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If China wants to enforce global censorship by using their market as a hammer, America should use their market to enforce global (or at least bilateral) freedom

If China wants to enforce global censorship by using their market as a hammer, America should use their market to enforce global (or at least bilateral) freedom of speech. It's an intl trade issue, it's impossible to expect every company to stand up to the CCP when they use access to one of the biggest markets in the world as a weapon

Mirioron 7y ago
As a European, I would like to see that, but I think the EU would have a problem with the US demanding free speech, let alone most of the other countries outside the west.
- PavlovsCat 7y ago
  > I think the EU would have a problem with the US demanding free speech That's because you reduce it to the word "freedom of speech", and then expand it again, to all sorts of other things. Call it freedom to criticize governments, totalitarianism, murder, and so on, and there will be no issue. https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-a-million-people-are-jailed-at-china-s-gulags-i-escaped-here-s-what-goes-on-inside-1.7994216 https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-a-milli... Most people don't want to be treated like this. So, either they are against it, or they don't get to speak anything on the matter, being hypocrites. A double standard is no standard. It really is that simple.
ianleeclark 7y ago
> If China wants to enforce global censorship by using their market as a hammer, America should use their market to enforce global (or at least bilateral) freedom of speech. China has an interest in their global censorship, American companies don't have the same impetus towards free speech. China has roughly 4x the population of the United States, and, as their GDP per capita raises, they will increasingly start to fulfill the American role: vacuuming up trade surpluses. It would be a poor business decision for Western companies to not seek the larger, emerging market. These companies don't have nations, they just have the pursuit of shareholder value. You're fooling yourself if they're going to express any sort of value system contrary to that stated goal.
jasonlotito 7y ago
There was a plan to do that. Americans (including people here) hated it. The TPP, as many issues as it might have had, was the solution. Instead of supporting it, we voted for our wallets.

Mirioron 7y ago

As a European, I would like to see that, but I think the EU would have a problem with the US demanding free speech, let alone most of the other countries outside the west.

PavlovsCat 7y ago
> I think the EU would have a problem with the US demanding free speech That's because you reduce it to the word "freedom of speech", and then expand it again, to all sorts of other things. Call it freedom to criticize governments, totalitarianism, murder, and so on, and there will be no issue. https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-a-million-people-are-jailed-at-china-s-gulags-i-escaped-here-s-what-goes-on-inside-1.7994216 https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-a-milli... Most people don't want to be treated like this. So, either they are against it, or they don't get to speak anything on the matter, being hypocrites. A double standard is no standard. It really is that simple.

ianleeclark 7y ago

> If China wants to enforce global censorship by using their market as a hammer, America should use their market to enforce global (or at least bilateral) freedom of speech. China has an interest in their global censorship, American companies don't have the same impetus towards free speech. China has roughly 4x the population of the United States, and, as their GDP per capita raises, they will increasingly start to fulfill the American role: vacuuming up trade surpluses. It would be a poor business decision for Western companies to not seek the larger, emerging market. These companies don't have nations, they just have the pursuit of shareholder value. You're fooling yourself if they're going to express any sort of value system contrary to that stated goal.

jasonlotito 7y ago

There was a plan to do that. Americans (including people here) hated it. The TPP, as many issues as it might have had, was the solution. Instead of supporting it, we voted for our wallets.