Chinese Get A Taste of People-Powered Politics

I ran across this article in the Washington Post this morning on Chinese environmental activists who used text messaging to organize a protest against a new chemical facility:  Text Messages Giving Voice to Chinese

I've heard a lot about the Chinese government's attempts to retain absolute control over the technology in their midst; this article shows why that may be a losing proposition.  The organizers not only used text messaging to organize people on the ground - they also got out the news all over China as it happened.  It also shows that someone - in fact, a lot of someones - care about the environmental destruction that has accompanied China's explosive growth.

A little ray of hope on a Thursday morning.

•  Environmental issues are dogging them as well.

  http://www.terradaily.com/...

  by Asinus Asinum Fricat on Thu Jun 28, 2007 at 07:28:37 AM PDT

  •  Moreso.....

    China is an absolute shithole.  The sky isn't even blue over there in most cities.

    We're worried about "carbon footprints" and eco-friendly coffee stirrers, and China is belching out foul poison like Lindsay Lohan after a 42-hour booze-and-coke binge.

    by heathergreen on Thu Jun 28, 2007 at 08:04:51 AM PDT

    •  And the Rivers are Shitholes!!!

      Even great ones like the Yellow and Yangtze (btw, I'd be afraid to see what all the Three Gorges Dam is catching!!!)

      What most people don't realize is that China, unlike us, has almost zero forests that might help ameliorate the sorry state of their air.  And, even worse, they have been voraciously gobbling up wood from Brazil, Indonesia, and elsewhere, doing grave damage to the great forests that exist in other parts of the globe....

      by serrano on Thu Jun 28, 2007 at 08:19:13 AM PDT

•  The Chinese Central Government is pulling the

  text messaging records and rounding up these Counter Revolutionaries as we speak.

  by heathergreen on Thu Jun 28, 2007 at 08:01:20 AM PDT

  •  Wouldn't surprise me

    easy to keep logs of text messages for a couple of weeks, and run a computer search for keywords whenever needed.

    by wondering if on Thu Jun 28, 2007 at 08:06:10 AM PDT

•  I find it slightly ironic that in the photo

  several of the marchers can be seen to be carrying the ubiquitous bottled water. Those bottles are made from PET, polyethylene terephthalate, which is made from ethylene glycol and terephthalatic acid, which in turn is made from para-xylene, the very chemical that the plant being opposed would produce.

  If the citizens of Xiamen were to stop purchasing products in PET bottles or other containers, mylar balloons, Dacron and other similar polyester fabrics, and all the other PET based products, I wonder how much the demand for para-xylene would drop.

  by wondering if on Thu Jun 28, 2007 at 08:19:24 AM PDT