Here’s what I said at the time: “I really did read the report. I don’t know all that much about Xinjiang, so it was informative for me to see it, so thank you.”

Ah, there was eventually a thank you! Count me corrected.

That second sentence could’ve been your entire response and we’d have been just as productive.

I also quoted some sections from the report which directly addressed things we were talking about.

Yeah duh.

I think you’re unhappy

I’m perfectly happy. You’re bad at guessing my emotions.

that I didn’t reach your conclusions by reading the report, and are trying to tell me that my conclusions are incorrect and lecture me on what the correct ones are.

Again, I am just responding to what you say, like praising yourself as curious or skeptical while doing opposite things and trying to find ways to be combative. I figure a curious, skeptical person might respond positively to a suggested critical reading and context from someone that does actually know this stuff. Alas, it is exactly the opposite.

This is getting boring and repetitive because you ignore most of what I sau and then just make up some bullshit again, so my gracious task is to remind you what I actually said.

That’s not really how it works. Someone you’re talking to could be right or wrong, but if you take the mode of just lecturing, I can’t really see it ever convincing someone to take on your conclusions.

You can bring a horse to water but you can’t make it drink. Communication and learning is a two-way street. It can’t just be that I have knowledge and information and suggested readings and pointers for where to criticize media. You have to be honestly interested in investigation and learning. Technically I don’t think my part should even be necessary: a curious skeptic would be asking themselves the same questions I’ve asked you before taking the genocide claim seriously in the first place. And a curious skeptic might appreciate being told to read more deeply because there is intrigue. But clearly that’s not happening on its own. You are either new to critical readings and investigating sources and think tanks and funding and seeking out criticisms or you just aren’t interested in doing that on this topic. I think it’s probably both and connected to the antagonism to basic things like giving you a source or treating me criticizing that source as something inherently wrong.

Sorry if I gave offense about the Gish Gallop.

I’m not offended. Maybe a little bored.

You started talking all kinds of things about terrorism in Syria

Which is very relevant to violent separatists in Xinjiang that did the terrorism leading to the actual policies implemented there. And who are linked to the US and its propaganda pushes, including contents of this report. I gave you relevant context to help you self-inform and you decided to frame this as a combative debate.

this story about a woman who fled with no money

Because it is relevant to the basics of this propaganda push, one pillar of which is premised on a handful of testimonies where every time the person is named it turns out they are tied to funding and usually very inconsistent. Some of them were surely in the unnamed interviewees, per thr report saying they talked to people that were previously published.

World Uyghur Congress

The relevance here will be obvious if you look into it.

NED-funded organizations, and so on

Because this is a propaganda push by organizations tied to US state propaganda organs like the NED. If you follow sourcing and funding you end up with a surprisingly small network of players.

I can see maybe you’re trying to communicate the context or a broader scope, but coming in rapid-fire to someone who has absolutely no context, it comes across very differently.

That’s a you thing.

I looked up quickly how many mosques in Xinjiang have been destroyed. https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/11/22/china-mosques-shuttered-razed-altered-muslim-areas says two-thirds of them have been damaged or destroyed.

Who did they cite?

I actually already thought about your point about sterilization being a thing that happens in China anyway, so are they genocidingchildren, with?

They are not. In fact a lot of this false narrative is about inappropriately and ahistorically projecting Western white supremacy amd colonialism onto China because they are selling this to a liberal Western audience that, at least in theory, rejects those things. Han are the plurality ethnicity in China and the propagandists want you to believe that Han supremacy is prevalent and responsible for all kinds of ills in Xinjiang.

China is not genociding its largest ethnic group. Though it should be noted that Han have the most restrictive control over reproduction. As a multi-ethnic country that embraces and protects its ethnic minorities, China implements affirmative action for them. One example of this is that ethnic minorities, including Uyghurs, are permitted to have more children, with the numbers being dictated, in part, by lifestyle (urban vs rural).

That was one part of the report I read in detail, and they do talk about it and give some points of comparison and arguments and other explanations for the numbers, and I can see some points to be able to disagree on.

Read those sections critically and as if you were a scientist trying to review whether their conclusions or insinuations follow from their premises and evidence. And read the sources.

That’s about as much as I want to look into it. I wasn’t intending this to be a long debate

This isn’t a debate.

I was just struck by some of the claims from the other person and was interested to see what backing there was behind them and unintentionally went down a rabbit-hole

The rabbit hole is even more ridiculous than they let on but it is instructive for how the US creates and supports propaganda campaigns.

But I’m not interested in the debate anymore. Have a good one.

Okay bye then you too