Pol Pots Paradise

by ballistic 16 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

  • ballistic
    ballistic

    Don't know if anyones mentioned this before, but I found it scary reading the site below about Pol Pots attempt to create an agrarian utopia. Scary because there are similarities between what dubs would need to do to create paradise and what he did.

    http://www.unitedhumanrights.org/Genocide/pol_pot.htm

    from the link above:

    Once in power, Pol Pot began a radical experiment to create an agrarian utopia inspired in part by Mao Zedong's Cultural Revolution, which he had witnessed, first-hand during a visit to Communist China.

    Mao's "Great Leap Forward" economic program included forced evacuations of Chinese cities and the purging of "class enemies." Pol Pot would now attempt his own "Super Great Leap Forward" in Cambodia, which he renamed the Democratic Republic of Kampuchea.

    He began by declaring, "This is Year Zero," and that society was about to be "purified." Capitalism, Western culture, city life, religion, and all foreign influences were to be extinguished in favor of an extreme form of peasant Communism.

    All foreigners were thus expelled, embassies closed, and any foreign economic or medical assistance was refused. The use of foreign languages was banned. Newspapers and television stations were shut down, radios and bicycles confiscated, and mail and telephone usage curtailed. Money was forbidden. All businesses were shuttered, religion banned, education halted, health care eliminated, and parental authority revoked. Thus Cambodia was sealed off from the outside world.

    All of Cambodia's cities were then forcibly evacuated. At Phnom Penh, two million inhabitants were evacuated on foot into the countryside at gunpoint. As many as 20,000 died along the way.

    Millions of Cambodians accustomed to city life were now forced into slave labor in Pol Pot's "killing fields" where they soon began dying from overwork, malnutrition and disease, on a diet of one tin of rice (180 grams) per person every two days.

    Workdays in the fields began around 4 a.m. and lasted until 10 p.m., with only two rest periods allowed during the 18 hour day, all under the armed supervision of young Khmer Rouge soldiers eager to kill anyone for the slightest infraction. Starving people were forbidden to eat the fruits and rice they were harvesting. After the rice crop was harvested, Khmer Rouge trucks would arrive and confiscate the entire crop.

    Ten to fifteen families lived together with a chairman at the head of each group. The armed supervisors made all work decisions with no participation from the workers who were told, "Whether you live or die is not of great significance." Every tenth day was a day of rest. There were also three days off during the Khmer New Year festival.

    Throughout Cambodia, deadly purges were conducted to eliminate remnants of the "old society" - the educated, the wealthy, Buddhist monks, police, doctors, lawyers, teachers, and former government officials. Ex-soldiers were killed along with their wives and children. Anyone suspected of disloyalty to Pol Pot, including eventually many Khmer Rouge leaders, was shot or bludgeoned with an ax. "What is rotten must be removed," a Khmer Rouge slogan proclaimed.

    In the villages, unsupervised gatherings of more than two persons were forbidden. Young people were taken from their parents and placed in communals. They were later married in collective ceremonies involving hundreds of often-unwilling couples.

    Up to 20,000 persons were tortured into giving false confessions at Tuol Sleng, a school in Phnom Penh, which had been converted into a jail. Elsewhere, suspects were often shot on the spot before any questioning.

    Ethnic groups were attacked including the three largest minorities; the Vietnamese, Chinese, and Cham Muslims, along with twenty other smaller groups. Fifty percent of the estimated 425,000 Chinese living in Cambodia in 1975 perished. Khmer Rouge also forced Muslims to eat pork and shot those who refused.

  • stillajwexelder
    stillajwexelder

    Hitler, Pol Pot - every generation unfortunately we get one

  • shark attack
    shark attack

    I HOLIDAYED THERE LAST YEAR.

  • Woodsman
    Woodsman

    Pol Pot just used the wrong lingo. He should have said:

    I'm going to destroy the wicked, eliminate false religion, remove apostates, destroy greedy merchants, and give the survivors satisfying work to my glory.

    Its all in how you sell it.

  • yaddayadda
    yaddayadda

    Comparing Pol Pot to the dubs view re a paradise earth is utterly ridiculous. get real.

  • ozziepost
    ozziepost

    I'm sorry yadda but it's been my view for some time that there are indeed many parallels between the Pol Pot regime and the Borg. It may seem an exaggeration when we read it but when you investigate more about those times and events, the more the parallels can be seen.

    Cambodians used to speak of the over-reaching "Angkar" much like dubs speak of "the F&DS" or "the Organisation" In both cases this cloudy presence was obeyed without question.

    Books that you may find helpful that well describe the regime where you will see the parallels are;

    "First They Killed My Father" by Loung Ung (Harper Collins)

    "When Broken Glass Floats" by Chanrithy Him (W W Norton & Co, NY)

    "Children of Cambodia's Killing Fields" Dith Pran (Silkworm Books, Chiang Mai)

  • yaddayadda
    yaddayadda


    I've travelled through Cambodia, visited the killing fields, and read about Pol Pot and his insane ideas and what he did.

    People will always draw ridiculously harsh parallels to try and totally demonize those they hate. This comparison with the org and Pol Pot's mad schemes is just the same mentality and unreasonable vilification as the way the organisation tries to thoroughly demonise apostates.

    World history is replete with insane political rulers that have tried to bring about their own 'utopia' and political paradise, from Nimrod through to Caligua to Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Osama Bin Laden. It is easy to compare them to absolutely any cult or sect if you tried hard enough.

  • ozziepost
    ozziepost

    yadda,

    Perhaps the answer is that all totalitarian organisations (like the Borg) and rulerships (like governments you mention) bear similarities

  • TallTexan
    TallTexan

    I agree w/ Ozzie. This relates to a post a few days (weeks?) ago about whether or not the org would kill apostates if they had the chance. I think they would, and rationalize it with the OT stories of God destroying those who were 'disloyal'. Some of the similarities are a little bit of a stretch, but I think the overall thought process is very similar. All totalitarian governments try to remove all remnants of the 'old' (putting on the 'new' personality, in JW lingo), sever all ties with anything they deem 'unfit', 'remove' (in one way or another) all those who disagree, and attempt to control every aspect of that person's life. So there are definite similarities. What you have to ask yourself is, how far would the FDS go if there were no laws to limit their actions?

  • Woodsman
    Woodsman

    I thought it was understood even in the org that the only law preventing the Dubs from killing everyone else is that they do not need to fight in this instance but that they are waiting on Jehovah.

    After all they do believe that the resurrected annointed will take part in the slaughter of everyone else at armageddon.

    What they actually pray for when they pray for the kingdom to come is horrifying. I have heard more than one witness comment on whose house they wanted to take after armageddon in some sick fantacy of sharing in the spoils of war.

    I don't see much difference between any group that wants to wipe out everyone else but themselves and have the whole earth for themselves. Details in ideology thats about it.

    Focusing on this helped me see that the JW fantasy of armageddon for all but them would never happen. They just didn't deserve it. I couldn't see any differences between the average JW and the average person. In many cases JWs I knew were less moral, less Christian.

    If some have traveled thru Cambodia and can't see the comparison then try to envision taking a walk around after the JW armageddon. I would imagine it would be worse.

Share this

Google+
Pinterest
Reddit