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> I get that “China bad” is a popular position America needs a new bogeyman now that Muslims are not scary anymore.
by alaricus 4y ago
> I get that “China bad” is a popular position
America needs a new bogeyman now that Muslims are not scary anymore.
- rootusrootus 4y agoIt helps that the CCP routinely does things worth despising them for.
- epgui 4y agoEvery government routinely does things worth criticism. I don’t mean to do moral equivocation between all possible different wrongs, but some wrongs do get amplified way more than other comparable wrongs.
- droptablemain 4y agoThis is true of all governments, but the CCP does far more good for China that the U.S. government does for the U.S.
- throwaway29812 4y agoAre you including the prison camps for millions of their own citizens in that equation?
- hunglee2 4y agoUS leads the world in incarcerated rate. This is fact.
- honkdaddy 4y agoThe difference being that those people stood trial, whether or not you think the sentence was justified. Earnestly, can you see how that's different from being taken away from your home in the middle of the night because your provincial government decided they don't like the way you practice your religion? Does it make sense to you, Hung, that those two situations are very different?
- throwaway29812 4y agoHe needs them to be the same, so his worldview can stay intact.
- alaricus 4y agoNot just lead, but lead by a huge margin.
- alaricus 4y agoUSA has more people in prison than China by a huge margin.
- throwaway29812 4y agoComparing criminals convicted of crimes (taking into account the unfairness of the law of course) with innocent people rounded up because they are the wrong ethnicity or religion is cynical, even for a tankie.
- munk-a 4y agoYeaaaa... no, no it doesn't. Even with all the anti-government rhetoric in the US when it comes to political discussions and the dysfunctional state of congress it's pretty clear that the US has a much more pleasant form of government to live under.
- alaricus 4y ago
- munk-a 4y agoThis feels like an extremely unproductive remark that essentially adds nothing to the discussion: > Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive.[1] 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- alaricus 4y agoThis is deflection, nothing more. Based on what exactly? You made a claim, without anything to back it up.
- munk-a 4y agoAs someone who isn't a huge cheerleader for America I'll add a few specific points. The US rather recently used tear gas to disperse a crowd in an absolutely unjustifiable action - while China has been regularly assaulting Hong Kong residents that are trying to preserve their comparatively free local government. China is chomping at the bit to seize and annex the Republic of China (aka Taiwan) while the US has (granted, with a fair bit of awful execution) generally entered into wars without the explicit goal of bringing more territory under a dictator. On American internet I can criticize Biden, Trump, Manchin and Cruz without being concerned over what consequences the government will try and visit on me for my disloyalty. As a young teenager I watched a neighbor of mine flee the country after 9/11 due to their Omani heritage and relations and I was horrified at how middle-easterners were treated. Some Americans were even kidnapped in the middle of the night and detained (I'd argue illegally) in Gitmo. China has routinely rounded up anti-party agitators. In my early adulthood I watched a semi-serious debate in Vermont about voluntarily leaving the union - anyone even talking about advocating for a free and independent Tibet is routinely arrested. America has shifty credit score companies that dictate what you can and can't afford through opaque, mysterious and often quite flawed metrics - China has social credit. America, as flawed as they may be, has elections, and, again as flawed as they may be, does have two parties - precisely one more party than China has. It'd be really nice if both countries actually had a sane number of political parties but hey 2 > 1.
- juanani 4y ago
- alaricus 4y agoYou mean how Americans are despised for their murders in the Middle East?
- basisword 4y agoAs does America. Internment of Japanese Americans, Vietnam War, Iraq War + the various war crimes committed there etc etc. most countries have things about them worth despising. Just depends on how long your memory is.
- rootusrootus 4y agoI'm okay letting go of things which happened before any current politician was in office. The past is the past, but I can despise the CCP for what they are doing right now.
- alaricus 4y agoWars in Iraq, Afganistan, Libya, Syria, routine drone strikes, mass deportations, children in cages... There is plenty to despise here.
- rootusrootus 4y agoYeah, you're cheerleading for the CCP, I get it. The intent alone that underlies genocide is not at all comparable to the questionable wars the US gets involved in for reasons many of us don't agree with. And think about the bright side. We can bitch here all we want about the US Government and I feel zero.... ZERO concern that they're going to track me down and punish me. Cannot say the same in China about the CCP.
- alaricus 4y agoI'm not cheerleading for CCP. Not everyone who disagrees with you is a cheerleader for someone else. > We can bitch here all we want about the US Government and I feel zero.... ZERO concern that they're going to track me down and punish me. Tell that to Julian Assange.
- rootusrootus 4y agoOkay, then blind hate for the US. You've actually attempted to equate civilian casualties of war with genocide, which is.... amazing. > Tell that to Julian Assange. Okay, sure. Has he ever been in the custody of the US govt? Was he accused of criticizing the government, or helping someone else divulge classified info? Whether you think that's what he was doing or not, you're stretching a looooong ways here to try and make the US govt as bad as the CCP. You've got a long ways to go.
- throwaway0x7E6 4y agohow many countries did China invade and/or bomb in the last 30 years? how many millions of civilians are dead or displaced directly or indirectly because of China's actions?
- rootusrootus 4y agoHow many genocides has the US government undertaken?
- alaricus 4y agoChina did not spend 20 years murdering people in the Middle East, resulting in the death and displacement of millions.
- rootusrootus 4y agoYes, war is bad. But if you're really trying to equate it with genocide, I don't know what to say.
- alaricus 4y agoHow many people did American wars in the Middle East kill?
- throwaway0x7E6 4y agoconsidering that Russia's actions in Ukraine are now the threshold for a genocide, the US and its allies have committed four genocides just in the last 20 years - in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in Libya and in Syria
- sofixa 4y agoNo, the threshold for genocide is actions like erasing whole cities off the map with zero regard for civilian life, and mass kidnapping of children.
- 4y ago
- jessaustin 4y agoRaytheon weapons don't sell themselves! Ukraine has generated $54B this year, but where will the profits be next year? In-the-know lobbyists say: "Taiwan!"
- throwaway29812 4y agoRight, threats against Ukraine and Taiwan were made up by checks notes Raytheon. Is the current, ongoing war in Ukraine "fake news" too ?
- munk-a 4y agoTwo things can simultaneously be true - the military industrial complex can exploit global politics to make money above and beyond what's necessary to actually provide aide to countries. I think the last big weapons deal the US signed before agreeing to help Ukraine was subsidizing Saudi Arabia killing Yemenese in a bid to extract value from their civil war.
- lalaland1125 4y ago> was subsidizing Saudi Arabia Seems really odd to call a deal where Saudi Arabia was paying us for weapons in Yemen a "subsidy". You can argue that we shouldn't have allowed the sale, but it was a net profit for America.
- munk-a 4y agoThat seems like a fair point, yea - we weren't really subsidizing and more just enabling.
- throwaway29812 4y agoOr just part of an international trade in weapons that > 10 other countries participate in. https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/22/middleeast/arms-exports-saudi-arabia-intl/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/22/middleeast/arms-exports-saudi... But that doesn't fit the narrative, now does it?
- oneoff786 4y agoOne would have hoped Russia would suffice. Maybe they don’t seem scary enough.
- munk-a 4y agoIt's hard to position Russia as a state enemy when half the politicians keep apologizing for and justifying their every action and decreeing any criticism of them as "a hoax". Two party political systems are the worst.
- oneoff786 4y agoThat’s not really accurate. Even Mitch McConnell is pretty vocally anti Russia. Just the most shameless borderline treasonous of the alt right.
- legutierr 4y agoWhether or not you agree with them, there are substantive reasons that sentiment in the US is turning against China. Your statement is too cynical.
- alaricus 4y agoThe most important reason appears to be that China is surpassing the US in global influence and importance.
- legutierr 4y agoPerhaps you may wish this to be true, but it hasn't happened yet.
- the_only_law 4y agoCertainly seems to be the case though, they’re clearly doing big work to build their own sphere outside east Asia, and seem much more competent than Russia, whom NATO seems to be paralyzed with.