Xinjiang is all around us - banning words, blowing up accounts, drinking tea, in fear, we come together because of Xinjiang

Author/"Xinjiang Re-education Camps" Simplified Chinese version translation team

For an introduction and link to this book’s e-book, please click here

In April 2021, the Xinjiang cotton incident was raging, and a debate broke out in a WeChat group we were in. At that time, thanks to the exposure of the international media, the existence of the re-education camps in Xinjiang was no longer a focus of debate. However, everyone still did not know the situation in the re-education camps and believed that Western reports were exaggerated. Many people do not believe in "forced labor" and believe that there are strong political motives behind the reports. At the same time, local Chinese media are overwhelmingly promoting the mechanized harvesting of cotton in Xinjiang, the modern operation of textile factories, and the clean and bright working environment of workers. "Where does forced labor come from?" a group member asked, "Those who believe in forced labor must have deep prejudices against China and Xinjiang."

Of course, it is easy for us to connect his indignation with the government’s propaganda, blockade, and censorship. However, at the same time, the incoherence, inconsistency, and lack of depth in the news reports outside the wall also prevent people from accurately and comprehensively understanding such a large-scale and complex incident. event. For example, in the absence of detailed and in-depth reporting, even if readers have the ability to think independently, it is still difficult to understand the causes, motivations, significance and impact of "forced labor", let alone provide sympathy, understanding and assistance to the victims. .

Because of this, the publication of the book "Xinjiang Re-education Camps" (the simplified Chinese version is translated as "Camp Chronicle") has become an important node. In this book, the author carefully analyzes the regional history and event background, uses in-depth investigations and personal interviews to penetrate the texture of the issue, and allows us to experience the personal pain of the parties involved. Most importantly, he provides a series of frameworks for understanding the meaning behind it all. This book directly and eloquently answers the group member’s question: “forced labor” in Xinjiang is an illiberal state under the re-education labor system. Some people were forced to work in the camps, and some were "released" and placed under the management of the street government and sent to factories connected to the re-education camps. They were not allowed to resign at will or leave the streets, while continuing Being spied on and exploited.

Therefore, translating this book into Chinese has become an urgent matter.

We are a group of social issue followers, writers and activists in China, Hong Kong and overseas. Since the situation in the re-education camps was exposed, Xinjiang has become one of the focuses of our common attention. So we came together and translated Darren. Simplified Chinese version of Byler's book.

Perhaps for many ordinary readers in the Simplified Chinese-speaking world, the mobile phone scanners, checkpoints, internment camps, beatings, electric shocks, forced labor, etc. described in the book are far away from life. It seems that what happens in Xinjiang can only happen in Xinjiang, and it is difficult to imagine that they will happen to us.

But in fact, things in Xinjiang are not limited to Xinjiang. Many similar situations happen around us, even to ourselves. In the past three years of the COVID-19 epidemic, the methods used against Turkic Muslims have been copied to COVID-19 patients and close contacts. They were identified by nucleic acid, thermal probes and other technologies, and were taken away by the auxiliary police (auxiliary police) or Dabai 1, and were detained in cabins and other temporary isolation points. And more ordinary people are trapped by the lockdown. Their families are separated, they are unable to live normally, have no source of income, lack food, and even die because they have no one to take care of them or cannot seek medical treatment. All people are in a state of unfreedom to varying degrees. Similar to Xinjiang's re-education system, the epidemic is promoted by the government as a broader state of exception and the people are forced to accept it, but looking at the two together, we can more clearly understand the operation and purpose of this system.

Even now that the pandemic is largely over, our lives are filled with technologies and institutions left over from these states of exception, from facial scanning to mass camera surveillance. The "telephone disaster" described in the book has also penetrated into the lives of almost every Chinese citizen through the Alipay and WeChat platforms of major Internet companies through health codes, itinerary codes, and location codes. Although the "internet disconnection" method used in Xinjiang has not yet appeared in areas outside Xinjiang, the use of mobile phone base station positioning to find out the identities of protesters and arrest them made a new appearance in Shanghai during the "White Paper Revolution". As described in the book, mobile phones have literally become tracking devices.

Control over online communities is even tighter and more pervasive. Using the technology and manpower provided by major Internet companies, the government can conduct real-time monitoring of all content posted on the Internet, including text, images, audio and even video. Any content that violates regulations, including criticism of the party, leaders, and national systems, discussion of sensitive historical events (such as the Tiananmen Incident) and figures, and especially the dissemination of images and video materials of emergencies, will be banned and accounts bombed. 2 Even as serious as drinking tea, 3 being detained, charged and imprisoned.

Therefore, the mass surveillance and re-education camp system in Xinjiang is not so far away that we cannot imagine it. Its production and the logic it generates are deteriorating day by day around us. For readers in the Simplified Chinese-speaking world, the book "Xinjiang Re-education Camps" tells us its seriousness and urgency.

However, we are also sad to find that in another sense, what happened in Xinjiang still only stays in Xinjiang. No matter how widespread, shocking, and cruel these things are, they can never become the focus of attention in the Simplified Chinese world. There is no doubt that the propaganda and blockade of the state apparatus are the main reasons for this lack of focus, but this cannot be used to cover up the flaws in our understanding, nor can it be an excuse for our inaction.

For example, as mentioned earlier, everyone always feels that Xinjiang will not happen to them, so they put it aside with a lucky mentality. However, a series of events such as the Hong Kong anti-extradition movement, the Xinjiang re-education camp system, and the COVID-19 epidemic have shown us that this is a process of boiling frogs in lukewarm water. In addition, although talking about Xinjiang is dangerous to a certain extent, it makes us afraid of bombing our accounts, afraid of drinking tea, and afraid of breaking the law and being jailed. But in fact, apart from "attacking the tower" (directly criticizing the government), many people are still groping for that red line, finding a certain space in the community to talk about Xinjiang, so that they can still grasp the reality despite the blockade. However, the reason why most people are alienated from Xinjiang is that they still regard Xinjiang as a "frontier." In our deep-rooted chauvinist consciousness, Xinjiang is still a "backward region" and a region that needs help with "advanced culture and advanced technology." On the one hand, this perspective places ethnic groups on the ladder of "different stages of development," which directly leads to discrimination and harm. On the other hand, it also creates the attitude that "we can't protect ourselves, so how can we manage Xinjiang?"

As a result, in this land, people who have been deprived of their power and dignity are alienated from each other. Workers and women, sexual minorities and political opponents, ethnic minorities and disadvantaged groups are either self-pitying and unaware of each other's existence, or they are in opposition and distrustful of each other. Even if there is a "stratosphere" where we can stay together for warmth, in this increasingly atomized society, the circle will only get smaller and smaller. People are unable to reach out to each other, make meaningful connections, and unite.

This book also gives us some inspiration about connection and resistance. Author Darren. Byler went deep into Xinjiang to conduct anthropological research, and developed deep friendships with his Uyghur students and friends. When the internment camp system threatened the entire Xinjiang, he not only personally helped the characters in the book escape, but also helped establish the "Xinjiang Documentation Project" to preserve evidence and inform the world. More importantly, through the writing of this book, he showed the suffering of the Uyghur, Kazakh and Hui people to the world, pointed out the crimes of the perpetrators, and encouraged the world to hold them accountable. From between the lines, we can see the author's feelings for Xinjiang and its people, and his belief in humanity and justice. As he said in the book, it is this act of showing humanity that breaks through the walls of the totalitarian system.

注釋1 編注：指中國的防疫人員及核酸檢測人員，因全身穿著白色防護衣，民間稱「大白」。 2 被社交媒體封鎖或者注銷其帳號，這給用戶帶來極多不便，比如微信炸號會導致暫時失聯、工作聯絡受影響，甚至無法使用電子貨幣。 3 被公安或者國家安全部門傳喚、詢問。