Martin Luther King Jr. once said that “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” Such a thought is common among people that want to spark change. To keep themselves alive, they rebel. Silence is the equivalent of death. It is death to hope for a better future. In China, many students shared this common idea. Beginning in the spring of 1989, Beijing’s students gathered in a famous square known as Tiananmen Square. They were protesting their communist government. There was unemployment, inflation, corruption of the government, and restrictions on the future of the students. They wished for a life of democracy where they could have a dialogue with the government. They refused to let silence kill them. Millions of students gathered, protested, paraded, held meetings, staged sit-ins, and hunger strikes. At first, the government let the protests continue. When it was out of control, the students were pushed to leave. When the students refused, chaos broke loose. Many …show more content…
In Tiananmen Square, the protesters were given a warning. The were ordered to clear the square before punishment arrived. The protesters refused to clear, so “On June 2, Yang ordered a military crackdown on the student-demonstrators and the clearance of Tiananmen Square on the grounds that a ‘counter-revolutionary riot’ was fermenting and continued instability would retard economic reform” (Tiananmen Square Incident: Cold War). This shows that after being advised to halt the rebellion, consequences ensued. The reasoning behind the consequence was that this demonstration caused instability even though part of the protest was requesting government stability. It is clear that in the rebellion of Tiananmen Square, protesters were given a chance to clear away before government
The Tiananmen Square Event in 1989 reflects the cult’s will over the people, where the military gunned down protestors. These events are results of cults and leader’s rule over their followers, but none is as significant as the tragedy in
On April 27, 1989, hundreds of Chinese protestors took a stand against the oppressive and corrupt government to fight for reform and democracy by occupying Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China. The protests were preceded by a memorial for Hu Yaobang, a Communist leader unpopular amongst Party members for his liberal ideas and lack of enthusiasm for Marxism and Maoism. Marxism is the political theories of Karl Marx which became the basis of Communism and the inspiration for Mao Zedong to create Maoism. Approximately 100,000 students had traveled to Tiananmen Square for Hu Yaobang’s memorial. Following the memorial, students presented a petition to meet with Premier Li Peng which the government refused. This led to a boycott of universities but also led to more demand for democracy. Catalyzing the protests was the unfair treatment of the Chinese people at the hands of the Chinese Communist Party. Along with students, civil servants, scholars and laborers joined the protests, risking their lives, jobs and reputations. By June of 1989, negotiations were in place to end the protests, now amounting to over a million people and for democratic reform. Mao Zedong had ordered troops
“There is danger0from all men.0The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man0living with power to endanger the0public liberty.” says Ayn Rand. The novel Forbidden City by William Bell tells us a real story about students and civilians democracy in0Beijing, China in 1989. The government no0longer works for people when the movement0becomes violent and a power struggle between the government and people appears. In a word, power0can take over0freedom when a certain0group of people controls it all, but it can’t control people’s0thoughts forever. Firstly, the setting shows the background0which is thousands of students were doing hunger strike in Tian An0Men Square because of freedom. The Character Lao Xu is one of the leaders in the activity of hunger strike Lao Xu sacrificed because saving students. Finally the conflict between China0and citizen shows that government cannot ignore any citizens and controls their thoughts.
The Tiananmen Square massacre happened on June 4, 1989. Chinese troops arrested and killed many pro-democratic protesters at the Tiananmen Square in Beijing. Young students were the majority of the protesters and they wanted the Chinese Communist Party to stop corruption. The protests started in May and continued into June, where they became more violent. When the troops opened fire on the protesters, some fought back. Grace’s description of the massacre was very accurate. She described it as very violent and the troops ran over protesters with tanks. Grace and her Mom went to the
Montag from Fahrenheit 451 and smith from 1984 are really similar in that they stand out as being abnormal in there societies.
On June 5, 1989, soldiers and tanks from China's People’s Liberation Army physically oppressed the student led protesters. The events surrounding this day are referred to as the Tiananmen Square Protest of 1989, a democracy movement calling for political and social reforms in the Republic of China. The deaths that occurred as a consequence of the Tiananmen Square Protest was not the fault of the students, but rather, the disastrous situation of China beforehand, the common belief that demonstrations would succeed, and the government’s obstinate decisions.
Mankind today has many sources predict that the future is likely headed into a world of tyranny, controlled by technology and secretive authorities playing us like marionettes. In the novels 1984 by George Orwell and Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, it explains the stories of two middle aged men, Guy Montag and Winston Smith, who live in dystopian societies where stupidity is conventional and knowledge is a crime. Bradbury teaches his audience that books are extremely vital for knowledge, while Orwell shows how technology and the manipulation of perception can easily be used to brainwash others into believing almost anything. While the high forces attempt to hypnotize everyone, the heroes of the story share similar fates, escape it and realize that the controlling forces in their society are performing an eradication of intelligence and freedom in order to manipulate mankind and they make a stand to fight for the truth.
The idea of being ruled by a totalitarian power has never ceased to scare an audience that fears of being controlled. By this case we can soon to establish from the reality today in certain countries, that we create our own story of how dystopian societies are seen. Dystopian societies in movies and novels have played a huge role in our lives, from Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games and Alduous Huxley’s Brave New World to Lois Lowry’s The Giver; cementing humanity's faults of suppressing power. But among those movies and novels, two have resonated in our minds, not only mimicking that of Syria and North Korea today, moreover presenting foreshadow of what is possibly to be. The film 1984 and the novel Fahrenheit 451 use fear
In the two dystopian novels Fahrenheit 451 and The Hunger Games, their protagonists Guy Montag and Katniss Everdeen do have a couple of differences. The first difference between Montag and Katniss are the consequences given to them throughout their novels. Montag, in Fahrenheit 451, was hiding illegal books in his house knowing how big of a punishment he could get. The head fire chief, Beatty, found out and sent the mechanical hound to chase Montag down and try to kill him. Bradbury describes Beatty’s anger towards Montag evidently: “It was pretty silly quoting poetry around free and easy like that. It was the act of a silly damn slob… Look where they got you, in slime up to your lip. If I stir the slime with my little finger, you’ll drown!” Different from Montag, Katniss in The Hunger Games snuck over the fence to
1984, written by George Orwell, and Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury, are similar to each other, however they also have several distinct differences. Both 1984 and Fahrenheit 451 are dystopian themed novels that deal with an overbearing and extremely powerful government. The nations in both novels are involved in wars that never seem to end, and their main characters begin to doubt the government and what society expects of everyone.
Political control has come a long way since 5,000 years ago when the first city-states appeared. Today with the advancement of technology and literature, political control has become more sophisticated and complex. Communication between the masses and their governments have been made easier with the use of television and political ideologies being published as books. The vast amount of sources available to the masses mean they can make more informed choices about politics. However, in ‘1984’ and ‘Fahrenheit 451’ the use of advanced technology and literature as political control is shown in a negative light. George Orwell and Ray Bradbury show the consequences of power being placed in the wrong hands. The dystopian governments presented by
The similarities between Fahrenheit 451 and 1984 are so similar they are practically distant cousins, with their takes on the political setting of the society in their books and the way the characters act in relation to their society. Both of these books, published only a few years apart from each other, take place in a dystopian future, though they are somewhat different in nature.
This is one of the issues we face because we always believe that people have a right to be angry, which they do, from the story I believe that expressing ones opinions through anger will reduce one’s ability to have influence. When we look at civil disobedience as the “voluntary disobedience of established laws based on our own moral beliefs defined by Rawls (1971) “as a public, non violent, conscientious, yet political act contrary to law and usually done with the aim of bringing about a change in law or policies of the government. Also citing from Martin Luther King Jr. “A just law is one that is consistent with morality, an unjust law is any that degrades human personality or compels a minority to obey something the majority does not adhere to or is a law that the minority had no part in making.” Protestors got people’s attention but created problems financially which resulted to violence. . Pollock stated that Martin Luther King Jr, Mahatma Gandhi and Henry Thoreau agreed with St. Augustine that “an unjust law is no law at all”
George Orwell produced 1984 in 1949,and in continuation Ray Bradbury introduce Fahrenheit 451 in 1953. Although both of these novels were written years ago, during their era both of these novels highlighted the future,how futuristic advancements can be placed above people in typical minds.How the future may be viewed as a threat rather than progress or improvement in the society of mankind. Fahrenheit 451 as well as 1984 made an impact on the demeanour and mentality of the people towards the future.Not only do they accentuate on the future,but on the importance of ignorance as well as the intelligence of one as an individual.However the resulting outcome or rather faith for the protagonists differ,yet these books share the same plot structure.
The Shanghai (Xinjiang) Riots and Tiananmen Square Massacre were a direct result from government corruption. The Shanghai (Xinjiang) riots developed around 1994. It began with about 10,000 “incidents” with 730,000 participants, it grew to 74,000 “incidents” with 3.8 million participants. There have been many casualties or as referred to by the government “incidents” by these riots, in 2000, there were 5,500 and in 2003 there were 58,000. These riots are due to overworked textile workers striking, villagers trying to keep their land from being taking over, but mostly because of poor victims of the transition to a market economy. This was directly a cause of government corruption due to unequal distribution of wealth and police abuse. A rioter stated “people can see who corrupt the government is while they barely have enough to eat.” However, this problem originated before those riots occurred. 5 years before that happened; a more famous incident took place, the Tiananmen Square Massacre. July 4th, 1989, thousands of students gathered outside Tiananmen Square to protest for a more democratic government. Chinese government sent officials