Talk:Bamboo torture

Comments
Come on, this is another bullsh1t page about Chinese torture. As it is stupid, ill-logical, childish, a-historical and not worth the bandwidth it is written on I suggest a speedy deletion. Anyone have any problems with that? And by the way has the genius that wrote this seen a bamboo shoot? It is soft and bendy. It is no more likely to pierce skin than a soggy noodle. How fast do you think bamboo grows anyway? Lao Wai 15:23, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Well personally, I've heard about this many times, and I don't think it's bullshit at all. First of all, concerning the growth rate of bamboo, encyclopedia britannica states that some bamboo grows as fast as 0.3 meters per day. This is enough to kill a person in just one day, and since the death is supposed to be slow, I would not be surprised if they came up with methods that took much longer than that. So in my opinion the rate of bamboo growth is not a problem here, and you should actually learn a bit more about how fast it grows. Of course, there are some strands of bamboo that need 120 years to grow, but no one said that those strands were used in the torture, since the torturers are (unfortunately) free to choose what they want to use. I have seen many bamboo shoots, and the ones I have seen were very hard, and not soft and bendy at all. Have you actually seen a bamboo shoot, because it's certainly starting to look like you haven't. If it's so soft and bendy, how did they manage to force under people's fingernails? Last of all, some people have tried placing vinyl carpets over growing bamboos, and they say that they go through them like a hot knife through butter. Since I have not witnessed this form of torture myself, I cannot claim that it did happen, but it doesn't seem impossible, and it's definitely not "stupid, ill-logical, childish".


 * I have heard that Jews run the world many times too and I don't find that any less offensive or any more credible. Some bamboos might.  Or they might not.  Do any of them live in China?  Yes, it is obvious that the rate of bamboo growth is important here.  No one has said anything worth taking seriously yet and the onus of proof is entirely on you - prove that there is a type of bamboo in Northern China (where, unlike Brazil, it is cold) that grows fast enough.  I eat them so it is a waste of time suggesting you know more about this.  I also reject the idea the Chinese forced them under people's fingernails, but if anyone did, they did so with slivers of hard wood taken from an adult shoot - the stuff they make chop sticks out of.  They say?  Who says?  Carpets are entirely different and they, presumably, have all the time in the world to sit there.  If you cannot claim it did happen why are you posting here?  If you do not have any information what are you contributing to this article?  There are dozens of these pages. They all revolve around the same basic racist stereotype by people who know little to nothing of China.  Forgive me if I get tetchy but this idiotic claim is just as I described it. Lao Wai 09:34, 10 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I came to this page to find out more information on Chinese bamboo torture. My mother, who was born near Shanghai and was raised in Taiwan, mentioned this as one method of torture employed by the Communists in China (in the past, at least).  She mentioned it upon seeing fresh bamboo shoots coming out of the ground at a temple we were visiting in Japan, so that's one more piece of anecdotal evidence to back the claim.  As for the growth rate of bamboo, you can visit http://www.lewisbamboo.com/habits.html and you'll come across the following:

++"It is much like a telescope in its growth habit as it emerges. Its' [sic] growth has been measured at almost four feet in a twenty four hour period during the Spring shooting period.."

+Also, on the American Bamboo Society (amazing what kinds of clubs are out there...) FAQ, the following information on the growth rate of bamboo can be found:

++"Q. I've heard that bamboo is the fastest-growing plant. Just how fast does it grow?

++David Farrelly, in his The Book of Bamboo, says that bamboo has been measured to grow 47.6 inches in a 24-hour period. Other sources specify it was a Japanese scientist who measured the growth of a Phyllostachys bambusoides. That must have been under ideal conditions of heat, humidity and very fertile soil. But, in the less than perfect conditions in my garden, I've seen new shoots of Phyllostachys nigra 'Henon' grow about a foot a day. What's most remarkable is that eight-inch diameter, 60 to 80 foot tall bamboos have reached that height in one growing season, which might have been as short as two months."

+I don't think the speedy growth rate can be disputed at all. As for the hardness and sharpness of bamboo, someone will have to continue looking into it.

+With regards to the sticking of bamboo shoots under people's fingernails, the Falun Gong regularly claims that its adherents are subjected to this kind of torture by the Chinese government, and they stage regular dramatizations of the torture at their protests.

+ An eyewitness account of this sort of torture is described as being used by the Japanese during World War 2 in Singapore in the book "You'll Die In Singapore" by Charles McCormac.


 * No it is not. He sees someone staked out on the ground and makes the claim that this is what the Japanese are doing.  But he does not see a thing.  Please sign your posts with four tildas (~) so everyone can follow the discussion. Lao Wai 11:08, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I've heard of this torture before, but it was described to me as Japanese Bamboo Torture. Which does sort of suggest that it's a gross exaggeration (or a flat-out lie) about the dangers presented by Them Foreigners With Their Cunning Foreign Ways, as trotted out by generations of over-excitable ignorant people of every colour... a web search also brings up Nepalese Bamboo Torture, same thing again!

Of course, torture is a field that encourages all sorts of inventive unpleasantness. So I'm not saying it never happened. But there doesn't seem to be any actual *proof* out there that this torture was used, certainly nothing worth citing, so I vote for deletion.Dantheman123 14:48, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps, instead of deletion we can mark the article as "unconfirmed" or "urban legend." At the very least, present the opinian that it may or may not be true. That way, people seeking information on it won't come up empty.75.132.188.108
 * I have just expanded the lead to make clear it may be apocryphal. There's a very strong racist overtone to it I think. Philafrenzy (talk) 12:26, 4 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Personally, I do not find the article to possess any racist overtones. Many Western cultures have historically practiced similarly horrific forms of torture, and this method, if it indeed was practised, was no worse than they were.
 * 114.75.85.77 (talk) 19:40, 12 August 2017 (UTC)