20-Year Anniversary of China’s Public Massacre

Twenty years ago, on June 4, 1989, the Chinese government ordered its military to kill the unarmed peaceful student protesters for democracy gathered in Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The army then shot the students and ran them over with tanks. In its murderous effort to suppress any form of free expression or protest, the Chinese government and its military murdered the people in Tiananmen Square while the entire world watched. China is now preventing any sort of commemoration or discussion of those events or the twenty-year anniversary by almost completely shutting down internet access to any material that could possibly mention the murder of Chinese people in Tiananmen Square.

You can see the police with umbrellas blocking the view of the BBC news cameraman in the embedded video. The entire square is closed to the press on this important day in Chinese history. The government does not want anyone in China to know anything about or understand what happened in 1989.

It is an honor to have a web site banned in China. Candlelight Stories receives a large number of visits from China and is actually used in English classes there. However, Candlelight Stories urges the citizens of China to wake up in the morning and completely overthrow and eliminate their oppressive government. It would be enlightening to see the government officials of China dragged by Chinese citizens into the middle of Tiananmen Square where the world could serve as witness to the end of this horrendous period in Chinese history.  Why any company or country does any business at all with the brutal despots ruling China is a complete and pitiful mystery to any rational thinker.  And people who site see in China would have probably been perfectly comfortable touring concentration camps in 1944.

Now, China, press the red button and ban me.

Word Bullets are Destabilizing Guatemala’s Government

The Guatemalan Twitter user named Jean Anleu Fernández who was arrested for making a Twitter post that suggested people should remove their money from the Banrural in order to help break the backs of corrupt politicians has been released from jail and placed under house arrest.  In the video above, you can watch as he greets his friends and makes a Twitter post while in handcuffs.  In one of the most fascinating recent examples of the battle for free expression we are watching a normal guy get persecuted by a Western nation for simply posting his thoughts on the internet.  He has been charged with inciting financial panic and attempting to cause a run on the bank.  I actually think his idea for pulling money out of the bank is a very good one and I fully support his idea.  Why not?  If Guatemala is so afraid of a run on its bank, then it either needs a new bank or a new government.  Perhaps both.  I think that, on the basis of what we are seeing in Guatemala, both the bank and the country’s government should be eliminated as quickly as possible.  The barrage of worldwide outrage toward Guatemala’s government via the internet is illustrative of the power of ‘word bullets’ to destabilize and destroy governments.  This is a fearsome power in the hands of ordinary internet users all over the globe.  It is this power that is the great weapon in the hands of all free people.  But it is also the power that will cause a dangerous reaction from governments seeking to eliminate this potent popular weapon.  I think that we are on the brink of the greatest assault on freedom of expression in history and that the assault will come primarily from free Western nations.  We are seeing it already in attempts like U.S. congressional representative Linda Sanchez’s bill to criminalize the posting of opinions on the internet that may offend anyone at all or emotionally injure a potential reader.  There is absolutely no difference between her attempt at legislation to eliminate freedom of speech and the behavior of the Guatemalan government in arresting a man for suggesting that people withdraw their own money from a bank.