HI! Chinese Culture is not doing this, Xi and the party hacks in the CCP are.
And as much as you are aghast that i am focusing on the clearly atheist cause of these atrocities, trying to limit the focus to "authoritarian roots" does not in any way, shape or form, and has not, does not, and will never contradict what I have just explained.
atheism and authoritarianism are not mutually exclusive, particularly not in countries like China, indeed where the authoritarian structure is imbued with atheism which is why in this case the authoritarians are attacking religious organizations.
You know those party hacks are people, right? People who grew up in the culture of . . . China.
The reason the atheist aspect of this doesn't bother me is that it isn't the driving philosophy for these attacks. There is no tenet of atheism that drives one to attack churches. The driving philosophy is authoritarianism: squash anything that threatens your power. Trump would love to be able to do the same thing, while pretending to be Christian. He has said as much in his jealous admiration of Xi. That's what bothers me.