6/4 Tiananmen Square Protests

From Heterodontosaurus Balls

6/4 Tiananmen Square Protests refers to the series of protests of 1989 held by students at Tiananmen Square against the Chinese government (specifically Deng and his allies). This is most known for the large scale protest and subsequent massacre that happened on June 4th, conducted on unarmed protesters by the People's Liberation Army (there were spillovers to the 3rd and 5th, but it mainly happened on the 4th). It was a result of two clashing ideologies and a fundamental fear that the CCP had that they would be destroyed in the process.

The young and naïve students, with limited knowledge through education in the communist regime, promoted their best guesses of what freedom is supposed to be, some examples include Democratic Socialism, Gorbachevism, Liberal Socialism, Tridemism, or even Maoism. At least, they know that their status quo of Dengism was anything but.

The Tiananmen Square protests and massacre has become the most sensitive topic in the PRC today. Any references to them will be heavily censored and removed.

History

Background

Deng Xiaoping selected Hu Yaobang as one of his advisors, and Hu was part of a reformist faction that called to liberalize China both economically and politically. A lot of young people became sympathetic to Hu. Deng did some economic reforms and got some people rich first ("crossing the river by stepping on the stones"), which benefited the CCP elite the most since they are profiting from the amount of control they have over the economic sector. This led to a public resentment towards government and party corruption. Calls for political reform were suppressed, as Deng indented to do capitalistic reforms in the economic sector only. So when the opening-up came with the Western ideas of freedom, that was a no-no. Hu and Deng were clashing with their different ideas, which led to Hu's forced resignation in 1987.

Hu died in 1989, and two days later students came to Tiananmen Square to mourn him. This kicked off the string of protests, and the students wanted the government to reform its corrupt system. Newspapers were ready to publish mournings of Hu, but they were reprimanded in Shanghai, leading to further protests. The new general secretary Zhao Ziyang declared martial law on May 20th and another time on June 3rd.

"Storming" Zhongnanhai

On the night of April 18th, three days after Hu died, students organized a sit in protest at the Xinhua Gate, which is the entrance to Zhongnanhai, the CCP central government compound. Armed police formed a line to oppose the students who wanted to deliver flower wreaths inside the compound for Hu's death, and they also wanted to submit their "Seven Demands":

  1. Reassess Hu Yaobang's legacy
  2. Punish officials who attacked civilians
  3. Legalize press freedom
  4. Publicize officials' wealth and profiteering
  5. Reform education
  6. Reverse anti-liberalization campaigns
  7. Report on protests fairly

Behind the human barricade of armed police, the students were shouting things like " Li Peng come out!". Li Peng was the premier at the time who was basically head of government. Allegedly some people did try to push through the barricade of police, but according to witnesses accounts they believed that they were disguised agents who are trying to stir things up and escalate the situation. There were people throwing shoes and pushing in shouting "go in, go in", and once they rushed into Zhongnanhai they never came out because they were all CCP affiliates, and once they go in they just stayed there because their job is done. No actual students "stormed" Zhongnanhai, as at the time they tried to verify all who went in Zhongnanhai against student records, and they weren't really students, making the possibility of agents present.

Zhao Ziyang instructed the police to not carry bayonets and both sides were to remain non-violent. Li Peng was very pro-martial law and wanted to violently suppress the students, while Zhao Ziyang was more sympathetic and wanted things to deescalate and find a peaceful solution.

Still, on April 19th and 20th, students gathered at Zhongnanhai, exchanges and intense standoffs occurred, along with clashes as well. The police had clubs and belts with icon buckles on them, so injuries still happened. On the 20th, police used batons to beat down students. This was the first bloodbath of the protests of 89.

Meetings and Negotiations

On April 22, students wanted to meet with the CCP leadership. But it never happened until May 18th.

On April 26, there was an editorial that came out from the People's Daily titled "We must take a clear cut stance against disturbances". The editorial defined the student movement as a destabilizing anti-Party movement.

On May 17th, Deng Xiaoping held meetings within the Politburo Standing Committee to state that martial law was needed. Zhao Ziyang spoke against this because he wanted to protect the protestors. The following day, May 18th, a second meeting happened at Deng's home in Beijing where Zhao was not involved. In this meeting, Deng effectively said that troops were needed and bloodshed will occur. On the same day, Li Peng met with the student protesters. The point of the meeting was useless as the Party has already made its decision.

On May 30th, a 10-meter-tall (33 ft) white statue made out of foam and papier-mâché was erected. It took 4 days to build, and was named "Goddess of Democracy" and was of a women holding a torch, a clear reference to the Statue of Liberty. The constructors decided to make the statue as large as possible to try to dissuade the government from dismantling it: the government would either have to destroy the statue—an action which would potentially fuel further criticism of its policies—or leave it standing.

June Fourth Protests and Massacre

A massive gathering at Tiananmen Square with thousands of students happened on June 3rd, and the People's Liberation Army arrived under order of the CCP. Local residents came out to support the protestors by building protective barricades and giving food and water.

The soldiers of the PLA began mounting in numbers. Some protestors tried to befriend the soldiers, saying that the people's army should not be enemies with the people.

The killing didn't start until late into the night of June 3rd and into the morning of June 4th, because the order was to clear the square by 5:00 AM next morning. The PLA wasn't the army of the nation, it was the army of the Communist Party. This was not a decision or will of the people to suppress these protestors. The barricades were smashed and civilians were killed.

The PLA began shooting indiscriminately at the crowd of protestors.

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Massacre Denial

The Chinese government denies the massacre ever happened. Their communist shills also repeat the same lie, claiming that the massacre didn't happen, or try to downplay it by saying "only 200 people died". These shills also claims that the local Chinese all agree that only few people died and it wasn't as bad as "Western propaganda" makes it out to be, but of course anyone who have saw the massacre and dared to speak about the truth would be censored.

No One Died in Tiananmen Square?

One of the ways the shills try to deny the massacre is by saying something like "no student died in Tiananmen Square" and therefore the idea of a "Tiananmen Square massacre" was null and void. This is semantic manipulation. It is true that more people died in the surrounding streets and areas, and that's why the massacre is more commonly known in Chinese as the "June Fourth Incident".

Additionally, deniers will site many Western news and WikiLeaks stating things like "the square was clear" and "no bloodshed in Tiananmen Square". The shills would then argue that there is no "Tiananmen Square massacre". But, people were killed in surrounding areas, and is that not a massacre still? And first, people did die in the square, according to witness accounts of people who were actually in the square and saw it firsthand. And unlike Western reporters who had a language barrier and possibly limited access to information in the following day, the Chinese were able to gather information from the deceased's family members, relatives, and fellow students. Due to this, the data is more complete in Chinese-speaking circles.

Protest participator Tang Kai (唐恺) who was sitting at the stairs of the Monument to the People's Heroes (which was across the Tiananmen gate), said he saw bodies lying on the ground after soldiers came. He saw tanks, he saw the military men shooting at protestors when they refused to leave the Great Hall of the People. Reporter Kate Adie was live at the square, and you could clearly hear gunshots in the background, further destroying the "no deaths in Tiananmen" myth. She also reported that most deaths happened off the streets near the square.

Benevolent CCP Leaders?

There is another CCP shill narrative that the CCP leaders at the time were benevolent or nice. Shills claim that the CCP was trying to have conversations with the students, but it was the violent students that pushed and escalated things, and martial law was enacted because there was no other choice. This is simply not true. To claim that the CCP was gracious for allowing the students to talk with them is twisting the reality. The only person that wanted talks at the time, maybe a few others but not as straightforward, was Zhao Ziyang. He was sympathetic to the students and wanted things to stop, basically he went against the orders of Deng Xiaoping who was very much calling for martial law and violence. Zhao's eventual demise and house arrest was because he supported the students.

Another thing the shills try to use is videos from the talks with Li Peng on May 18, and the students were rude. But, the Party had already decided what they were going to do, as in Deng's meeting with other CCP officials on the same day talking about needing to enact martial law, making the meeting with students pointless. It was true that at the time individual officials were reachable, but it was only the individual, not the whole government, and they just had to play into certain meetings for public image's sake. This was the last time officials met with the dissident, minus the time in April 25 1999 when premier Zhu Rongji met with Falun Gong adherents outside of Zhongnanhai. But after that, it was the end of this meeting with officials type of thing.

Violent Students?

Shills also say that the students were violent, they killed PLA soldiers, burned tanks, APCs, buses and stole weapons. One such example is a famous photo used by state media of a soldier lynched. However, witnesses accounts say that the lynched soldier got lost while firing at the students, and he took the lives of many residents. So, he got pelted by rocks and died. A photo was taken of him and used as "proof" that the students were murderers.

Most of the students were nonviolent. They didn't have any weapons. This calls to the question, were there agents in disguise trying to escalate things? And were there situations of friendly fire, accidents, tragedies on the side of the soldiers that were being blamed on the protestors? It is very true that the students were angry that guns were being pointed at them and soldiers are willing to fire at them, their own people. A lot of local Beijing residents have also game out to support the students, some of them bought water, snacks, etc., and they were very much supporting the student's cause. So on the night of June 3rd, a lot of them came out to build barricades in order to protect the students. The barricades were smashed, and a lot of civilian casualties also occurred during this process. So, many photos the shills use are aftermath photos, so you really have no idea of what exactly happened. Just because we have burning images of the aftermath, it does not account for the real situation of the night. You can also find articles and interviews of individual soldiers who left China to say that they were given real bullets on June 3rd.

Another image the shills use is one that was taken on June 10th, of a burnt person with a soldier cap on. It is strange that a cap was put on him, as we do not know if he was a soldier or protestor. The claim that soldiers were murdered by the protestors in the most horrible way possible is false. Of course, PLA casualties did happen, but most of it was trucks falling over, exploding, friendly fire, and all that is being blamed on the protestors whose casualties are way higher.

Massive Censorship

The CCP tries to hide June 4th so hard and pretend nothing happened, it's kind of obvious that something happened on this day.

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Relationships

Enemies

  • Dengism - Corrupt tyrant who refuses to reform! It's your fault you can't handle criticism, it's your fault that you opened fire on us! Now you are desperately trying to paint us as terrorists, either that or deny the whole thing ever happened.

Songs

Flower of Freedom

Flower of Freedom

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How to draw

Anti-Authoritarian symbol with "64" written in Chinese

6/4 Tiananmen Square Protests has a drawing rating of intermediate.

  1. Draw a ball.
  2. Fill it with white.
  3. Add three black arrows pointing downwards, facing left.
  4. Add the Chinese characters 六四 beside the arrows.
  5. Add a red headband around the ball's top and a plastic bag on each side.
  6. Add Chinese eyes and you're done!
Color Name HEX
White #FFFFFF
Black #000000

Gallery

  • Map of the Tiananmen Square massacre

    Map of the Tiananmen Square massacre

Navigation

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