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It seems to me that China can only make wrong in your eyes. If it takes time to act it is because the system causes this failure. If the government acts swif

It seems to me that China can only make wrong in your eyes. If it takes time to act it is because the system causes this failure. If the government acts swiftly, it is because they are in panic. If it does not solve the situation, of course because they have a terrible oppressive culture. If the problem is fixed. Of course, because these are one of the few advantages of having an authoritarian system. No matter what China does, you will say something bad. I know this makes me sound like CCP shill, but I am not. I only want to read an assessment made with the same level of rigour and sympathy, if, instead of China was Denmark or Australia.

Jamwinner 7y ago
Denmark is nothing like china besides being a country. If china wants to be compared favorably to other contries, the need to act favorible to most countries. Full stop.
totalZero 7y ago
I think the point is that the Chinese government didn't act swiftly, arrested people who initially spread information about the disease in Wuhan, failed to contain the situation, and has now allowed it to become a global problem. Due to the way China's government has lied in the past, I am hesitant to believe their numbers or their narrative until it can be confirmed by outside parties.
- FooBarWidget 7y ago
  Then does the fact that they're responding much more quickly and much more heavily this time mean nothing at all? You say "didn't act swiftly". What is swift to you? A month went by since the first case before they started getting their act together, true, but how quickly do you think other nations could have acted? Compared to SARS, where it took them months, 1 month is a major improvement. It's still not good enough because the virus is that ruthless, but Rome isn't built in one day. I have reason to believe that they've learned a great deal from how SARS was handled, and that they'll respond even better in a future outbreak event.
- TheNorthman 7y ago
  Are there any government whose narrative you trust? It seems to me that never trusting anything a governments because they have once [0] lied is a little extreme. In fact, I'm not sure I can name a country whose government hasn't lied in recent times. This would then extend to academia as well, since most research is in some way funded by the state. [0]: I know they have lied more than once. I'm not sure what a more appropriate word would have been.
  - alasdair_ 7y ago
    I would trust the CDC’s numbers because I know of no incentive for them to lie and their numbers have generally been truthful in the past. In addition, any doctor at the CDC is free to say “these numbers are fraudulent” publicly without worrying they will be arrested. I would not trust a political party’s economy numbers without external verification, however, because a party has an incentive to lie.
    - TheNorthman 7y ago
      > because I know of no incentive for them to lie Their incentive to lie seems obvious to me. The US benefits from what hurts China. Besides, the CDC have been caught accepting millions of dollars from commercial interests ("Big pharma"), which obviously also plays a role in fear mongering.
      - Supermancho 7y ago
        So it is the US Gov bribing the CDC to "hurt" China? No. While the CDC is tarnished by the events surrounding the 2015 scandals, and the US is in opposition to many Chinese initiatives, these things are not related. Hurting China via misinformation about a legitimate contagion hurts the world. There are levels of trust and Chinese officials are about as reliable as US candidates running for office (ie I have 0 trust).
  - stale2002 7y ago
    > because they have once [0] lied is a little extreme But it is not that they have once lied that it is a problem. It is instead, that just right now, a couple weeks ago, china was arresting journalists for this stuff. If you want to say that we should ignore bad behavior from 20 years ago, because it is no longer relevant, thats fine. But we are not talking about stuff from 20 years ago. We are instead talking about behavior that china does all the time, right now.
adnzzzzZ 7y ago
This is the first comment I've made on this forum about China, so whoever you're speaking to is clearly not me but a collective "you" instead. Responding as myself, I simply added balance to the comment above me. Many people are making the exact same argument the person I responded to is making, and while that argument isn't false, it's clearly misleading. China does get credit for responding to the situation as they did after the central government got involved. However, we must remember that the situation would likely not have occurred in the first place if the people speaking out about it early on weren't punished, which wouldn't happen in most western countries as local governments have way less power and way less incentives to make that kind of thing happen. This situation is a good example of the problems of their authoritarian system, and a good reminder of why we value (or why we should value) the things we value in the West, like free speech.
- stone-monkey 7y ago
  > However, we must remember that the situation would likely not have occurred in the first place if the people speaking out about it early on weren't punished, which wouldn't happen in most western countries as local governments have way less power and way less incentives to make that kind of thing happen. I'm not saying the Chinese government doesn't have problems, nor am I saying free speech is bad, but I have no idea how you could come to this conclusion that free speech would somehow limit the spread of this disease. We have free speech in the US and that's literally led to the rise of anti inoculation advocacy.
  - adnzzzzZ 7y ago
    Anti-vaccination advocacy exists because some kids do get problems from vaccines. I'm not an anti-vaxxer but it's an inherent feature of how vaccines work that a very small percentage of kids will have some serious things happen as a result of being vaccinated. When you have a big population and the Internet, this small percentage of parents will logically come together to cope with their problems. The fact that those people exist and they can talk about it is evidence that our system is working, not that it isn't.
    - 7y ago
blfr 7y ago
It seems to me that China can only make wrong in your eyes. It's a semi-communist dictatorship. They do have a terrible, oppressive system. This is not some questionable assumption. And naturally, free people's opinion of China is much lower than of Denmark or Australia.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]

Jamwinner 7y ago

Denmark is nothing like china besides being a country. If china wants to be compared favorably to other contries, the need to act favorible to most countries. Full stop.

totalZero 7y ago

I think the point is that the Chinese government didn't act swiftly, arrested people who initially spread information about the disease in Wuhan, failed to contain the situation, and has now allowed it to become a global problem. Due to the way China's government has lied in the past, I am hesitant to believe their numbers or their narrative until it can be confirmed by outside parties.

FooBarWidget 7y ago
Then does the fact that they're responding much more quickly and much more heavily this time mean nothing at all? You say "didn't act swiftly". What is swift to you? A month went by since the first case before they started getting their act together, true, but how quickly do you think other nations could have acted? Compared to SARS, where it took them months, 1 month is a major improvement. It's still not good enough because the virus is that ruthless, but Rome isn't built in one day. I have reason to believe that they've learned a great deal from how SARS was handled, and that they'll respond even better in a future outbreak event.
TheNorthman 7y ago
Are there any government whose narrative you trust? It seems to me that never trusting anything a governments because they have once [0] lied is a little extreme. In fact, I'm not sure I can name a country whose government hasn't lied in recent times. This would then extend to academia as well, since most research is in some way funded by the state. [0]: I know they have lied more than once. I'm not sure what a more appropriate word would have been.
- alasdair_ 7y ago
  I would trust the CDC’s numbers because I know of no incentive for them to lie and their numbers have generally been truthful in the past. In addition, any doctor at the CDC is free to say “these numbers are fraudulent” publicly without worrying they will be arrested. I would not trust a political party’s economy numbers without external verification, however, because a party has an incentive to lie.
  - TheNorthman 7y ago
    > because I know of no incentive for them to lie Their incentive to lie seems obvious to me. The US benefits from what hurts China. Besides, the CDC have been caught accepting millions of dollars from commercial interests ("Big pharma"), which obviously also plays a role in fear mongering.
    - Supermancho 7y ago
      So it is the US Gov bribing the CDC to "hurt" China? No. While the CDC is tarnished by the events surrounding the 2015 scandals, and the US is in opposition to many Chinese initiatives, these things are not related. Hurting China via misinformation about a legitimate contagion hurts the world. There are levels of trust and Chinese officials are about as reliable as US candidates running for office (ie I have 0 trust).
- stale2002 7y ago
  > because they have once [0] lied is a little extreme But it is not that they have once lied that it is a problem. It is instead, that just right now, a couple weeks ago, china was arresting journalists for this stuff. If you want to say that we should ignore bad behavior from 20 years ago, because it is no longer relevant, thats fine. But we are not talking about stuff from 20 years ago. We are instead talking about behavior that china does all the time, right now.

adnzzzzZ 7y ago

This is the first comment I've made on this forum about China, so whoever you're speaking to is clearly not me but a collective "you" instead. Responding as myself, I simply added balance to the comment above me. Many people are making the exact same argument the person I responded to is making, and while that argument isn't false, it's clearly misleading. China does get credit for responding to the situation as they did after the central government got involved. However, we must remember that the situation would likely not have occurred in the first place if the people speaking out about it early on weren't punished, which wouldn't happen in most western countries as local governments have way less power and way less incentives to make that kind of thing happen. This situation is a good example of the problems of their authoritarian system, and a good reminder of why we value (or why we should value) the things we value in the West, like free speech.

stone-monkey 7y ago
> However, we must remember that the situation would likely not have occurred in the first place if the people speaking out about it early on weren't punished, which wouldn't happen in most western countries as local governments have way less power and way less incentives to make that kind of thing happen. I'm not saying the Chinese government doesn't have problems, nor am I saying free speech is bad, but I have no idea how you could come to this conclusion that free speech would somehow limit the spread of this disease. We have free speech in the US and that's literally led to the rise of anti inoculation advocacy.
- adnzzzzZ 7y ago
  Anti-vaccination advocacy exists because some kids do get problems from vaccines. I'm not an anti-vaxxer but it's an inherent feature of how vaccines work that a very small percentage of kids will have some serious things happen as a result of being vaccinated. When you have a big population and the Internet, this small percentage of parents will logically come together to cope with their problems. The fact that those people exist and they can talk about it is evidence that our system is working, not that it isn't.
  - 7y ago

blfr 7y ago

It seems to me that China can only make wrong in your eyes. It's a semi-communist dictatorship. They do have a terrible, oppressive system. This is not some questionable assumption. And naturally, free people's opinion of China is much lower than of Denmark or Australia.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]