Made the mistake of engaging with an anti China robot on an Indian left subreddit. When I asked for evidence for genocide they gave me this AP News article as proof of genocide. I wanted to discuss this article because it has the veneer of being scientific because it uses graphs so people jump on these to confirm their biases. But my grasp of statistics is weak so please feel free to criticise.

The article has two graphs:

• Birth rates vs. time of China, Xinjiang and two Xinjiang cities
• Sterilization (per 100,000) of the same as above

Basically it shows that birth rates started dropping around 2016, same time at which sterilization rates spiked. Their conclusion is that it’s a genocide.

The problem is that this is the common correlation being mistaken as causation “mistake”. I’m quoting mistake because this was probably done maliciously on purpose.

First thing is that sterilization rates are not the only factor determining birth rates. There are countless other factors as well. The article intentionally omits it because it’s a Zenz piece. Second is that, at it’s peak the sterilization rate is 250 per 100,000. I think this number is too low to genocide a population but I am not confident about this so feel free to correct me. Third is that at the end of this genocide, the birth rates on Xinjiang are level with the national average. This is a pretty terrible attempt at genocide because it still indicates a growing population.

My understanding of this situation is that Xinjiang was underdeveloped and neglected before, leading to much higher birth rates than the national average because the family planning policies were not strictly enforced. After CPC started giving it attention to root out extremism, they identified underdevelopment as an issue, and high birth rates as a hindrance to development, hence they started applying the family planning policies more strictly.

I have seen some people attribute the drop in birth rate to development. I think it’s an important factor but it works in tandem with state enforced family planning policies. I mention this because I don’t want to suggest that the drop in birth rate is something that happened “naturally”, just that it is not genocide.

Edit: Numbers about the sterilization rates:

• Population of Xinjiang (estimate for 2019): 25,230,000
• Estimate female population (~50%): 12,615,000
• Peak sterilization rate: 0.25%
• Sterilized women: 31,539
• Unsterilized women: 12,583,461

Also this says nothing about whether women are being sterilized before or after children. I am pretty sure it’s the latter.