this post was submitted on 24 Sep 2023
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Honestly, I read the above article a few months ago, and I think it is a genuinely good article that I would recommend others read. It was written nine years after Tiananmen by Jay Mathews of the Washington Post, who was in Beijing during the protests; and the Columbia Journalism Review is a respected publication written by and for professional journalists. So the article is basically just trying to disspell the dumbing down and memeifying and misremembering and making-into-propaganda that happened with Tiananmen, and which honestly tends to happen with any major loss of life. No conspiracy theories, no denialism or claiming that "they had it coming", just dispelling misconceptions. It's good stuff.
I can't speak for Davel's other comment citing Prolewiki, though — I'm pretty skeptical to any website that tries to be Wikipedia but for X ideology.
In any case, this "butthurt report" feels pretty unfair, although I honestly did kinda roll my eyes at how Davel's comment said "6 out of 7 ain't bad", that was kinda cringe... But basically, what I'm trying to say is that I wouldn't fault someone for commenting under a "9/11 NEVER FORGET" post about the extent to which mismanagement and confusion contributed to the death toll of that, and likewise I wouldn't fault someone for commenting under a Tiananmen Square post with more nuance about that event.
It’s not unreasonable to have skepticism of ProleWiki.
You might think Wikipedia lacks ideology or bias, but in my opinion it tends to have a Global North/Atlanticist bias. This is probably because of the place of its birth and the people who created it, like American libertarian Jimmy Wales, and the people who have managed it, like Katherine Maher, who has worked for National Democratic Institute and the Atlantic Council, and currently works for the U.S. State Dept.
And obviously the English language Wikipedia is generally going to have an anglo-Atlanticist point of view, as virtually all L1 English speakers and ~~most~~ many L2 English speakers do.
Honestly, I absolutely already believe that Wikipedia can be highly biased in those ways. The problem is really just with the liberal shaitan who whispers kapitalist propaganda into my ears. I should know better.
It's silly to trust the testimony of a single journalist over the dozens of other journalists who were there. His conflicting report is the minority and for a reason. I'm not saying he's lying, but it seems disingenuous to seek out anything that goes against the consensus. The evidence and the testimonies clearly point towards a government ordered massacre of civilians. If nothing happened like tankies claim, then the Chinese government would go to the extreme lengths that it does to deny the existence of the event entirely.