- Di 8. Mai 2007, 16:31
#306484
nicht unbedingt neu und schon gar nicht zum schmunzeln, dafür immerhin mir neu und definitiv zum kopfschütteln: die historische begebenheit, nach dem sich interessanterweise die post rock-band red sparowes (rote sperlingsvögel bzw. spatzen; im bandnamen sparow tatsächlich nur mit einem "r") benannt hat:
"May 23, 1958: Mao Tse Tung initiates the Great Leap Forward, his second five-year plan for the People's Republic of China. In addition to imposing impossibly high quotas on mainland farmers (to produce both grain in their fields and shoddy steel in their backyard furnaces) the Chairman insists that the countrys four greatest evilsrats, mosquitoes, flies and sparrowsmust be exterminated in order to maximize production. Villagers are instructed to scream and bang pots and pans to keep the sparrows in flight until the birds die of exhaustion. Soon, the sparrow population is drastically reduced, leaving no natural predator for the countrys locustswhich proceed to decimate Chinas crops. The result is possibly the worst famine in human history. Between 1958 and 1961, as many as 43 million Chinese die of starvation. Meanwhile, local government authorities falsify agricultural reports in order to avoid Maos often senseless wrath. Soldiers are dispatched to villages to find grain that the peasants are accused of hiding. Thousands of villagers are tortured and murdered in the search for grain stores that never existed. When they run out of bark and grass to eat, peasants in some provinces resort to cannibalism.
The Chairman: Where is the grain? The people deceive their country. Relieve them of the ravages of the sparrow, and they welcome the havoc of the locust. What guidance will they accept, if not Mine? What punishment shall I mete out, if not everything at My disposal?
The Proletariat: How is it that our Leader cannot see us starving? Why do we continue to toil in vain? Is not revolution in the hearts and minds of the people? If political power grows out of the barrel of a gun, perhaps we are harvesting the wrong crops."
schon unglaublich, welch ein unzivilisiertes land china noch vor 50 jahren war (und in weiten teilen heute noch ist).