does all the time, and definitely represents corruption and pisses on the concept of democracy.

“The analysis you posted above is too simple and primitive within its conclusion, sorry to say it, and it offends me a lot, since you clearly don’t have knowledge of the historical background from the current situation in Colombia.”

While I agree with you that the government in Colombia is corrupt and borders being undemocratic, I don’t think FARC is any better at all. They remind me of the Tamil Tigers, who claim to have a just cause for fighting (and killing thousands of innocent people along the way) for an independent Tamil state in Sri Lanka, yet they have done nothing but kill innocent people and keep the country at civil war for decades. And no, I am not ignoring atrocities comitted by the Sri Lankan government, search around on my blog, and you’ll see me lambast them as terrorists, and somebody replying essentially saying I was being a Sinhalese shill, being “ignorant” and being a “smart parot” etc. etc.

First of all, if you get offended by my statements, you shouldn’t be reading my blog, because I honestly couldn’t care less about whom I might offend, be it Iranian fascists, Chinese dictators, Japanese nationalists, American imperialists (George W. Bush), Jewish/Christian/Muslim/Hindu fundamentalists, or just your average Joe reading a random blog on the Internet. You know what, your attitude towards the United States that I responded to earlier offends me as well. In my original blog post I simply say “Happy Independence Day!” to the American people, among whom I have a few friends that I talk to regularly, and yet you accuse me of praising the US government (Which so far is the Bush administration). I cannot stand George W. Bush, this guy, along with his administration, should be put on trial for war crimes. If you want to demonize an entire nation for something their government does, go ahead, I just don’t see it as being any different from demonizing all Germans for the things Hitler and his regime did, or demonizing all Japanese for what Imperial Japan did during World War 2, or their current government’s refusal to apologize for it, and compensate victims (Look up “comfort women” on Wikipedia if you want to know more).

“If you want to read some more objective, left-wing oriented articles (Danish) about the case (you say that you identify yourself as a socialist),”

1. Any of various political philosophies that support social and economic equality, collective decision-making and public control of productive capital and natural resources, as advocated by socialists.

2. The socialist political philosophies as a group, including Marxism, libertarian socialism, democratic socialism, and social democracy.

3. (Leninism) The intermediate phase of social development between capitalism and full communism. This is a strategy whereby the State has control of all key resource-producing industries and manages most aspects of the market, in contrast to laissez faire capitalism.

4. (Classical Marxism) The international communist society where classes and the state no longer exist.

Source: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/socialism

As I state on the “My Political Position” page of my blog, I’m a social democrat, which qualifies as socialism if we’re talking about true social democracy (The ideology), according to Wiktionary, and not this neo-liberal bullshit many people who call themselves social democrats, are doing these days. The Labour Party of the United Kingdom is probably one of the best examples of this crap.

“(when the USA invaded the Ecuadorian territory recently to assassinate the leader of FARC, Paul Reyes, which forced Ecuador and Venezuela to rearm and put their military forces at the borders to Colombia protesting against the insulting behavior – if you ignored this TERRORIST ATTACK on the Ecuadorian side of the borders by the COLOMBIAN GOVERNMENT itself and the UNITED STATES, you showed yourself as truly ignorant by writing this blog post! Sorry for the hard words, but FARC is more than just ‘pointless terrorism’. It’s the only serious socialist alternative to the current form of government. Of course I lament their use of i.e. child soldiers, but sometimes it can be the only way of succeeding in a greater struggle.)”

If FARC is more than “pointless terrorism”, then why are they deliberately killing and kidnapping innocent people? They’re no flipping different from the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka. Both claim to have righteous intentions, yet they murder innocent people.
I didn’t follow that whole debacle with Ecuador and Venezuela that you mention, and I refuse to be called “truly ignorant” for not following everything you do as much as you do. You’re the ignorant one if you ignore killing of the innocent on ANY SIDE of ANY CONFLICT. Because you seem to be glorifying FARC for their fight against the Colombian government, and only lightly skip over their killing of civilians and use of child soldiers, yet you beat a dead horse about corruption and misdeeds by the Colombian government (Which, just so we’re clear, I agree with you completely on) and how evil the United States is. Sure, I admit that I didn’t mention the Colombian government’s killing of opposition members or corruption, but my post was not about that, it was about why I see FARC as hypocrites when they refer to them as “People’s Army” or socialists. If I blogged about Japan’s outrageous atrocities during World War II, and their current government’s continual refusal to apologize for it, I’m sure somebody would reply and say how “truly ignorant” I was and how China and Korea exaggerate the things Japan did and blah blah blah. And oh by the way, I view China the same way as I view FARC. Let’s take the name of China’s military as an example. It’s official name is “People’s Liberation Army”, well, don’t you think it ought to be called People’s Oppression Army after the outrageous oppression of pro-democracy movements and human rights advocates, especially in Tibet?

One last thing about FARC, because we clearly have different opinions of them, WHY THE FUCK do they kidnap a politician (Íngrid Betancourt) who was actively trying to fight corruption!!! That’s just retarded! I could understand (But DEFINITELY NOT agree) if they kidnapped the leader of the liberal party, but kidnapping a person who essentially agrees with them on something, is simply stupid, let alone be unjust! That’s like an African-American kidnapping Martin Luther King!!!

A friend of mine, Karmus, made a comment to my earlier, short, posting Happy Independence Day!, that I wanted to reply to.

His full comment goes:

“I congratulate the fact that the Americans actually managed to separate themselves from the UK back in the days, because they wanted to be FREE, but you forget that the U.S. is a country built upon the ethnic cleansing of Native Americans (the Indian people). Therefore I see no reason to praise this terror regime murdering millions of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. Furthermore it’s economic and imperialistic world policies are draining the global climate of the world. USA is a catastrophic (in Danish: ’sminket lig’) superpower, having the world’s second highest social inequalities between the rich and poor.”

As several points are made, I’m gonna do one at a time.

“I congratulate the fact that the Americans actually managed to separate themselves from the UK back in the days, because they wanted to be FREE, but you forget that the U.S. is a country built upon the ethnic cleansing of Native Americans (the Indian people). Therefore I see no reason to praise this terror regime murdering millions of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

No, I actually have not forgotten that. I know that darn well. However, what do you want me to do? Bring them back to life, beside the fact that nobody in the world have the ability to do so? Also, if you reread my posting, you’ll notice that it’s actually not a praise of the US government, it’s me saying “Happy Independence Day!” to the Americans who might be reading this blog. If I said “Merry Christmas!” to a former classmate of mine, who’s a very religious Christian (Borderline fundamentalist), would I then be praising the murder of 90% of the Indian population in Mexico by the Spanish settlers? If I said “Happy Eid” to a friend of mine who’s a Muslim, would I be praising Iran’s regime? And lastly, this is my favorite actually, if I sent a greeting to some of my family members in Japan, on the occasion of National Foundation Day, which is “a national holiday in Japan celebrated annually on February 11. On this day, Japanese celebrate the founding of the nation and the imperial line by its mythical first emperor, Jimmu, who established his capital in Yamato” would I be praising Imperial Japan (1968 – 1945) and “forgetting” the atrocities it committed during World War II against more than 30 million people in Asia?

“Furthermore it’s economic and imperialistic world policies are draining the global climate of the world. USA is a catastrophic (in Danish: ’sminket lig’) superpower, having the world’s second highest social inequalities between the rich and poor.”

While I agree with some of what you’re saying, I refuse to demonize average people of a country for something their government is doing. What about all the people in Nazi Germany, who weren’t nazis? Are they just as evil as the people who poured Zyklon.B gas into the gas chambers of Auchswitz? You decide for yourself!

In light of the rescue of Íngrid Betancourt, a former Colombian presidential candidate, last week on July 2nd, DR2 (A Danish TV channel) showed a documentary about her political campaigning and following kidnapping by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC as they are better known. FARC are notorious for their kidnapping of thousands of people, and holding them for random or prisoner exchange.

I have read off and on about FARC, and after watching this documentary, I looked through a few more details. What I can already conclude, is that what they are is a big farce!
Their full name, in English, is Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People’s Army, OK, I got a big problem with the last part of this name. These guys are “a self-proclaimed Marxist-Leninist revolutionary guerrilla organization”, according to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FARC), which does fall under the umbrella of socialism. There’s a nice quote, and I apologize in advance to the person who came up with it that I can’t credit them for it (Because I don’t know his/her name), “All communists are socialists, but not all socialists are communists”, which I am glad to say that I could not agree more with!
The reason I identify myself with socialism, is because I believe a country is it’s people, and a government is obligated to listen to the people, and represent their best interests. I also believe, that socialism must go together with a true democracy (I think the democracy we have here in Denmark is one of the best in the world, certainly not perfect, but nonetheless one of the best ones) to fullfill this obligation. Any person who claims to be a socialist, who would reject this is nothing but a hypocrite if you ask me. What FARC represents, what FARC have done for decades now represents nothing but …. TERRORISM!!!
These guys have done nothing but promote violence, murder, kidnapping, and worst of all, tormented the people they ludicrously claim to represent (Their full name is enough reference for such a claim). This is high treason against the people, if you ask me!

In the words of Adam Beach, in the role of Ira Hayes in the movie Flags of Our Fathers, “You know, I think this whole damn thing is a farce, if you ask me.”

Before I say anything, let me warn you that while writing this, I am about to explode out of frustration and anger.

In my opinion, the responsibility of a government is to insure it’s people’s well being, and to work in the people’s best interests. But look at what is happening out there: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHar0wJn4VA.
This military junta in Burma is doing, what I would consider high treasonous against it’s people. It is not caring one bit about their lives and well being, and simple letting them die, by preventing aid from coming in as fast as possible. I consider this indirect genocide, because by not allowing aid to come in, they are letting people die. So it makes no difference that they aren’t killing people themselves, because the result is the same, oh and they actually were killing their own people only months ago!!
This has been going on since the cyclone happened at the beginning of this month.

We already know this government does not serve the people, it serves it’s own greed and corruption. We saw this during the pro-democracy protests led by Buddhist monks some months back. And for over a decade now, they have gone against the wishes of the people and prevented Aung San Suu Kyi‘s party, National League for Democracy, to form a government, despite the fact that they were elected by the people to govern. And for several decades they have repressed the people.

The military junta’s mouth-piece media outlet, is saying that they won’t allow American, British and French warships loaded with aid supplies to bring that to the people who need it, because that assisted “comes with strings attached”, in the form of an American invasion to take control of their oil resources etc. etc.

Alright, ENOUGH!!! of this nonsense! If they’re afraid of an invasion, that’s exactly what we, the international community, should give them! UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has stated that he is “frustrated” (Source: UN Chief Criticizes Burma’s ‘Slow’ Response to Cyclone) with the military junta’s unwillingness to let aid come in. The UN is obviously useless in this case, thanks to a hopelessly old and crusty system of decision making, because Russia and China is obviously gonna veto any proposal of military action against the military junta, that the US, UK or France might come up with.

The article I linked to above mentions that the US already have four warships stationed outside of Burma, with aid supplies and a thousand US marines. It also means that ships from Great Britain and France are also there. Well, I think the right thing to do right now is to bring in armed warships, and escort that aid to the devastated areas. Bring in fighter jets if needed to make sure the aid gets to the people who need it. If the military junta attempts to fight such efforts, I think they should be overthrown militarily, and the people responsible for the violent repression of the peaceful demonstrations a few months back, and the people responsible for blocking aid from coming in (These are like the same bastards) should be put on trial for crimes against humanity.

And to those of you who might say “Ohh no, if you do that this will turn into another Afghanistan!”, well, let’s lay the scenario than the UN or NATO takes military action, and successfully removes the military junta from power, and take control of their armed forces (And NOT disbanding it, which is what really made Iraq go down the gutter), at this point, I think Burma is a very different beast to deal with than Afghanistan. One, in my opinion, very good argument is that it’s a largely Buddhist country, okay. Theravada Buddhism (Which is what you find in Burma) advocates dialog and non-violence, so I don’t think you would have influential spiritual leaders saying “My follows go fight those evil crusaders!” or whatever. On top of that, remember the big-ass protests against the repressive military regime? There’s clearly resentment towards the military junta, but like Poland during the cold war, it’s next to impossible to get rid of such a regime, through violent means, when you’re surrounded by a large military. In Burma’s case, any rebellion would be up against, I mentioned it earlier, a military with over 500,000 available troops (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myanmar_Military), or in the example of Poland, the Solidarity movement in Poland (Which persued non-violent means to fight the Soviet regime) was surrounded by 200,000 Red Army troops armed to the teeth … yeah, good luck fighting against that with violence.
Also, another contrast to Afghanistan is that if you got rid of the military junta, there already are people, who are qualified and EVEN freaking elected by the people to govern!! Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy won 392 out of 492 seats during the 1990 parliamentary elections (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_League_for_Democracy), yet the military junta never allowed them to form a government. This is a huge-ass contrast to Afghanistan, for which the operation itself was extremely poorly done, and it was non-obvious what to do after that. Of course, military action against the military junta in Burma could be poorly done as well, but if we can wait weeks not doing anything, I think it’s relatively trivial to get some aid in by escorting the carrying vessels by warships or fighter planes, and then spending sometime to potentially plan a fullscale invasion.