Nevertheless, it is evident that, for its part, the Chinese Communist Party would very much like everyone to forget about Liu Si ("June 4th")., and this has been true for quite a while. Every year that I lived in China, around the time of the anniversary of the massacre, there were problems using the Internet as a result of the government's efforts to block any online references to Liu Si. The students at the university where I taught had little or no idea about what had happened in June 1989, in the very city in which they were living, thanks to the government's strategy of keeping the younger generation ignorant of the massacre. On one June 4th, I began a class by making a very oblique reference to what had happened on that day many years before. We had been studying a poem by T.S. Eliot (1888-1965), who had been a student at Harvard. I mentioned that the philosopher and poet George Santayana (1863-1952) had taught at Harvard and repeated his famous quote: "Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it." However, it was quite evident from my students' bewilderment that they had no clue as to what I was referring to. Thus, many years later, when I read Louisa Lim's 2014 book about the Tiananmen Massacre and its aftermath, I found its title--The People's Republic of Amnesia--to be quite fitting.
Still, despite the regime's efforts to erase the memory of the event, it is apparent from occasional news reports that not everyone in China has forgotten or is ignorant of what actually happened in June 1989. Moreover, in at least one part of the People's Republic, Hong Kong, there continue to be annual commemorations of the massacre--although given recent political trends there, I wonder how much longer those commemorations will be allowed. To be honest, it is frustrating that even after so many years, the Chinese government is unwilling to acknowledge the truth about this atrocity it committed against its own people, while being quick to point out the historical evils perpetrated against China by Japan and the western "imperialists." The hypocrisy is quite blatant.
Nevertheless, we need not despair, for, as the Scripture reminds us: "The LORD is a God of justice" (Isaiah 30:18, NIV). Consequently, I am convinced that one day the truth about "June 4th" will be revealed in such a way that none will be able to deny it, and justice will at last be done.
Image of "Tank Man" from June 1989 in Beijing from wikipedia.org