20 ms·

Why does the west continue to tolerate China as a trading partner? China is pretty obviously building their empire. They, as a government, appear to have almo

by blhack 8y ago

Why does the west continue to tolerate China as a trading partner? China is pretty obviously building their empire. They, as a government, appear to have almost no regard whatsoever for human life. They, as a government, appear to have absolutely no regard whatsoever for national sovereignty. They, as a government, appear to have absolutely no regard for the environment. It just seems completely inevitable to me that China eventually wants to conquer the world. Why is the west enriching them, and by proxy funding their research into war machines when it seems obvious that these things will eventually be used against us? These acts are atrocities, no doubt. But these atrocities aren't being committed by some dictator in some small, isolated country. These atrocities are being committed by a regime that has all but said that it intends to conquer the rest of the planet and export these atrocities as the standard operating procedure for the entire planet, and which very probably WILL DO THIS if something doesn't occur to change the course. People are upset about the "trade war" we are currently in, or about to be in, or were in, or whatever the pundit of the hour says. I can't say I agree that restricting trade with China, and encouraging the infrastructure being built there to be built in the US, or at the very least in a country that respects human rights instead, is a bad thing.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
TaylorAlexander 8y ago
We fund them because it helps the people in charge get rich off the backs of cheap Chinese labor. We (the U.S) tolerate their disrespect for human rights because we also do not respect human rights, as demonstrated by our relationship with Saudi Arabia, our many horrible wars, etc. We also do not respect national sovereignty, as demonstrated by our covert wars in South America, our firebombing of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, and our occupation of the Middle East. We do business with them because they are like us. Or at least, like our business people. They want to grow their power as our businesses do. Not all business people are like this, but we allow the influential businesses to support these actions and we as a people do not stop it.
- blhack 8y ago
  >We (the U.S) tolerate their disrespect for human rights because we also do not respect human rights I'm sorry but this statement is just absolutely and completely ridiculous. I don't know if you've either never been to The United States, or you've never left The United States, but the difference between the respect that we have for human rights, and the respect that much of the rest of the world has, is stark.
  - throwba43yt 8y ago
    The US talks about respecting human rights, but has no problem with 1 million dead Iraqi civilians. Individual Americans may respect human rights. Just like individual Chinese do as well. But when you challenge them as a nation, well, then the needs of the stong outweigh the needs of the weak.
    - onetimemanytime 8y ago
      >>The US talks about respecting human rights, but has no problem with 1 million dead Iraqi civilians. So you took a poll, "do you give a rats @ss that 1 Million Iraqis were killed by USA" and most people didn't care? Let's tone it down, USA did not go there to kill a million people, it happened because of the war, and Saddam might have killed 2 mil if he was alive for Arab Spring. Not saying that Iraq war was justified but there's a huge difference.
      - flukus 8y ago
        > So you took a poll, "do you give a rats @ss that 1 Million Iraqis were killed by USA" and most people didn't care? The war had bipartisan support and the leader that started it was re-elected in the ultimate poll, so I'd say the majority are fine with it.
        onetimemanytime 8y ago
        Not necessarily, as you know elections are about several major issues.
crimsonalucard 8y ago
It's not as atrocious as you think. The united states has its' own fair share of heinous crimes as well. I feel a lot of people have this perception of China as a Technologically powerful North Korea... Nothing can be further from the truth. China is like an asian tiger... Japan, Singapore or Taiwan.. or maybe not exactly an asian tiger, but somewhere in-between North Korea and an Asian Tiger but leaning much more closer to an Asian Tiger than it does its' historical regime based roots. You guys need to visit China to get a more realistic perspective. I recommend Shenzhen.
- sgustard 8y ago
  While visiting, am I free to loudly denounce the government?
  - crimsonalucard 8y ago
    No you're not. Snowden wasn't allowed to denounce the government either.
    - EdwardDiego 8y ago
      He was, just not with a bunch of classified documents in hand.
      - crimsonalucard 8y ago
        Those classified documents showed how the government was spying on their own citizens and breaking the law. He was whistleblowing. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/07/edward-snowden-whistleblower-nsa-bulk-surveillance-illegal https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/07/edward-snowden... He is literally not allowed to denounce the government for breaking their own laws.
        EdwardDiego 8y ago
        That's what classifying documents is for - to keep them secret. He didn't get in trouble for "denouncing the government", he got in trouble for publishing classified documents. I agree with what Snowden did, and respect him for having the courage to do so, but I'm not sure if you're trying to demonise the US government or legitimise the Chinese one by claiming the prosecuting someone for publishing classified documents is equivalent to prosecuting someone for disagreeing with the ruling party.
Derek_MK 8y ago
It's the same reason why everyone wants everyone else to fix climate change: The negative effects from supporting China won't affect the people who actually make the decision to support China.
Brain_Thief 8y ago
It seems that an ever-increasing number of basic behavioral decisions facing western populations have large abstract consequences and can be described by the basic shape: A) Option that marginally (and in some cases significantly) increases personal convenience while incrementally undermining the long-term probability of western moral aspirations maturing to their full promise and forming the basis of a more human-centric global future. or B) Option that rejects the temptation of new gadgetry / marginal personal convenience improvements but that withholds some small amount of fuel from the growing moral conflagration. This option is increasingly associated with social circle friction. This is perfectly exemplified, on a much less serious level than human organ harvesting and trade policy, by the Chrome vs. FireFox situation, or by the choice to use FaceBook. There needs to be a realization that the current version of extreme economic policies governing large multi-national corporations like Google, FaceBook, Exxon, etc., are diametrically opposed to western moral aspirations w.r.t human rights, and are in fact fueling the demise of said aspirations. These corporations are not "American" or "Chinese" or "Other Nationality" in any way that matters for actual human beings, but exist as increasingly-autonomous global entities that are radically reshaping the geopolitical landscape and diverting increasing amounts of power to actors that have an open disdain for the human condition. People who oppose the current trends of inequality growth, corruption normalization, environmental exploitation, human rights abuses, and other deleterious effects of extreme capitalism don't seem to have an option other than to reject the consumerist culture / mindset that it's all built upon.
jamesb93 8y ago
Let me make it really simple for you. Because its cheap and people are greedy.
shorty_ 8y ago
This should indeed not be supported. But US isn't better at all... Bomb all countries back to the stoneage and as it is proved, US always used a lie as a reason (to start a war against an enemy that can't really defend against US). 90%+ victims are civilians. ppl should always first think "am i (or in this case... is my government) even better?"
- ajross 8y ago
  No, that's rank whataboutism, and all it does is serve to cut off discussion about important issues, even the ones you personally care about. It's possible to oppose organ harvesting in China and actions by the US. But you have to do them independently (i.e. not whining about the US in a post about China) and specifically (i.e. "organ harvesting, here's the cite" vs. your rather generic complaint above).
  - shorty_ 8y ago
    i just wrote it related to the post by blhack. otherwise your statement would be correct
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
PeterisP 8y ago
China is a major and valuable contributor to the global economy, and instrumental in providing the first world citizens with cheap consumer goods. Voters value bread and circuses above ethics or human rights of faraway people. In a democratic country, if a politician would implement impactful policies aimed to improve human rights elsewhere at the cost of local economic harm and inflation hitting their workers, then that politician would get voted out of office and these policies reversed - so they don't do that. If some politician genuinely desire to help human rights elsewhere, then they'd still not implement such overt policies (since they'd get reversed and help no one) but implement subtle diplomatic pressure. The same logic, by the way, explains the current situation with climate change.
- SubiculumCode 8y ago
  Other nation-states in the Asia Pacific would be perfectly willing to start taking our orders for commercial goods. No doubt the trade war with China has been, or will be, good for their industrial economies. It is not ethics however that is driving a wedge between the United States and China. It is China's efforts to solidify its power over the Asian Pacific seas (in)conveniently named the China Sea and their trade routes, their One Road foreign policy efforts, and China's efforts to remain outside of the international order while also participating in it (e.g. IP theft, etc).
  - ShorsHammer 8y ago
    Can you name one with the appropriate morals for Western sensibilities?
    - SubiculumCode 8y ago
      South Korea is a good example maybe of a country that was happy to become technologically advanced and wealthy without trying to dominate its neighbors, and who was willing to buy into international systems of rule and trade.
      - 8y ago
stcredzero 8y ago
It just seems completely inevitable to me that China eventually wants to conquer the world. Why is the west enriching them Up to the 20th century, the west had a surefire meta-strategy for dealing with world-conquering former empires like China. You bring them into modern industrial economics while exporting western culture. The massive changes would destabilize the old regime and turn it into another trading partner. In 2018, media and economics have changed to the point where everything's now mediated by computers and networks. Things have changed so much, all we can be sure of is that meta-strategy no longer works in quite the same way. These atrocities are being committed by a regime that has all but said that it intends to conquer the rest of the planet and export these atrocities as the standard operating procedure for the entire planet You can say this for just about everyone on the world stage. Spain, France, Britain, and the US have all taken their turns as the lead player on that stage, and the quoted sentence could be applied to them all, just with different levels of severity for the atrocities. The long arc of history is really just about asymptotically reducing the level of atrocities to zero. The question of Chinese ascendancy is just a matter of when and how large the local spike in atrocity might be. (EDIT: To clarify, the local spike in atrocity for Britain and the US were smaller than what came before, and the affect of their hegemony has been net positive.)
- hashr8064 8y ago
  > You can say this for just about everyone on the world stage. Spain, France, Britain... True, but you could argue that these countries had excuses. At the time of the worst crimes (colonialism, slavery, etc) there were no examples of benign, free trading partners, abiding by international law - all this had to be designed, philosophized, created - and the modern western countries did all this because they saw how bad those atrocities were. I'm not saying all western countries are benevolent or don't commit atrocities now, but certainly most try to uphold international laws and human rights and their populations have a very big democratic voice that is constantly fighting towards these ends, despite what political leaders and power elites want. Compare that to China, which is not even attempting to abide by any of these standards - despite the fact that these laws, ideas, and rules have been around and well established in the entire rest of the world for at least the past 50 years. At some point, you'd think the west would wake up, China is super nationalistic, powerful and has no regard for human rights.
forapurpose 8y ago
Unfortunately (for our cognitive load and moral comfort) the situation is much more complex: * It's hindsight to say China' embrace of authoritarianism, nationalism, and expansionism was inevitable. Even around ten years ago it was a much different place, with much more freedom of expression (you could find fascinating discussions of democracy by leading figures on Weibo, for example) [0] and a slow process of liberalization. And if it was an error of foresight at the time to assume that the then-current trend of liberalization would continue, it's an equal error to assume the trend of today will continue. By far the best outcome for the people of China, the region, and the world is for China to liberalize; a global contest would be very damaging and expensive; a war could destroy several civilizations, including the U.S. While it would be foolish to ignore current trends, it has proven equally foolish to accept them as an inevitable future and to let the bad guys dictate your values and the future. * The people of China are not the government of China; it's difficult to oppose the latter without hurting the former. The people deserve freedom, human rights, food, shelter, and prosperity and the things that go with it. China's economic growth arguably has lifted more people from perilous levels of poverty than any event in human history, and they still have a ways to go. If the West didn't trade with China, that never would have happened. * Of course, the West has profited immensely from China joining the global economy. [0] China Digital Times (CDT) used to carry many of them, possibly still available in their history/archives. https://chinadigitaltimes.net/ https://chinadigitaltimes.net/
- FireBeyond 8y ago
  > Even around ten years ago it was a much different place, with much more freedom of expression (you could find fascinating discussions of democracy by leading figures on Weibo, for example) [0] and a slow process of liberalization. And ten years before that, it was using deadly military force to subdue similar democratic thoughts in Tiananmen Square.
  - forapurpose 8y ago
    I don't understand what you mean to imply ? (Also, Tienanmen Square was in 1989.)
NeoBasilisk 8y ago
Because it makes powerful people fabulously rich. That is all you need to know.
sizzle 8y ago
"It just seems completely inevitable to me that China eventually wants to conquer the world. Why is the west enriching them, and by proxy funding their research into war machines when it seems obvious that these things will eventually be used against us?" I think the threat angle is questionable, even if China perfects altering human genetics to create a superior breed of humans, the theory of mutually assured destruction + our arsenal of intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear payloads + the concept of a deadman's switch is still pretty solid insurance against anything they can do on a macro level along with any other major world power like Russia. Any war/history buffs out there care to chime in and change or reinforce my opinion on the topic with some concrete facts and data?
- tandr 8y ago
  > even if China perfects altering human genetics to create a superior breed of humans, the theory of mutually assured destruction + our arsenal of intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear payloads + the concept of a deadman's switch is still pretty solid insurance against anything they can do on a macro level and any other major world power like Russia. Altering human genetics might lead to a creation of radiation-resistant human. If such mutation gets to a significant percentage of country population, such country might actually welcome an unfolding MAD scenario. (Subject to radiation-resistant food and energy supplies etc) I think it is ultimately possible - elephants have large bodies but less cancer, cockroaches posses high resistance to radiation, etc. Would this be called "human" is another question...
  - Angelore 8y ago
    This doesn't really matter since not only humans are affected. The most obvious example is the destruction of any semiconductors, which along with the destruction of the environment, will send the remaining humans into the bronze age at best.
turtlecloud 8y ago
The fear over Chinese taking over the world is overblown. They don’t have colonist tendencies, esp on non Asian people. Why would they want the burden of having to subjugate blacks, whites, and everyone else?? The fear of China is a reflection of white colonist mentality. When viewing the world they see it in terms of what they would do, not as what other cultures realistically would do.
astrostl 8y ago
Trading products and services results in the trading of ideas and values as well.
garfieldnate 8y ago
I still don't understand how we had the Olympics there. That should never have happened.

by blhack 8y ago

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

TaylorAlexander 8y ago

We fund them because it helps the people in charge get rich off the backs of cheap Chinese labor. We (the U.S) tolerate their disrespect for human rights because we also do not respect human rights, as demonstrated by our relationship with Saudi Arabia, our many horrible wars, etc. We also do not respect national sovereignty, as demonstrated by our covert wars in South America, our firebombing of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, and our occupation of the Middle East. We do business with them because they are like us. Or at least, like our business people. They want to grow their power as our businesses do. Not all business people are like this, but we allow the influential businesses to support these actions and we as a people do not stop it.

blhack 8y ago
>We (the U.S) tolerate their disrespect for human rights because we also do not respect human rights I'm sorry but this statement is just absolutely and completely ridiculous. I don't know if you've either never been to The United States, or you've never left The United States, but the difference between the respect that we have for human rights, and the respect that much of the rest of the world has, is stark.
- throwba43yt 8y ago
  The US talks about respecting human rights, but has no problem with 1 million dead Iraqi civilians. Individual Americans may respect human rights. Just like individual Chinese do as well. But when you challenge them as a nation, well, then the needs of the stong outweigh the needs of the weak.
  - onetimemanytime 8y ago
    >>The US talks about respecting human rights, but has no problem with 1 million dead Iraqi civilians. So you took a poll, "do you give a rats @ss that 1 Million Iraqis were killed by USA" and most people didn't care? Let's tone it down, USA did not go there to kill a million people, it happened because of the war, and Saddam might have killed 2 mil if he was alive for Arab Spring. Not saying that Iraq war was justified but there's a huge difference.
    - flukus 8y ago
      > So you took a poll, "do you give a rats @ss that 1 Million Iraqis were killed by USA" and most people didn't care? The war had bipartisan support and the leader that started it was re-elected in the ultimate poll, so I'd say the majority are fine with it.
      - onetimemanytime 8y ago
        Not necessarily, as you know elections are about several major issues.

crimsonalucard 8y ago

It's not as atrocious as you think. The united states has its' own fair share of heinous crimes as well. I feel a lot of people have this perception of China as a Technologically powerful North Korea... Nothing can be further from the truth. China is like an asian tiger... Japan, Singapore or Taiwan.. or maybe not exactly an asian tiger, but somewhere in-between North Korea and an Asian Tiger but leaning much more closer to an Asian Tiger than it does its' historical regime based roots. You guys need to visit China to get a more realistic perspective. I recommend Shenzhen.

sgustard 8y ago
While visiting, am I free to loudly denounce the government?
- crimsonalucard 8y ago
  No you're not. Snowden wasn't allowed to denounce the government either.
  - EdwardDiego 8y ago
    He was, just not with a bunch of classified documents in hand.
    - crimsonalucard 8y ago
      Those classified documents showed how the government was spying on their own citizens and breaking the law. He was whistleblowing. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/07/edward-snowden-whistleblower-nsa-bulk-surveillance-illegal https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/07/edward-snowden... He is literally not allowed to denounce the government for breaking their own laws.
      - EdwardDiego 8y ago
        That's what classifying documents is for - to keep them secret. He didn't get in trouble for "denouncing the government", he got in trouble for publishing classified documents. I agree with what Snowden did, and respect him for having the courage to do so, but I'm not sure if you're trying to demonise the US government or legitimise the Chinese one by claiming the prosecuting someone for publishing classified documents is equivalent to prosecuting someone for disagreeing with the ruling party.

Derek_MK 8y ago

It's the same reason why everyone wants everyone else to fix climate change: The negative effects from supporting China won't affect the people who actually make the decision to support China.

Brain_Thief 8y ago

It seems that an ever-increasing number of basic behavioral decisions facing western populations have large abstract consequences and can be described by the basic shape: A) Option that marginally (and in some cases significantly) increases personal convenience while incrementally undermining the long-term probability of western moral aspirations maturing to their full promise and forming the basis of a more human-centric global future. or B) Option that rejects the temptation of new gadgetry / marginal personal convenience improvements but that withholds some small amount of fuel from the growing moral conflagration. This option is increasingly associated with social circle friction. This is perfectly exemplified, on a much less serious level than human organ harvesting and trade policy, by the Chrome vs. FireFox situation, or by the choice to use FaceBook. There needs to be a realization that the current version of extreme economic policies governing large multi-national corporations like Google, FaceBook, Exxon, etc., are diametrically opposed to western moral aspirations w.r.t human rights, and are in fact fueling the demise of said aspirations. These corporations are not "American" or "Chinese" or "Other Nationality" in any way that matters for actual human beings, but exist as increasingly-autonomous global entities that are radically reshaping the geopolitical landscape and diverting increasing amounts of power to actors that have an open disdain for the human condition. People who oppose the current trends of inequality growth, corruption normalization, environmental exploitation, human rights abuses, and other deleterious effects of extreme capitalism don't seem to have an option other than to reject the consumerist culture / mindset that it's all built upon.

jamesb93 8y ago

Let me make it really simple for you. Because its cheap and people are greedy.

shorty_ 8y ago

This should indeed not be supported. But US isn't better at all... Bomb all countries back to the stoneage and as it is proved, US always used a lie as a reason (to start a war against an enemy that can't really defend against US). 90%+ victims are civilians. ppl should always first think "am i (or in this case... is my government) even better?"

ajross 8y ago
No, that's rank whataboutism, and all it does is serve to cut off discussion about important issues, even the ones you personally care about. It's possible to oppose organ harvesting in China and actions by the US. But you have to do them independently (i.e. not whining about the US in a post about China) and specifically (i.e. "organ harvesting, here's the cite" vs. your rather generic complaint above).
- shorty_ 8y ago
  i just wrote it related to the post by blhack. otherwise your statement would be correct
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

PeterisP 8y ago

China is a major and valuable contributor to the global economy, and instrumental in providing the first world citizens with cheap consumer goods. Voters value bread and circuses above ethics or human rights of faraway people. In a democratic country, if a politician would implement impactful policies aimed to improve human rights elsewhere at the cost of local economic harm and inflation hitting their workers, then that politician would get voted out of office and these policies reversed - so they don't do that. If some politician genuinely desire to help human rights elsewhere, then they'd still not implement such overt policies (since they'd get reversed and help no one) but implement subtle diplomatic pressure. The same logic, by the way, explains the current situation with climate change.

SubiculumCode 8y ago
Other nation-states in the Asia Pacific would be perfectly willing to start taking our orders for commercial goods. No doubt the trade war with China has been, or will be, good for their industrial economies. It is not ethics however that is driving a wedge between the United States and China. It is China's efforts to solidify its power over the Asian Pacific seas (in)conveniently named the China Sea and their trade routes, their One Road foreign policy efforts, and China's efforts to remain outside of the international order while also participating in it (e.g. IP theft, etc).
- ShorsHammer 8y ago
  Can you name one with the appropriate morals for Western sensibilities?
  - SubiculumCode 8y ago
    South Korea is a good example maybe of a country that was happy to become technologically advanced and wealthy without trying to dominate its neighbors, and who was willing to buy into international systems of rule and trade.
    - 8y ago

stcredzero 8y ago

It just seems completely inevitable to me that China eventually wants to conquer the world. Why is the west enriching them Up to the 20th century, the west had a surefire meta-strategy for dealing with world-conquering former empires like China. You bring them into modern industrial economics while exporting western culture. The massive changes would destabilize the old regime and turn it into another trading partner. In 2018, media and economics have changed to the point where everything's now mediated by computers and networks. Things have changed so much, all we can be sure of is that meta-strategy no longer works in quite the same way. These atrocities are being committed by a regime that has all but said that it intends to conquer the rest of the planet and export these atrocities as the standard operating procedure for the entire planet You can say this for just about everyone on the world stage. Spain, France, Britain, and the US have all taken their turns as the lead player on that stage, and the quoted sentence could be applied to them all, just with different levels of severity for the atrocities. The long arc of history is really just about asymptotically reducing the level of atrocities to zero. The question of Chinese ascendancy is just a matter of when and how large the local spike in atrocity might be. (EDIT: To clarify, the local spike in atrocity for Britain and the US were smaller than what came before, and the affect of their hegemony has been net positive.)

hashr8064 8y ago
> You can say this for just about everyone on the world stage. Spain, France, Britain... True, but you could argue that these countries had excuses. At the time of the worst crimes (colonialism, slavery, etc) there were no examples of benign, free trading partners, abiding by international law - all this had to be designed, philosophized, created - and the modern western countries did all this because they saw how bad those atrocities were. I'm not saying all western countries are benevolent or don't commit atrocities now, but certainly most try to uphold international laws and human rights and their populations have a very big democratic voice that is constantly fighting towards these ends, despite what political leaders and power elites want. Compare that to China, which is not even attempting to abide by any of these standards - despite the fact that these laws, ideas, and rules have been around and well established in the entire rest of the world for at least the past 50 years. At some point, you'd think the west would wake up, China is super nationalistic, powerful and has no regard for human rights.

forapurpose 8y ago

Unfortunately (for our cognitive load and moral comfort) the situation is much more complex: * It's hindsight to say China' embrace of authoritarianism, nationalism, and expansionism was inevitable. Even around ten years ago it was a much different place, with much more freedom of expression (you could find fascinating discussions of democracy by leading figures on Weibo, for example) [0] and a slow process of liberalization. And if it was an error of foresight at the time to assume that the then-current trend of liberalization would continue, it's an equal error to assume the trend of today will continue. By far the best outcome for the people of China, the region, and the world is for China to liberalize; a global contest would be very damaging and expensive; a war could destroy several civilizations, including the U.S. While it would be foolish to ignore current trends, it has proven equally foolish to accept them as an inevitable future and to let the bad guys dictate your values and the future. * The people of China are not the government of China; it's difficult to oppose the latter without hurting the former. The people deserve freedom, human rights, food, shelter, and prosperity and the things that go with it. China's economic growth arguably has lifted more people from perilous levels of poverty than any event in human history, and they still have a ways to go. If the West didn't trade with China, that never would have happened. * Of course, the West has profited immensely from China joining the global economy. [0] China Digital Times (CDT) used to carry many of them, possibly still available in their history/archives. https://chinadigitaltimes.net/ https://chinadigitaltimes.net/

FireBeyond 8y ago
> Even around ten years ago it was a much different place, with much more freedom of expression (you could find fascinating discussions of democracy by leading figures on Weibo, for example) [0] and a slow process of liberalization. And ten years before that, it was using deadly military force to subdue similar democratic thoughts in Tiananmen Square.
- forapurpose 8y ago
  I don't understand what you mean to imply ? (Also, Tienanmen Square was in 1989.)

NeoBasilisk 8y ago

Because it makes powerful people fabulously rich. That is all you need to know.

sizzle 8y ago

"It just seems completely inevitable to me that China eventually wants to conquer the world. Why is the west enriching them, and by proxy funding their research into war machines when it seems obvious that these things will eventually be used against us?" I think the threat angle is questionable, even if China perfects altering human genetics to create a superior breed of humans, the theory of mutually assured destruction + our arsenal of intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear payloads + the concept of a deadman's switch is still pretty solid insurance against anything they can do on a macro level along with any other major world power like Russia. Any war/history buffs out there care to chime in and change or reinforce my opinion on the topic with some concrete facts and data?

tandr 8y ago
> even if China perfects altering human genetics to create a superior breed of humans, the theory of mutually assured destruction + our arsenal of intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear payloads + the concept of a deadman's switch is still pretty solid insurance against anything they can do on a macro level and any other major world power like Russia. Altering human genetics might lead to a creation of radiation-resistant human. If such mutation gets to a significant percentage of country population, such country might actually welcome an unfolding MAD scenario. (Subject to radiation-resistant food and energy supplies etc) I think it is ultimately possible - elephants have large bodies but less cancer, cockroaches posses high resistance to radiation, etc. Would this be called "human" is another question...
- Angelore 8y ago
  This doesn't really matter since not only humans are affected. The most obvious example is the destruction of any semiconductors, which along with the destruction of the environment, will send the remaining humans into the bronze age at best.

turtlecloud 8y ago

The fear over Chinese taking over the world is overblown. They don’t have colonist tendencies, esp on non Asian people. Why would they want the burden of having to subjugate blacks, whites, and everyone else?? The fear of China is a reflection of white colonist mentality. When viewing the world they see it in terms of what they would do, not as what other cultures realistically would do.

astrostl 8y ago

Trading products and services results in the trading of ideas and values as well.

garfieldnate 8y ago

I still don't understand how we had the Olympics there. That should never have happened.