8 ms·

I am deeply disturbed by what we are seeing in China. The Great Firewall, massive concentration camps in Xinjiang, a new "social credit" system - I think the dy

I am deeply disturbed by what we are seeing in China. The Great Firewall, massive concentration camps in Xinjiang, a new "social credit" system - I think the dystopia of 1984 is becoming a reality. I am afraid that as a society we have the complacency that the "good guys" - democracy, human rights, freedom - will always win. Stalinism and facism eventually fell, but the Communist Party of China is still going strong, and seems to be more than able to extend its grip to the 21st century.

legionof7 8y ago
And no one will stand up to them because they are too economically and culturally powerful.
- TazeTSchnitzel 8y ago
  Western leaders meet Chinese ones and make a mention of human rights… then sign trade deals anyway.
  - TaylorAlexander 8y ago
    Like how western CEOs pulled out of the Saudi conference... but sent other employees as representatives. They want to look like they are opting out, but they still have every intention of being “in”.
    - C1sc0cat 8y ago
      Or maybe taking to their "friends" in the royal family about how MBS is a liability and you know ought to go. I used to work for a big Consulting engineer who did a lot of work in the middle east and we had our friends in high places (you can probably guess who I worked for)
      - biglenny 8y ago
        I am low IQ. Please give me a hint
        dredmorbius 8y ago
        Bechtel, Halliburton, Kellogg Brown & Root (now KBR), and Schlumbarger are among the larger energy-projects engineering firms in the US. For the UK, BP. OP appears to be British.
        C1sc0cat 8y ago
        Lol it was not Ove Arup (I did say consulting not contractors) much much better connected :-)
        dredmorbius 8y ago
        https://targetjobs.co.uk/uk300/construction-civil-engineering-and-surveying https://targetjobs.co.uk/uk300/construction-civil-engineerin...
  - Aeolun 8y ago
    It would be nice if we could just be done with all these dictatorships at some point during my lifetime, but I frankly don’t see it happening.
  - dsfyu404ed 8y ago
    Even HN is generally overflowing with pro-authoritarian sentiment and people lamenting the slow pace of western governments when you talk about how good Singapore's healthcare is, how many opportunities there are for genetics based medicine research in China, etc, etc.
    - TeMPOraL 8y ago
      I'm pretty sure people can advocate for both a little bit more efficiency in critical infrastructure and respect for human rights at the same time.
      - dsfyu404ed 8y ago
        The power that lets a government steamroll opposition and quarreling over $good_thing can also be used to steamroll opposition to $bad_thing and when everyone's used to seeing the government steamroll opposition for $good_thing they don't ask questions when they see that power used for $bad_thing.
        TeMPOraL 8y ago
        That's true. And the question - IMO worth investigating - is, is there a way to structure the system so that "steamrolling opposition and quarreling" over $good_thing is easier, while doing the same over $bad_thin is difficult? Maybe there isn't, but did we look at it hard enough? Especially that the inability of the western world to create and maintain infrastructure is starting to turn into a huge risk.
        xkcd-sucks 8y ago
        Make sure everyone in the group agrees on what good and bad things are? This is much easier in small groups
        mmirate 8y ago
        That, mind you, merely shifts the problem to "make governance-groups smaller". But no politician wants to reduce their job responsibilities such that they now govern fewer people, that's bad for their egos and their resumes. And nobody seems to have figured out how to refactor the law so that ontology (which is finicky, takes lots of resources to get right, and could be applied globally, even if different nations will want some extra nouns and verbs for their own use) and preferences (which ought be as local as possible) are cleanly separated and the former are easily reusable across nations without obligating that such nations come to global consensus on the latter. Instead, every sovereign entity (USA and EU, not France nor Florida) is its own pile of spaghetti-code.
- TaylorAlexander 8y ago
  This to me is a reminder why it is so important that the people control the means of production. Whether it be the Chinese Government or Amazon, concentrated power leads that power to make anti social decisions. Harm to the environment, harm to individuals, and harm to society can be incentivized by concentration of power. I believe a vitally important way to fight those powers is to build independent people-first power. We can do it. Our earth is so productive now that it’s possible to live like a king without hurting others. But we must abstain from buying this cheap plastic garbage like the product the woman found the note in. Buying products we know will become waste, or whose workers we can’t account for, means we are directly supporting the destruction of the earth and of society. We have to stand up. We must. There is no other way to change. Not voting, not blogging. We must stop being consumers of harmful products and use our money to support organizations that truly represent change.
  - Pristina 8y ago
    >This to me is a reminder why it is so important that the people control the means of production The irony of this is palpable. The communist government, who got there trumpeting this exact ideology, would be stopped by the exact same thing? Is this the case of those who dont know history are doomed to repeat it?
    - xg15 8y ago
      "the people controlling the means of production" seems to be a much more basic demand than full-blown socialism or communism or a one-party state. I could also imply worker-owned factories or unions. If that is already problematic, then this would imply to me that the means of production should never be controlled by the people who do the actual work, otherwise we'd get an authoritarian outcome - which seems a pretty authoritarian statement in itself.
      - xg15 8y ago
        * It could also imply
    - 8y ago
- whatshisface 8y ago
  In another thread, HN is discussing Trump's attempt at setting up a trade war. Although I honestly don't think the Kissinger school cares one bit about other people's genocides, or about dictatorships in other countries, (you've heard the quotes about how some US politicians wish our government would be more like China's, there's not a lot of moral outrage), if you want a belligerent US that gets in China's way then we probably have the ideal president for that.
sigi45 8y ago
We are better but also not good: - No healthcare for everyone - War over oil - closed borders and no asylum support but cheap foreign labor
- colanderman 8y ago
  FYI, you are being downvoted not because those things are not true or bad, but because those things are totally irrelevant to the topic of whether the actions of the Chinese state are moral. (You are also further assuming that the person to whom you are replying is a US citizen, which is far from given on HN.)

legionof7 8y ago

And no one will stand up to them because they are too economically and culturally powerful.

TazeTSchnitzel 8y ago
Western leaders meet Chinese ones and make a mention of human rights… then sign trade deals anyway.
- TaylorAlexander 8y ago
  Like how western CEOs pulled out of the Saudi conference... but sent other employees as representatives. They want to look like they are opting out, but they still have every intention of being “in”.
  - C1sc0cat 8y ago
    Or maybe taking to their "friends" in the royal family about how MBS is a liability and you know ought to go. I used to work for a big Consulting engineer who did a lot of work in the middle east and we had our friends in high places (you can probably guess who I worked for)
    - biglenny 8y ago
      I am low IQ. Please give me a hint
      - dredmorbius 8y ago
        Bechtel, Halliburton, Kellogg Brown & Root (now KBR), and Schlumbarger are among the larger energy-projects engineering firms in the US. For the UK, BP. OP appears to be British.
        C1sc0cat 8y ago
        Lol it was not Ove Arup (I did say consulting not contractors) much much better connected :-)
        dredmorbius 8y ago
        https://targetjobs.co.uk/uk300/construction-civil-engineering-and-surveying https://targetjobs.co.uk/uk300/construction-civil-engineerin...
- Aeolun 8y ago
  It would be nice if we could just be done with all these dictatorships at some point during my lifetime, but I frankly don’t see it happening.
- dsfyu404ed 8y ago
  Even HN is generally overflowing with pro-authoritarian sentiment and people lamenting the slow pace of western governments when you talk about how good Singapore's healthcare is, how many opportunities there are for genetics based medicine research in China, etc, etc.
  - TeMPOraL 8y ago
    I'm pretty sure people can advocate for both a little bit more efficiency in critical infrastructure and respect for human rights at the same time.
    - dsfyu404ed 8y ago
      The power that lets a government steamroll opposition and quarreling over $good_thing can also be used to steamroll opposition to $bad_thing and when everyone's used to seeing the government steamroll opposition for $good_thing they don't ask questions when they see that power used for $bad_thing.
      - TeMPOraL 8y ago
        That's true. And the question - IMO worth investigating - is, is there a way to structure the system so that "steamrolling opposition and quarreling" over $good_thing is easier, while doing the same over $bad_thin is difficult? Maybe there isn't, but did we look at it hard enough? Especially that the inability of the western world to create and maintain infrastructure is starting to turn into a huge risk.
        xkcd-sucks 8y ago
        Make sure everyone in the group agrees on what good and bad things are? This is much easier in small groups
        mmirate 8y ago
        That, mind you, merely shifts the problem to "make governance-groups smaller". But no politician wants to reduce their job responsibilities such that they now govern fewer people, that's bad for their egos and their resumes. And nobody seems to have figured out how to refactor the law so that ontology (which is finicky, takes lots of resources to get right, and could be applied globally, even if different nations will want some extra nouns and verbs for their own use) and preferences (which ought be as local as possible) are cleanly separated and the former are easily reusable across nations without obligating that such nations come to global consensus on the latter. Instead, every sovereign entity (USA and EU, not France nor Florida) is its own pile of spaghetti-code.
TaylorAlexander 8y ago
This to me is a reminder why it is so important that the people control the means of production. Whether it be the Chinese Government or Amazon, concentrated power leads that power to make anti social decisions. Harm to the environment, harm to individuals, and harm to society can be incentivized by concentration of power. I believe a vitally important way to fight those powers is to build independent people-first power. We can do it. Our earth is so productive now that it’s possible to live like a king without hurting others. But we must abstain from buying this cheap plastic garbage like the product the woman found the note in. Buying products we know will become waste, or whose workers we can’t account for, means we are directly supporting the destruction of the earth and of society. We have to stand up. We must. There is no other way to change. Not voting, not blogging. We must stop being consumers of harmful products and use our money to support organizations that truly represent change.
- Pristina 8y ago
  >This to me is a reminder why it is so important that the people control the means of production The irony of this is palpable. The communist government, who got there trumpeting this exact ideology, would be stopped by the exact same thing? Is this the case of those who dont know history are doomed to repeat it?
  - xg15 8y ago
    "the people controlling the means of production" seems to be a much more basic demand than full-blown socialism or communism or a one-party state. I could also imply worker-owned factories or unions. If that is already problematic, then this would imply to me that the means of production should never be controlled by the people who do the actual work, otherwise we'd get an authoritarian outcome - which seems a pretty authoritarian statement in itself.
    - xg15 8y ago
      * It could also imply
  - 8y ago
whatshisface 8y ago
In another thread, HN is discussing Trump's attempt at setting up a trade war. Although I honestly don't think the Kissinger school cares one bit about other people's genocides, or about dictatorships in other countries, (you've heard the quotes about how some US politicians wish our government would be more like China's, there's not a lot of moral outrage), if you want a belligerent US that gets in China's way then we probably have the ideal president for that.

sigi45 8y ago

We are better but also not good: - No healthcare for everyone - War over oil - closed borders and no asylum support but cheap foreign labor

colanderman 8y ago
FYI, you are being downvoted not because those things are not true or bad, but because those things are totally irrelevant to the topic of whether the actions of the Chinese state are moral. (You are also further assuming that the person to whom you are replying is a US citizen, which is far from given on HN.)