I would have been one when it happened. Much too young to remember. When shots rang out under the vault of stars over the Gate of Heavenly Peace, I was probably swattled in warm blankets in a peaceful city half a world away.
When I was young I remember it being part of the collective conscious. By the time I knew what China was, I knew of the man who stood on Chang’An Ave that day.
That picture was what I saw, the white shirt, the green tanks. I saw it long before I understood what it was.
Honestly, I stood on the same spot he did before I really understood.
Today, again, a world away from that square I watched the day pass unremarked. Today of all days I even heard the People’s government compared with ‘just any other government.’ they’re all the same, right? Every government censors, every government oppresses, right? Same shit different name, right?
What bothers me to my very core is the idea that the Party may be winning.
I stood in Victoria Park, white candle wax running down my hand and tears running down my cheek as the multitudes stood in silence, remembering those not present- for whom that beautiful day in Hong Kong was denied.
Even that right is now denied, in the name of tyranny and quarantine.
Today, though, around the world my sentiments and tears are not echoed. Companies say the market is too big, others that it can’t be that bad, or that its bad but not their problem.
The Propaganda Department is getting savier and those in the west are lapping it up. Green Energy, bullet trains, 5G, but not horrific pollution, workers killed or enslaved, stolen technology, cultural genocide, pandemics, and over a million in concentration camps.
Why when some many monuments say never again and nunca mas does it still happen today?
Perhaps in the tumolt of pandemic and exposed protest by brave Hong Kongers the terrifying truth will be brought to light- The brave doctors of Wuhan and the umbrella wielders of the Fragrant Harbor are heros in the fight.
I cannot let the Party win. If the only thing I can do is hold the memory of the heros in my heart, then I swear that till my heart’s last beat I will hold them dear.
I feel this is not enough. I could educate, but I feel it is not enough, I could pontificate, but I feel it will fall on deaf ears.
Lu Xun said that hope is a road worn by the footsteps of many. I wish to blaze that path so that together we can walk towards the day when the Massacre will be remembered where the blood was spilt- when the Chairman’s corpse is replaced with the Goddess’ countenance.
The Chinese Communist Party sent in tanks to crush those that stood up. Their sacrifice passed the torch on to my generation. I want to bear the light- for them I must.
I must search for ways to fight the CCP like a thirsty man searches for water.
And we must be victorious.
