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This is not correct. The Muslim world hasn't been silent on Xinjiang, on the contrary it's been vocally supportive of China. Look for instance at this statement by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) where it "commends the efforts of the People's Republic of China in providing care to its Muslim citizens": https://t.co/tSSH7xhVm3 Why? Simply put, because they see the accusations against China in much the same light as the see the Iraq WMD claims: a way to manufacture consent for hostile measures against China. As such, far from dividing the Muslim world away from China (which probably was one of the objectives), these accusations have drawn them closer together in a coalition of countries united by complementary grievances. This is all very indicative of the West's arrogance and blindness to how they're perceived in the world: did they seriously think they could credibly make the case that they care about Muslim lives? As I type this they are - AGAIN! - committing an atrocious massacre of many thousands of Muslim women and children. Right after America's so-called "war on terror" claimed at least a million violent deaths, and 38 million people displaced. And they then want to be trusted when they say "we care so very much about Muslims, look at China"?... Also, interestingly, notice how the narrative has markedly changed over the past couple of years? How we're not so much talking about a "Uyghur genocide" anymore but about "China’s attacks on Islam and Uyghur culture" (which is what The Diplomat writes here 👇), which is a vastly different thing? This is now consistent across Western media. See for instance this recent report by Australia's ABC (https://t.co/UKVnSKk62w) which tries to operate this narrative shift by explaining what's happening is in fact a "cultural genocide" but not an actual one. They even funnily dissociate themselves completely from the previous genocide claim by saying it was only an American accusation: "the United States has labelled the crackdown 'genocide', but Australia hasn't used that word." Or take this FT article on "How China is tearing down Islam" (https://t.co/bSgz2J8fWc) which is a perfect example of the new narrative. They denounce "a widespread policy of stripping buildings of Arabic features, and in some cases replacing them with traditional Chinese designs" and present this as "Beijing’s suppression of Islamic culture" (and ultimately, as the title of the article says, a supposed Chinese project to "tear down Islam"). Do pay attention to the false synonym they're trying to create between "Arabic features" and "Islamic culture" or "Islam" wholesale. Which is why the article and the claims it contains are so profoundly dishonest: it seeks to mislead readers by equating Islam with Arabic culture and architecture, when both are just completely different things. It is true and undeniable that China has renovated many mosques in the past few years to remove typically Arabic architectural features and make the mosques look more traditionally Chinese. But in no universe can one equate this with "tearing down Islam". Arabic features on mosques in China is an extremely recent phenomenon, which the article itself actually acknowledges: “In the 1980s, during Deng Xiaoping’s liberal era, a new mosque-building boom began, marked by a fashion for domed prayer halls and tall, slender minarets”. Before this, mosques in China looked very... Chinese, unsurprisingly! For proof please check this website of "Historical Photographs of China" made in partnership between the University of Bristol and the British Academy, these are the pictures tagged "mosques": https://t.co/YILFZWAG5b You can't find a single Arabic-style mosque here, from those photos taken in the 19th and early 20th century, all the mosques look positively Chinese. So far from "tearing down Islam", what this renovation initiative is actually doing is restoring China's Islam, embracing the fact that Islam is a religion that's been part of China for some 1,300 odd years and reflecting this in the architecture. What China is doing is ensuring that it isn't "Islam in China" but "Islam of China", in other words they're trying to preserve a Muslim identity that is not deterritorialized nor deculturalized but very much local. It's like Chinese Buddhism: by embracing Buddhism and making it part of Chinese culture, China didn't "tear down Buddhism". Doing this is "tearing down Islam" only if you see Islam as a purely foreign political project, which it very much isn't. Seeing it like that actually reflects a very biased and malign understanding of the religion: if you present Islam as an Arabic project, you present it as foreign, as some sort of invading force, instead of a religion which is universal and which all people can make their own, which is exactly what China is doing here. This article therefore achieves the feat of both slandering China and Islam, whilst trying to gaslight readers into believing it is China that's "tearing down Islam". Which is why, in conclusion, no Muslim country will buy into this new narrative either: they'll see it as yet another clumsy attempt to manufacture consent against China by people who don't understand the first thing about Islam, or about China.

Every use of a leaf blower is a massacre. The stream of air from a handheld leaf blower comes out between 180 and 200 miles per hour. That's enough to shred caterpillars, strip butterfly eggs off leaves, and fling overwintering bees, fireflies, ladybugs, and moths into the street. A chickadee needs 6,000 to 9,000 caterpillars to raise one brood. They overwinter in the leaf litter that falls ever autumn. The leaf litter your neighbor is blowing to the curb is next summer's songbird food. And on top of it, leaf blower emissions are their own category of bad. Running a two-stroke gas leaf blower for 30 minutes produces roughly the same hydrocarbon pollution as driving a car 1,100 miles. California and a growing list of cities have banned them outright. Germany's environment ministry told citizens not to use them unless "indispensable." Is it time for a total ban?