China: Tiananmen 25th anniversary

Amber Larson, Seth Auberon, Wisdom Quarterly; Massoud Hayoun (Al Jazeera America)

Artist/activist's rendition of the famous "Tank Man," the brave Chinese citizen who stood up to state and corporate power by famously placing his body between a tank and Tienanmen.

China tightens security in Beijing on Tienanmen [massacre's] 25th anniversary

Police state cameras, Tienanmen today

Human rights advocates say it’s only a matter of time before government recognizes killings of pro-democracy protesters.

Human-rights advocates reported unprecedented security measures at China’s Tienanmen Square on Wednesday that barred Chinese from marking the 25th anniversary of pro-democracy protests there that ended with a government crackdown killing hundreds, if not thousands, of civilians.
 

Gearing up for Tiananmen 2.0

Eyewitnesses in Beijing reported that access to the square, a symbol of the Chinese Communist Party’s nearly 65-year rule, had been restricted. Walking from Beijing’s Wangfujin shopping district a little over half a mile to Tienanmen, Twitter user Ban Yue Ban posted photos of three checkpoints he had to pass, with law enforcement officials checking his identification and searching his bag.

The human rights monitoring organization Amnesty International reported that 48 known dissidents -- including activists, lawyers, and artists -- had disappeared or been detained by authorities ahead of the June 4 anniversary. [The U.S. government's spying apparatus known as] Google and a number of other websites were blocked ahead of the day.
 
Chinese youth reflect on Tienanmen Square 25 years later 

Al Jazeera America News, June 3, 2014

Comrade, are you wearing eyeliner? - Maybe.

Renowned Chinese human rights advocate Hu Jia told Al Jazeera, while under detention in his Beijing home, that he hoped Chinese would still “return to the square” to achieve what he believes are China’s inevitable objectives of democracy and rule of law.
 

NRA calls open-carry gun demos foolish

But by late afternoon in Beijing, it appeared that access to the site had been so heavily restricted that there would be no mass movement reminiscent of the one in 1989, despite attempts by New York-based dissident blogger Wen Yunchao to have people “Return to Tiananmen.”

Wen had mounted a long-distance campaign to return the ideals of democracy and transparency for China to the nation’s public and international media. More

• Beijing crushing West China's Uighur separatists
• China clamping down on Taiwanese Buddhists
• China oppresses its Tibetan Buddhists daily
• China does not believe in human rights that stand in the way of business
• NSA pulls in "millions of images" every day to aid its homeland spying facial recognition on Facebook and other social media
• American toddler in coma after SWAT's stun grenade lands in crib
• Earth heading toward another mass extinction
• Arctic ice melt to release trillion pieces of plastic in sea 
• "Tiananmen" happened in US' Kent State University
• "Friday of martyrs" 2013 brings fear of new showdown in Egypt

Underground worlds: Buddhist Russia

Amber Larson, Xochitl, Pat Macpherson, Pfc. Sandoval, Wisdom Quarterly; RT News (facebook); Lindsey Bright (curatormagazine.com)

There are habitable caverns all over the planet (Buddha cave/Chatchai laka-mankong/flickr)

RT covers the US well

(RT) Many interesting things are hidden under the ground. In Odessa, Ukraine (formerly Czarist Russia and the USSR, part of Russia's Far East in Northern Asia), man made caves, caverns, and catacombs are scattered across the region -- stretching 2,500 km long, making them the longest in the world, but not necessarily the biggest, however.

These so-called catacombs were home to partisan bases during World War II. In Vladivostok -- the main Russian military naval base in the Far East -- engineers built a fortress at the beginning of the 20th century. Moreover, the largest underground Russian church is hidden in Penza, according to RT.

D.U.M.B.s

What greed overcomes the U.S. MIC?

Are there similar deep underground military bases in the United States? Better believe it. They exist under Los Angeles but are most famously concentrated in Nevada and New Mexico, particularly the Archuleta Mesa (Dulce, NM) and in and around the Grand Canyon, Arizona.

These were not built exclusively by the U.S. military, CIA, and MIC (military-industrial complex). Native Americans say they were the home of humanoids referred to as the "Ant People," who live there and saved the lives of humans on the surface from time to time by welcoming them into their subterranean cities, which are not dark or lifeless but fully fleshed out and high tech.
 
Archuleta Mesa and its off-planet inhabitants

Archuleta Mesa, a bluff in the desert mountains of Dulce, New Mexico

 
Archuleta Mesa is the central geographic feature of Dulce, New Mexico, the heart of the Jicarilla Apache Nation.... In 2009, 120 people from around the world and the area attended the Dulce Underground UFO Base Conference. One local in attendance was Horacio Garcia. I know Garcia well. I know his kids and family and have spent time with them.

Big, kind, with baggy pants, bandana often tied low on his forehead and tattoos covering his arms, he is known for his knowledge on aliens. In Dec. 2011, I asked him about the Greys and the Dulce Alien Base.

[He answered,] “I don’t have to tell you anything. In a few weeks, everybody will know. The aliens will reveal themselves,” Garcia said. A few weeks passed, and I felt, thought, saw, and believed the same. If I was looking at aliens or alien artifacts, I didn’t see them. Yet, many claim to have seen strange and bizarre sights in Dulce and Lumberton, New Mexico -- coyotes that turn into humans, big orbs of light floating in the valleys, dogs that run faster than a speeding car, Bigfoot (Sasquatches), cow fetuses with the face of a tiger (government research chimeras) -- and (extraterrestrial) aliens, specifically, the Greys. More
 

It is interesting to note that according to Hindu and later Buddhist cosmologies, "heavens," usually referring to celestial worlds, are described as existing in space as well as underground inside this planet, which Wisdom Quarterly has covered.

Russia, China beat CIA/MIC: "Pipelineistan"

Dictator Vlad Putin and China's President Xi Jinping attend a welcoming ceremony at the Xijiao State Guest house ahead of the 4th Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) summit in Shanghai on May 20, 2014 (Alexey Druzhinin/AFP).

 

Future "collateral damage," Afghanistan

While the West imposes sanctions on Russia, Russia is making a deal with China as each has something to offer the other, David Kuo, CEO of the Motley Fool Singapore financial Website, told RT. [One of the real reasons the U.S. fulfilled its longstanding plans to invade innocent Afghanistan -- after fomenting controversy by creating "the Taliban" with the help of Pakistani intelligence, demolishing the Buddhas of Bamiyan, and using 9/11 as the ultimate pretext for invasion, revenge, and an endless war on terror/fear in the Middle East and Wahabhi-Islam -- was for oil. There was a plan to build a massive pipeline to facilitate the plans of American and Western multinational corporations. "No blood for oil" protesters aware of this used to say.] More

Is a bigger Buddha better? (video)

Amber Larson, Maya, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; Fareed Zakaria, Global Public Square (CNN)

The Buddha, Statue of Liberty (USA), The Motherland Calls (Russia), Redeemer (Brazil) [W]

Is bigger better?

Mountaintop Tian Tan Buddha, Lantau Island, Hong Kong (rmonty119/flickr)

  

Smaller Afghan Buddha

China is home to the world's fastest train, longest bridge, largest freestanding building, longest wall, and is the biggest source of tourists in the world. In China, bigger is definitely better -- even when it comes to the Buddha.

 

Massive Buddha statues have been built around the country over the past few decades. The 160-foot Buddha in the video towers over crowds like another 300-foot Buddha in eastern China. 

 

Is Liberty a freed slave? (USS)

In 2002, the tallest statue in the world -- the 500-foot Spring Temple Buddha -- was unveiled in China. It is almost 200 feet taller than the Statue of Liberty!

[Scholar Dr. Joy DeGruy points out that the Statue of Liberty in New York harbor is shackled by broken ankle chains signifying our history of enslaving Africans and others, yet nearly no American knows it because the truth is kept hidden by the Nat'l Park Service].

 

India's future biggest Buddha? (Maitreya)

So why is Buddha on steroids? One word: tourists. Last year, this Buddha reportedly brought in 3.8 million visitors and $200 million. Not every large statue has been met with appreciation though. Two giant Buddhas in their birthday suits recently unveiled in Eastern China were taken down after an uproar. More

In 1886, the Statue of Liberty was a symbol of democracy and Enlightenment ideals. It was also a celebration of the Union's Civil War victory and our [official] abolition of slavery. Edouard de Laboulaye first proposed the idea of a great monument as a gift from France. He was a firm supporter of Pres. Lincoln's fight for abolition. For he saw it as a way to eliminate immorality and a means of protesting repressive tendencies in France. More

China [not] closing forced labor camps (video)

CC Liu, Pat Macpherson, Wisdom Quarterly; BBC.co.uk

China has forced labor camps for lower cost merchandise, but who cares? That merchandise goes mainly to the USA and Europe. It is not only for forcing free labor out of "undesirables" or promoting communism; it is for destroying civil liberties and promoting capitalism. If we don't care, we do not understand that there is no Xmas Without China. Today China announced the camps' closure, but that may just mean a change of sign boards.

World Buddhist Forum III, 2012 (china.org.cn)

Many celebrated last week's announcement that China will abolish its much-hated "re-education through labor" system.

 

The system, which dates back to the 1950s, allowed the Chinese police to send anyone to prison for up to four years without a trial. [Now Americans face the same fate under the 2014 NDAA.] A labor camp sentence was almost impossible to appeal. 

 

Abuse not limited to Tibetan minority (NPR)

"The...labor system was arbitrary, it was abusive, it was unconstitutional," explains Nicholas Bequelin, a senior researcher with rights group Human Rights Watch. He argues that the system's abolition opens the door for legal reform in China. 

(MY) China's slave labor camps make toys and electronics for the West

"Sometimes we have no choice; we work till dawn. When you work all night you become dizzy and your eyes hurt because you can't take any breaks." SANTA'S WORKSHOP explores the real world of China's toy factories. Workers speak of long working hours, low wages, and dangerous work places. Those who protest or try to organize trade unions risk imprisonment. Low labor costs attract more and more companies to China. Today more than 75% of our toys are made in China. But this industry takes its toll on the workers and on the environment. European and American buyers blame bad conditions on Chinese suppliers. They say that increasingly hard competition gives them no option. Believe it? What can we do?

• YEAR IN PHOTOS: China 2013
• PHOTOS: Christmas around the world

Big Leshan Budddha (leana.niemand3/flickr)

"There's no point in trying to improve the criminal law system, trying to decrease the incidents of torture, forced confessions, and miscarriage of justice if the police can just go another route and send someone without any kind of procedure and due process for up to four years to a labor camp," Mr. Bequelin says.

 

China had 260 labor camps holding 160,000 inmates at the start of this year, according to figures from the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights Watch. But that number seems to be shrinking. The Shanghai government announced on Wednesday that it has already released all of the people held at its labor camps. 

(AH) iPad: Secret Horrors Inside Chinese Foxconn Factory City as 

American journalist gains access to see how iPads are really made.

 

"Changing sign boards"

Top of Leshan Buddha (Joegwolf/flickr)

Still, some fear that the extra-legal camp system will disappear in name only. Most of the people locked up under the re-education through labor system are detained for drug offenses -- either selling or buying small quantities of illegal narcotics. [The same happens to an increasing number of Americans in possession of addictive prescription narcotics and pain killers. More

• VIDEO: Russia's adrenaline junkies seek YouTube fame

Exploring the Moon from Beijing today

CC Liu, Pat Macpherson, Wisdom Quarterly; NPR.org; News.XinhuaNet.com

The Rabbit (Yutu) and Moon (Chang'e) as seen from the surface of Gaia (4allreligion)

China's first lunar rover separates from Chang'e-3 Moon lander early Dec. 15, 2013 as seen from the screen of the Beijing Aerospace Control Center in Beijing, China (Xinhua).

  

Control Center, Beijing (Xinhua/NPR)

Very early Sunday morning [Dec. 15, 2013], China's Moon rover, Yutu or "Jade Rabbit," separated from its lander and began its exploration.

 

This means that China has officially joined the USA and the former USSR as the only three [imperial] countries to make a soft landing and drop an exploratory vehicle on the Moon [named Chang'e in Chinese] safely. The Chinese state news agency Xinhua reports:

"The 140 kg six-wheeled rover touched the lunar surface at 4:35 a.m., leaving deep trace on the loose lunar soil. The process was recorded by the camera on the lander and the images were sent to the Earth, according to the Beijing Aerospace Control Center.

"After the separation, the rover and lander will take photos of each other and start their own scientific explorations.

"Engineers made final checks of the environment of the landing site, the situation of the probe and the solar incidence angle late night on Saturday and sent signals of separation to Chang'e-3.

"Yutu, atop the probe, extended its solar panel and started to drive slowly to the transfer mechanism at 3:10. The transfer mechanism unlocked at 4:06 with one side reaching the moon's surface, allowing the rover to descend to the surface following a ladder mechanism."

As NPR reported yesterday, this is a big deal for China, as it shows off its technical prowess and is a point of national pride. But it's also a big deal for humankind. More

• PHOTOS: Secrets of the Moon, its ruins, and its civilization may be revealed by China (Richard C. Hoagland, enterprisemission.com)

Suburban school boy to Shaolin monk (video)

Amanda Cable (DailyMail.co.uk, 11-14-08); Pat Macpherson (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly

Shaolin monk demonstrates pain tolerance by breaking bricks with his head using a sledgehammer, indicating that most of us live nowhere near our human potential (Reuters).

(Nat'l Geographic) "Myths and Logic of Shaolin Monks" (kung fu documentary, see Part 2)

 

Ahmet gave up the trappings of suburbia for the good life.

He's the ordinary north London boy who became a Chinese warrior monk. And his story is as astonishing as it is inspiring.

 

Matthew Ahmet is 20 and he's hard, very hard. His head is shaved, and his body bears the ravages of a violent life. A mark on his forehead shows where a metal bar came crashing down on his skull. His forearms have been sliced repeatedly by razor-sharp knives, and his left arm has a "punishment" burn from boiling water.

 

So when he sits down, flashes a beautiful smile and talks about spreading happiness and peace, it comes as a great surprise. Matthew left his home in Enfield, north London, at the age of 17 to become a Shaolin Buddhist monk in China. In doing so, he renounced all the worldly belongings that are the staple diet of teenage life and entered upon a grueling regime of training, sacrifice, and punishment. Each mark on his body bears testament to this new and extraordinary life. Ahmet says:

Publicity poster for Ahmet's Shaolin show

"Recently, I went to visit an old schoolfriend of mine, who is at Manchester University. I met him at the digs he shares with his friends and I was stunned. There were dirty clothes everywhere, unwashed dishes and belongings just thrown around. In China, I wash my own robes in a bucket of cold water, which I also use to bathe in. I sleep on a bunk bed with no mattress, lying directly on a plank of wood. Everything in my new life is so neat and disciplined that I can't imagine being a typical student now."

Does this earnest young man, who looks like a feral youth but who is in fact gentle and thoughtful, miss anything about his "old life"? He says with a brilliant smile, "Hot showers. When I do go home, I love the luxury of being able to have hot water running over my body." More

"Xmas Without China" (film)

CC Liu, Ashley Wells, Wisdom Quarterly; Tom Xia (kickstarter); Conscientious Projector

Mary's Christmas Museum for an inclusive Xtmas (Kevin Dooley/flickr.com)

(xmaswithoutchina) "Xmas Without China

Chinese immigrant Tom Xia challenges his American neighbors, the Joneses, to one Christmas season without using anything made in China!

"Xmas Without China" is a feature documentary set around the Christmas holiday in Arcadia, California, a Pasadena-adjacent neighborhood in the San Gabriel Valley that used to be predominantly Anglo, but is now half Asian.

 

Tom Xia, a Chinese-American immigrant, challenges his neighbors, the Jones family, to spend the entire month leading up to the commercial holiday season with no Chinese products in their homes and without purchasing any Chinese products for the holidays.

"Black Friday" is coming. Where will you be?

 

(Kevin Dooley/flickr.com)

Fed up with food and toy recalls, the Joneses take up the challenge. But the tables turn when Tim Jones provokes Tom about who he is and why he's so proud of China. As the Joneses struggle to figure out how to have a simpler Christmas in a time when "We don't make anything anymore." They also begin to think about just how related they are to China. 

 

Fed up with the mudslinging between the two countries, Tom finds himself on an unlikely journey to break down stereotypes between China and America. He find his own place between these worlds.

 

We shot the first half of the film, and in the wonderful way of documentary, we discovered that Tom's challenge brings us a fascinating story of the unusual relationship between two families who are each trying to adapt to the enormous changes that are defining our world today. More

The Chinese Buddhist Canon (lectures)

Wisdom Quarterly; ICBS, University of the West (uwest.edu)

Associate Prof. Jiang Wu from the Dept. of East Asian Studies, University of Arizona is the author of Enlightenment in Dispute: The Reinvention of Chan Buddhism in Seventeenth-Century China.

 

"Truly a work of merit for the history of religious and intellectual thought, practice, and sociopolitics..."

"Jiang Wu's Enlightenment in Dispute succeeds in its bold claim that the revival of Chan Buddhism deserves to be seen as playing a significant role in 17th-century Chinese history.

 

"Among Wu's many important findings are his specific tracing of Chan in late Ming thought and factionalism, the significance of Chan 'textual spirituality' in the intellectual questing of the time, the surprising use of the law in the adjudication of disputed Dharma transmissions, the intersections of Chan with Ming loyalist sentiments and actions, and the central part played by Yongzheng (first as prince and then as emperor) in defining Chan doctrinal legitimacy and ultimately his own enlightenment.

 

"The book is a valuable addition to our studies of China's turbulent and formative 'long seventeenth century.'" --Jonathan Spence, author of The Search for Modern China and Return to Dragon Mountain