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How would you have any idea what China does except through various news articles? Why would an authoritarian control of information lead to only bad information

How would you have any idea what China does except through various news articles? Why would an authoritarian control of information lead to only bad information getting out? China does not have a great government, but American coverage of it is also extreme propaganda.

cowsandmilk 6y ago
There is a huge Chinese diaspora in the US with family members who still live in China. They are the source of information that most in the US rely on more than news articles.
underseacables 6y ago
And what is extreme propaganda? Is the Uyghur genocide propaganda? Is the Murder of Tibetans, aggression against Taiwan, imprisonment of journalists, propaganda? Show me American propaganda that does not have a strong correlation of truth, and I’ll show you concentration camps and disappeared citizens. When was the last time the U.S. government put a doctor in prison for trying to warn others about a deadly virus? No matter the corruption of America, its corporatacracy and greed, no matter the propaganda of its politicians, nothing in the developed western world can hold a candle to the CURRENT genocide of China.
- hungryhobo 6y ago
  What if the Uyghur genocide is indeed propaganda? How would you know? A lot of the Uyghur witness have been revealed to have ties to NED and the population of Uyghur minorities in china have increased. If there is an active genocide on the scale that's being reported, why have we not seen reports of mass exodus into neighbouring countries?
- boomboomsubban 6y ago
  >nothing in the developed western world can hold a candle to the CURRENT genocide of China Things that the developed Western world are causing are worse though. The UN had repeatedly called the ongoing Yemen situation the largest ongoing humanitarian crisis, killing over 200,000 people with millions facing starvation. The few mentions this gets generally are only used to demonize Iran when US generals have stated that we could end this war tomorrow if we wanted to. Yet you can claim that nothing the West does can hold a candle to China's acts. That is the aim of the propaganda. Yes, China is committing atrocities. They are not alone in this and the methods suggested to combat these actions are likely going to cause far more suffering.
- alisonatwork 6y ago
  I agree with you, but making statements like these will just open you up to attacks from sophisticated CCP operatives and their allies. One very popular talking point is that mass incarceration in America has resulted in quadrupling of the prison population, putting millions of - mostly black - people behind bars. This is America's version of Uighur internment camps. Let's not even get started on the hundreds of thousands of deaths America has been responsible for around the world. It's hard to deny that - at least in the last 50 years (i.e. carefully avoiding Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution) - America has probably spread more misery and death around the world than China. However. The thing that I think is important to push on, is that in America, and in other free countries, there is open dialog on these issues. Reporters report on war crimes, millions take to the streets to protest, people take their leaders to account, politicians are voted out. Granted, history has shown that we have not been very successful at stopping these injustices, despite freedom of the press and democracy... But could they have been even worse without those freedoms? Yes. We know this because we can look at the awful record of authoritarian regimes in the 20th century. So I think it's more effective to not take the bait and pretend that the west is nowhere near as bad... Instead focus on the accountability that democratically-elected governments in free societies have, as opposed to single-party states like the PRC.
  - boomboomsubban 6y ago
    >Reporters report on war crimes, The reporters then face prosecution or assassination, see Assange, while the war criminals receive promotions. >people take their leaders to account, politicians are voted out. Which sounds nice, but "taking account" means cushy private sector jobs, and both parties carry the same general foreign policy backed by generations of state propaganda. The "Democratic society" argument isn't much better. Two parties may lead to better treatment inside the country, but as a worldwide force it's just as flawed.
  - emptysongglass 6y ago
    You cannot draw an equivalence between America's prison population and the CCP's literal concentration camps. There's a lot you can say about the failure of the justice system, the failure of its policing system, the yawning generational failure to address race and poverty in this country. Of course black people are going to be disadvantaged to breaking. So we demonstrate for our black sisters and brothers. We rally our voices and let out our primal screams that are heard around the nation. No screams will be heard from the Tibetans and Uyghurs. No reporters in China will tell their story. They will be broken and forgotten in silence. There is an ocean's difference between the failure and neglect of US institutions to protect its black people from harm and the determined, targeted extermination of millions of people of race not Han.
contingencies 6y ago
Agreed. If we were to evaluate China objectively we would have to recognize its huge achievements. Living in China for much of the last 20 years and being able to witness the changes first hand, the subject often comes up in conversation both here and overseas. Without getting bogged down in tangential statistics, I generally point out that at the beginning of the 20th century, China was roughly parallel to India in many macro-economic metrics. Now look at the difference. It is a viable superpower, a space power, the world's renewable energy technology and perhaps also deployment leader (certainly e-vehicles), the world's reforestation leader, a far more educated (eg. popularly literate and numerate) and healthy (well fed) population, a population no longer dangerously expanding, corruption is under control, world leading mobile payments, world leading logistics, and it is at the center of the world's global supply chain (and consumption!) for almost every industry. That said, China has many problems (living here is earth-shatteringly frustrating a lot of the time), @alisonatwork's comment is on the mark, and the achievements of the 20th century do not by any means excuse the grave and terrible costs, but to suggest that its government is inept in a hand-wave is shatteringly naive.
underseacables 6y ago
“ Why would an authoritarian control of information lead to only bad information getting out?” That’s the point: there is no bad information coming out of China, it’s always “positive,” like it was written by a PR team. No nation is perfect, but China works very hard so that nothing comes out of the country that is negative. By manipulating the news so that nothing is ever negative, you destroy all confidence in the accuracy of that reporting. If China was serious about being a world power, worthy of respect, they wouldn’t work so hard to hide all the negative, censor, and punish people who speak the truth.
- boomboomsubban 6y ago
  >there is no bad information coming out of China Then what do you consider the article this post is discussing? Or all of the stories mentioned in your other post?

cowsandmilk 6y ago

There is a huge Chinese diaspora in the US with family members who still live in China. They are the source of information that most in the US rely on more than news articles.

underseacables 6y ago

And what is extreme propaganda? Is the Uyghur genocide propaganda? Is the Murder of Tibetans, aggression against Taiwan, imprisonment of journalists, propaganda? Show me American propaganda that does not have a strong correlation of truth, and I’ll show you concentration camps and disappeared citizens. When was the last time the U.S. government put a doctor in prison for trying to warn others about a deadly virus? No matter the corruption of America, its corporatacracy and greed, no matter the propaganda of its politicians, nothing in the developed western world can hold a candle to the CURRENT genocide of China.

hungryhobo 6y ago
What if the Uyghur genocide is indeed propaganda? How would you know? A lot of the Uyghur witness have been revealed to have ties to NED and the population of Uyghur minorities in china have increased. If there is an active genocide on the scale that's being reported, why have we not seen reports of mass exodus into neighbouring countries?
boomboomsubban 6y ago
>nothing in the developed western world can hold a candle to the CURRENT genocide of China Things that the developed Western world are causing are worse though. The UN had repeatedly called the ongoing Yemen situation the largest ongoing humanitarian crisis, killing over 200,000 people with millions facing starvation. The few mentions this gets generally are only used to demonize Iran when US generals have stated that we could end this war tomorrow if we wanted to. Yet you can claim that nothing the West does can hold a candle to China's acts. That is the aim of the propaganda. Yes, China is committing atrocities. They are not alone in this and the methods suggested to combat these actions are likely going to cause far more suffering.
alisonatwork 6y ago
I agree with you, but making statements like these will just open you up to attacks from sophisticated CCP operatives and their allies. One very popular talking point is that mass incarceration in America has resulted in quadrupling of the prison population, putting millions of - mostly black - people behind bars. This is America's version of Uighur internment camps. Let's not even get started on the hundreds of thousands of deaths America has been responsible for around the world. It's hard to deny that - at least in the last 50 years (i.e. carefully avoiding Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution) - America has probably spread more misery and death around the world than China. However. The thing that I think is important to push on, is that in America, and in other free countries, there is open dialog on these issues. Reporters report on war crimes, millions take to the streets to protest, people take their leaders to account, politicians are voted out. Granted, history has shown that we have not been very successful at stopping these injustices, despite freedom of the press and democracy... But could they have been even worse without those freedoms? Yes. We know this because we can look at the awful record of authoritarian regimes in the 20th century. So I think it's more effective to not take the bait and pretend that the west is nowhere near as bad... Instead focus on the accountability that democratically-elected governments in free societies have, as opposed to single-party states like the PRC.
- boomboomsubban 6y ago
  >Reporters report on war crimes, The reporters then face prosecution or assassination, see Assange, while the war criminals receive promotions. >people take their leaders to account, politicians are voted out. Which sounds nice, but "taking account" means cushy private sector jobs, and both parties carry the same general foreign policy backed by generations of state propaganda. The "Democratic society" argument isn't much better. Two parties may lead to better treatment inside the country, but as a worldwide force it's just as flawed.
- emptysongglass 6y ago
  You cannot draw an equivalence between America's prison population and the CCP's literal concentration camps. There's a lot you can say about the failure of the justice system, the failure of its policing system, the yawning generational failure to address race and poverty in this country. Of course black people are going to be disadvantaged to breaking. So we demonstrate for our black sisters and brothers. We rally our voices and let out our primal screams that are heard around the nation. No screams will be heard from the Tibetans and Uyghurs. No reporters in China will tell their story. They will be broken and forgotten in silence. There is an ocean's difference between the failure and neglect of US institutions to protect its black people from harm and the determined, targeted extermination of millions of people of race not Han.

contingencies 6y ago

Agreed. If we were to evaluate China objectively we would have to recognize its huge achievements. Living in China for much of the last 20 years and being able to witness the changes first hand, the subject often comes up in conversation both here and overseas. Without getting bogged down in tangential statistics, I generally point out that at the beginning of the 20th century, China was roughly parallel to India in many macro-economic metrics. Now look at the difference. It is a viable superpower, a space power, the world's renewable energy technology and perhaps also deployment leader (certainly e-vehicles), the world's reforestation leader, a far more educated (eg. popularly literate and numerate) and healthy (well fed) population, a population no longer dangerously expanding, corruption is under control, world leading mobile payments, world leading logistics, and it is at the center of the world's global supply chain (and consumption!) for almost every industry. That said, China has many problems (living here is earth-shatteringly frustrating a lot of the time), @alisonatwork's comment is on the mark, and the achievements of the 20th century do not by any means excuse the grave and terrible costs, but to suggest that its government is inept in a hand-wave is shatteringly naive.

underseacables 6y ago

“ Why would an authoritarian control of information lead to only bad information getting out?” That’s the point: there is no bad information coming out of China, it’s always “positive,” like it was written by a PR team. No nation is perfect, but China works very hard so that nothing comes out of the country that is negative. By manipulating the news so that nothing is ever negative, you destroy all confidence in the accuracy of that reporting. If China was serious about being a world power, worthy of respect, they wouldn’t work so hard to hide all the negative, censor, and punish people who speak the truth.

boomboomsubban 6y ago
>there is no bad information coming out of China Then what do you consider the article this post is discussing? Or all of the stories mentioned in your other post?