Based on TFA, it's pretty clear that Uyghurs and Western Europeans are far more similar than either is to Han Chinese. By appearance, which more-or-less means genetics. And by religion and culture, both Uyghurs and Western Europeans having been Judeo-Christian for centuries.

But anyway, it'd be better if Xinjiang were independent. Or even if it had been occupied by Russia, as the "stans" and Mongolia were. But so it goes.

And arguably, if there were some area, occupied by China, that was populated largely by Jews or Slavs or some other Western European ethnic group, they'd be just as screwed as the Uyghurs are.

Edit: If someone actually has some evidence that TFA is wrong, and that Buddhist Han Chinese were historically the majority in Xinjiang, please share. Everything that I've found online does seem to agree.

This comment is sort of funny because the term Judeo-Christian gained prominence is the 1940s as a political tool to unite christians and jews in America (forget all that historical baggage you guys are on the same team!), and here you're essentially doing the same. Maybe good intentioned, but still similar.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judeo-Christian#Inter-group_re...

I'm not trying to unite anyone. I was just pointing out that Judaism, Christianity and Islam are closely related, and only distantly related to anything Han Chinese.

Fun fact, that's how you unite people :)

For more details see RCT, which specifies that ingroup bonding accompanies outgroup hostility. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Realistic_conflict_theory

The proper term for the union of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam is "Abrahamic religions".

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abrahamic_religions

Sure. So I just made up a new term. Whatever.

The point is that they're both derivatives of Judaism. Along with some minor offshoots of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. And a bunch of others that haven't survived.

The "proper term" doesn't matter much when everyone already understands what the person was saying.

> both Uyghurs and Western Europeans having been Judeo-Christian for centuries.

Uyghurs are Muslim - which is most definitely not "Judeo-Christian" but is Abrahamic. The term "Judeo-Christian" is effectively erasure of Islam (intentional or not) and is typically used to suggest cultural distance between Islam and Judaism/Christianity

Yes, I was wrong in saying "Judeo-Christian".

> both Uyghurs and Western Europeans having been Judeo-Christian for centuries

...what?

I'm pretty sure that if there is any sense in which the Uyghurs were Judeo-Christian for centuries, they were also Buddhist for centuries in the same sense. But I tend to doubt the premise.

Yeah, OK. I was being sloppy. I should have said "Judeo-Christian-Muslim". But really, Muslims and Christians are both basically mutant Jews. Same God. And ~same older prophets. Muslims actually credit Christ as a prophet. Just not the latest one. Pretty much like Mormons, with Joseph Smith.

And all of that is totally different from old-school Han.

Where do you get Buddhist from? TFA says:

> The most populous ethnicity in Xinjiang was Uyghur, though the scales have tipped as more Han Chinese have moved into the province. Uyghurs are Turkic in ethnicity and language, look very different from Han Chinese, and are typically Muslim.

Huh. If that article is accurate, then China actually has a better claim on Xinjiang than the Uyghurs do.

So is it accurate?

Edit: But actually, China's behavior in the 18th and 19th centuries was worse.

> Xinjiang consists of two main geographically, historically, and ethnically distinct regions with different historical names, Dzungaria north of the Tianshan Mountains and the Tarim Basin south of the Tianshan Mountains, before Qing China unified them into one political entity called Xinjiang province in 1884. At the time of the Qing conquest in 1759, Dzungaria was inhabited by the Dzongar people, a steppe dwelling, nomadic Mongol-related ethnic group who practiced Tibetan Buddhist. Meanwhile, the Tarim Basin was inhabited by sedentary, oasis dwelling, Turkic speaking Muslim farmers, now known as the Uyghur people. They were governed separately until 1884. The native Uyghur name for the Tarim Basin is Altishahr.

> In the Dzungar genocide the Manchus exterminated the native Buddhist Dzungar Oirat Mongolic speaking people from their homeland of Dzungaria in Northern Xinjiang and resettled the area with a variety of different ethnic groups.

> The Qing "final solution" of genocide to solve the problem of the Dzungar Mongols, made the Qing sponsored settlement of millions of Han Chinese, Hui, Turkestani Oasis people (Uyghurs) and Manchu Bannermen in Dzungaria possible, since the land was now devoid of Dzungars.

Damn.

> Uyghurs are Turkic in ethnicity and language, look very different from Han Chinese, and are typically Muslim.

The name "Uyghur" goes back quite a long way, and originally refers to a Turkic group. Modern Uyghurs are only tenuously related to the ancient Uyghurs -- as noted, modern Uyghurs are visually distinct from the Chinese. Modern Uyghurs are a recent hybrid population between a Turkic group and a Caucasoid (Iranian?) group. Compare the Mongols, who do look like Chinese.

I assumed you might be talking about some remote point in time during which the ancient Uyghurs were Jewish or Christian; that is where I got "also Buddhist" from.

> If that article is accurate, then China actually has a better claim on Xinjiang than the Uyghurs do.

> So is it accurate?

If you're going to start talking about what things have been like in the region for centuries, this is kind of an embarrassing question to have to ask.

> But actually, China's behavior in the 18th and 19th centuries was worse.

What did China do in the 18th and 19th centuries? The Manchu emperor conquered Xinjiang over the objections of his Chinese officials, who took the position that it wasn't part of China and he had no business invading it. If (1) Germany conquered Poland, and then (2) Germany conquered France, why would France hold a grudge against Poland?

It does say that the Qing committed genocide against the Dzungar Mongols. So that goes beyond "conquered".

But the aspect that's hard to keep in mind is how far back China's relationship with Xinjiang (and Tibet, for that matter) goes. Centuries. So this is not just some post-WWII thing. Like China just occupied Xinjiang, and they're oppressing the locals.

I mean, there's support (albeit fringe) among Mexicans and Mexican immigrants in the west and southwest for Reconquista. The argument that California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas ought to be part of Mexico.

There's also some Native American support for secession from the US. The Comanche, for example. And really, indigenous Mexicans are really just Native Americans. In Mexico and Guatemala, once you get away from large cities, especially up in the mountains, Spanish is a second language for the locals. They fled to the mountains during Spanish colonization, and they've been there ever since.

So the time frames for the colonization of the Americas by Europeans and China's interactions with Xinjiang overlapped considerably. And the many millions of Native American deaths could be considered, at least in part, genocide.

Really, the Chinese are managing Uyghurs a lot like Americans managed surviving Native Americans. And how Canadians have even more recently managed the Inuit. So I get how China might tell foreigners to fsck off.

Edit:

> If you're going to start talking about what things have been like in the region for centuries, this is kind of an embarrassing question to have to ask.

There are no "embarrassing questions".

> The name "Uyghur" goes back quite a long way, and originally refers to a Turkic group. Modern Uyghurs are only tenuously related to the ancient Uyghurs -- as noted, modern Uyghurs are visually distinct from the Chinese. Modern Uyghurs are a recent hybrid population between a Turkic group and a Caucasoid (Iranian?) group. Compare the Mongols, who do look like Chinese.

OK, so you argue that TFA is wrong about current Uyghurs being a "Turkic group".

I'm getting the feeling that there's some anti-Chinese propaganda at play here. Just as there was anti-Russian propaganda about the Ukraine. Not that either the Chinses or the Russians are beyond criticism.

A couple of points:

- Yes, the Qing wiped out the Dzunghars. But that was not a Chinese policy. That was a policy the Chinese objected to.

- The Uyghurs are not survivors of the Dzunghar genocide. The Dzunghars were wiped out. The Uyghurs moved into the void left by the Dzunghars. This differs conceptually from indigenous Mexicans retreating into the mountains -- the Uyghurs look more like the Spanish in that analogy.

- The two centuries since the conquest of Xinjiang or the American Revolution are not, from a historical viewpoint, a long time. Chinese relations with the area of Xinjiang go back thousands of years, not a trifling couple of centuries. The idea that this is a long-lasting situation comes across as strange. America is known for its exceptional newness as a country, not for its long-established traditions.

Huh? From Wikipedia:

> The Qing dynasty, officially the Great Qing ... was the last imperial dynasty of China. It was established in 1636, and ruled China proper from 1644 to 1912.

So how are "the Qing" distinct from "the Chinese"? Are you saying that it was Qing imperial policy, but that popular Chinese opinion, or the opinions of regional governments, opposed it?

I get that the Uyghurs are not survivors of the Dzunghar genocide. And that they were one of the peoples that the Chinese moved into the area.

But I disagree that "the Uyghurs look more like the Spanish in that analogy". I don't know specifics about Mexico, but I do know that the Spanish exploited enmity among various indigenous groups. And that many Aztec subjects helped them take down the Aztecs. I mean, there weren't that many in Cortez's party.

So anyway, I'm pretty sure that there are many instances where the Spanish displaced one indigenous group with another. In the Caribbean, they committed genocide, and brought in African slaves.

Bottom line, though, I now see that "Chinese relations with the area of Xinjiang go back thousands of years, not a trifling couple of centuries". And so I'm more sympathetic to China.

Yes, the Great Qing, 大清, was the last imperial dynasty of China. It was a roughly 300-year period during which the Chinese people did not enjoy self-rule. The Qing was established and ruled by the Manchus, a semi-civilized people from the northeast who conquered the (Chinese) Ming dynasty. Two Qing emperors had Chinese mothers, but the demarcation between Manchus and Chinese was always clear. The queue hairstyle that all male Chinese were legally required to wear as a symbol of subjugation was the Manchu traditional hairstyle. The Chinese hated it. (See: symbol of subjugation.)

Right now there are a few popular movements in China that do things like wear 14th-century clothing in their free time because what has come to be viewed as "traditional Chinese clothing" is, in their view, actually Manchu, having become popular under the Qing. Chinese-language tours of the Forbidden City will emphasize that although the Qing imperial family lived there and governed from there, the City was built in the Ming dynasty and is therefore authentically Chinese.

In other words, the distinction between the Qing ruling classes and the Chinese people has always been deeply felt on both sides, and still is.

In response to your edit a couple levels up:

> OK, so you argue that TFA is wrong about current Uyghurs being a "Turkic group".

I wouldn't put it that strongly. (I'll admit my wording there was pretty poor.) The current Uyghurs speak a Turkic language and broadly share a culture with other Turkic-speaking peoples around them. It's fair to call them a "Turkic group". But I think it's an error to assume they have very much in common with the ancient people also called the Uyghurs, and in particular they are not ethnically Turkic in the same way that the ancient Uyghurs were ethnically Turkic. But they are ethnically Turkic in the same way that the modern Turks (in Turkey) are ethnically Turkic.

(While we're on the subject of classifying ethnies by the language they speak, I'll note that the Manchu language does not belong to the Sino-Tibetan (Chinese) language family.)

> I'm pretty sure that there are many instances where the Spanish displaced one indigenous group with another. In the Caribbean, they committed genocide, and brought in African slaves.

Sure, the analogy between those Africans and the modern Uyghurs is much tighter than between the Spanish and the Uyghurs.

Thanks :) That was a very informative thread.

And an off-topic question. I've always been struck by the apparent inversion of terms for deities between the Hindus and Persians.

Hindus: benevolent Devas and their ~enemies Asuras

Persians: good gods Ahuras vs bad gods Daevas

Then we have the term "devil", which sounds a lot like "deva/daeva". And maybe even "asura/ahura" to "angel"?

Am I just tripping, or is there something to that?

Sanskrit and Persian (or, as you prefer, Hindi and Farsi) are closely related, both belonging to the "Indo-Iranian" branch of the Indo-European language family, so a connection is plausible.

My go-to for etymological questions is https://www.etymonline.com . Looking up the entries for "Ahura Mazda", "Asmodeus", "deva", and "devil", we see that yes, ahura and asura are the same word (descending from an Indo-European root meaning "spirit", and cognate with the Norse Asa-gods), and daeva and deva are also the same word (descending from a root meaning "shine", and cognate with e.g. "divine").

"Devil" is not related to deva/daeva/divine, though -- it comes from a Greek word meaning "slander" or "attack". The "de" part is the Greek prefix dia-, "across", and the "vil" part is the Greek root -ball-, "throw". (This is clearer in the preserved adjective form, "diabolical".) So similarity to "deva" is a coincidence. Similarly, "angel" is a word of unknown origin, not related to ahura/asura. (In ancient Greek, anggelos is an ordinary word referring to ordinary messengers.)

Etymology is certainly an interest of mine, but I'm curious why you chose to ask me about it. It's not obvious to me where I suggested that I might know the answer to your question (which I didn't) or how to find out (which I did).

Thanks.

I asked because you seem knowledgeable about cultures. Whereas I'm 100% a science geek.

Obligatory clarification---Mormons also believe Christ was the Son of God.

Ah. Good point. And Muslims obviously don't. So Mormons are far closer to mainstream Christians. Except for the part about Joseph Smith getting briefed by some angel (Moronai, if memory serves). Martin Luther etc never made such claims.

I feel this can be a self fulfilling prophecy.

When I went to China, I definitely got along better with my Han Chinese friends, coworkers and acquaintances. Granted, there weren’t many Uighurs there, but interacting with them felt very shallow. And it wasn’t a Muslim issue, as the ones I met that were Hui were very friendly.

There is a difference between me and other expats: I can speak and understand Mandarin. I find the interactions with Chinese people changes dramatically when you speak to them in Mandarin.

> Granted, there weren’t many Uighurs there, but interacting with them felt very shallow.

Can you elaborate?

What units do you measure culture in? I feel more similar to my Middle Eastern friends than I do to my Western ones, do any of our opinions have objective merit?

I vouched for this comment, which was previously invisible unless you had showdead toggled on. The thought is expressed civilly and I see no reason for it to be flagged out of the conversation.