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The United States already includes social media into police threat scoring algorithms, which are used to track and prioritize police surveillance and citizen 'n

The United States already includes social media into police threat scoring algorithms, which are used to track and prioritize police surveillance and citizen 'nudging'. Algorithms across the US attempt to constrain the conversation to maintain confidence in public institutions. Facebook censored me from posting the Snowden documents. It stopped Mayday protestors from organizing. Amazon took down Wikileaks (for a short while). This article is just an instance of hate-them-not-us propaganda. The problem is that I don't hate the Chinese, they are a peaceful country (read: are in and have not been in wars, are leaders of the UN peacekeeping forces, and do not militarily interfere in other countries' affairs). Plus they have done nothing to me and I love all the Chinese people I have met.

woodandsteel 10y ago
So you are saying the civil rights situations in China and the US are equally bad? That is certainly not what the various organizations that study rights in different countries around the world say.
- jimnotgym 10y ago
  Do you have a reference?
burkaman 10y ago
This article also specifically addresses that comparison.
- xnull2guest 10y ago
  It actually doesn't mention that police surveillance of your social media posts calculates a threat score for you, which is used to make law enforcement decisions. In fact, the article I think does a poor job overall doing compare-and-contrast. It has a paragraph (two?) on the United States, and dovetails into an opinion (without covering America much at all) about why China is worse. Americans need to understand that they can't fight the Chinese for their rights. They have to fight Washington for their rights.
mattnewton 10y ago
I absolutely agree this is propaganda, but I think there is a meaningful distinction about the degree this is done in China vs here. America cannot completely censor something internally, because we have no great firewall, despite being able to practically do it for millions relying on facebook. And that is a meaningful difference, the difference between some and almost none. We cannot make a political dissidents life as hard as it is in china, with originizations like the ACLU, and that too is a meaningful difference of degree. The goals of the organizations doing these things are not always aligned either, since many of them do have to maintain consumer trust they aren't always on the same page as the government, and that's a meaningful friction that doesn't exist AFAICT in China. I hope Americans don't get cynical enough to discredit that we have more rights and they are worth fighting for, because it could always get far worse.
- xnull2guest 10y ago
  The article overplayed the contrast and underplayed the comparison. China has civil rights organizations parallel to the ACLU, and in America civil rights activists and journalists are routinely finding themselves charged with crimes, in prison or harassed. I myself have been harassed (followed, gaslit, personally surveilled, and threatened) by state police in America, for sharing Snowden documents and their contents. My mail between my relatives and I were opened. All subtle hints and threats: stop being outspoken. Following the state of the law with regard to providers and services in the United States, I think you've overemphasized the capability for companies to fight back, as the pressure from the state is incredible and at every front. Primarily, PR is used to emphasize that businesses are really on consumers' sides: that they'd like to not provide data and access. But in actuality, being a successful company at the scale you need to survive means working hand in hand with the US government. We saw how large ("trusted") brands worked hand-in-hand with government by the Snowden documents and we've watched it slip further since. > I hope Americans don't get cynical enough to discredit that we have more rights and they are worth fighting for, because it could always get far worse. We have the same rights worth fighting for that the Chinese have. Government does not give us rights. The rights are independent of government. Americans and Chinese have the same rights. Both governments are impeding on them. Washington DOES NOT give Americans more rights than the Chinese. Rights have never been something Washington can give. What you are seeing is Washington taking rights, and pointing fingers at the Chinese, telling you that they're taking more. You want to fight for rights? You can't fight the Chinese for your rights. You have to fight Washington for your rights.
zeusk 10y ago
> they are a peaceful country (read: no wars) Hah. Their aggression in/with South China Sea, Vietnam, Korea, Japan, India is just fake news right?
- xnull2guest 10y ago
  I would call it state propaganda, not fake news.
- swuecho 10y ago
  Try to understand the role US play in that.
  - digi_owl 10y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Convention_on_the_Law_of_the_Sea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Convention_on_t... may be of interest?
    - xnull2guest 10y ago
      I can't tell if you are bringing this up because you are criticizing the Americans for refusing to join and be bound by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea or if you are accusing the Chinese of violating their treaty commitments. If it's the former, I don't think the US will be joining it any time soon. US military grand strategy depends on its ability to deploy marines with its navy anywhere swiftly in the world. That's why the Panama Canal was built: to allow the US Navy to swiftly move between Oceans to reallocate force posture. This is why the United States rejected the UNCLOS court juristiction over its boobytrapping the coastal regions around Nicaragua - the US refuses to be bound by this international law (the other major one, I would suggest, is the International Criminal Court/Rome Statues). If you mean the second, the Chinese have argued that this is a territory dispute, in which case UNCLOS itself (article 299, IIRC) agrees it has no authority. Certainly UNCLOS is a major aspect to understanding the South China Sea situation, and should be linked.
- smallnamespace 10y ago
it_learnses 10y ago
China is a peaceful country? Let me guess, you are Chinese.
- xnull2guest 10y ago
  I am American. I am referring to the well known and well regarded Chinese policy of non-interference and non-intervention, and the Chinese leadership of UN Peacekeeping missions, as well as their lack of having been in a war with any external country for a very long time (and then their being the defenders in those wars). Let me guess, you are American.
  - truth_sentinell 10y ago
    That's like saying your neighbour is peaceful and serene because he hasn't got in trouble with anyone in your neighbourhood, yet he beats his wife, is an alcoholic, etc.. Come on man, seriously? Tibet? rings a bell?
    - FullMtlAlcoholc 10y ago
      What China has done in Tibet is nothing compared to the misery wrought by the US to the near entirety of central and southern America.
      - truth_sentinell 10y ago
        I get it, but the discussion is about China, not the US. Please don't tu quoque.
    - XiaomiFan 10y ago
      Hi there, Chinese here. Perhaps you would be interested in learning about East Turkestan, or as we like to call it "XinJiang", or perhaps South Mongolia, or "Inner Mongolia". Calling us out on Tibet is nice and all, but it does get so very boring. If you are a CCP employee, please contact me to give me my 5角, cheers!
maloney 10y ago
> read: are in and have not been in wars, are leaders of the UN peacekeeping forces, and do not militarily interfere in other countries' affairs) Tibet might disagree
- paradite 10y ago
  Read these sources to understand the context around Tibet: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_sovereignty_debate#Foreign_interventions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_sovereignty_debate#For... http://www.globalresearch.ca/democratic-imperialism-tibet-china-and-the-national-endowment-for-democracy/6530 http://www.globalresearch.ca/democratic-imperialism-tibet-ch...
mtgx 10y ago
Something similar is happening with "Russia got Trump elected" (simply by exposing some truths about Clinton) propaganda that you see in the media today. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/16/opinion/now-america-you-know-how-chileans-felt.html http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/16/opinion/now-america-you-kn...
woodandsteel 10y ago
So you are saying we should not condemn the Chinese government for the actions described in the article because the US government is doing the same things. I strongly disagree. I think all human beings have the same basic rights, and so we should condemn actions that undermine them no matter where they happen in the world. Furthermore, governmental violations are complicated and so for each government we need separate articles describing what it is doing wrong. And that is what we indeed get in many media articles linked to here at HN, including lots at The Economist. That being the case, why is it that you condemn describing what the Chinese government is doing wrong, but think it is good to do so for the US? I don't know, but one possibility is that you are a troll paid by the Chinese government to promote its propaganda.
- xnull2guest 10y ago
  > why is it that you condemn describing what the Chinese government is doing wrong, but think it is good to do so for the US? I condemn the Chinese for all of their civil rights infractions, watch: China has a serious problem with gross human and civil rights violations. Anyway. People tend to react to accusation that the United States government commits serious human rights attrocities with a knee jerk - accusing the other person of being employed by other governments, etc. This is not the case. Let me put this out there, because I think it's important to understand. China has been drastically improving in the field of human rights over time. It's trajectory is UP. America has been drastically devolving in the field of human rights over time. It's trajectory is DOWN. Is that concerning? Why do Americans feel that China is even a metric for comparison? No government gives their people rights. Rights are inalienable. The United States government has been taking away their people's rights. Articles such as the above make China seem like the problem, or the most important problem. If you are an American and you are concerned with human and civil rights, you won't win them by fighting the Chinese. You will win them by fighting your own government. I take the allegation that I am a paid Chinese propagandist seriously. I reject this accusation fully.
- jimnotgym 10y ago
  I read it more as 'people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones'. The line of 'their restrictions on human rights are worse than ours' seems like at best a race to the bottom. I feel western democracy should be setting a standard so far above what this article describes that there are no comparisons to draw. In which case the OP has a good point
FrancoDiaz 10y ago
Yeah, as WestisEast already pointed out, this is an operative. By the way, you guys should brush up on your English some more. Plus they have done nothing to me and I love all the Chinese people I have met. You are they.
danso 10y ago
> Facebook censored me from posting the Snowden documents. Can you be more specific? You tried to post the actual Snowden documents (whatever that means...Are you Glenn Greenwald, or Snowden himself?)? Or you posted a story about the Snowden documents? AFAIK, there's no public repository of the Snowden documents, something that Wikileaks has been keen to snark about: http://www.businessinsider.com/edward-snowden-and-wikileaks-clash-over-dnc-leaks-2016-7 http://www.businessinsider.com/edward-snowden-and-wikileaks-...
- xnull2guest 10y ago
  Sure. I tried to post actual Snowden documents (that means PDFs hosted on the internet, on CDNs, on mirrors and on news websites). I also tried to post articles about Snowden documents (Der Speigel articles and Guardian articles). Public repository of Snowden Documents: https://search.edwardsnowden.com/ https://search.edwardsnowden.com/ There's actually a few of them, for example Cryptome had them hosted.
Zafira 10y ago
> they are a peaceful country (read: are in and have not been in wars, are leaders of the UN peacekeeping forces, and do not militarily interfere in other countries' affairs). Plus they have done nothing to me and I love all the Chinese people I have met. This is alarmingly disturbing nonsense; it doesn't even make any sense. What does "are in and have not been in wars" mean? The Chinese engage in lots of wars, they're just not that loud about it in recent history.
tn13 10y ago
USA is moving in same bad direction but is nowhere close to China

woodandsteel 10y ago

So you are saying the civil rights situations in China and the US are equally bad? That is certainly not what the various organizations that study rights in different countries around the world say.

jimnotgym 10y ago
Do you have a reference?

burkaman 10y ago

This article also specifically addresses that comparison.

xnull2guest 10y ago
It actually doesn't mention that police surveillance of your social media posts calculates a threat score for you, which is used to make law enforcement decisions. In fact, the article I think does a poor job overall doing compare-and-contrast. It has a paragraph (two?) on the United States, and dovetails into an opinion (without covering America much at all) about why China is worse. Americans need to understand that they can't fight the Chinese for their rights. They have to fight Washington for their rights.

mattnewton 10y ago

I absolutely agree this is propaganda, but I think there is a meaningful distinction about the degree this is done in China vs here. America cannot completely censor something internally, because we have no great firewall, despite being able to practically do it for millions relying on facebook. And that is a meaningful difference, the difference between some and almost none. We cannot make a political dissidents life as hard as it is in china, with originizations like the ACLU, and that too is a meaningful difference of degree. The goals of the organizations doing these things are not always aligned either, since many of them do have to maintain consumer trust they aren't always on the same page as the government, and that's a meaningful friction that doesn't exist AFAICT in China. I hope Americans don't get cynical enough to discredit that we have more rights and they are worth fighting for, because it could always get far worse.

xnull2guest 10y ago
The article overplayed the contrast and underplayed the comparison. China has civil rights organizations parallel to the ACLU, and in America civil rights activists and journalists are routinely finding themselves charged with crimes, in prison or harassed. I myself have been harassed (followed, gaslit, personally surveilled, and threatened) by state police in America, for sharing Snowden documents and their contents. My mail between my relatives and I were opened. All subtle hints and threats: stop being outspoken. Following the state of the law with regard to providers and services in the United States, I think you've overemphasized the capability for companies to fight back, as the pressure from the state is incredible and at every front. Primarily, PR is used to emphasize that businesses are really on consumers' sides: that they'd like to not provide data and access. But in actuality, being a successful company at the scale you need to survive means working hand in hand with the US government. We saw how large ("trusted") brands worked hand-in-hand with government by the Snowden documents and we've watched it slip further since. > I hope Americans don't get cynical enough to discredit that we have more rights and they are worth fighting for, because it could always get far worse. We have the same rights worth fighting for that the Chinese have. Government does not give us rights. The rights are independent of government. Americans and Chinese have the same rights. Both governments are impeding on them. Washington DOES NOT give Americans more rights than the Chinese. Rights have never been something Washington can give. What you are seeing is Washington taking rights, and pointing fingers at the Chinese, telling you that they're taking more. You want to fight for rights? You can't fight the Chinese for your rights. You have to fight Washington for your rights.

zeusk 10y ago

> they are a peaceful country (read: no wars) Hah. Their aggression in/with South China Sea, Vietnam, Korea, Japan, India is just fake news right?

xnull2guest 10y ago
I would call it state propaganda, not fake news.
swuecho 10y ago
Try to understand the role US play in that.
- digi_owl 10y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Convention_on_the_Law_of_the_Sea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Convention_on_t... may be of interest?
  - xnull2guest 10y ago
    I can't tell if you are bringing this up because you are criticizing the Americans for refusing to join and be bound by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea or if you are accusing the Chinese of violating their treaty commitments. If it's the former, I don't think the US will be joining it any time soon. US military grand strategy depends on its ability to deploy marines with its navy anywhere swiftly in the world. That's why the Panama Canal was built: to allow the US Navy to swiftly move between Oceans to reallocate force posture. This is why the United States rejected the UNCLOS court juristiction over its boobytrapping the coastal regions around Nicaragua - the US refuses to be bound by this international law (the other major one, I would suggest, is the International Criminal Court/Rome Statues). If you mean the second, the Chinese have argued that this is a territory dispute, in which case UNCLOS itself (article 299, IIRC) agrees it has no authority. Certainly UNCLOS is a major aspect to understanding the South China Sea situation, and should be linked.
smallnamespace 10y ago

it_learnses 10y ago

China is a peaceful country? Let me guess, you are Chinese.

xnull2guest 10y ago
I am American. I am referring to the well known and well regarded Chinese policy of non-interference and non-intervention, and the Chinese leadership of UN Peacekeeping missions, as well as their lack of having been in a war with any external country for a very long time (and then their being the defenders in those wars). Let me guess, you are American.
- truth_sentinell 10y ago
  That's like saying your neighbour is peaceful and serene because he hasn't got in trouble with anyone in your neighbourhood, yet he beats his wife, is an alcoholic, etc.. Come on man, seriously? Tibet? rings a bell?
  - FullMtlAlcoholc 10y ago
    What China has done in Tibet is nothing compared to the misery wrought by the US to the near entirety of central and southern America.
    - truth_sentinell 10y ago
      I get it, but the discussion is about China, not the US. Please don't tu quoque.
  - XiaomiFan 10y ago
    Hi there, Chinese here. Perhaps you would be interested in learning about East Turkestan, or as we like to call it "XinJiang", or perhaps South Mongolia, or "Inner Mongolia". Calling us out on Tibet is nice and all, but it does get so very boring. If you are a CCP employee, please contact me to give me my 5角, cheers!

maloney 10y ago

> read: are in and have not been in wars, are leaders of the UN peacekeeping forces, and do not militarily interfere in other countries' affairs) Tibet might disagree

paradite 10y ago
Read these sources to understand the context around Tibet: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_sovereignty_debate#Foreign_interventions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_sovereignty_debate#For... http://www.globalresearch.ca/democratic-imperialism-tibet-china-and-the-national-endowment-for-democracy/6530 http://www.globalresearch.ca/democratic-imperialism-tibet-ch...

mtgx 10y ago

Something similar is happening with "Russia got Trump elected" (simply by exposing some truths about Clinton) propaganda that you see in the media today. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/16/opinion/now-america-you-know-how-chileans-felt.html http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/16/opinion/now-america-you-kn...

woodandsteel 10y ago

So you are saying we should not condemn the Chinese government for the actions described in the article because the US government is doing the same things. I strongly disagree. I think all human beings have the same basic rights, and so we should condemn actions that undermine them no matter where they happen in the world. Furthermore, governmental violations are complicated and so for each government we need separate articles describing what it is doing wrong. And that is what we indeed get in many media articles linked to here at HN, including lots at The Economist. That being the case, why is it that you condemn describing what the Chinese government is doing wrong, but think it is good to do so for the US? I don't know, but one possibility is that you are a troll paid by the Chinese government to promote its propaganda.

xnull2guest 10y ago
> why is it that you condemn describing what the Chinese government is doing wrong, but think it is good to do so for the US? I condemn the Chinese for all of their civil rights infractions, watch: China has a serious problem with gross human and civil rights violations. Anyway. People tend to react to accusation that the United States government commits serious human rights attrocities with a knee jerk - accusing the other person of being employed by other governments, etc. This is not the case. Let me put this out there, because I think it's important to understand. China has been drastically improving in the field of human rights over time. It's trajectory is UP. America has been drastically devolving in the field of human rights over time. It's trajectory is DOWN. Is that concerning? Why do Americans feel that China is even a metric for comparison? No government gives their people rights. Rights are inalienable. The United States government has been taking away their people's rights. Articles such as the above make China seem like the problem, or the most important problem. If you are an American and you are concerned with human and civil rights, you won't win them by fighting the Chinese. You will win them by fighting your own government. I take the allegation that I am a paid Chinese propagandist seriously. I reject this accusation fully.
jimnotgym 10y ago
I read it more as 'people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones'. The line of 'their restrictions on human rights are worse than ours' seems like at best a race to the bottom. I feel western democracy should be setting a standard so far above what this article describes that there are no comparisons to draw. In which case the OP has a good point

FrancoDiaz 10y ago

Yeah, as WestisEast already pointed out, this is an operative. By the way, you guys should brush up on your English some more. Plus they have done nothing to me and I love all the Chinese people I have met. You are they.

danso 10y ago

> Facebook censored me from posting the Snowden documents. Can you be more specific? You tried to post the actual Snowden documents (whatever that means...Are you Glenn Greenwald, or Snowden himself?)? Or you posted a story about the Snowden documents? AFAIK, there's no public repository of the Snowden documents, something that Wikileaks has been keen to snark about: http://www.businessinsider.com/edward-snowden-and-wikileaks-clash-over-dnc-leaks-2016-7 http://www.businessinsider.com/edward-snowden-and-wikileaks-...

xnull2guest 10y ago
Sure. I tried to post actual Snowden documents (that means PDFs hosted on the internet, on CDNs, on mirrors and on news websites). I also tried to post articles about Snowden documents (Der Speigel articles and Guardian articles). Public repository of Snowden Documents: https://search.edwardsnowden.com/ https://search.edwardsnowden.com/ There's actually a few of them, for example Cryptome had them hosted.

Zafira 10y ago

> they are a peaceful country (read: are in and have not been in wars, are leaders of the UN peacekeeping forces, and do not militarily interfere in other countries' affairs). Plus they have done nothing to me and I love all the Chinese people I have met. This is alarmingly disturbing nonsense; it doesn't even make any sense. What does "are in and have not been in wars" mean? The Chinese engage in lots of wars, they're just not that loud about it in recent history.

tn13 10y ago

USA is moving in same bad direction but is nowhere close to China