By @jwassers: "One thing to watch for now is how much the apartment-building tragedy in Urumqi affects discussions in #China of the discrimination against such Turkic Muslim groups, including grave human-rights abuses, in #Xinjiang." theatlantic.com/international/…
"Two kinds of deaths, one of ordinary people and the other of famous ones, periodically pose special challenges for the Chinese Communist Party.
Both types can give rise to immediate vigils and later anniversary commemorations that become occasions for an outpouring of popular sentiment that turns from grief to anger—with sharp criticism of the authorities licensed by mourning."
"For today’s CCP leaders, who are well aware of such precedents, the last week of November was a nervous one. This was because both kinds of death occurred in short order."
"A theme of the unrest was that the COVID measures designed to protect lives were sometimes endangering them: One of the labor conditions provoking discontent was that healthy workers could be confined in close quarters with ones who were sick."
"Though different from the vigils that came later in the month, social-media posts about the factory unrest gave people a prior sense that protest was in the air."
"We can also expect November 24 to have a place on the political calendar as another anniversary potentially marked with expressions of sorrow that may take on a political edge.
The anniversaries of tragedies involving the deaths of ordinary citizens have proved in China even more potent than those commemorating famous figures."
"Proof of that anniversary’s potency comes every year in the steps authorities take to prevent its being marked at all. Until recently, the way activists in Hong Kong observed the June 4 massacre offered a striking contrast with the absence of any commemoration on the mainland."
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