Did Mao killed 20million of his own people? - True or False?

[GuErRrIlLa]

My history teacher told me that Mao killed 20million of his own people. But I think he is full of shit.

[thursday night]

It is a total fallacy. Yes, the Great Leap Forward and the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution were probably (in retrospect) failures but twenty million people...as Mao Zedong said himself, how is that possible?

[Umoja]

I've heard 800,000 as the proper numbers for the great leap forward. Don't get me wrong though, that's still a huge turn-off for most people and communism. It's a turn-off for me.

[Saint-Just]

Quote: from Umoja on 12:16 pm on Mar. 25, 2003
I've heard 800,000 as the proper numbers for the great leap forward. Don't get me wrong though, that's still a huge turn-off for most people and communism. It's a turn-off for me.

It was a failure, however, they did not intentionally kill people. China would be considerably worse off if it were still under the archaic national government. In their current transition to capitalism millions are dying, more than in the great leap forward, can't imagine why only a few left-wing bourgeois media sources ever cover it, while the majority of the world media never comments.

Millions are dying of disease, around 80 million have become unemployed, all due to the closing of factories and the loss of any social welfare.

[Uhuru na Umoja]

There definitely were losses caused by government policies under Mao. However, these deaths were less than those that would likely have occurred - given the numbers who died before 1949 under the Kuomintang - if the Kuomintang had remained in power. Given how commonplace famines were before Mao came to power, it is a great achievement of his that there were so few under his reign.

[Invader Zim]

sorry about earlier, i had to delete my post as i was being stupid... (Ie i was talking about stalin, like a retard)

However as to Mao i am inclined to agree with many sources that it was well above 20,000,000 however ive looked for evidence online and many sources appear however none of them have any substancial proof just opinion or estimates.

[GuErRrIlLa]

Maybe you can give me the links to these sourses

[Invader Zim]

Quote: from GuErRrIlLa on 5:38 pm on Mar. 26, 2003
Maybe you can give me the links to these sourses

Just put "Mao"+"Crimes" into a search engine Ie google thats what i did. Ialso did genocide+moa on yahoo.

[canikickit]

I would like to hear some defense (if such a thing could exist) of Mao's "quest to murder the counterrevolutionary sparrows of doom and imperialism" (or the appropriate grandiose name).

For those that don't know here's what happened (according to many sources - such as the book Wild Swans) in a nutshell;

Mao wanted to control the people and give them a sense of unity - so he decided to tell the people that Sparrows had to be anhilated. The people successfully killed many, many sparrows (by making noise to scare them so they eventually flew themselves to death, and probably other ways), this resulted in a larger than usual amount of small insects which were a part of sparrow's diets, the insects ate the crops, and "millions" died in the resulting famine.

That's pretty biased, I'm sure, and I'm not fully serious, but what is perhaps, Chairman Mao's view on these events?

I'd also like to add, that although it may be true that Mao's policies and the result would be far superior to any alternative which may or may not have happened (we'll never know, and saying otherwise is mere speculation), there is no need to beat around the bush and say - Mao was bad but it could have been worse. We are, after all, here to improve the situation. Criticism is very important.

(Edited by canikickit at 11:30 pm on Mar. 26, 2003)

[Saint-Just]

'The people successfully killed many, many sparrows'

So far that is correct.

(by making noise to scare them so they eventually flew themselves to death, and probably other ways)

This is simply amusing.

'this resulted in a larger than usual amount of small insects which were a part of sparrow's diets, the insects ate the crops, and "millions" died in the resulting famine.'

This is not correct, grain output decreased, but there were not deaths of millions. Seems this policy is being confused with others.

'Mao wanted to control the people and give them a sense of unity - so he decided to tell the people that Sparrows had to be anhilated.'

This made me laugh for a long time. This shows that this whole statement is rather biased. When this individual wrote this either they were attempting humour or they simply decided or create a ridiculous lie. The truth is that sparrows destroyed grain, so they killed sparrows, however as it is seen the sparrows who usually killed off other pests were now gone and thus the population of various other pests lower in the food chain increased and overall grain yield actually fell. Suggesting that he wanted to control people so he told them to kill sparrows.... He certainly wanted to give people a sense of unity, but this is not how he did it.

[canikickit]

A sense of unity...to control them. Mao loved doing that - everyone dressing the same, everyone quitting school to make sub-standard steel, everyone killing sparrows.

He did it in a lot of ways - killing sparrows was, of course, one of them.

It's not the fact that he got them to kill sparrows - it's the fact that it was promoted on such a large scale. It's the same type of thing as the terror alerts in the US, or the "duck and cover" days of the cold war.


(by making noise to scare them so they eventually flew themselves to death, and probably other ways)

This is simply amusing.

That's what it say in Wild Swans, and some documentry which was just on. Are you telling me that people didn't scare the sparrows by making noise, in an effort to tire them out? I think you are lying or mistaken. It is amusing; it's fucking stupid.

The reason "millions" was in inverted commas, was because I don't suspect that to be the real number - I was suggesting sarcasm.


When this individual wrote this either they were attempting humour or they simply decided or create a ridiculous lie.

Nice of you to take such a personal tone. How endearing of you. Obviously my "attempt" was quite successful. Come now, comrade.

Was there not a famine soon after this attack on nature? The fact is that the "death to sparrows" campaign was a mistake which demonstrated disrespect and a lack of understanding for nature and the environment. As you said. I'm glad we agree.

But seriously, how many deaths would you attribute to the famine? and how badly did the sparrow campaign contribute?

[Saint-Just]

'The reason "millions" was in inverted commas, was because I don't suspect that to be the real number - I was suggesting sarcasm.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When this individual wrote this either they were attempting humour or they simply decided or create a ridiculous lie.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Nice of you to take such a personal tone. How endearing of you. Obviously my "attempt" was quite successful. Come now, comrade.'

I did not notice the 'millions' in inverted commers. I don't know what you mean by my taking a personal tone is endearing, possibly it is, I would like it if it were. Or what you mean by your "attempt" was quite successful, nor do I know what you are saying with 'come now comrade'.

'That's what it say in Wild Swans, and some documentry which was just on. Are you telling me that people didn't scare the sparrows by making noise, in an effort to tire them out? I think you are lying or mistaken. It is amusing; it's fucking stupid.'

I mean it is amusing by what it focuses on and says 'and probably other ways'. Its not particularly amusing however.

'Was there not a famine soon after this attack on nature? The fact is that the "death to sparrows" campaign was a mistake which demonstrated disrespect and a lack of understanding for nature and the environment. As you said. I'm glad we agree.'

A disrespect and lack of understanding of nature? China in the 50's was not a country that particularly cultivated respect and understanding of nature. If this comment were referring to 90's or 21st century Europe U.S. I would understand your comment better.

I would attribute 5-7 million deaths to the famine, however it could be more, I would not disregard suggestions of 30 million.

I have no idea how badly the sparrow campaign contributed. It depends how widespread the campaign was and how long it lasted before they realised it was wrong. It also obviously depends how much of an affect the increase in the population of small insects affected yield.


'A sense of unity...to control them. Mao loved doing that - everyone dressing the same, everyone quitting school to make sub-standard steel, everyone killing sparrows.

He did it in a lot of ways - killing sparrows was, of course, one of them.'

I disagree in this assertion that he desired to control people to this extent. I agree with his instilling of unity with all the methods he used. However, I do not regard commanding large parts of the population to kill sparrows as one of these methods. I believe that this campaign that had the interest of increasing crop yield had been linked to his methods of creating unity within China (a country of class and faction that had seen conflict for thousands of years) by bourgeois propagandists and ignorant bourgeois.

It is obvious you are not of the same political ideology of me. It is our ideology I believe that causes this difference of opinion and is what we are debating here. Our ideology are rather far apart.

[hazard]

I tend to think that all capitalist history is propaganda, especially all that makes mention of communist nations slaughtering great massess of its own people. Naturally, every single communist nation, according to capitalism, is responsible for committing such an attrocity. I believe this about as much as I believe anything that capitalism states about communism. That is not at all.