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I'd say there's one non-violent way to fight back that could significantly hurt China. Host an open source repo on GitHub that highlights China's suppressed his

I'd say there's one non-violent way to fight back that could significantly hurt China. Host an open source repo on GitHub that highlights China's suppressed history, and use QQ/WeChat/Weibo/etc to spread it to Chinese locals. Do the same for Reddit, and every other western service that isn't blocked in China. (It would likely also help to leave 1-2 star app/play store reviews of WeChat and mention the fact that all private messages/pictures are accessible to the government, and they use the service to limit free speech.) Imagine how much western companies would suffer if GitHub disappeared overnight. It would quickly become known to the Chinese that a freaking repo containing nothing besides accurate Chinese history was responsible. If you already obtained a decent reach within Chinese social media apps, then you should consider this: China can easily "shadow-block" certain phrases like tiananmen, hong kong + protest in same message, etc. and you can be certain most of these imagines you find online will also be "shadow-blocked". However, all it takes to beat their current system is to modify a single pixel.

nick32m 9y ago
I think they could block that Github repository/repositories but not the entire Github. Also I don't want them to DDOS Github and affect other uses. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9275041 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9275041
- singularity2001 9y ago
  they would have to block all the Forks as well
- ashleycole 9y ago
  They cannot block a specific repo (although GitHub could make it inaccessible to Chinese users, but I don't think they'd want to censor their platform), which is why China resorted to DDOS. I think it really speaks volumes as to how important GitHub currently is to them.
- marcosdumay 9y ago
  HTTPS makes it impossible to block only part of the site. At least if they don't push their certs onto the population.
Sacho 9y ago
Before you(or anyone else) commits to this plan, consider that your point of view may not be shared by the chinese people themselves. Your activism may have a negative effect for a variety of reasons - the people you're trying to educate don't have the same values as you, and they don't really see American intervention into local affairs as benevolent and virtuous.
- ashleycole 9y ago
  I'm honestly too scared to do it. Not because I worry I'll be known as the guy who got GitHub banned in China (presumably after the rest of the world had to suffer from the inaccessibility caused by DDOS attacks that would likely last weeks (I mean the DDOS would last weeks, not the inaccessibility)), but because I worry the Chinese government would retaliate on me. I agree that many Chinese don't share these values (although I do believe most of them choose to sacrifice their freedom because they don't really have a choice, and they feel it's justified by the country's growth), and that many innocent people would suffer. But I feel as long as the repo focus on spreading truthful history, then the government is to blame for whatever negative effect that occurs as a result of this.
  - richardknop 9y ago
    As previous poster I would advise against this. While your intentions might be good it is usually a bad idea to try to intervene in domestic affairs of another country. See Iraq/Iran/Libya/Egypt and other examples from Middle East. You might just anger the local population and fuel anti American sentiment. Plus also the point about Chinese people not necessarily sharing your western liberal values is a good one. It's not true that western values are universal (they are just a product of our society and history) and perhaps they have slightly different set of values based on their society and history.
    - stale2002 9y ago
      What's China gonna do about it? If someone lives in America, then they have nothing to worry about. China can go ban github or something if they get upset over "foreign intervention". Then they will suffer all the economic damages that comes from that. The reason to do something like this is PRECISELY because it makes those who do not support "western liberal values" upset.
dilemma 9y ago
What have you done to spread the word about Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States?
- AnimalMuppet 9y ago
  Why, if he wants to do one thing, do you pretend that he has to do everything?
  - dilemma 9y ago
    I don't. I'm merely asking for consistency.
    - AnimalMuppet 9y ago
      Consistency would be nice. I'll even give you a stronger word for it: integrity. But you didn't ask for consistency. You asked for one specific thing. Why that one thing rather than something else? Why not something more general? It sounds like you don't just want him to be consistent. It sounds like you want him to grind the axe that you want him to grind, or else like you want to discredit him while he's grinding the axe that he wants to grind. And it sounds like you want to hide that behind asking for consistency, which is a really dishonest and cheap rhetorical trick. Now, it's possible that I'm misreading what you're trying to do. But you sure come across that way, at least to me.
terminalcommand 9y ago
Github and Google services were once blocked in Turkey for political reasons. Even ATMs couldn't fetch updates because they relied on Github. When people started to realize the situation, github and google services were unblocked in a day.
paradite 9y ago
I thank you for having good intention, but please do research properly, understand the bias and perspective from each article that you read, and make a judgement only after you have considered all sides of the argument. Do rush to spread information that you think is true just because you read it from the Internet and China is bad.

nick32m 9y ago

I think they could block that Github repository/repositories but not the entire Github. Also I don't want them to DDOS Github and affect other uses. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9275041 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9275041

singularity2001 9y ago
they would have to block all the Forks as well
ashleycole 9y ago
They cannot block a specific repo (although GitHub could make it inaccessible to Chinese users, but I don't think they'd want to censor their platform), which is why China resorted to DDOS. I think it really speaks volumes as to how important GitHub currently is to them.
marcosdumay 9y ago
HTTPS makes it impossible to block only part of the site. At least if they don't push their certs onto the population.

Sacho 9y ago

Before you(or anyone else) commits to this plan, consider that your point of view may not be shared by the chinese people themselves. Your activism may have a negative effect for a variety of reasons - the people you're trying to educate don't have the same values as you, and they don't really see American intervention into local affairs as benevolent and virtuous.

ashleycole 9y ago
I'm honestly too scared to do it. Not because I worry I'll be known as the guy who got GitHub banned in China (presumably after the rest of the world had to suffer from the inaccessibility caused by DDOS attacks that would likely last weeks (I mean the DDOS would last weeks, not the inaccessibility)), but because I worry the Chinese government would retaliate on me. I agree that many Chinese don't share these values (although I do believe most of them choose to sacrifice their freedom because they don't really have a choice, and they feel it's justified by the country's growth), and that many innocent people would suffer. But I feel as long as the repo focus on spreading truthful history, then the government is to blame for whatever negative effect that occurs as a result of this.
- richardknop 9y ago
  As previous poster I would advise against this. While your intentions might be good it is usually a bad idea to try to intervene in domestic affairs of another country. See Iraq/Iran/Libya/Egypt and other examples from Middle East. You might just anger the local population and fuel anti American sentiment. Plus also the point about Chinese people not necessarily sharing your western liberal values is a good one. It's not true that western values are universal (they are just a product of our society and history) and perhaps they have slightly different set of values based on their society and history.
  - stale2002 9y ago
    What's China gonna do about it? If someone lives in America, then they have nothing to worry about. China can go ban github or something if they get upset over "foreign intervention". Then they will suffer all the economic damages that comes from that. The reason to do something like this is PRECISELY because it makes those who do not support "western liberal values" upset.

dilemma 9y ago

What have you done to spread the word about Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States?

AnimalMuppet 9y ago
Why, if he wants to do one thing, do you pretend that he has to do everything?
- dilemma 9y ago
  I don't. I'm merely asking for consistency.
  - AnimalMuppet 9y ago
    Consistency would be nice. I'll even give you a stronger word for it: integrity. But you didn't ask for consistency. You asked for one specific thing. Why that one thing rather than something else? Why not something more general? It sounds like you don't just want him to be consistent. It sounds like you want him to grind the axe that you want him to grind, or else like you want to discredit him while he's grinding the axe that he wants to grind. And it sounds like you want to hide that behind asking for consistency, which is a really dishonest and cheap rhetorical trick. Now, it's possible that I'm misreading what you're trying to do. But you sure come across that way, at least to me.

terminalcommand 9y ago

Github and Google services were once blocked in Turkey for political reasons. Even ATMs couldn't fetch updates because they relied on Github. When people started to realize the situation, github and google services were unblocked in a day.

paradite 9y ago

I thank you for having good intention, but please do research properly, understand the bias and perspective from each article that you read, and make a judgement only after you have considered all sides of the argument. Do rush to spread information that you think is true just because you read it from the Internet and China is bad.