REVIEWS BY STUDENTS: Bloody Map

Bloody Map Project
https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&msa=0&msid=212261269395391329707.0004921f02f43f6c4f07e&ll=35.317366,111.357422&spn=16.751302,43.286133&z=5
By Aline Hernández and María José Chávez

 Since 2007, China has reported countless cases of eviction in several regions of the country. This situation, which has been increasing ever since, is due to the pressure that the government, led by the Communist Party, has been persistently putting into the local governments, forcing them to generate a substantial economic growth which is hardly achievable. Hence, the local governments have been acquiring debts in order to be able fulfill the government’s expectations and consequently, they have resorted to bank loans which they are later incapable of paying. Local governments resort to random evictions that take place in poor zones of the country, giving in exchange to all those families a miserable payment that leaves them homeless in order for them  to be able to resell their lands to the real state agency’s and investors. Ultimately, the whole situation has turned into a vicious circle which is mainly affecting the citizens who have been deprived from their homes. These homes soon become into factories and highways.

 The Bloody Map Project arose from one of these evictions that took place on the 12th of October 2012 in Baihutou town located in Beihai, Guangxi. It was launched by an anonymous Chinese blogger who decided to activate an online denounce mechanism, through an interactive map set on Google maps, in which the people could upload their personal eviction cases, or rather the cases they have witnessed. All they needed was to prove what happened. Later the blogger would, verify the evidence and upload the cases into the definitive map, using specific symbols that showed the way in which these cases have occurred (the volcanos represent the evictions in which violence has been used, the beds represent the evictions in which deaths have been implicated and the flames represent the cases in which the inhabitants have killed themselves).

Finally, the activism project, seeks to function as a history archive of these evictions and also, endeavors to work as a starting point to disseminate all those cases that haven´t reach the news. The aim is also to get the potential buyers to think twice before acquiring one of those properties. Parting from a censure tantrum, Bloody Map prompts to spread an open call to the community to get involved in this cause and also pursuits to denounce, to critical effects and through a communicative action, the situation that has been taking place non-stop.