Correct, but at the same time the Cultural Revolution happened because Mao wanted to accelerate the process of transition towards socialism, and he saw the traditional structure deeply entrenched in the Chinese society as an impediment of progress.
It would eventually cause vast destruction and internal turmoil never seen since the founding of the PRC, where millions and millions of youth roaming the streets and destroying properties and culturally significant artifacts, before Mao realized that he had unleash a force that would soon spiral out of control if not curbed immediately.
The anti-intellectualism also caused scientific research to be halted for nearly ten years, and would take decades more after liberalization for Chinese academia to catch up with the West.
Many former Red Guards are still alive today, which is why the topic is still controversial in China today. I think we will only get to a proper denouncement of the Cultural Revolution by the party once the older generation has finally died out.
Let me preface this by saying that I recognize that the primary element of the Cultural Revolution, the Red Guard movement, was massively misbegotten from a methodological standpoint, and in that respect maybe the most catastrophic mistake in the history of the PRC, one which was at the same time very consistent with Mao’s past mistakes like the Hundred Flowers campaign, the research element of the Four Pests campaign, and some other aspects of the GLF, where he just sort of trusted people on a scale of tens of millions or greater to spontaneously and independently (even of each other) act in a constructive and informed manner. It was a left-deviationist tendency bordering on anarchism and I struggle to understand how he didn’t correct it after decades of it backfiring on him, except that there were also cases where a superficially similar approach worked out astoundingly well, like the land reform. The critical difference imo is that the peasants had a lot more grounding their response because they had their obvious oppressor right in front of them and the tools to handle it themselves, whereas more nebulous tasks of construction resulted in a scatter-shot response at best.
This all having been said:
Many Red Guards are still alive today, which is why the topic is still controversial in China today. I think we will only get to a proper denouncement of the Cultural Revolution by the party once the older generation has finally died out.
I’m really confused by this response, because my impression has very consistently been that the modern PRC errs on the side of over-denouncement of the CR, ignoring the respects in which it was actually successful (like the barefoot doctors campaign, which was internationally revered in its time), and respects in which it had good goals (like fighting bureaucracy) and just took catastrophic measures to ultimately fail to achieve those goals. Is it really under-denounced?
I’m also not sure if people mention that Mao siccing the PLA on the Red Guards resulted in five times the number of deaths of the entire CR (by then functionally a civil war) up to that point, which I think is probably indicative of a miscarriage of justice even if a number of people definitely needed to die, practically speaking.
I know a Chinese woman whose parents were killed during the CR. She herself was tortured by red guard, she was 8-10 years old I believe and the guards were 13-15 boys. You can imagine the cruel acts they perpetrated on her.
She ended up escaping to Hong Kong and immigrated to America, where she worked at my elementary school.
She recently got in touch with one of the same red guard that is alive in China. He was beside himself with grief and apology at the terrible acts he committed. She forgave him, saying they were both young and in a terrible political time people are led astray and can make those choices.
She is also a well known homeless advocate, really her life became dedicated to feeding and housing the homeless after she was in America. She has visited the white house as well as meeting officials in China in her capacity as an advocate and volunteer.
Not adding much to your point but just an interesting anecdote from the CR that I know of as someone living in America
Correct, but at the same time the Cultural Revolution happened because Mao wanted to accelerate the process of transition towards socialism, and he saw the traditional structure deeply entrenched in the Chinese society as an impediment of progress.
It would eventually cause vast destruction and internal turmoil never seen since the founding of the PRC, where millions and millions of youth roaming the streets and destroying properties and culturally significant artifacts, before Mao realized that he had unleash a force that would soon spiral out of control if not curbed immediately.
The anti-intellectualism also caused scientific research to be halted for nearly ten years, and would take decades more after liberalization for Chinese academia to catch up with the West.
Many former Red Guards are still alive today, which is why the topic is still controversial in China today. I think we will only get to a proper denouncement of the Cultural Revolution by the party once the older generation has finally died out.
Let me preface this by saying that I recognize that the primary element of the Cultural Revolution, the Red Guard movement, was massively misbegotten from a methodological standpoint, and in that respect maybe the most catastrophic mistake in the history of the PRC, one which was at the same time very consistent with Mao’s past mistakes like the Hundred Flowers campaign, the research element of the Four Pests campaign, and some other aspects of the GLF, where he just sort of trusted people on a scale of tens of millions or greater to spontaneously and independently (even of each other) act in a constructive and informed manner. It was a left-deviationist tendency bordering on anarchism and I struggle to understand how he didn’t correct it after decades of it backfiring on him, except that there were also cases where a superficially similar approach worked out astoundingly well, like the land reform. The critical difference imo is that the peasants had a lot more grounding their response because they had their obvious oppressor right in front of them and the tools to handle it themselves, whereas more nebulous tasks of construction resulted in a scatter-shot response at best.
This all having been said:
I’m really confused by this response, because my impression has very consistently been that the modern PRC errs on the side of over-denouncement of the CR, ignoring the respects in which it was actually successful (like the barefoot doctors campaign, which was internationally revered in its time), and respects in which it had good goals (like fighting bureaucracy) and just took catastrophic measures to ultimately fail to achieve those goals. Is it really under-denounced?
I’m also not sure if people mention that Mao siccing the PLA on the Red Guards resulted in five times the number of deaths of the entire CR (by then functionally a civil war) up to that point, which I think is probably indicative of a miscarriage of justice even if a number of people definitely needed to die, practically speaking.
I know a Chinese woman whose parents were killed during the CR. She herself was tortured by red guard, she was 8-10 years old I believe and the guards were 13-15 boys. You can imagine the cruel acts they perpetrated on her.
She ended up escaping to Hong Kong and immigrated to America, where she worked at my elementary school.
She recently got in touch with one of the same red guard that is alive in China. He was beside himself with grief and apology at the terrible acts he committed. She forgave him, saying they were both young and in a terrible political time people are led astray and can make those choices.
She is also a well known homeless advocate, really her life became dedicated to feeding and housing the homeless after she was in America. She has visited the white house as well as meeting officials in China in her capacity as an advocate and volunteer.
Not adding much to your point but just an interesting anecdote from the CR that I know of as someone living in America