7 ms·

Well that's part of the point, China is obsessed with territorial unity, not expansionist policies, where the overlap is limited specifically to where we alread

Well that's part of the point, China is obsessed with territorial unity, not expansionist policies, where the overlap is limited specifically to where we already know: other places that China already calls China. The American perspective is that everyone is secretly trying to expand - like America did. Chinese hegemony could happen in other areas, like how it already has resulted in movies being changed to accommodate Chinese audiences, or having leverage over many private sectors who want access to their market, and with a currency based hegemony that could increase. But the other person's point about books being too "US good/China scary & evil" is exactly about the very limiting false dichotomies that you latched directly on to.

adventured 6y ago
> China is obsessed with territorial unity, not expansionist policies Obviously false. From Tibet to the recent massive South China Sea annexation and Taiwan, all of it is hyper expansionist. It doesn't matter if they lie and claim otherwise, it's plainly a lie. They're seeking territorial expansion. Nobody in their right mind believes the waters off the coast of south Vietnam belongs to China, except China. That's not about territorial unity, it's about hegemony in Asia and expanding their territory through military force. They're in conquering mode. The territy they took when they conquered Tibet is twice the size of France. The South China Sea territory they're attempting to take now - which does not belong to them - is at least the size of Tibet or larger. That's conquering on a scale not seen since immediately after WW2 with the Soviet Union's land grab in Eastern Europe.
makomk 6y ago
The Chinese propaganda says they're just defending their territory, but as far as I can tell it's just expansionism in disguise. That is to say, they've been taking areas that even China considered to be part of (say) India, rewriting the past so that they're not only part of China but always have been, and sending in troops to claim them. In many ways their claim to the South China Sea is like this too.
- vmception 6y ago
  yes, I'm watching them to see the incongruence. But primarily, the Chinese constitution calls for upholding territorial unity, and this undermines every other right granted in the constitution, and this is the nature of most of their punishments domestically, demands from foreigners (like when actors and celebrities end up saying boilerplate comments about Chinese sovereignty and unity, and it barely makes any sense to the English audience about why they would say that), and it is also congruent with their actions. Now, is the limitation of my perspective that they can rationalize anything with this? Or that the unanimous People's Congress can update the constitution if any other roadblock is in their way? Sure. I just don't see that predilection. There are plenty of disputed land borders around the edges of China. But I just don't see things beyond that and the South China Sea. I was surprised to see the treatment of their state of Inner Mongolia, and to me this is a separate form of discrimination in favor of Han Chinese (or something more nuanced). My line in the sand - for the expansionist opinion - would be taking pieces of Mongolia. Or way into states of India and bordering nations. Or way past Xinjiang.
boc 6y ago
What makes people uncomfortable is that the US is a democracy, and the leaders are chosen by the population. China's military and social power is wielded by a very small group of elites in the CCP, which makes it hard to trust. The nature of US policy has been shaped over the centuries in the open, whereas China's policies and doctrines are sometimes changed overnight.
- wcarss 6y ago
  > What makes people uncomfortable is that the US is a democracy, and the leaders are chosen by the population. Well, sort of. They're almost always from very wealthy families with very particular educational, social, and occupational histories, on both sides. We get to choose from within the group that makes it to through the candidate vetting processes controlled by the parties. > China's military and social power is wielded by a very small group of elites in the CCP, which makes it hard to trust. Again, it's pretty similar. The rich and their children have time and money to build the connections that can get them into positions of institutional power. > The nature of US policy has been shaped over the centuries in the open, whereas China's policies and doctrines are sometimes changed overnight. Policy changes in China get voted on too. They might seem like an orchestrated rubber stamp to us -- and they might actually be! But similarly in the US, executive orders, agency decisions, and supreme court orders can happen swiftly and have similarly profound impacts on the people and the system. See for example Citizen's United, or the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine by the FCC. Did any normal people vote for those things? They kind of just... happened, and their impacts are huge. I'm not trying to say I would rather live in China or under its system, rather that our perceptions of the differences between the systems are influenced heavily by our context and our naturally western-oriented media diet, and they may in reality be smaller than we feel. To put it very cynically, our system currently works by allowing average people to feel like we have control over it, while China's doesn't use that tool so much. In truth, average people don't have any real control over either system under normal circumstances.
  - throwaway894345 6y ago
    > Again, it's pretty similar. I don't see how... Yes, the US has a classist bias and certainly some mild corruption. That still seems a world apart from a single party system that routinely flouts its own constitution. Also, executive orders and legislation are bound by the constitution in theory and practice. While they may result in abrupt changes from time-to-time, they are limited in scope. That seems materially different to me than a single party system that can pass, overturn, or utterly ignore whatever legislation it likes overnight.
throwaway894345 6y ago
I think I'm not quite following--it seems clear to me that China has been interested in expanding its influence for the last 20+ years in much the same way that post-war America was interested in expansion (albeit post-war America had the credible-at-the-time excuse that it was expanding its influence to prevent the spread of communism for the good of the whole world).
tertius 6y ago
Expansionist as in borders, no, as in marketshare of foreign capital and resources? Undoubtedly.
yongjik 6y ago
> China is obsessed with territorial unity, not expansionist policies ... You say as if it makes China better, but I see strong parallels with Nazi Germany's Lebensraum, or Imperial Japan's "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere". Nationalist sentiments can paint a surprising amount of aggression as "defending what's naturally ours."
r00fus 6y ago
> Well that's part of the point, China is obsessed with territorial unity, not expansionist policies They are not directly militarily expansionist but are very economically influential by bankrolling the new silk road and lots of developments in Africa. > The American perspective is that everyone is secretly trying to expand A huge & growing society seeks resources - which requires expansion; it would be more surprising if they did not given their capabilities and size.
aksss 6y ago
> China is obsessed with territorial unity, not expansionist policies I don’t think the evidence supports that - they’re literally creating new islands to gain more territorial water, for instance. They contest their borders with India and Japan regularly. Their international economic and development policies serve to expand their global influence.

adventured 6y ago

> China is obsessed with territorial unity, not expansionist policies Obviously false. From Tibet to the recent massive South China Sea annexation and Taiwan, all of it is hyper expansionist. It doesn't matter if they lie and claim otherwise, it's plainly a lie. They're seeking territorial expansion. Nobody in their right mind believes the waters off the coast of south Vietnam belongs to China, except China. That's not about territorial unity, it's about hegemony in Asia and expanding their territory through military force. They're in conquering mode. The territy they took when they conquered Tibet is twice the size of France. The South China Sea territory they're attempting to take now - which does not belong to them - is at least the size of Tibet or larger. That's conquering on a scale not seen since immediately after WW2 with the Soviet Union's land grab in Eastern Europe.

makomk 6y ago

The Chinese propaganda says they're just defending their territory, but as far as I can tell it's just expansionism in disguise. That is to say, they've been taking areas that even China considered to be part of (say) India, rewriting the past so that they're not only part of China but always have been, and sending in troops to claim them. In many ways their claim to the South China Sea is like this too.

vmception 6y ago
yes, I'm watching them to see the incongruence. But primarily, the Chinese constitution calls for upholding territorial unity, and this undermines every other right granted in the constitution, and this is the nature of most of their punishments domestically, demands from foreigners (like when actors and celebrities end up saying boilerplate comments about Chinese sovereignty and unity, and it barely makes any sense to the English audience about why they would say that), and it is also congruent with their actions. Now, is the limitation of my perspective that they can rationalize anything with this? Or that the unanimous People's Congress can update the constitution if any other roadblock is in their way? Sure. I just don't see that predilection. There are plenty of disputed land borders around the edges of China. But I just don't see things beyond that and the South China Sea. I was surprised to see the treatment of their state of Inner Mongolia, and to me this is a separate form of discrimination in favor of Han Chinese (or something more nuanced). My line in the sand - for the expansionist opinion - would be taking pieces of Mongolia. Or way into states of India and bordering nations. Or way past Xinjiang.

boc 6y ago

What makes people uncomfortable is that the US is a democracy, and the leaders are chosen by the population. China's military and social power is wielded by a very small group of elites in the CCP, which makes it hard to trust. The nature of US policy has been shaped over the centuries in the open, whereas China's policies and doctrines are sometimes changed overnight.

wcarss 6y ago
> What makes people uncomfortable is that the US is a democracy, and the leaders are chosen by the population. Well, sort of. They're almost always from very wealthy families with very particular educational, social, and occupational histories, on both sides. We get to choose from within the group that makes it to through the candidate vetting processes controlled by the parties. > China's military and social power is wielded by a very small group of elites in the CCP, which makes it hard to trust. Again, it's pretty similar. The rich and their children have time and money to build the connections that can get them into positions of institutional power. > The nature of US policy has been shaped over the centuries in the open, whereas China's policies and doctrines are sometimes changed overnight. Policy changes in China get voted on too. They might seem like an orchestrated rubber stamp to us -- and they might actually be! But similarly in the US, executive orders, agency decisions, and supreme court orders can happen swiftly and have similarly profound impacts on the people and the system. See for example Citizen's United, or the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine by the FCC. Did any normal people vote for those things? They kind of just... happened, and their impacts are huge. I'm not trying to say I would rather live in China or under its system, rather that our perceptions of the differences between the systems are influenced heavily by our context and our naturally western-oriented media diet, and they may in reality be smaller than we feel. To put it very cynically, our system currently works by allowing average people to feel like we have control over it, while China's doesn't use that tool so much. In truth, average people don't have any real control over either system under normal circumstances.
- throwaway894345 6y ago
  > Again, it's pretty similar. I don't see how... Yes, the US has a classist bias and certainly some mild corruption. That still seems a world apart from a single party system that routinely flouts its own constitution. Also, executive orders and legislation are bound by the constitution in theory and practice. While they may result in abrupt changes from time-to-time, they are limited in scope. That seems materially different to me than a single party system that can pass, overturn, or utterly ignore whatever legislation it likes overnight.

throwaway894345 6y ago

I think I'm not quite following--it seems clear to me that China has been interested in expanding its influence for the last 20+ years in much the same way that post-war America was interested in expansion (albeit post-war America had the credible-at-the-time excuse that it was expanding its influence to prevent the spread of communism for the good of the whole world).

tertius 6y ago

Expansionist as in borders, no, as in marketshare of foreign capital and resources? Undoubtedly.

yongjik 6y ago

> China is obsessed with territorial unity, not expansionist policies ... You say as if it makes China better, but I see strong parallels with Nazi Germany's Lebensraum, or Imperial Japan's "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere". Nationalist sentiments can paint a surprising amount of aggression as "defending what's naturally ours."

r00fus 6y ago

> Well that's part of the point, China is obsessed with territorial unity, not expansionist policies They are not directly militarily expansionist but are very economically influential by bankrolling the new silk road and lots of developments in Africa. > The American perspective is that everyone is secretly trying to expand A huge & growing society seeks resources - which requires expansion; it would be more surprising if they did not given their capabilities and size.

aksss 6y ago

> China is obsessed with territorial unity, not expansionist policies I don’t think the evidence supports that - they’re literally creating new islands to gain more territorial water, for instance. They contest their borders with India and Japan regularly. Their international economic and development policies serve to expand their global influence.