I have no way of knowing if this particularly is true. I am Chinese myself and lived overseas for most of my life, a year or so ago I backpacked around Xinjiang so I can certainly attest to the police state over there.
When I returned from Xinjiang, I thought about it a lot and the only conclusion I could come to in the end is that human beings in aggregate are for the most part scum and cowards. It's conclusion that gives me no hope in the future but I cannot avoid it.
Taking into account the scale but not the novelty (genocide/ethnic cleansing as a form of statecraft, in fact I am reminded of Japanese experiments on Chinese in WW2, the irony of the oppressed eventually becoming the oppressor). I have to conclude that given the right circumstances, anyone can do just about anything. It takes constant vigilance and self-courage to be a consistently good person, most of us in the developed west have just never been put into a situation where we are compelled to do something real shitty.
When I returned from Xinjiang, I thought about it a lot and the only conclusion I could come to in the end is that human beings in aggregate are for the most part scum and cowards. It's conclusion that gives me no hope in the future but I cannot avoid it.
Taking into account the scale but not the novelty (genocide/ethnic cleansing as a form of statecraft, in fact I am reminded of Japanese experiments on Chinese in WW2, the irony of the oppressed eventually becoming the oppressor). I have to conclude that given the right circumstances, anyone can do just about anything. It takes constant vigilance and self-courage to be a consistently good person, most of us in the developed west have just never been put into a situation where we are compelled to do something real shitty.