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It's worth noting that American censorship in, say, 1960, was at close to the same level. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_censorship_in_the_United_Stat

It's worth noting that American censorship in, say, 1960, was at close to the same level. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_censorship_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_censorship_in_the_United_...

pnemonic 4y ago
Is it just as worth noting then that China is more than 60 years behind the US in terms of social progress?
- jl6 4y ago
  I’d probably agree with you - but only just. 60 years ago was pre-Civil Rights Act.
- planb 4y ago
  “Behind” implies that they’re following and moving in the same direction. Unfortunately, I don’t think that’s the case.
  - vkou 4y ago
    No, behind implies that they are currently in the opposite direction of the current direction of western cultural movement. If the direction of our movement changes, they will, without lifting a finger, become ahead of us. Social progress is inherently subjective (because progress in one value system is actually a regression in a different value system), and the observer always grounds their claim of 'behind' or 'ahead' in their culture's viewpoint.
  - pessimizer 4y ago
    The incarceration rate of the US in 1960 was about 225/100K, and in China it's currently around 120/100K, so China is doing a little better than we were 60 years ago. Of course our incarceration rate now has nearly tripled to 640/100K, so thank God they're not following us.
    - fortuna86 4y ago
      Are you including the camps in XJ in that metric ?
- Bakary 4y ago
  Social progress is somewhat of a loaded term, but for instance abortion has been legal for longer and is still more widely available in China than in the US. The controversy surrounding abortion is in itself different, since instead of Christian concerns you have sex-selective abortion and population management that determine policy in this era. Homosexuality actually became less tolerated in the 19th and 20th century through Western influence. Now the West has done an about face in the span of one or two generations and China is comparatively less tolerant. All this to say that it's difficult to quantify since - assigning a teleological direction to social mores is perilous at best - comparing entire societies means you overlook specific cases that often aren't even evaluated along the same axis - Societies ebb and flow at unpredictable rates and with meandering paths and influence each other in often bizarre ways
- stavros 4y ago
  Or ahead, who knows?
pjc50 4y ago
When I saw the comment about "perfectly aligned with China’s “main melody” perspective that justice always wins.", I was immediately reminded of the Hays code. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hays_Code https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hays_Code (reading that again I discovered https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_Film_Corp._v._Industrial_Commission_of_Ohio https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_Film_Corp._v._Industria... ; the idea that movies were not counted as free speech for several decades in the US may come as a surprise to other HN readers)
- jibe 4y ago
  It's helpful to look at that case in the context of the time, which was pre-New Deal, more federalist, and the Bill of Rights applied narrowly to the Congress. It was about a state (Ohio) having a censorship board, not federal censorship. The argument wasn't even made that it was a violation of the first amendment (which would have only applied to laws by Congress, not states). The argument was more about things like whether it was a violation of interstate commerce to have to have different versions of a movie for different states. They did argue that it violated the Ohio state constitutional right to free speech.
curun1r 4y ago
1960s? Try the 1990s. The Blockbuster version of Bad Lieutenant had almost 30 min removed. Blockbuster was silently editing many of their VHS rentals before DVD took over. Yes, not government censorship, but it’s almost worse when a private, unaccountable, entity is imposing its own moral values, especially when they reach the size that Blockbuster did during its heyday.
- jibe 4y ago
  Blockbuster was silently editing many of their VHS rentals before DVD took over. That's not exactly right. Blockbuster simply had a policy not to carry X-rated films that became a no NC-17 rated films when the rating changed. The video distributor of Bad Lieutenant created an R rated version of the film. The end result is still a wrecked/censored version of the movie, but it wasn't Blockbuster doing the silent editing. It is the choice of the film maker/studio/distributor to get the extra money from Blockbuster.
- stickfigure 4y ago
  Blockbuster was given a death sentence by the market. Seems like justice done?
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
coryfklein 4y ago
Did the article imply somewhere that China is unique in it's censorship? I personally tire of this pattern: 1. Article submitted to an international forum about X country doing Y bad thing 2. "Well the USA is just as bad, they also did/doing/will do Y bad thing" Well yes, that is true, but people are voting up the submission because they found that X-doing-Y-today was interesting and don't care to rehash the history of the US every single time. YES the US has plenty of blemishes in its history. Yes it has censored, warred, raped, extorted, and imprisoned. Yes the US persists in directly doing some of those today, and through malice or ineptitude it fails to prevent others. But the regularity with which this pattern repeats feels so much like state sponsored astroturfing I'm just tired of it.
- the_af 4y ago
  > Did the article imply somewhere that China is unique in it's censorship? I don't think it implies that, but to be honest, the general implication here on HN is that China is the current Big Bad and everything they do is uniquely bad. It's not spelled out, exactly, but that's how I read many comments here. It may be just me, but that' s the vibe I get from HN in relation to China. > But the regularity with which this pattern repeats feels so much like state sponsored astroturfing I'm just tired of it. I think this is unfair. I also don't think you truly think people asking about US behavior here are Chinese agents. That's just silly. China hasn't infiltrated HN.
  - coryfklein 4y ago
    > I also don't think you truly think people asking about US behavior here are Chinese agents. Maybe my thinking is misguided, but this is exactly what I think. China has an abundance of labor and a strong appetite to perform just such tasks. > That's just silly. China hasn't infiltrated HN. It's not like you have to "infiltrate" anything here, it's an open forum and China would need to do little more than pay 2 people to take rotating shifts and they have essentially full coverage to counter any content critical of the country. Since the readership of HN likely holds much more power than the average American, I'd think China silly to not make that investment.
hindsightbias 4y ago
Growing up in the 70-80s, American TV/movies seem pretty censored today. Adult and under-18 T&A, light sexual content were the norm. Of course, the children are safe now and I guess it must be an accurate reflection of that age group if inceldom is the new norm. Oprah used to cover sex topics all the time.

pnemonic 4y ago

Is it just as worth noting then that China is more than 60 years behind the US in terms of social progress?

jl6 4y ago
I’d probably agree with you - but only just. 60 years ago was pre-Civil Rights Act.
planb 4y ago
“Behind” implies that they’re following and moving in the same direction. Unfortunately, I don’t think that’s the case.
- vkou 4y ago
  No, behind implies that they are currently in the opposite direction of the current direction of western cultural movement. If the direction of our movement changes, they will, without lifting a finger, become ahead of us. Social progress is inherently subjective (because progress in one value system is actually a regression in a different value system), and the observer always grounds their claim of 'behind' or 'ahead' in their culture's viewpoint.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  The incarceration rate of the US in 1960 was about 225/100K, and in China it's currently around 120/100K, so China is doing a little better than we were 60 years ago. Of course our incarceration rate now has nearly tripled to 640/100K, so thank God they're not following us.
  - fortuna86 4y ago
    Are you including the camps in XJ in that metric ?
Bakary 4y ago
Social progress is somewhat of a loaded term, but for instance abortion has been legal for longer and is still more widely available in China than in the US. The controversy surrounding abortion is in itself different, since instead of Christian concerns you have sex-selective abortion and population management that determine policy in this era. Homosexuality actually became less tolerated in the 19th and 20th century through Western influence. Now the West has done an about face in the span of one or two generations and China is comparatively less tolerant. All this to say that it's difficult to quantify since - assigning a teleological direction to social mores is perilous at best - comparing entire societies means you overlook specific cases that often aren't even evaluated along the same axis - Societies ebb and flow at unpredictable rates and with meandering paths and influence each other in often bizarre ways
stavros 4y ago
Or ahead, who knows?

pjc50 4y ago

When I saw the comment about "perfectly aligned with China’s “main melody” perspective that justice always wins.", I was immediately reminded of the Hays code. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hays_Code https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hays_Code (reading that again I discovered https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_Film_Corp._v._Industrial_Commission_of_Ohio https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_Film_Corp._v._Industria... ; the idea that movies were not counted as free speech for several decades in the US may come as a surprise to other HN readers)

jibe 4y ago
It's helpful to look at that case in the context of the time, which was pre-New Deal, more federalist, and the Bill of Rights applied narrowly to the Congress. It was about a state (Ohio) having a censorship board, not federal censorship. The argument wasn't even made that it was a violation of the first amendment (which would have only applied to laws by Congress, not states). The argument was more about things like whether it was a violation of interstate commerce to have to have different versions of a movie for different states. They did argue that it violated the Ohio state constitutional right to free speech.

curun1r 4y ago

1960s? Try the 1990s. The Blockbuster version of Bad Lieutenant had almost 30 min removed. Blockbuster was silently editing many of their VHS rentals before DVD took over. Yes, not government censorship, but it’s almost worse when a private, unaccountable, entity is imposing its own moral values, especially when they reach the size that Blockbuster did during its heyday.

jibe 4y ago
Blockbuster was silently editing many of their VHS rentals before DVD took over. That's not exactly right. Blockbuster simply had a policy not to carry X-rated films that became a no NC-17 rated films when the rating changed. The video distributor of Bad Lieutenant created an R rated version of the film. The end result is still a wrecked/censored version of the movie, but it wasn't Blockbuster doing the silent editing. It is the choice of the film maker/studio/distributor to get the extra money from Blockbuster.
stickfigure 4y ago
Blockbuster was given a death sentence by the market. Seems like justice done?

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

coryfklein 4y ago

Did the article imply somewhere that China is unique in it's censorship? I personally tire of this pattern: 1. Article submitted to an international forum about X country doing Y bad thing 2. "Well the USA is just as bad, they also did/doing/will do Y bad thing" Well yes, that is true, but people are voting up the submission because they found that X-doing-Y-today was interesting and don't care to rehash the history of the US every single time. YES the US has plenty of blemishes in its history. Yes it has censored, warred, raped, extorted, and imprisoned. Yes the US persists in directly doing some of those today, and through malice or ineptitude it fails to prevent others. But the regularity with which this pattern repeats feels so much like state sponsored astroturfing I'm just tired of it.

the_af 4y ago
> Did the article imply somewhere that China is unique in it's censorship? I don't think it implies that, but to be honest, the general implication here on HN is that China is the current Big Bad and everything they do is uniquely bad. It's not spelled out, exactly, but that's how I read many comments here. It may be just me, but that' s the vibe I get from HN in relation to China. > But the regularity with which this pattern repeats feels so much like state sponsored astroturfing I'm just tired of it. I think this is unfair. I also don't think you truly think people asking about US behavior here are Chinese agents. That's just silly. China hasn't infiltrated HN.
- coryfklein 4y ago
  > I also don't think you truly think people asking about US behavior here are Chinese agents. Maybe my thinking is misguided, but this is exactly what I think. China has an abundance of labor and a strong appetite to perform just such tasks. > That's just silly. China hasn't infiltrated HN. It's not like you have to "infiltrate" anything here, it's an open forum and China would need to do little more than pay 2 people to take rotating shifts and they have essentially full coverage to counter any content critical of the country. Since the readership of HN likely holds much more power than the average American, I'd think China silly to not make that investment.

hindsightbias 4y ago

Growing up in the 70-80s, American TV/movies seem pretty censored today. Adult and under-18 T&A, light sexual content were the norm. Of course, the children are safe now and I guess it must be an accurate reflection of that age group if inceldom is the new norm. Oprah used to cover sex topics all the time.