Antiquing and the troubled past

Today we had the excellent experience of accompanying my friend Julia on one of her "junking" expeditions to a flea market and antique shopping street. She has lived in China for about 5 years, off and on, so she knows a lot about different items, prices, etc. While I am not a big antique collector as a rule, there were so many interesting items that I felt myself getting drawn into the fun and ended up with some cool things. I would describe them in detail, but my sister might get one of them for her birthday and I know she reads the blog, so I don't want to give it away! Thomas is now collecting old Chinese coins and Helen found glass heart shaped beads she fancied, so we all had a good time with Julia and her girls.

I meant to take pictures, but once I started shopping seriously, I forgot in my effort to keep all those numbers straight in my head while we bargained. Towards the end of the day I did see a ceramic tile (the kind which is often inlaid in wood) which really got my attention, a cultural revolution scene with someone being denounced at a public meeting.

How do you start understanding an item like this? And how do we understand the Chinese people we know when the culture which produced art like this is barely a generation removed from the present?
This tile features a scene that was so common in its day that I have concluded that every family has a story...people attended many meetings like this, maybe some were denounced in this way, or even participated actively...
China has changed so much, so fast -- its hard to make the China we are seeing -- the free wheeling market place, the colorful traditional arts, the very modern and educated community at Xiada -- jive with the not so distant history of the cultural revolution, when the leadership wanted to destroy every shred of connection with the arts of the past, and when a paranoid mob rule mentality led to so much persecution by people of one another. When I stop to think of it, as I did today when the raw pain of this piece caught me by surprise -- I wonder if the calm we see isn't a more fragile thing than it seems. I think I begin to get some idea why the average person here is so apolitical and focuses exclusively on economics and development. Development and a rising standard of living is the key to maintaining stability even while certain freedoms that people in the West find so important may be lacking. Americans look at China and say -- well, capitalism will lead to democracy. But I think that the average person here is willing to forgo real democracy in exchange for some choices in their person life (like what kind of work to do, where to live) and a stability that is such a vast improvement over the world their parents and grandparents lived in.
Deep thoughts for a Friday night -- and I will probably not be able to get back on blogger easily while the firewall scans my posts after all this politics. (Am I paranoid? -- don't think so...)
We are off to Beijing for a few days and will post if we can -- but we are staying somewhere nice (its a Fulbright meeting) so we should be able to stay in touch.