Millions of Uighur Muslims are being held in concentration camps in China

Very few people in Norwood, much less the in United States, have any idea of the international genocide going on right now in China. According to PBS News there are an estimated one million Muslims being held in so-called “Re-education centers' ' in China since 2018, being killed and tortured because of their religion. 

They are frequently being forced to undergo psychological indoctrination programs. Torture methods like sexual assault and water boarding are used on them. They are also being forced to eat pork and drink alcohol which goes against their religion.

According to The Guardian, Uighur and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang are mostly being targeted because authorities think they could be potential terrorists. The Chinese government is claiming that people in the re-education camps are not forced to go and are simply students. It is very difficult to get proper evidence of what's going on because authorities in China are constantly searching people, including the content of their cellphones, making it almost impossible to prove that a mass genocide is going on.

According to Politico, the American government won’t label the situation as a mass genocide because they get a lot of their low price goods from China. China is also a major export market for America, and going against them would plummet their good trade system. 

Rebecca Newman, a history teacher at Norwood High School did not think this was a valid reason to not take action.“Clearly when we look back on historical events like the Holocaust, the Armenian genocide, the genocide in Rawanda, I think in the time period people are very hesitant to call it what it is. They [the Uighur camps] are drawing a lot of parallels to the Holocaust...these events still can happen and I would say not just the United States but countries around the world need to be taking notice of it and taking steps to call China out on it…”

According to The New York Times, China is allegedly using Uighur labor to produce a lot of the face masks people have been buying and wearing. The spokesman for China’s embassy claims it’s a program for minorities to rise above poverty and live fulfilling lives, and saying that they are not being forced to work in the factories.

NHS Sophomore Victoria Williams said, “I actually have seen a few videos about the situation on TikTok but never anywhere else… for something as big of a deal as this, more people should be educated about it and it’s crazy how I found out from a TikTok video and not even the news.”