My personal affinity? The hell does that even mean?
I mean that because the Uighurs are a Turkic people you might feel you have more reason to be concerned for their well-being than I do. I'm sorry if this was presumptuous of me or if I've given offense.
Are you telling me, because death is a natural process, we may aswell allow the killing of a certain ethnic people in the masses?
Yes.
How does your brain work? Will you deny the holocaust next or tell me saving Jews from the genocide in WW2 shouldnt have been a priority?
No, I will not deny the Holocaust. The historical record is clear on this matter.
But your question seems to include an implied assumption that saving Jews from genocide at the hands of the Nazi regime in World War 2
was a priority of the Allies. It was not. It was an afterthought, and a means to justify more thoroughly humiliating and dominating Germany after the war in order for the victorious Allies to more effectively exploit them. Even the welfare of the Jews
after the Holocaust was an afterthought, as Britain did not cede them the land that became Israel until years afterward when they decided that Jewish Holocaust survivors both in Britain and in their Palestinian colonies were inconvenient. American support of Israel did not begin until decades later.
The Jews did not survive World War 2 because of the Allies' humanitarian interests in saving them. They survived because the Nazis were merely the latest in a long line of people determined to enslave and/or exterminate them, and because they are a tough and resilient people. I admire the Hell out of the Jewish people.
You will notice that we did not pursue Japanese war criminals with the same vigor, nor did we show even a small measure of the same concern for their Chinese and Korean victims as we did for-- some of-- the victims of the Nazi regime.
Korimyr, please do not imply that I'm a bleeding heart liberal. I believe in sensible policy and also don't believe in interfering with the affairs of another nation.
I did not intend to. While I do not agree with you, I respect your position on this matter and your unique perspective on it, given your direct experience living in China and dealing with the Chinese government. Unlike the other person I responded to, I did not take your accusation of selfishness as an attempt at personal insult and I hope that my direct reply to you was taken as an attempt at clarification of my moral and political position.
I realize your life has been hard and people have done things to you that make others appear selfish, and I also understand that we can't get involved in the affairs of other countries just because we don't like what we see.
I'm not opposed to active intervention in other nations' business. My only concern is that any such intervention needs to be carried out with clear and measurable objectives, and that those objectives can be reasonably accomplished without compromising our own interests. Aside from the point that I do not see any benefit in attempting to protect the Uighurs, I do not see any means by which we could effectively do so and I am concerned that any attempt to do so would harm our relationship with China which is a serious economic and military power and with whom our relationship is essential to our own economic well-being.
By that same token, we can still condemn it, even if we can't do anything about it. I condemn China's actions, even though I was in the middle of it one day and had no power to do anything about it. That's different, though, than remaining completely apathetic.
I do not see any difference between futile protest and complete inaction, except that futile protest wastes energy. And I do not honestly understand why I should be anything but completely apathetic to the fate of people I have no connection to. I might lament the loss of their artistic and literary traditions and their unique genetic makeup, but seeing as these things are highly unlikely to ever be of benefit to my own people, I am not terribly concerned.
Furthermore, the U.S. is also engaged in imperialism in the Middle East, something directly connected to your participation in democracy. If you don't care, then no one will care for your country if it one day becomes weak and vulnerable.
I have attempted, within my means, to oppose our imperalistic efforts in the Middle East because I do not see any profit in them.
And I do not share your assumption that others will care about my nation when it becomes weak and vulnerable. They will do as my nation has done, and as every powerful nation has done, and they will either exploit our weakness for their own gain or they will crush us into dust in order to lay claim to our land and our natural resources. This will occur whether we show compassion or not, and I can already see the vultures circling.
You may think death is an end to a means, but to most people, what happens in between matters a lot.
I think it matters, too. I just don't share your moral priorities. And I might point out that it's very useful that most people are concerned with what happens to distant strangers-- because it provides convenient justification for whatever intervention the ruling elite intend to pursue for their own purposes. There's a reason we used military force in Iraq and Kosovo while making nothing but token sounds of protest at Rwanda, Darfur, and Georgia.