Slashdot Mirror
China's Response To the Internet Addiction Death
eldavojohn writes "Last week, news broke of a tragic incident that resulted in the death of a 16-year-old boy at one of China's internet addiction camps. Details were scarce except for reports that the camp remained open. New reports are now coming in from China Daily that report 13 arrested and the camp closed down on Friday with 122 participants being sent home. The vice-chief of the district has stated that the authorities are working on the case to identify and punish the criminals involved in the death. Xinhua is reporting that the camp was unlicensed. This is directly in conflict with what the Southern Metropolis Daily reporter is saying, 'When the reporter arrived outside the rear wall of the school, children on the third and fourth floors started to stick notes into aluminum cans, drink bottles, and slippers, and others folded notes into paper planes. They tried to throw them over the wall, but owing to the distance, none of them succeeded. Some children had papers bearing the messages "SOS" and "beating" which they waved out the windows. Some wrote calls for help on their clothing, which they displayed to the reporter. Some even yelled for help. They were all stopped by the instructors.' Here is that original story in Chinese. Is China handling this delicate issue appropriately or are the news reports of justice and monitoring treatments merely a facade?"
There was a similar case at a Florida boot camp a few years back. A kid was beaten to death, and it was all caught on tape. The murderers were acquitted, but Florida did shut down its boot camps. We'll probably see similar results from this incident in China.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Is China handling this delicate issue appropriately or are the news reports of justice and monitoring treatments merely a facade?
Of course it is not, you cannot say that a country that allows for few basic freedoms, has a mostly state-run economy, and has almost no non-state run news. Along with no real way for its people to voice their opinion in government matters. So lets see, we have no third-party news service, no public records, and no way for Chinese citizens to act against this. How can anyone say they are anything but a facade?
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
What the Southern Metropolis Daily reported was a case in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, in contrast to the other case in the Guangxi province, where the death happened. See the difference here?
Considering that the "editorial" staff here missed the fact that the Southern Metropolis Daily article covered a DIFFERENT camp with the same problems and claimed that there was conflicting stories...Heh...
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
various practices of western governments. i won't aggrevate your prejudices too much by suggesting some of your fears of an unstoppable march to orwellian fascism in the west are somewhat hysterical or overhyped
but did any of you stop and think that what is going on in iran or china is perhaps exactly what your orwellian fears allude to? and that it might pay more dividends, at least in the realm of intellectual honesty, to criticize those governments rather than western governments?
because no matter how bad it is in the west, surely you can see how downright horrific it is in some other places in the world. not that the west doesn't have problems. not that horrible problems elsewhere doesn't mean you should ignore little problems close by. and of course, it is invalid to be only able to criticize practices in other countries, not your own
its just that, to me, there seems to be a lot of people in the west who fall into a ridiculous trap: some people's ability to criticize ends at the borders of their own countries. you are a human being, right? or does the rationale for your ability to judge right and wrong magically vaporize at the straits of bosporus or the rio grande?
while you make mountains out of molehills in the practices of governments in the west, all i am asking is that you sometimes actually pay attention to the real mountains outside your border. they represent a threat to you just as much, if not more. its not THAT big of a planet you know, and its not the days of slowly sailing ships. what happens in beijing and tehran does have a real and measurable impact on your life, and it isn't a good impact. some days, you should stop beating the drums of the evils of the west, and turn your moral and intellectual concerns outside your borders
the only valid moral and intellectual point of view is a global one, not a western one, nor an indian one, nor a chinese one. its just that, if you only concern yourself with criticism of the west, you fail this qualificiation for being able to consider yourself as having a truly human conscience
stand up, criticize beijing and tehran. it doesn't mean you are suddenly a dick cheney style neocon. the rationale and ability to criticize nonwestern governments does not start with the assumption that you are enamored of western governments. you can hate washington dc just as much as you hate beijing. criticizing the former does not mean you love the latter, and visa versa
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
You're reasoning on the basis of short slogans, and not actually the rules that these slogans imperfectly summarize.
In the USA, the criminal court system operates on a presumption of the innocence of the defendant. This means that the prosecution has the burden of proving that the charges are true; defendants don't have the burden of proving themselves innocent, and have the right to not testify during the process.
A person truly does commit a murder, but is acquitted of the charge for it, is quite simply an acquitted murderer. If you call somebody an "acquitted murderer" there's of course the issue of why do you believe you are justified in believing that person to be a murderer when the court ruled in his favor, but we're all certainly entitled to our own opinions.
Are you adequate?
Let's recap: in that case the guards
- were videotaped punching and kicking a 14 year old, who died soon afterwards
- they did not deny it. In fact, they said it was normal boot-camp procedure. You don't get a much clearer admission than that.
I'm sorry, but I don't need media hype to think that those assholes should be in jail. If not for murder, then for the assault that they're not even denying. It's hard for me to imagine them as innocent of at least that savage beating, when even they admit it. In fact, that it was common procedure and they did it to lots of other children.
We're not even talking about a belting or spanking (much as I'm against those too, but, ok, let's skip that part for now.) We're talking a group of adults punching and kicking a 14 year old child.
To add insult to injury: it wasn't even because said child had actually done anything bad. They were beating him because they thought he was simulating an illness. Except it turns out that the illness was real, and in fact they argued in court (and that was why they were acquitted) that the kid died of the disease not of the punching and kicking received. Again, it's stuff they themselves argued in court, so I'm not doing more than taking their own word for it.
Roll that around in your head a bit: a child received that savage beating (whether lethal or not), just because he was genuinely ill. No other guilt, infraction, misdeed, or anything else involved. Get sick, get beaten. Does that sound right to you?
I mean, FFS, even the advocates of corporal punishments argue that it's to correct some antisocial behaviours. Whereas in this case a child was savagely beaten just for being ill. Instead of being taken to a doctor, he was punched and kicked by a bunch of adults. I can't imagine any scenario, no matter how convoluted, where that can possibly be morally right.
But at any rate, murder or not, by their own confessions they are at the very least guilty of assault. And for that, they earn my heartfelt contempt. Bunch of scumbags.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.