4 ms·

It's concerted effort by Chinese establishment to whitewash their handling of the whole thing. They even want to pretend that the virus didn't even originate in

by hawk_ 7y ago

It's concerted effort by Chinese establishment to whitewash their handling of the whole thing. They even want to pretend that the virus didn't even originate in China! https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/13/asia/china-coronavirus-us-lijian-zhao-intl-hnk/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/13/asia/china-coronavirus-us...

guardiangod 7y ago
You should see what some of my Chinese relatives/friends are forwarding in WeChat- 1. CIA created the virus and released the virus in China as a test. 2. (In Chinese there's no word for 'flu', only 'cold', or 'transmissible cold'.) The 'cold' virus originated in US last year and killed more than 10k Americans before US sent special force to Wuhan to infect us Chinese! Even the head of CDC admitted it (see article). 3. A 5 member US special force went to Wuhan in November. They returned to US and all died in suspicious circumstances. 4. Now all the western countries are sending infected agents into China to blow the epidemic again. You might notice a common theme that US is the enemy, and they are the originator of all bad things that happened to China. This is not a coincidence.
- sieabahlpark 7y ago
  That's probably exactly what China wants it's population to believe.
- knzhou 7y ago
  Sigh. Each dumb conspiracy theory in Chinese social media has an equal and opposite dumb conspiracy theory in American social media.
  - taiwanboy 7y ago
    The CIA rumour is no less raised by the CHINESE FOREIGN MINISTRY spokesman https://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-official-says-us-army-maybe-brought-coronavirus-to-wuhan-2020-3 https://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-official-says-us-arm...
    - knolax 7y ago
      ...on Twitter.
      - scotty79 7y ago
        Which is the main medium that US president uses for communication with public.
    - knzhou 7y ago
      And the equal and opposite rumor is being raised by an American Senator: https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-bioweapon-tom-cotton-conspiracy-theory-china-warfare-leak-2020-2 https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-bioweapon-tom-co...
  - spectramax 7y ago
    Why does every criticism of China have to have a corollary accompanying US criticism? Can we not just talk about one issue at a time instead of muddling up the waters?
    - indemnity 7y ago
      Classic Chinese / Soviet tactic. Every action can be justified because someone else did something bad at some point in time.
      - knzhou 7y ago
        Sorry if you're that nostalgic, but the cold war ended decades ago.
      - refurb 7y ago
        You're right. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_you_are_lynching_Negroes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_you_are_lynching_Negroes Use of the phrases like these, exemplifying the tu quoque logical fallacy, was an attempt to deflect criticism of the Soviet Union by referring to racial discrimination and lynching in the United States.
      - FpUser 7y ago
        Look at it from the other angle. If you are to blame someone for doing XYZ I assume that you are sparkling clean. If however you are doing the same thing simply get lost. You have no moral right to blame someone for doing exactly the same thing you do. It is not "Classic Chinese / Soviet tactic (TM)". It is a friggin natural sense of justice that normal people possess.
        jessaustin 7y ago
        In modern parlance, a respect for fairness and basic logical coherence is called "whataboutism".
        FpUser 7y ago
  - guardiangod 7y ago
    Look I know this is dumb and all. Other Chinese relatives/friends (usually oversea) are trying to combat all these fake news. But 2 things- 1. WeChat is heavily patrolled and monitored by the PRC censors. If the PRC doesn't want these rumors to circulate, these rumors would not last more than a hour (or seconds. It's very enlightening to see the sensitive terms get filtered in real time.) In fact, in the last week or so, I've been getting more conspiracy forwards. The spread of rumors on this topic on WeChat is speeding up. 2. I don't see US' Secretary of State accusing China of intentionally creating the virus.
    - knzhou 7y ago
      > If the PRC doesn't want these rumors to circulate, these rumors would not last more than a hour Reddit tries to stop conspiracy theories with quarantines and bans. But they're rapidly spreading anyway. > 2. I don't see US' Secretary of State accusing China of intentionally creating the virus. It really is symmetric: Tom Cotton, Senator from Arkansas, has been on Fox saying exactly this. Fox also has other people on saying it was a joint North Korean and Chinese bioweapon, made solely to attack America, but released initially in China as a decoy. Fox is the most watched cable news channel in America.
      - taiwanboy 7y ago
        Disingenuous comparison. Ministers of foreign affairs in China is similar to Secretary of State in US. A senator is nowhere near equivalent.
        knzhou 7y ago
        Senators are within the top 100 most powerful people in the US. They represent millions of people. I think you're just grasping at straws because you've already decided what narrative you want. In which case there's nothing more for me to say here.
        seanmcdirmid 7y ago
        Senators are from the legislative branch and have no executive power, however. Their power stems from what they can vote on, eg what justices they can confirm. China for all effective purposes lacks an independent judicial or legislative branch, so it is difficult to compare the two governments.
spectramax 7y ago
Why is this downvoted? There is a source and the point is valid. This is a fact of what's going on in China. To the downvoters - explain.
- peyao 7y ago
  Don't pretend you don't know the answer.
dirtyid 7y ago
For context, there's a growing number of Chinese diplomats from younger generation who want China to reciprocate the rhetoric of the current US administration. Expect a lot more ridiculous clap backs like this, especially on Twitter where Chinese diplomats have been cultivating a following since HK. This is probably a direct response to folks in US administration using Wuhan/Chinese Virus. Chinese international messaging has been predicable and fairly mellow, western MSM likes to blow it out of proportion, but looks like they're about to fully embrace post-truth twitter drama.
- seanmcdirmid 7y ago
  You do realize that the MSM and current US administration are completely at odds right? Just by using that term, MSM, would get most people flagged as a Trump supporter. The US drama is mostly internal and has little to do with China.
  - jessaustin 7y ago
    You do realize that's all marketing bullshit, right? They're so at odds they agreed to give the Pentagon $100B more this year than last, in addition to loosening accounting rules so they can hide even more of their shenanigans from the taxpayer. They're so at odds that Gitmo is still open, we're still fighting in a dozen nations, we're undermining the democratic governments of several more, and they just gave the next appointed coup leader a unanimous standing ovation at the state of the union ("it's not good!") speech. They're so at odds that to contest an election with a loud-mouthed incoherent corrupt old person with shady Ukraine connections, they've chosen... a loud-mouthed incoherent corrupt old person with shady Ukraine connections. They're so at odds that when the government decided they needed to destroy a journalist for doing journalism, for revealing to the USA voter and tax payer the evil shit done with their votes and taxes, not a single journalist anyone had ever heard of spoke up in his defense. Oh yeah, that MSM is speaking "truth to power" now. Good grief.
    - seanmcdirmid 7y ago
      I really don’t think you understand how government works: the media is run by private industry and doesn’t have power to give the pentagon anything. They also don’t run Gitmo, they don’t fight wars, etc... Yes, the American media isn’t perfect, but deriding it as “fake news” while CCTV a somehow put on a pedestal just seems really wrong. The fact is that it is at least independent of the government and doesn’t have to act in the interest in the ruling executive (and in fact, depending on who is president, there will always be plenty of media that isn’t friendly to their agenda). The first thing authoritarians do when they gain power is to try and delegitimize the free press so they can get rid of it. That is exactly wha it is going on now, and whenever someone uses the term MSM, that is what I know their agenda is.
knzhou 7y ago
You can't just declare everything that any low-ranking Chinese bureaucrat does to be an "effort by Chinese establishment". This is nationalistic flame-bait.
takeda 7y ago
If there was any country that did it maliciously, it would be Russia. The government never had any ethical qualms (and is known of doing many horrible things), the things they way they are is benefiting the most to them, they don't have many cases surprisingly even though they declared 2 cases early on, when many countries didn't have any. Yes, a conspiracy theory, but there's no denying that current state benefits them the most.

by hawk_ 7y ago

guardiangod 7y ago

You should see what some of my Chinese relatives/friends are forwarding in WeChat- 1. CIA created the virus and released the virus in China as a test. 2. (In Chinese there's no word for 'flu', only 'cold', or 'transmissible cold'.) The 'cold' virus originated in US last year and killed more than 10k Americans before US sent special force to Wuhan to infect us Chinese! Even the head of CDC admitted it (see article). 3. A 5 member US special force went to Wuhan in November. They returned to US and all died in suspicious circumstances. 4. Now all the western countries are sending infected agents into China to blow the epidemic again. You might notice a common theme that US is the enemy, and they are the originator of all bad things that happened to China. This is not a coincidence.

sieabahlpark 7y ago
That's probably exactly what China wants it's population to believe.
knzhou 7y ago
Sigh. Each dumb conspiracy theory in Chinese social media has an equal and opposite dumb conspiracy theory in American social media.
- taiwanboy 7y ago
  The CIA rumour is no less raised by the CHINESE FOREIGN MINISTRY spokesman https://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-official-says-us-army-maybe-brought-coronavirus-to-wuhan-2020-3 https://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-official-says-us-arm...
  - knolax 7y ago
    ...on Twitter.
    - scotty79 7y ago
      Which is the main medium that US president uses for communication with public.
  - knzhou 7y ago
    And the equal and opposite rumor is being raised by an American Senator: https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-bioweapon-tom-cotton-conspiracy-theory-china-warfare-leak-2020-2 https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-bioweapon-tom-co...
- spectramax 7y ago
  Why does every criticism of China have to have a corollary accompanying US criticism? Can we not just talk about one issue at a time instead of muddling up the waters?
  - indemnity 7y ago
    Classic Chinese / Soviet tactic. Every action can be justified because someone else did something bad at some point in time.
    - knzhou 7y ago
      Sorry if you're that nostalgic, but the cold war ended decades ago.
    - refurb 7y ago
      You're right. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_you_are_lynching_Negroes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_you_are_lynching_Negroes Use of the phrases like these, exemplifying the tu quoque logical fallacy, was an attempt to deflect criticism of the Soviet Union by referring to racial discrimination and lynching in the United States.
    - FpUser 7y ago
      Look at it from the other angle. If you are to blame someone for doing XYZ I assume that you are sparkling clean. If however you are doing the same thing simply get lost. You have no moral right to blame someone for doing exactly the same thing you do. It is not "Classic Chinese / Soviet tactic (TM)". It is a friggin natural sense of justice that normal people possess.
      - jessaustin 7y ago
        In modern parlance, a respect for fairness and basic logical coherence is called "whataboutism".
        FpUser 7y ago
- guardiangod 7y ago
  Look I know this is dumb and all. Other Chinese relatives/friends (usually oversea) are trying to combat all these fake news. But 2 things- 1. WeChat is heavily patrolled and monitored by the PRC censors. If the PRC doesn't want these rumors to circulate, these rumors would not last more than a hour (or seconds. It's very enlightening to see the sensitive terms get filtered in real time.) In fact, in the last week or so, I've been getting more conspiracy forwards. The spread of rumors on this topic on WeChat is speeding up. 2. I don't see US' Secretary of State accusing China of intentionally creating the virus.
  - knzhou 7y ago
    > If the PRC doesn't want these rumors to circulate, these rumors would not last more than a hour Reddit tries to stop conspiracy theories with quarantines and bans. But they're rapidly spreading anyway. > 2. I don't see US' Secretary of State accusing China of intentionally creating the virus. It really is symmetric: Tom Cotton, Senator from Arkansas, has been on Fox saying exactly this. Fox also has other people on saying it was a joint North Korean and Chinese bioweapon, made solely to attack America, but released initially in China as a decoy. Fox is the most watched cable news channel in America.
    - taiwanboy 7y ago
      Disingenuous comparison. Ministers of foreign affairs in China is similar to Secretary of State in US. A senator is nowhere near equivalent.
      - knzhou 7y ago
        Senators are within the top 100 most powerful people in the US. They represent millions of people. I think you're just grasping at straws because you've already decided what narrative you want. In which case there's nothing more for me to say here.
        seanmcdirmid 7y ago
        Senators are from the legislative branch and have no executive power, however. Their power stems from what they can vote on, eg what justices they can confirm. China for all effective purposes lacks an independent judicial or legislative branch, so it is difficult to compare the two governments.

spectramax 7y ago

Why is this downvoted? There is a source and the point is valid. This is a fact of what's going on in China. To the downvoters - explain.

peyao 7y ago
Don't pretend you don't know the answer.

dirtyid 7y ago

For context, there's a growing number of Chinese diplomats from younger generation who want China to reciprocate the rhetoric of the current US administration. Expect a lot more ridiculous clap backs like this, especially on Twitter where Chinese diplomats have been cultivating a following since HK. This is probably a direct response to folks in US administration using Wuhan/Chinese Virus. Chinese international messaging has been predicable and fairly mellow, western MSM likes to blow it out of proportion, but looks like they're about to fully embrace post-truth twitter drama.

seanmcdirmid 7y ago
You do realize that the MSM and current US administration are completely at odds right? Just by using that term, MSM, would get most people flagged as a Trump supporter. The US drama is mostly internal and has little to do with China.
- jessaustin 7y ago
  You do realize that's all marketing bullshit, right? They're so at odds they agreed to give the Pentagon $100B more this year than last, in addition to loosening accounting rules so they can hide even more of their shenanigans from the taxpayer. They're so at odds that Gitmo is still open, we're still fighting in a dozen nations, we're undermining the democratic governments of several more, and they just gave the next appointed coup leader a unanimous standing ovation at the state of the union ("it's not good!") speech. They're so at odds that to contest an election with a loud-mouthed incoherent corrupt old person with shady Ukraine connections, they've chosen... a loud-mouthed incoherent corrupt old person with shady Ukraine connections. They're so at odds that when the government decided they needed to destroy a journalist for doing journalism, for revealing to the USA voter and tax payer the evil shit done with their votes and taxes, not a single journalist anyone had ever heard of spoke up in his defense. Oh yeah, that MSM is speaking "truth to power" now. Good grief.
  - seanmcdirmid 7y ago
    I really don’t think you understand how government works: the media is run by private industry and doesn’t have power to give the pentagon anything. They also don’t run Gitmo, they don’t fight wars, etc... Yes, the American media isn’t perfect, but deriding it as “fake news” while CCTV a somehow put on a pedestal just seems really wrong. The fact is that it is at least independent of the government and doesn’t have to act in the interest in the ruling executive (and in fact, depending on who is president, there will always be plenty of media that isn’t friendly to their agenda). The first thing authoritarians do when they gain power is to try and delegitimize the free press so they can get rid of it. That is exactly wha it is going on now, and whenever someone uses the term MSM, that is what I know their agenda is.

knzhou 7y ago

You can't just declare everything that any low-ranking Chinese bureaucrat does to be an "effort by Chinese establishment". This is nationalistic flame-bait.

takeda 7y ago

If there was any country that did it maliciously, it would be Russia. The government never had any ethical qualms (and is known of doing many horrible things), the things they way they are is benefiting the most to them, they don't have many cases surprisingly even though they declared 2 cases early on, when many countries didn't have any. Yes, a conspiracy theory, but there's no denying that current state benefits them the most.