5 ms·

Because keeping a large diverse country stable and safe is very difficult, and a failure causes enormous tragedy. The approach that works to keep the US stable

by _cs2017_ 9y ago

Because keeping a large diverse country stable and safe is very difficult, and a failure causes enormous tragedy. The approach that works to keep the US stable does not always work well in other countries. To keep the billion people who live in China safe from civil war and rampant terrorism is already a great achievement -- even it comes at the expense of some nice things such as human rights. In fact, China manages to do more than just keep itself stable; it's actually improving economically. That state of affairs is a lot better than many, many countries can even dream about. A push for human rights increases the chance of a government collapse. That's what happened in the Soviet Russia during Gorbachev. It was everyone's luck that it resulted in relatively little suffering. A similar fall of the government in Syria, Yugoslavia, Iraq, etc were absolutely horrible for the people living in those countries. It is very hard to accept even a small risk of such an event in China; the suffering it would cause is beyond imagination. Therefore, many people are quite happy with the approach followed by the Chinese government. In fact, it gives many people a hope that China might become a little similar to Singapore. The Singapore government has some issues with human rights (of course, much more modest than China), but is still highly respected both inside and outside the country precisely due to the prosperity and safety it brought to people. Of course, for people who absolutely prioritize human rights, this is not good enough. But such people have relatively little influence outside the Western civilization. One certainly cannot blame people who prioritize the safety and prosperity of their family above human rights, and these people seem to be by far the majority of the Chinese population.

dragonwriter 9y ago
> A push for human rights increases the chance of a government collapse. That's what happened in the Soviet Russia during Gorbachev Strictly, no. That was the USSR. Soviet Russia (the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic) didn't experience government collapse, though it did change its name to the Russian Federation.
- _cs2017_ 9y ago
  Yes yes, I misused the term. I meant the USSR, of course.
ghostcluster 9y ago
The ruling ethnic elite (and fully 91.51% of the population as of 2010) are Han Chinese, and you could say they enforce somewhat of an ethnostate. Foreigners cannot become citizens even if they marry a native Chinese and contribute to their economy.
- _cs2017_ 9y ago
  Yes. I don't disagree.
- oh_sigh 9y ago
  Is that rule true even if, say, a Han Chinese citizen marries as second generation USAmerican+Han person?
  - barry-cotter 9y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationality_law_of_the_People%27s_Republic_of_China#Frequency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationality_law_of_the_People%... In practice, naturalizing as a Chinese national is extremely rare, even more so when the sheer population of the region is taken into account and compared to other comparable regions, such as the European Union, United States and India. Majority of foreign permanent residents simply remain that for the duration of their residency, without ever being asked or forced to naturalize. During the Fifth National Population Census (2000), only 941 naturalized citizens that do not belong to any of Communist Party of China's recognized 56 indigenous ethnic groups (which already includes Koreans, Vietnamese, and Russians)[13] were counted in China's mainland.[14] As of 2010, the total number of naturalized Chinese was only 1,448 in Mainland China, out of the population of over 1.33 billion. In 1990, there were over 3,000.[15] More foreigners have applied for naturalization as Chinese nationals with permanent residency of Hong Kong since the handover in 1997. Among Hong Kong residents from 1997 to 2012, 3,411 Pakistanis, 3,399 Indonesians, 2,487 Indians, 1,115 Vietnamese, and 387 Filipinos have been naturalized.[16] One case of mass naturalization occurred in 2003, when less than 200 Damans, an ethnic-Nepali people who had resided in Gyirong County of Tibet for over two centuries, were granted Chinese nationality. The serial numbers on their naturalization certificates suggested that around 4,000 people (including the Damans) had naturalized as Chinese nationals in Mainland China until 2003.[17]
yusuke10 9y ago
1.) Chinese government did this to itself, with the 1.3B population. China only had 500M in 1950, but the communist government condemned birth control and banned imports of contraceptives. 2.) At some point, you can't keep using the excuse "but 1 Billion people" for doing disgusting things. When you harvest prisoners' organs. When you imprison 120,000 minorities in camps. When you build an artificial island to the horror of 10+ other countries around you. When you keep threatening to invade Taiwan. When you prop up North Korea. When you monitor and censor everything. 3.) You rule out the possibility that China can have a republic or democracy. which is shameful. Granted it's low, but Authoritarian regime doesn't have to be a certainty.
- _cs2017_ 9y ago
  1) Absolutely agree, the Chinese government after the war was absolutely horrendous. That, however, is only slightly relevant to the question of what to do today. 2) You can always use the excuse "I don't want a billion people that I care about to go through the hell that is Syria." 3) I don't rule out that possibility at all. I'm just saying the risk that it won't work seems too high given how bad the outcome would be if it doesn't work.
  - jonathanstrange 9y ago
    It's a false dichotomy, as e.g. the prospering former East Bloc countries who are now part of the EU demonstrate.
    - _cs2017_ 9y ago
      Of course it's possible. And much better examples of that are post war Japan and Germany. The changes there literally made them global leaders. I'm not saying it's impossible. I'm saying it's risky, especially for China which hasn't had a history of being successful without an authoritarian government. And which had a terrible history of chaos when it didn't have a strong government.
- thaumasiotes 9y ago
  What's so wrong with building an artificial island?
jonathanyc 9y ago
I always am humbled to think about the many massive wars in China that no one in the West has ever heard of—for example, the Punti Hakka Clan Wars in the 19th century which killed a million people, which is around the same number that died in the US Civil War. Similarly, in one year, 1858, the amount of opium imported into China was the same as the entire production for the decade around 2010. And in the Great Leap Forward bad policy led to tens of millions of deaths. I personally am unsure whether the CCP is really holding back the gates against a resurgence of death and suffering on this sort of scale (after all, in its earlier years it was responsible for the Great Leap Forward). But if we are to judge by the economic growth and stability imposed upon China since then, they seem to be doing a decent job. Unfortunately I imagine it will be many decades until we can know for sure. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_opium_in_China https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_opium_in_China
- _cs2017_ 9y ago
  I agree with you completely. In the earlier years, CCP was responsible for some of the worst suffering that the 20th century has seen; worse, it was totally without purpose. It was not even helping some people survive at the expense of others, it was just destroying millions of lives to satisfy the egos and delusions of a few leaders who were especially good at brainwashing people. Those leaders deserve to burn in hell for eternity, in my opinion. Today's CCP, despite the continuity in the government, is very far from doing that. Of course, it wants to stay in power, as almost every government does. But I do not know whether, in staying in power, it's also helping hold back the gates of death or suffering. As you say, the evidence so far, limited as it is, is slightly positive. China moved from one of the poorest large countries, with a horrible past, to a place where many (although not all) people are happy to return after they travelled the world. But in truth, we'll never know for sure, since we can't see the alternate timeline of history. In a few decades, we'll merely have a bit more evidence one way or the other. However, I do see a lot of moderate to terrible disasters that befall other countries that try to change their system of government. So I personally have a very high degree of concern about the risk that comes with such changes.
librexpr 9y ago
What about the families of the 120 000 people in the re-education camp? Or the families of the people who's organs are harvested, or who are imprisoned for being mildly critical of the government? Are they safe? It's easy to excuse horrible acts by saying it's for the greater good, but it's rarely actually the case. Chinese civilization won't collapse if they stop harvesting organs and imprisoning people who are even mildly critical of the government.
- _cs2017_ 9y ago
  About re-education camps and imprisonment for being critical of the government. Horrible acts are occasionally better than the alternative, if you think of the number of lives lost compared to the number of lives saved. I am not sure that these actions by the Chinese government are perfectly justified by this argument. But I think it's possible. Often, governments fall and civil wars start from a tiny spark of seemingly innocuous political dissent that grows out of control. I am sure you'll find many examples of that in history. The stability of Chinese society, just like the stability of any modern society, is always hanging on a thread. You may just not realize it because you (I hope) live in a country that is not drowned in blood. A small problem can easily grow into a disaster, and then no one can stop it -- look at Yugoslavia, Syria, Somalia, Yemen, Eritrea, Libya, Sudan, Congo, Liberia, Georgia (ex-USSR). And these are just the ones I remember watching live, in disbelief. About organ harvesting. From what little I read about it, prisoners may be executed, and their organs given to people who need them for medical reasons. I assume you're not against organ transplantation, since that saves lives at no cost to their original (dead) owner. So I assume you're only against the execution of prisoners. Opinions on capital punishment vary, even in the US. What's viewed as fair and just penalty in California or Florida, has been viewed as unreasonable cruelty and violation of human rights in Maine for well over a century. Of course you're right that in the US, most people would not be ok with executing people for political views (except state treason), and even less so if the execution is timed to make their organs available to others. However, I think you could allow a larger difference of accepted practices between two completely different countries than between states of the US.
  - lambdadmitry 9y ago
fdsak 9y ago
Well said. West always sees or interferes into other countries without knowing any cultural, religious or political background. And on another level that is not also different from dictatorship. I live on the other side of the China (Pakistan) and too my observation Uighers are little bit or angry (not finding good word). Few years back it was not safe to roam freely in Urumqi and everyone used to hang daggers of all king around their waist. Sometime fierce fighting might erupt on small pity things and people get slaughtered more like the situation American are having with GUNS right now.
lambdadmitry 9y ago
Unfortunately there is a false equivalence in your post: you implicitly equate "prosperity of a family" with "having a huge all-powerful nation state". There is no such link; if anything, life of Russians improved after the collapse of USSR (undoubtedly in a middle term, arguably even in a short term; source: am Russian). That equivalency is a linchpin of any aspiring fascist state. Please try and question it, you will notice that ir doesn't make much sense.
- _cs2017_ 9y ago
  They are not always equivalent. But in the case of China, changing from the current state to some new form of government carries a high risk of a prolonged chaos, which would destroy safety and prosperity for most families. Russia risked that chaos, but it had little choice: the USSR was a complete economic disaster. If China today was as bad economically as the USSR in 1985, a big part of my argument would disappear. In some limited sense, I might even say that the Chinese economy today with the old regime is more promising than the Russian economy today after all the changes. And even if I'm wrong on that, still the Chinese economy is at least decent. So the people in China have a lot more to lose from chaos than the people in the USSR did. Another thing. You're saying Russia is in a better state today than 30 years ago. Yes, but Russia is governed by a strongman, who doesn't allow much political dissent. Are you sure that without him Russia wouldn't be in chaos? And if you think that what is going on in Russia is an acceptable compromise, then why would you be uncomfortable with the Chinese government? The difference is not that great. By the way, authoritarian governments had been around for millennia before fascism was even a thing. I don't see why you would equate the two.
naiveai 9y ago
> To keep the billion people who live in China safe from civil war and rampant terrorism is already a great achievement -- even it comes at the expense of some nice things such as human rights. Some nice things? Nice things??? What the actual lord upon almighty.

dragonwriter 9y ago

> A push for human rights increases the chance of a government collapse. That's what happened in the Soviet Russia during Gorbachev Strictly, no. That was the USSR. Soviet Russia (the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic) didn't experience government collapse, though it did change its name to the Russian Federation.

_cs2017_ 9y ago
Yes yes, I misused the term. I meant the USSR, of course.

ghostcluster 9y ago

The ruling ethnic elite (and fully 91.51% of the population as of 2010) are Han Chinese, and you could say they enforce somewhat of an ethnostate. Foreigners cannot become citizens even if they marry a native Chinese and contribute to their economy.

_cs2017_ 9y ago
Yes. I don't disagree.
oh_sigh 9y ago
Is that rule true even if, say, a Han Chinese citizen marries as second generation USAmerican+Han person?
- barry-cotter 9y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationality_law_of_the_People%27s_Republic_of_China#Frequency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationality_law_of_the_People%... In practice, naturalizing as a Chinese national is extremely rare, even more so when the sheer population of the region is taken into account and compared to other comparable regions, such as the European Union, United States and India. Majority of foreign permanent residents simply remain that for the duration of their residency, without ever being asked or forced to naturalize. During the Fifth National Population Census (2000), only 941 naturalized citizens that do not belong to any of Communist Party of China's recognized 56 indigenous ethnic groups (which already includes Koreans, Vietnamese, and Russians)[13] were counted in China's mainland.[14] As of 2010, the total number of naturalized Chinese was only 1,448 in Mainland China, out of the population of over 1.33 billion. In 1990, there were over 3,000.[15] More foreigners have applied for naturalization as Chinese nationals with permanent residency of Hong Kong since the handover in 1997. Among Hong Kong residents from 1997 to 2012, 3,411 Pakistanis, 3,399 Indonesians, 2,487 Indians, 1,115 Vietnamese, and 387 Filipinos have been naturalized.[16] One case of mass naturalization occurred in 2003, when less than 200 Damans, an ethnic-Nepali people who had resided in Gyirong County of Tibet for over two centuries, were granted Chinese nationality. The serial numbers on their naturalization certificates suggested that around 4,000 people (including the Damans) had naturalized as Chinese nationals in Mainland China until 2003.[17]

yusuke10 9y ago

1.) Chinese government did this to itself, with the 1.3B population. China only had 500M in 1950, but the communist government condemned birth control and banned imports of contraceptives. 2.) At some point, you can't keep using the excuse "but 1 Billion people" for doing disgusting things. When you harvest prisoners' organs. When you imprison 120,000 minorities in camps. When you build an artificial island to the horror of 10+ other countries around you. When you keep threatening to invade Taiwan. When you prop up North Korea. When you monitor and censor everything. 3.) You rule out the possibility that China can have a republic or democracy. which is shameful. Granted it's low, but Authoritarian regime doesn't have to be a certainty.

_cs2017_ 9y ago
1) Absolutely agree, the Chinese government after the war was absolutely horrendous. That, however, is only slightly relevant to the question of what to do today. 2) You can always use the excuse "I don't want a billion people that I care about to go through the hell that is Syria." 3) I don't rule out that possibility at all. I'm just saying the risk that it won't work seems too high given how bad the outcome would be if it doesn't work.
- jonathanstrange 9y ago
  It's a false dichotomy, as e.g. the prospering former East Bloc countries who are now part of the EU demonstrate.
  - _cs2017_ 9y ago
    Of course it's possible. And much better examples of that are post war Japan and Germany. The changes there literally made them global leaders. I'm not saying it's impossible. I'm saying it's risky, especially for China which hasn't had a history of being successful without an authoritarian government. And which had a terrible history of chaos when it didn't have a strong government.
thaumasiotes 9y ago
What's so wrong with building an artificial island?

jonathanyc 9y ago

I always am humbled to think about the many massive wars in China that no one in the West has ever heard of—for example, the Punti Hakka Clan Wars in the 19th century which killed a million people, which is around the same number that died in the US Civil War. Similarly, in one year, 1858, the amount of opium imported into China was the same as the entire production for the decade around 2010. And in the Great Leap Forward bad policy led to tens of millions of deaths. I personally am unsure whether the CCP is really holding back the gates against a resurgence of death and suffering on this sort of scale (after all, in its earlier years it was responsible for the Great Leap Forward). But if we are to judge by the economic growth and stability imposed upon China since then, they seem to be doing a decent job. Unfortunately I imagine it will be many decades until we can know for sure. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_opium_in_China https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_opium_in_China

_cs2017_ 9y ago
I agree with you completely. In the earlier years, CCP was responsible for some of the worst suffering that the 20th century has seen; worse, it was totally without purpose. It was not even helping some people survive at the expense of others, it was just destroying millions of lives to satisfy the egos and delusions of a few leaders who were especially good at brainwashing people. Those leaders deserve to burn in hell for eternity, in my opinion. Today's CCP, despite the continuity in the government, is very far from doing that. Of course, it wants to stay in power, as almost every government does. But I do not know whether, in staying in power, it's also helping hold back the gates of death or suffering. As you say, the evidence so far, limited as it is, is slightly positive. China moved from one of the poorest large countries, with a horrible past, to a place where many (although not all) people are happy to return after they travelled the world. But in truth, we'll never know for sure, since we can't see the alternate timeline of history. In a few decades, we'll merely have a bit more evidence one way or the other. However, I do see a lot of moderate to terrible disasters that befall other countries that try to change their system of government. So I personally have a very high degree of concern about the risk that comes with such changes.

librexpr 9y ago

What about the families of the 120 000 people in the re-education camp? Or the families of the people who's organs are harvested, or who are imprisoned for being mildly critical of the government? Are they safe? It's easy to excuse horrible acts by saying it's for the greater good, but it's rarely actually the case. Chinese civilization won't collapse if they stop harvesting organs and imprisoning people who are even mildly critical of the government.

_cs2017_ 9y ago
About re-education camps and imprisonment for being critical of the government. Horrible acts are occasionally better than the alternative, if you think of the number of lives lost compared to the number of lives saved. I am not sure that these actions by the Chinese government are perfectly justified by this argument. But I think it's possible. Often, governments fall and civil wars start from a tiny spark of seemingly innocuous political dissent that grows out of control. I am sure you'll find many examples of that in history. The stability of Chinese society, just like the stability of any modern society, is always hanging on a thread. You may just not realize it because you (I hope) live in a country that is not drowned in blood. A small problem can easily grow into a disaster, and then no one can stop it -- look at Yugoslavia, Syria, Somalia, Yemen, Eritrea, Libya, Sudan, Congo, Liberia, Georgia (ex-USSR). And these are just the ones I remember watching live, in disbelief. About organ harvesting. From what little I read about it, prisoners may be executed, and their organs given to people who need them for medical reasons. I assume you're not against organ transplantation, since that saves lives at no cost to their original (dead) owner. So I assume you're only against the execution of prisoners. Opinions on capital punishment vary, even in the US. What's viewed as fair and just penalty in California or Florida, has been viewed as unreasonable cruelty and violation of human rights in Maine for well over a century. Of course you're right that in the US, most people would not be ok with executing people for political views (except state treason), and even less so if the execution is timed to make their organs available to others. However, I think you could allow a larger difference of accepted practices between two completely different countries than between states of the US.
- lambdadmitry 9y ago

fdsak 9y ago

Well said. West always sees or interferes into other countries without knowing any cultural, religious or political background. And on another level that is not also different from dictatorship. I live on the other side of the China (Pakistan) and too my observation Uighers are little bit or angry (not finding good word). Few years back it was not safe to roam freely in Urumqi and everyone used to hang daggers of all king around their waist. Sometime fierce fighting might erupt on small pity things and people get slaughtered more like the situation American are having with GUNS right now.

lambdadmitry 9y ago

Unfortunately there is a false equivalence in your post: you implicitly equate "prosperity of a family" with "having a huge all-powerful nation state". There is no such link; if anything, life of Russians improved after the collapse of USSR (undoubtedly in a middle term, arguably even in a short term; source: am Russian). That equivalency is a linchpin of any aspiring fascist state. Please try and question it, you will notice that ir doesn't make much sense.

_cs2017_ 9y ago
They are not always equivalent. But in the case of China, changing from the current state to some new form of government carries a high risk of a prolonged chaos, which would destroy safety and prosperity for most families. Russia risked that chaos, but it had little choice: the USSR was a complete economic disaster. If China today was as bad economically as the USSR in 1985, a big part of my argument would disappear. In some limited sense, I might even say that the Chinese economy today with the old regime is more promising than the Russian economy today after all the changes. And even if I'm wrong on that, still the Chinese economy is at least decent. So the people in China have a lot more to lose from chaos than the people in the USSR did. Another thing. You're saying Russia is in a better state today than 30 years ago. Yes, but Russia is governed by a strongman, who doesn't allow much political dissent. Are you sure that without him Russia wouldn't be in chaos? And if you think that what is going on in Russia is an acceptable compromise, then why would you be uncomfortable with the Chinese government? The difference is not that great. By the way, authoritarian governments had been around for millennia before fascism was even a thing. I don't see why you would equate the two.

naiveai 9y ago

> To keep the billion people who live in China safe from civil war and rampant terrorism is already a great achievement -- even it comes at the expense of some nice things such as human rights. Some nice things? Nice things??? What the actual lord upon almighty.