It's pretty absurd to suggest that trade wars are even remotely equivalent to kinetic wars.

I was more responding to the claim that China has done nothing but focus internally. That said, I disagree and think that generally kinetic wars are over and that economic warfare can be quite serious too. China was able to lift hundreds of millions out of people out of poverty because of trade, one of the greatest achievements in our lifetimes to improve life. By that logic, the repression of economic achievement should also be of significant consequence if it drives people elsewhere into poverty.

Kinetic wars are over? I guess that event in Afghanistan was a 20 year picnic then?

Look at what a boondoggle it was! Not to mention, how many people were actually paying attention for the last 10 years other than politicians, the poor soldiers that had to fight, the poor Afghanis stuck in the middle, and the defense companies. Look at how many people are paying attention now that the "excitement" of the withdrawal is over and how many people are sick of "forever wars."

What western country has an appetite for any more kinetic conflicts? I think this is why Crimea was such a shock to people, because the seizing of territory just seemed so odd in this day and age. Plus, why put people's lives on the line in a war when you could hit their power grid with a cyberattack you can pin on a non-state actor since attribution is so hard or you can use the weight of your economic activity to force other countries to do what you want?

> the genocide being perpetrated on the Uyghur people

A "genocide" in which nobody is being killed.

The fact that anyone is even using the word "genocide" regarding Xinjiang with a straight face is a perfect example of how extreme the propaganda in the US has become in the last 5 years.

It's also a perfect example of US media not doing its job to hold the US government accountable when it makes absurd claims (à la WMD in Iraq).

The UN defines genocide as: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Killing members of a group is not necessary for something to be genocide. I realize the legal meaning of genocide is different than how some people generally use the word, but I don't think your objection holds up to scrutiny.

https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide_Convention#Definition...

You left out a critical part of the definition of genocide: those actions have to be carried out with the intent to physically annihilate the group.

That's why, for example, birth control policies are only genocide if they're intended to completely physically annihilate the group. China's 1-child policy severely restricted the growth of the Han population, but it wasn't genocide, because there was no intent to physically annihilate the Han. The 3-child policy that the Uyghurs and the Han are now equally subject to is not genocide: there's no intent to physically annihilate the Uyghurs, and indeed the Uyghur population continues to grow.

> I realize the legal meaning of genocide is different than how some people generally use the word

The legal definition is essentially the same to the colloquial usage of the term. The problem is that people pushing the "Uyghur genocide" narrative almost always leave out the physical annihilation requirement, which is right at the beginning of the official definition (which you linked).

I have to say, though, that it's a slick rhetorical trick:

1. Allege "genocide," which everyone understands as mass murder of an ethnic group.

2. When someone points out there's no mass murder, claim (incorrectly) that the technical definition of "genocide" is completely different from how the public understands the term.

Even if it were true that the technical definition of genocide were completely different from the colloquial definition (it isn't), this would still be a dishonest rhetorical move.

You may wish to look up the definition of genocide.

Genocide is about extinguishing an ethnic, racial, or religious group.

One way is to simply murder everyone that belongs to it. It is effective, but hard to do without consequences.

Another, perhaps more insidious way is to prevent that culture from propagating, thus destroying it in the long run. Tools you can use are involuntary birth control, displacement, and indoctrination. Which is what is happening in Xinjiang.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/dec/09/uyghurs-subjec...

This is just flat out disinformation.

UK Tribunal calls it a genocide: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-59595952

Forced Sterilization of Uyghur women: https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/21/asia/xinjiang-china-response-...

Mass internment camps: https://www.icij.org/investigations/china-cables/exposed-chi...

Survivor Testimony: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/12/uighur-xinjian...

Multiple governments pass motions declaring it to be genocide or that the serious risk of genocide existed: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/19/us/politics/trump-china-x...

Do I need to go on?

Anyone can set up a "tribunal" to come to whatever predetermined conclusion they want. This "tribunal" was set up by a literal US-government-backed Uyghur separatist group (the US government is very good at setting up of these sorts of "government-in-exile" groups for countries it doesn't like, like the former "Iraqi National Council"). The chair of the "tribunal" was previously chair of the Falun Gong cult's "tribunal" on organ harvesting. The tribunal admitted that it couldn't find evidence of mass killing, but still decided that it was a genocide, as absurd as that is, because that was the predetermined conclusion the "tribunal" was created to affirm.

This is how the propaganda game is played.

Nobody is being killed, and killing people is pretty much the some qua non of genocide. Anyone can throw around "genocide" as a rhetorical trick. The US killed hundreds of thousands of people in Iraq - genocide? US sanctions against Afghanistan are causing widespread hunger - genocide? Of course not, because genocide actually means something, and we shouldn't hollow out the word to score geopolitical points.

What's happening in Xinjiang? The Chinese government is using police-state methods to destroy the Uyghur separatist movement and to go after religious extremism that it thinks endangers the state and society. The government is certainly violating a great many people's civil rights and dragging up people with only vague connections to the separatist movement or religious extremism. At the same time, the government is pouring money into the region in order to try to raise living standards, on the theory that that will dry up support for separatism and religious extremism in the Uyghur population. As a result, incomes and life expectancy among Uyghurs are increasing. The Uyghur population is also increasing.

There's a real "there" there, but it has nothing to do with genocide, and calling it "genocide" is frankly just propaganda.

To those claiming that this somehow meets the technical UN definition of "genocide," this is simply untrue: the definition requires a deliberate attempt to physically annihilate (not culturally assimilate) an ethnic group. Historically, this has always been through mass killing. The definition says that attempting to annihilate a population by completely stopping any member of the group from giving birth would be genocide, but nothing of the sort is being alleged. The Chinese government has a 3-child policy, and the Uyghur population continues to grow, in fact.