4 ms·

Do you think Americans are going to hate their country after reading about MKUltra? How about solitary confinement? WMDs in Iraq?

JumpCrisscross 7y ago
> Do you think Americans are going to hate their country after reading about MKUltra? One, we don’t censor that information. Two, I’d expect most Americans to freely criticise those government actions, as well as the people and agencies responsible. The latter is prohibited in China.
- SamReidHughes 7y ago
  So what? I’m talking about why anybody would expect a Chinese student to change their attitude because of 6/4. Your response and the others here have nothing to do with that.
  - JumpCrisscross 7y ago
    > I’m talking about why anybody would expect a Chinese student to change their attitude because of 6/4 I wouldn’t, but that’s because of something deeper than anything we experience in America or Australia. Consider pre-Snowden public opinions on mass surveillance. The public didn’t know and didn’t believe. Once the information came out, however, people believed. Some actions were taken, and on many fronts activism got aggressive. (A large minority accepted the new facts while deeming it acceptable. A smaller minority thinks the disclosures themselves were a conspiracy.) It would be surprising if a majority of Chinese students, after learning about the massacre at Tiananmen Square [1], rejected it as a global propaganda campaign. Some will. More than in America, given the energy given to brainwashing by Beijing. The difference will be in the number who believe it happened but defend it as having been necessary. Teaching the worth of democratic values is tough. The violence exhibited towards the Hong Kong protesters, and Beijing’s emissary’s support of it as patriotism, exemplifies that. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1989 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of...
    - rotred 7y ago
      > I wouldn’t, but that’s because of something deeper than anything we experience in America or Australia. I'm sick of this holier than thou attitude that people have here. There's this patronizing attitude that if only the brain washed Chinese knew what was really happening they would rise up! Yet you know about the Nayirah testimony, MKUltra, Snowden, Cambridge Analytica, migrant camps... why aren't you out protesting, storming congress, why isn't Bush in prison, why isn't Trump impeached? It's not a "small minority"; it's the majority. Most Americans don't care enough to find out and if they did they wouldn't care enough to do anything. I'd argue that the propaganda is much deeper and subtle in the West. The media is a oligarchy yet it's still "independent" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWLjYJ4BzvI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWLjYJ4BzvI You believe are the good guys despite history despite everything.
      - coldtea 7y ago
        >why isn't Bush in prison, why isn't Trump impeached? It's not a "small minority"; it's the majority Because in America you can openly talk about those things on the press and the internet and comments, and thus let off steam... Of course the end result is the same, as in China they keep happening!
      - jhanschoo 7y ago
        Trump isn't impeached simply because not enough representatives think that these are sufficiently severe atrocities to do so, and not enough people think that these are severe enough to undermine the state institutions. You have legislators and media critical of the government wrt CA and migrant camps. That's why you don't see so much civil disobedience, because these concerns are visibly reflected in the government. This doesn't mean I disagree with you that Chinese who know more about Tiananmen wouldn't "rise up", but against your argument that it is propaganda in the West that prevents people from civil disobedience. I would agree that propaganda and soft power shape opinion and taboo in the West and US, but on the other hand, I don't think that this insidious and subtle propaganda is anywhere near as powerful as the total propaganda and coercion practiced by some other regimes.
- coldtea 7y ago
  >One, we don’t censor that information You don't have to, when nobody really cares for it, and the system is such that nobody is gonna do anything about it (and the people who did those things get a slap on the wrist, if not a pat on the back). It's regimes that lack this that censor information -- regimes that are worried that e.g. protests could result in bringing them down. If you don't worry about that, you can let almost anything be said. Especially if you just let it be declassified/acknowledged decades after the fact, when even fewer will care.
  - jhanschoo 7y ago
    The comment you are replying to is not making any judgment on the morality of the state, and is likely in agreement with you. It's just pointing out that the grandparent's rhetorical suggestion is undermined by an incorrect premise (that people don't know about US atrocities and their criticism and would be appalled to know them, where actually such information is easily available)
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
merpnderp 7y ago
Americans didn’t have their government machine gun down peaceful protestors, then the medics and doctors who went to help them, and then run over the bodies with tanks until they were mush. And if they had to learn about something that bad, they’d learn about it as soon as possible and the government would be powerless to cover it up.
jrockway 7y ago
Ultimately, what we have that China doesn't have is a system in place to address these concerns. Technology companies freely and openly made it more difficult for the NSA to spy. The prison system is on the minds of every politician and newspaper, and change is happening (slowly, sure). The Iraq war was debated to death. Every country is going to have problems. It can never make decisions that satisfy everyone. What matters is the ability to talk about it, like what we're doing here. Politics is always going to be slow, though; that's the tradeoff versus having a dictator.
Aaronstotle 7y ago
I can only speak for myself, my answer is no. I've read up on the numerous atrocities committed by the U.S. Government (highly recommend Wikileak Files: World according to U.S. Empire) I think citizens of every country shouldn't ignore their past, they should look directly towards it, grapple with the consequences, and critique it.
AWildC182 7y ago
It's cool, we already do. Just because you have problems doesn't mean you can't point out that someone else does too, as long as you have acknowledged yours.
SkyBelow 7y ago
No, but Americans do seem intent on labeling any modern day version of MKUltra to be a conspiracy theory only an idiot would believe. That might be worse than just censoring it.
adventured 7y ago
> Do you think Americans are going to hate their country after reading about ... Yes, this commonly occurs in fact. Americans trash their own country aggressively, routinely all over social media, for its flaws and past mistakes. See: Twitter, Reddit or Imgur comments every day of the week. We pay sports athletes and celebrities tens of millions of dollars and they regularly trash the US for its flaws and past mistakes. They do so all over social media, routinely, and with few repercussions (essentially none from the government, and few from social blowback). How many famous millionaire Hollywood celebrities would you like me to quote - eg from their tweets - saying they somehow hate the US or wish to leave?
- SamReidHughes 7y ago
  A small minority of Americans do that and when talking about large populations, it goes without saying that we’re not talking about population distributions in an absolutist sense.
  - filoleg 7y ago
    It isn't about how many people do that, it is about how many people can do that publicly without any repercussions towards them from the state. And I would say, in the US that proportion comes to around "pretty much all of them".
    - SamReidHughes 7y ago
      Actually that is not what this conversation is about.
  - pertymcpert 7y ago
    No not a small minority.
Wowfunhappy 7y ago
Reading about American atrocities doesn't make me hate my country, it makes me want my country to do better.

JumpCrisscross 7y ago

> Do you think Americans are going to hate their country after reading about MKUltra? One, we don’t censor that information. Two, I’d expect most Americans to freely criticise those government actions, as well as the people and agencies responsible. The latter is prohibited in China.

SamReidHughes 7y ago
So what? I’m talking about why anybody would expect a Chinese student to change their attitude because of 6/4. Your response and the others here have nothing to do with that.
- JumpCrisscross 7y ago
  > I’m talking about why anybody would expect a Chinese student to change their attitude because of 6/4 I wouldn’t, but that’s because of something deeper than anything we experience in America or Australia. Consider pre-Snowden public opinions on mass surveillance. The public didn’t know and didn’t believe. Once the information came out, however, people believed. Some actions were taken, and on many fronts activism got aggressive. (A large minority accepted the new facts while deeming it acceptable. A smaller minority thinks the disclosures themselves were a conspiracy.) It would be surprising if a majority of Chinese students, after learning about the massacre at Tiananmen Square [1], rejected it as a global propaganda campaign. Some will. More than in America, given the energy given to brainwashing by Beijing. The difference will be in the number who believe it happened but defend it as having been necessary. Teaching the worth of democratic values is tough. The violence exhibited towards the Hong Kong protesters, and Beijing’s emissary’s support of it as patriotism, exemplifies that. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1989 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of...
  - rotred 7y ago
    > I wouldn’t, but that’s because of something deeper than anything we experience in America or Australia. I'm sick of this holier than thou attitude that people have here. There's this patronizing attitude that if only the brain washed Chinese knew what was really happening they would rise up! Yet you know about the Nayirah testimony, MKUltra, Snowden, Cambridge Analytica, migrant camps... why aren't you out protesting, storming congress, why isn't Bush in prison, why isn't Trump impeached? It's not a "small minority"; it's the majority. Most Americans don't care enough to find out and if they did they wouldn't care enough to do anything. I'd argue that the propaganda is much deeper and subtle in the West. The media is a oligarchy yet it's still "independent" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWLjYJ4BzvI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWLjYJ4BzvI You believe are the good guys despite history despite everything.
    - coldtea 7y ago
      >why isn't Bush in prison, why isn't Trump impeached? It's not a "small minority"; it's the majority Because in America you can openly talk about those things on the press and the internet and comments, and thus let off steam... Of course the end result is the same, as in China they keep happening!
    - jhanschoo 7y ago
      Trump isn't impeached simply because not enough representatives think that these are sufficiently severe atrocities to do so, and not enough people think that these are severe enough to undermine the state institutions. You have legislators and media critical of the government wrt CA and migrant camps. That's why you don't see so much civil disobedience, because these concerns are visibly reflected in the government. This doesn't mean I disagree with you that Chinese who know more about Tiananmen wouldn't "rise up", but against your argument that it is propaganda in the West that prevents people from civil disobedience. I would agree that propaganda and soft power shape opinion and taboo in the West and US, but on the other hand, I don't think that this insidious and subtle propaganda is anywhere near as powerful as the total propaganda and coercion practiced by some other regimes.
coldtea 7y ago
>One, we don’t censor that information You don't have to, when nobody really cares for it, and the system is such that nobody is gonna do anything about it (and the people who did those things get a slap on the wrist, if not a pat on the back). It's regimes that lack this that censor information -- regimes that are worried that e.g. protests could result in bringing them down. If you don't worry about that, you can let almost anything be said. Especially if you just let it be declassified/acknowledged decades after the fact, when even fewer will care.
- jhanschoo 7y ago
  The comment you are replying to is not making any judgment on the morality of the state, and is likely in agreement with you. It's just pointing out that the grandparent's rhetorical suggestion is undermined by an incorrect premise (that people don't know about US atrocities and their criticism and would be appalled to know them, where actually such information is easily available)
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

merpnderp 7y ago

Americans didn’t have their government machine gun down peaceful protestors, then the medics and doctors who went to help them, and then run over the bodies with tanks until they were mush. And if they had to learn about something that bad, they’d learn about it as soon as possible and the government would be powerless to cover it up.

jrockway 7y ago

Ultimately, what we have that China doesn't have is a system in place to address these concerns. Technology companies freely and openly made it more difficult for the NSA to spy. The prison system is on the minds of every politician and newspaper, and change is happening (slowly, sure). The Iraq war was debated to death. Every country is going to have problems. It can never make decisions that satisfy everyone. What matters is the ability to talk about it, like what we're doing here. Politics is always going to be slow, though; that's the tradeoff versus having a dictator.

Aaronstotle 7y ago

I can only speak for myself, my answer is no. I've read up on the numerous atrocities committed by the U.S. Government (highly recommend Wikileak Files: World according to U.S. Empire) I think citizens of every country shouldn't ignore their past, they should look directly towards it, grapple with the consequences, and critique it.

AWildC182 7y ago

It's cool, we already do. Just because you have problems doesn't mean you can't point out that someone else does too, as long as you have acknowledged yours.

SkyBelow 7y ago

No, but Americans do seem intent on labeling any modern day version of MKUltra to be a conspiracy theory only an idiot would believe. That might be worse than just censoring it.

adventured 7y ago

> Do you think Americans are going to hate their country after reading about ... Yes, this commonly occurs in fact. Americans trash their own country aggressively, routinely all over social media, for its flaws and past mistakes. See: Twitter, Reddit or Imgur comments every day of the week. We pay sports athletes and celebrities tens of millions of dollars and they regularly trash the US for its flaws and past mistakes. They do so all over social media, routinely, and with few repercussions (essentially none from the government, and few from social blowback). How many famous millionaire Hollywood celebrities would you like me to quote - eg from their tweets - saying they somehow hate the US or wish to leave?

SamReidHughes 7y ago
A small minority of Americans do that and when talking about large populations, it goes without saying that we’re not talking about population distributions in an absolutist sense.
- filoleg 7y ago
  It isn't about how many people do that, it is about how many people can do that publicly without any repercussions towards them from the state. And I would say, in the US that proportion comes to around "pretty much all of them".
  - SamReidHughes 7y ago
    Actually that is not what this conversation is about.
- pertymcpert 7y ago
  No not a small minority.

Wowfunhappy 7y ago

Reading about American atrocities doesn't make me hate my country, it makes me want my country to do better.