Phil Cunningham Profile picture
金培力 CCTV FOLLIES at https://t.co/Ytx660bYM5 Fulbright, Knight, Nieman Fellow. @jinpeili.bsky.social @jinpeili@ieji.de

Dec 27, 2022, 37 tweets

CCTV FOLLIES Documentary Special: 12.27
"China Human Rights in the New Era"

-Aggressive push back to notion that China has human rights problem
-Solve problem by redefining human rights to mean whatever the party happens to be doing.

Jets shedding color in the sky, a plane taking off, a ballerina spinning in the airport and a little sprout sprouting from the deep, dark earth.
These beautiful symbolic scenes help set the mood for a show on human rights in that inimitable CCTV style.

CCTV defines human rights as that which the party bestows upon the people, ranging from "Serve the People" gate of Zhongnanhai, to berobed high court judges sashaying down the corridors of power, to tall rockets and fast trains.

The people are so healthy and happy, what more could you want?

Let's take a hard look at Xinjiang.
Why do Westerners go on whingeing about it?

Xinjiang is nothing to be ashamed of, it's a CCP success story!

Here a Uyghur grandma chats about the old days and how much better things are now. She's with the party and wears a party pin, too.

Under CCP rule, Xinjiang is all about ethnic contentment, picnics under a blossoming tree, an ample supply of dates and childhood innocence.

It's children playing in a playground, its elders drinking tea. It's a feast, and it's all thanks to the party.

The grapes symbolize the abundance of Xinjiang, and indirectly, the benevolence of the party, for telling the natives to grow more grapes.
More fragrant tea and then a drone shot of the picnic.

The CCTV announcer says Xinjiang is on "the road to happiness..."

The happy road is pictured below. It has red flags posted every 100 feet or so.

The sun sets beautifully.

Space is another area that proves China is extending human rights to far-flung places. The rockets go up really high and now a Chinese space station orbits the earth. The 3 astronauts on board have human rights.

So do the happy children on the home planet. They eat, they dance, sing and cavort in amusement parks.

Chinese have long enjoyed the right to take selfies while visiting scenic spots.
A typical Chinese home can be seen below.
The lone fisherman has human rights, but not the fish.

Human rights is colorful costumes, heavy on the red. It's opening umbrellas while dancing for a drone shot from above. It's pointing the camera at kids and recording their kid-like behavior.

Chinese style human rights can be seen in agriculture. Look at the happy drones hovering over happy fields that are being plowed by happy tractors.
There's so much abundance they can waste a whole field to make a big red flag.

Mao introduced the concept of serve the people and helped establish a fine human rights record. He had his people build roads and railways in isolated places.

Trains proved useful for transporting ponies and ducks.

Pigs were pulled on the train by their ear in 1970.
Decades later, similar "touching" scenes can be seen today.

This contemporary pig also gets the traditional ear-tugging treatment at as train station.

And today's rural trains continue in the good tradition of Mao's day, serving the needs of rural vendors, ducks and roosters.

I like riding the train.
It's convenient.
I sometimes look at the view.
It goes very far.

That's my chicken.
The conductor is helpful.
The engineers up front are skillful

Did you hear the good tidings?
The paramount leader has descended upon our district!
He is so humble, just like a real person.
He talks in easy-to-understand words.
He shows us how to cook.

We gather around the great, humble leader to listen to his wise instruction. He seems to know everything.
We have so many human rights.

Let's clap for the great man's performance. He insists that not a single person, not a single minority group will be left out of his big plans to change China.

The changes can be seen in the form of red banners everywhere.
(can anyone decipher the pinyin?)

Another banner, more weird Roman letters.
It's moving day!

We are happy, can't you see?
We are minorities living far from the capital, so it is an honor when CCTV's Beijing crew barges into our home to take our pictures.
We smile big smiles to show our appreciation.

CCTV loves kids. Kids love CCTV.

Our native women, wearing their everyday work clothes, attend to their sewing and embroidery in a natural candid way, as if the camera and film crews isn't there.

In the old days, we used to just sew our own clothes.
Now we can produce materials for the tourist market.

Oh, how our poor, mountainous home of Liangshan has developed under the wise and munificent guidance of the Chinese Communist Party!

Human rights?

How dare they ask the question!
Everywhere in China, human rights abound.
We can take selfies all day long. We even have domestically-manufactured selfie sticks.

Fisherman fly the red flag while fishing,
Our laborers engage in Sisyphean tasks.

Our athletes dominate the Winter Olympics. Our children draw pictures and show the camera.
Our dams and hydropower stations are powerful and produce mist.

What more could you want?

A gigantic panda made of solar panels?

Or perhaps a rainbow?
A rainbow it is.
Not the LGBTQ+ rainbow...

but the China Human Rights double rainbow.

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