Tiananmen Square

In exploring modern China via the government's reaction to student demonstrators in the name of democracy in Tiananmen Square, we must truly wonder if there is any difference between modern China and historical China. In taking a close look at the government's reaction to the demonstrations for freedom in Tiananmen Square, we must wonder if there has truly been any progress where human rights or the classroom ideals of democracy are concerned.

On May 17, 1989, more than a million people stormed Beijing's Tiananmen Square, the former off-limits home of many of China's imperial dynasties (Chin 1). Defiant, red banners emblazoned with slogans against Premier Li Peng flew in the square, while loudspeakers encouraged the people to keep their spirits high in the name of freedom, human rights, and democracy. More than 1,600 people were arrested during the demonstration, demonstrations favoring the individual over the state in a turn-a-round of China's historical state over the individual ideology (Doerner 1).

Many human rights organizations like the United Nations and Amnesty International often criticize China's policy on human rights and the government's willingness to suppress and oppress its own people in order to continue to cling to Communist institutions and ideologies. In fact, the Chinese government's reaction to the demonstrations in Tiananmen Square made many of those living in Hong Kong worried that communist oppression would be

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ard freedom without coming off to the rest of the world as one more barbaric communist regime. However, after weeks of hesitation, on the orders of Li Peng, the regime began to crack down and an unleashed military committed a massacre against its own people. By the end of the first week of the demonstrations and gatherings that were moving toward Beijing, unarmed soldiers were called in to disperse the crowd, many of them in shirtsleeves. Tear-gas shells, beatings, belt whippings and other tactics were used by soldiers to try and disperse the growing and frustrated throngs of people. Behind the Great Hall of the People, soldiers began to beat student demonstrators as thousands of people continue to march toward the region. Truncheons, belts, and other weapons were used to bloody anyone in the path of the soldiers but to no avail. Students and other demonstrators kept marching and protesting despite the actions of the Chinese soldiers. For nearly six hours the students held their ground before the army disappeared. Seemingly vanished, there was no sign of the soldiers until about an hour later when more than 1,200 troop appears off Qianmen West Road (Birnbaum and Chua-Eoan 1). Saturday came and went with the soldiers retre

Category: Foreign - T