5 ms·

I've been to China a few times, most recently in late 2018. I traveled overland by train from Beijing to Xian and then to Shanghai. Everything as a non-chinese

by ciguy 6y ago

I've been to China a few times, most recently in late 2018. I traveled overland by train from Beijing to Xian and then to Shanghai. Everything as a non-chinese citizen was just harder than it was when I visited in 2014. Buying train tickets was a massive hassle without a Chinese ID. Paying for anything was difficult because many places no longer take cash and you can't really get a proper WeChat account as a foreigner. The entire time I just couldn't shake the feeling that I was living in a dystopian future. Security around Tiananmen Square in Beijing was so overdone it would almost have been funny if it wasn't scary. Facial recognition scans on the metro system. In Shanghai they use facial recognition at crosswalks and then put up the name and picture of violators on a huge screen at the intersection (I can only assume they also deduct from their social credit score). If this is the direction China wants to continue to go in, I no longer want anything to do with it. As long as the CCP is in power I won't be visiting again. And now that includes Hong Kong sadly.

mlthoughts2018 6y ago
Completely agree. I lived and worked in HK a number of years ago and find China and Chinese people to be some of the most beautiful and interesting cultural assets in the world. So it sucks that I likely will never visit again in my lifetime. China is already dying, the oppressionist leadership just is self-deluded and doesn’t understand it yet. The further you move away from liberal democracy with deliberately decentralized power, the more isolationist your economy becomes. On the scale of years, sure you can manipulate markets, send elite spy teams to kill foreign dissidents, pressure other developed economies to buy your exports and respect your authoritarian escalations. On the scale of decades you can’t. China foolishly underestimates how smart and hard working everyone else is, how easily a generation can be disenfranchised from Chinese exports, and how little of a threat Chinese cyber warfare truly is. China is just a large, slow North Korea with enough starting capital to superficially appear OK in the short run.
- jarfil 6y ago
  I'm not sure China is underestimating anything. They had an asset, in the form of millions of underqualified workers, and they've used it, to manufacture cheap stuff. But with increasing automation, that asset was never going to last; every passing year it's becoming easier for other countries to replace Chinese manufacturing with local developments, and I think they know it. In order to stay relevant, China needs a better educated workforce, but in order to control those better educated people, they will need ever better control mechanisms. I doubt they'll be able to make it work in the long run, so they likely will need to change strategies, but right now it makes sense.
  - mlthoughts2018 6y ago
    I think you misunderstand > “ but in order to control those better educated people, they will need ever better control mechanisms.” This is like a building whose own load directly undermines its own stability, or a roller coaster whose own construction dynamics tears itself apart little by little with each run. Trying to institute mass social control while changing a population to be highly educated knowledge workers is like boiling the ocean. In some small local patch of time, it looks scary (ooooh social credit system, face recognition everywhere, disappeared artists and journalists, cyber warfare.. spooky) Zoom out on the scale of 50 years and it’s farcically stupid. Wanting an enduring human population asset and wanting authoritarian control are fundamentally incompatible desires. At best they can be sustained through force on short time scales, then ending up very very bloody for the leadership involved.
    - sterlind 6y ago
      You can be highly educated at engineering and still know nothing about politics or philosophy. I think the best thing they can do is induce political apathy. Discourage people from trying to get into even the Party apparatus, except as functionaries doing repetitive, menial jobs, and then keep people prosperous so they don't question. I've certainly known a lot of engineers - Western engineers, even - who didn't care about politics because they simply didn't need to.
      - mlthoughts2018 6y ago
        I don’t agree. To become highly educated in really any type of knowledge work, it requires a type of intellectual curiosity and openness to the scientific method applied to all possible policy decision making that is incompatible with the generalization you claim, at a fundamental level. The drives simply can’t coexist in the same mind at the scale of a society. The drive of scientific inquiry required to be literate in almost all knowledge work is an incompatible internal drive against mindless acceptance of authoritarian policy.
        abandonliberty 6y ago
tpmx 6y ago
I last visited China a few years ago. I felt a bit sad, because I felt like it was the last time. It was. I got the same same feeling. They are building a new and technologically "better" Soviet Union, actually implementing a bunch of the ideas from Orwell's '1984' novel about totalitarian communism. I feel (selfishly) happy that I got to experience Hong Kong a bunch of times while it still existed as free city.
rorykoehler 6y ago
Posted 10 mins ago and already downvoted. Do HN not have algos to stop this astroturfing behaviour? It’s becoming very prevalent for anything that criticises the CCP.
- tpmx 6y ago
  It will be on the second or third page in a few minutes, after a few "trusted" HN members object. That's the extent of the "algorithm".
- ciguy 6y ago
  Yep, every time I post anything that mentions China I lose Karma, but I don't particularly care. Sometimes the comments start with 10+ upvotes and then suddenly a wave of downvotes comes. Most recently some very new accounts with mostly pro china submissions and comments began using my real name and posting it in comments, apparently thinking I would be scared of having my real name associated with anything critical of China.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - Nginx487 6y ago
    Karma is just a counter in database. Hong Kongers do not afraid to face a death sentence for opposing the regime. Don't afraid to tell the truth, the worst may happen to you is a couple of downvotes by troll factory workers from Beijing.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- TimTheTinker 6y ago
  Comments about voting are generally off-topic. Although if you have genuine concerns about astroturfing, I suggest emailing hn@ycombinator.com.
  - deleted 6y ago
rat323 6y ago
I don't know how China will cope with you not visiting. This may destroy the CCP altogether!
ketzu 6y ago
I went to Beijing in 2019 and while I felt the security of subway stations was a bit overdone (metal detectors and bag scanners) I had little trouble buying things: while shops wanted me to pay with wechat they accepted cash all the time. I also found the security of tiennam square not much different from the eiffel tower (which I didn't enter because the security seems such a hassle at that time). Security of very high profile spots seems to be high in general these days. Not to deny your experience, I just had a different one. When talking to other travelers, it seems difference in experience happens all the time while traveling.
- ciguy 6y ago
  I've been to the Eiffel tower several times. The security there is not even in the same league as the security as Tiananmen Square.
  - ketzu 6y ago
    My experience in tienanmen: Showing my passwort and a bag scanner, going through. Area was limited with small metal fences. My experience at the eiffel tower: Bag scanner, didn't go through (because I had a huge bag which was not allowed). Area was limited with huge glass panes. (Don't know if they want to see any ID) So it felt very much the same to me, but the security in Paris was probably not police (I didn't go fully in, so I don't remember).
    - ciguy 6y ago
      You just ignored the armored vehicles and police station permanently setup at one end of the square? The facial recognition when you go through the scanners? The guards posted at vantage points with rifles? You were either paying no attention at all, or you are intentionally misrepresenting the situation.
      - ebg13 6y ago
        > The guards posted at vantage points with rifles? Your other points notwithstanding, rifles aren't particularly special in French policing. Gendarmerie are basically everywhere.
jackewiehose 6y ago
> The entire time I just couldn't shake the feeling that I was living in a dystopian future [...] they use facial recognition at crosswalks and then put up the name and picture of violators on a huge screen at the intersection "feeling of a dystopian future"? That sounds straight like from an episode of Black Mirror.
- ciguy 6y ago
  Yeah actually I did get a Black Mirror kind of vibe at certain times for sure.
dehrmann 6y ago
I regret that I wasn't able to see HK before China got to it. While I hope for the best for Taiwan, it might be one of the places I go next for that reason.

by ciguy 6y ago

mlthoughts2018 6y ago

Completely agree. I lived and worked in HK a number of years ago and find China and Chinese people to be some of the most beautiful and interesting cultural assets in the world. So it sucks that I likely will never visit again in my lifetime. China is already dying, the oppressionist leadership just is self-deluded and doesn’t understand it yet. The further you move away from liberal democracy with deliberately decentralized power, the more isolationist your economy becomes. On the scale of years, sure you can manipulate markets, send elite spy teams to kill foreign dissidents, pressure other developed economies to buy your exports and respect your authoritarian escalations. On the scale of decades you can’t. China foolishly underestimates how smart and hard working everyone else is, how easily a generation can be disenfranchised from Chinese exports, and how little of a threat Chinese cyber warfare truly is. China is just a large, slow North Korea with enough starting capital to superficially appear OK in the short run.

jarfil 6y ago
I'm not sure China is underestimating anything. They had an asset, in the form of millions of underqualified workers, and they've used it, to manufacture cheap stuff. But with increasing automation, that asset was never going to last; every passing year it's becoming easier for other countries to replace Chinese manufacturing with local developments, and I think they know it. In order to stay relevant, China needs a better educated workforce, but in order to control those better educated people, they will need ever better control mechanisms. I doubt they'll be able to make it work in the long run, so they likely will need to change strategies, but right now it makes sense.
- mlthoughts2018 6y ago
  I think you misunderstand > “ but in order to control those better educated people, they will need ever better control mechanisms.” This is like a building whose own load directly undermines its own stability, or a roller coaster whose own construction dynamics tears itself apart little by little with each run. Trying to institute mass social control while changing a population to be highly educated knowledge workers is like boiling the ocean. In some small local patch of time, it looks scary (ooooh social credit system, face recognition everywhere, disappeared artists and journalists, cyber warfare.. spooky) Zoom out on the scale of 50 years and it’s farcically stupid. Wanting an enduring human population asset and wanting authoritarian control are fundamentally incompatible desires. At best they can be sustained through force on short time scales, then ending up very very bloody for the leadership involved.
  - sterlind 6y ago
    You can be highly educated at engineering and still know nothing about politics or philosophy. I think the best thing they can do is induce political apathy. Discourage people from trying to get into even the Party apparatus, except as functionaries doing repetitive, menial jobs, and then keep people prosperous so they don't question. I've certainly known a lot of engineers - Western engineers, even - who didn't care about politics because they simply didn't need to.
    - mlthoughts2018 6y ago
      I don’t agree. To become highly educated in really any type of knowledge work, it requires a type of intellectual curiosity and openness to the scientific method applied to all possible policy decision making that is incompatible with the generalization you claim, at a fundamental level. The drives simply can’t coexist in the same mind at the scale of a society. The drive of scientific inquiry required to be literate in almost all knowledge work is an incompatible internal drive against mindless acceptance of authoritarian policy.
      - abandonliberty 6y ago

tpmx 6y ago

I last visited China a few years ago. I felt a bit sad, because I felt like it was the last time. It was. I got the same same feeling. They are building a new and technologically "better" Soviet Union, actually implementing a bunch of the ideas from Orwell's '1984' novel about totalitarian communism. I feel (selfishly) happy that I got to experience Hong Kong a bunch of times while it still existed as free city.

rorykoehler 6y ago

Posted 10 mins ago and already downvoted. Do HN not have algos to stop this astroturfing behaviour? It’s becoming very prevalent for anything that criticises the CCP.

tpmx 6y ago
It will be on the second or third page in a few minutes, after a few "trusted" HN members object. That's the extent of the "algorithm".
ciguy 6y ago
Yep, every time I post anything that mentions China I lose Karma, but I don't particularly care. Sometimes the comments start with 10+ upvotes and then suddenly a wave of downvotes comes. Most recently some very new accounts with mostly pro china submissions and comments began using my real name and posting it in comments, apparently thinking I would be scared of having my real name associated with anything critical of China.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- Nginx487 6y ago
  Karma is just a counter in database. Hong Kongers do not afraid to face a death sentence for opposing the regime. Don't afraid to tell the truth, the worst may happen to you is a couple of downvotes by troll factory workers from Beijing.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
TimTheTinker 6y ago
Comments about voting are generally off-topic. Although if you have genuine concerns about astroturfing, I suggest emailing hn@ycombinator.com.
- deleted 6y ago

rat323 6y ago

I don't know how China will cope with you not visiting. This may destroy the CCP altogether!

ketzu 6y ago

I went to Beijing in 2019 and while I felt the security of subway stations was a bit overdone (metal detectors and bag scanners) I had little trouble buying things: while shops wanted me to pay with wechat they accepted cash all the time. I also found the security of tiennam square not much different from the eiffel tower (which I didn't enter because the security seems such a hassle at that time). Security of very high profile spots seems to be high in general these days. Not to deny your experience, I just had a different one. When talking to other travelers, it seems difference in experience happens all the time while traveling.

ciguy 6y ago
I've been to the Eiffel tower several times. The security there is not even in the same league as the security as Tiananmen Square.
- ketzu 6y ago
  My experience in tienanmen: Showing my passwort and a bag scanner, going through. Area was limited with small metal fences. My experience at the eiffel tower: Bag scanner, didn't go through (because I had a huge bag which was not allowed). Area was limited with huge glass panes. (Don't know if they want to see any ID) So it felt very much the same to me, but the security in Paris was probably not police (I didn't go fully in, so I don't remember).
  - ciguy 6y ago
    You just ignored the armored vehicles and police station permanently setup at one end of the square? The facial recognition when you go through the scanners? The guards posted at vantage points with rifles? You were either paying no attention at all, or you are intentionally misrepresenting the situation.
    - ebg13 6y ago
      > The guards posted at vantage points with rifles? Your other points notwithstanding, rifles aren't particularly special in French policing. Gendarmerie are basically everywhere.

jackewiehose 6y ago

> The entire time I just couldn't shake the feeling that I was living in a dystopian future [...] they use facial recognition at crosswalks and then put up the name and picture of violators on a huge screen at the intersection "feeling of a dystopian future"? That sounds straight like from an episode of Black Mirror.

ciguy 6y ago
Yeah actually I did get a Black Mirror kind of vibe at certain times for sure.

dehrmann 6y ago

I regret that I wasn't able to see HK before China got to it. While I hope for the best for Taiwan, it might be one of the places I go next for that reason.