5 ms·

I'm not particularly convinced this is much worse than what happens in the west, where people get their news from biased sources, be they Fox News, CNN, or Face

I'm not particularly convinced this is much worse than what happens in the west, where people get their news from biased sources, be they Fox News, CNN, or Facebook. Sure, there's the theoretical difference, censorship is bad, etc., but practically speaking, the result does not feel that different...

tdb7893 8y ago
In the West there are biased sources (it's impossible to have unbiased sources because there's no consistent agreement on what "unbiased" could be) but there's actually a lot of diversity of content. It's pretty easy to find some articles arguing different sides and get a decent idea of the whole situation, which is obviously not true when the government censors content.
charlysl 8y ago
It is much worse, given that in the west biased reporting and cover ups can be publicly denounced, whether by other biased sources at the other end of the spectrum or in social media, whereas in China it is not allowed to disclose by any means that bad economic news is being suppressed.
- hrktb 8y ago
  I feel the strategy is just different. In our culture there is no need to suppress the bad news, it can just be drowned down in a flurry of stupid news, contradictory statements and "why do you hate freedom" kind of finger pointing. If random people speaking freely has close to no effect on the leading class, there is not much need to suppress free speech.
  - charlysl 8y ago
    Sure, in the west there are constant attempts at gaming the system, and propaganda is as rife as in authoritarian regimes, and this often results in the masses (us) being misinformed. However, I still don't think it's the same as direct censorship, where it's pretty much game over, nor as damaging. I mean, do you really believe that it's irrelevant that the conversation we are having now, without any fears, I assume, would be extremely risky in China?
    - hrktb 8y ago
      Disclaimer: I don’t have any experience living in China. With that in mind, from what I get anything political or touching the PRC will be heavily scrutinized, anything else nobody will bat an eye. In that respect, the fact we can discuss this freely is nice. But I’d be cautious to declare we’re freer than them just on that fact alone. I just don’t know. Compound to that, the fact that we went through series of very serious crisis (the banking crash 10 years ago comes to my mind) with almost no long lasting structural change of the same order as the crisis, despite people’s engagement. This to me brings the question: how much impact does free public discussion have on the real world ? Does it even have a real impact on public opinion ? Or are we just set in a sandbox, toying with whatever we want, while everything else rolls around ?
      - charlysl 8y ago
        I totally agree with you that the aftermath of the financial crisis has been appaling. Before the crisis both the right and the left had achieved their main political goal (capitalism and the welfare state, respectively), and both accepted the status quo. It is astonishing that after a crisis that was caused by capitalist greed, it was the welfare state that was compromised. This has damaged the establishment left, which is being replaced by populists that, although often branded as far-right, are big defenders of the welfare state and "the people". The western liberal capitalist elites, which control the media, are struggling to contain these populists. So, although, in particular, the US media is under their control, they couldn't stop Trump, whose supporters in the fringe media had no trouble spreading their opinions. Although a westerner, I have first-hand experience of life in an authoritarian country. Of course, I will never claim that this makes me an expert, but an interesting observation that I have made is that educated people in dictatorships seem not to believe anything from their country's media. So far so good. The interesting bit is that they seem to give enormous credibility to rumours and conspiracy theories, no matter how outlandish. I have the suspicion that often these rumours originate from the opposition in the diaspora, who I believe are just as biased and self-serving as the officials. I find this side-effect of censorship quite fascinating. In fact, China recently cracked down on those spreading rumours. [1] [1] https://www.scmp.com/news/china/poliitics/article/2162036/china-launches-piyao-platform-crack-down-online-rumours https://www.scmp.com/news/china/poliitics/article/2162036/ch...
- cmoscoso 8y ago
  Unless you are Alex Jones.
  - sgift 8y ago
    Last time I checked he was fully able to spit whatever nonsense he wanted out into the world without being send to any reeducation camps.
    - mistermann 8y ago
      Whether anyone in the mainstream will encounter his message is another matter. Pointing out that no rights have been violated entirely misses/avoids the point.
westiseast 8y ago
In China you’re talking about those in power actively hiding important public information from those without power. If you are one of the ‘without’, then there’s very little you can do to challenge official viewpoints. A Facebook bubble can be similarly truth-distorting, but your bubble is ultimately a reflection of your individual choices, and it barely takes a couple of clicks before you can find conflicting information or alternate opinions.
SirHound 8y ago
Theoretical differences? People don't regularly go missing in the west for reeducation. There is a difference between a biased news source and flat-out censorship. Equating us to China is disingenuous and loopy.
danmaz74 8y ago
The ENORMOUS difference is that, in China, you only have sources with one bias - the one the government wants. In the West, for all our defects, you can get all the points of view you want.
GuB-42 8y ago
So basically, the west is a brave new world, China is 1984.
07d046 8y ago
I'm not sure you understand how much is unknown about China: https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/21/nobody-knows-anything-about-china/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/21/nobody-knows-anything-a... And don't forget that this lack of knowledge about the true state surely contributed to the famines that killed tens of millions of Chinese during the Great Leap Forward. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Chinese_Famine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Chinese_Famine
hevi_jos 8y ago
One of the great advantages of the West happens when biased sources do not overlap. That is for example the CNN or NYT looking with microscope whatever Republicans do badly and ignoring what Hillary or Obama does wrong could be extremely valuable is there are "opposite biased media" that looks with microscope whatever Hillary does wrong. This happens in multiple levels, there are financial interest that own media and will never criticize its masters. The Churches also own media, the Unions own media, the military and farma industry own media. Google or Facebook ARE media. People in power should be controlled, and that is one of the most realistic ways to control people in power. Wanting media to be unbiased is a dream. Most people are biased.

tdb7893 8y ago

In the West there are biased sources (it's impossible to have unbiased sources because there's no consistent agreement on what "unbiased" could be) but there's actually a lot of diversity of content. It's pretty easy to find some articles arguing different sides and get a decent idea of the whole situation, which is obviously not true when the government censors content.

charlysl 8y ago

It is much worse, given that in the west biased reporting and cover ups can be publicly denounced, whether by other biased sources at the other end of the spectrum or in social media, whereas in China it is not allowed to disclose by any means that bad economic news is being suppressed.

hrktb 8y ago
I feel the strategy is just different. In our culture there is no need to suppress the bad news, it can just be drowned down in a flurry of stupid news, contradictory statements and "why do you hate freedom" kind of finger pointing. If random people speaking freely has close to no effect on the leading class, there is not much need to suppress free speech.
- charlysl 8y ago
  Sure, in the west there are constant attempts at gaming the system, and propaganda is as rife as in authoritarian regimes, and this often results in the masses (us) being misinformed. However, I still don't think it's the same as direct censorship, where it's pretty much game over, nor as damaging. I mean, do you really believe that it's irrelevant that the conversation we are having now, without any fears, I assume, would be extremely risky in China?
  - hrktb 8y ago
    Disclaimer: I don’t have any experience living in China. With that in mind, from what I get anything political or touching the PRC will be heavily scrutinized, anything else nobody will bat an eye. In that respect, the fact we can discuss this freely is nice. But I’d be cautious to declare we’re freer than them just on that fact alone. I just don’t know. Compound to that, the fact that we went through series of very serious crisis (the banking crash 10 years ago comes to my mind) with almost no long lasting structural change of the same order as the crisis, despite people’s engagement. This to me brings the question: how much impact does free public discussion have on the real world ? Does it even have a real impact on public opinion ? Or are we just set in a sandbox, toying with whatever we want, while everything else rolls around ?
    - charlysl 8y ago
      I totally agree with you that the aftermath of the financial crisis has been appaling. Before the crisis both the right and the left had achieved their main political goal (capitalism and the welfare state, respectively), and both accepted the status quo. It is astonishing that after a crisis that was caused by capitalist greed, it was the welfare state that was compromised. This has damaged the establishment left, which is being replaced by populists that, although often branded as far-right, are big defenders of the welfare state and "the people". The western liberal capitalist elites, which control the media, are struggling to contain these populists. So, although, in particular, the US media is under their control, they couldn't stop Trump, whose supporters in the fringe media had no trouble spreading their opinions. Although a westerner, I have first-hand experience of life in an authoritarian country. Of course, I will never claim that this makes me an expert, but an interesting observation that I have made is that educated people in dictatorships seem not to believe anything from their country's media. So far so good. The interesting bit is that they seem to give enormous credibility to rumours and conspiracy theories, no matter how outlandish. I have the suspicion that often these rumours originate from the opposition in the diaspora, who I believe are just as biased and self-serving as the officials. I find this side-effect of censorship quite fascinating. In fact, China recently cracked down on those spreading rumours. [1] [1] https://www.scmp.com/news/china/poliitics/article/2162036/china-launches-piyao-platform-crack-down-online-rumours https://www.scmp.com/news/china/poliitics/article/2162036/ch...
cmoscoso 8y ago
Unless you are Alex Jones.
- sgift 8y ago
  Last time I checked he was fully able to spit whatever nonsense he wanted out into the world without being send to any reeducation camps.
  - mistermann 8y ago
    Whether anyone in the mainstream will encounter his message is another matter. Pointing out that no rights have been violated entirely misses/avoids the point.

westiseast 8y ago

In China you’re talking about those in power actively hiding important public information from those without power. If you are one of the ‘without’, then there’s very little you can do to challenge official viewpoints. A Facebook bubble can be similarly truth-distorting, but your bubble is ultimately a reflection of your individual choices, and it barely takes a couple of clicks before you can find conflicting information or alternate opinions.

SirHound 8y ago

Theoretical differences? People don't regularly go missing in the west for reeducation. There is a difference between a biased news source and flat-out censorship. Equating us to China is disingenuous and loopy.

danmaz74 8y ago

The ENORMOUS difference is that, in China, you only have sources with one bias - the one the government wants. In the West, for all our defects, you can get all the points of view you want.

GuB-42 8y ago

So basically, the west is a brave new world, China is 1984.

07d046 8y ago

I'm not sure you understand how much is unknown about China: https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/21/nobody-knows-anything-about-china/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/21/nobody-knows-anything-a... And don't forget that this lack of knowledge about the true state surely contributed to the famines that killed tens of millions of Chinese during the Great Leap Forward. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Chinese_Famine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Chinese_Famine

hevi_jos 8y ago

One of the great advantages of the West happens when biased sources do not overlap. That is for example the CNN or NYT looking with microscope whatever Republicans do badly and ignoring what Hillary or Obama does wrong could be extremely valuable is there are "opposite biased media" that looks with microscope whatever Hillary does wrong. This happens in multiple levels, there are financial interest that own media and will never criticize its masters. The Churches also own media, the Unions own media, the military and farma industry own media. Google or Facebook ARE media. People in power should be controlled, and that is one of the most realistic ways to control people in power. Wanting media to be unbiased is a dream. Most people are biased.