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I basically agree with you on all points. But can we please drop this "civilized world" term? I suggest "democratic world".
by cpursley 4y ago
I basically agree with you on all points.
But can we please drop this "civilized world" term?
I suggest "democratic world".
- amelius 4y agoIf you agree with all the points, then civilized seems apt.
- cpursley 4y agoYou can be "civilized" and an autocracy. Certain aspects of modern China makes the West look like a backwater. Hell, even Russia has less people in prison than the US and free heath care. Also, that phrase just reeks of imperialism, racism and superiority - just a modern version of "savages who need our one true religion". OPs argument is about democracy, not level of development and culture. For clarity: I'm anti-autocracy
- bigDinosaur 4y agoWhat aspect of China makes the West look like a 'backwater'? I literally cannot think of a single thing. That doesn't mean China has no positive aspects. The West is also not monolithic.
- peoplefromibiza 4y ago> What aspect of China makes the West look like a 'backwater'? Compare China homicide rates to USA. Or China incarceration rate to USA incarceration rate.
- lpcvoid 4y agoI have not done any research on this and am genuinely interested - why can I trust the numbers the CCP releases on incarceration rate?
- JZM8yKnRvGv 4y agoAccording to stats there are 1.3 million people incarcerated in China. If incarceration rates in China were similar to those in USA it should be 10.3 million people. It would be pretty hard to hide them. USA are by far the number one country in the World for jail population and for incarceration rates, worse even than Putin's Russia. They would love to share the top step of the podium with someone else if they could prove it. The most logical explanation is that they can't, because the numbers are probably not true, but not too far from the truth.
- pistoriusp 4y agoDoes this include the 12.8 million Uyghurs in China?
- otikik 4y agoProbably those are not on the “stats”
- alex_smart 4y agoDo you seriously believe that all 12.8 million Uyghurs in China are literally imprisoned?
- DiogenesKynikos 4y agoThis is what a walk down the street in Urumqi looks like: [0]. It's possible to talk about Xinjiang without going over into hyperbole. 0. https://youtu.be/_OMaUIC4Om8 https://youtu.be/_OMaUIC4Om8
- peoplefromibiza 4y agoSome source to backup this number? Are they actually in prison? IMO the fact that we should be skeptic about China official stats means that we should also refrain from throwing random numbers at the wall hoping it will make China look bad. BTW, two wrongs don't make a right, it's not about what they do wrong, it's about what we do better, like for example, is Guantanamo acceptable in a western democracy?
- torben-friis 4y agoI’d argue that most of the numbers you’ll find apply to the US, not to the west. The US is pretty much known everywhere for having third world shortcomings on specific areas.
- peoplefromibiza 4y agoI agree. The problem is we as westerners are guilty by association. I don't approve of the US methods, nonetheless they represent the west in most non westerner people eyes. we all know that NATO==US even though it should be a coalition. That's why I, as European, hope in a strong and independent EU, at least we'll make our own mistakes.
- onetokeoverthe 4y ago
- wil421 4y agoChina has less prisoners and the fastest wait times for organ transplants.
- amelius 4y agoThe combination of those two things make it sound very suspicious ...
- TMWNN 4y ago
- philwelch 4y agoAlso, China’s incarceration rates don’t count people who have been welded into their apartments under the zero-COVID policy.
- peoplefromibiza 4y ago> Also, China’s incarceration rates don’t count people who have been welded into their apartments under the zero-COVID policy Do you know any Country that counts that? For example, does the US count the penal labor as labor camps? Potato potato.
- peoplefromibiza 4y agoUS has also many more strip clubs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_trafficking_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_trafficking_in_the_United_... The United States ranks as one of the worst countries in the world for human trafficking Despite a common and widespread misconception, human trafficking is not just a problem outside the US. It also happens here, within United States borders, and in every state. https://deliverfund.org/the-human-trafficking-problem-in-america/where-does-human-trafficking-happen/ https://deliverfund.org/the-human-trafficking-problem-in-ame... Listen, let's have an honest discussion here. What China does better than USA? Less people incarcerated is good, how the prisoners are treated is another issue entirely and of course China can and should be heavily criticized for that. But penal labor for literally cents/day or private prisons as a source of profit or the death penalty are something that the US, above all, should be able to improve on, before lecturing other countries over human rights. Let's talk about “Guantanamo Bay is a site of unparalleled notoriety, defined by the systematic use of torture, and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment against hundreds of men brought to the site and deprived of their most fundamental rights.” This is a statement from "The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights of the United Nations". What have the consequences been? Nothing. Literally nothing has changed! People have been detained there for years, most of them without any charges, denied of the right to a due process, only because they were Muslims. 39 of those men are still kept captive there as of today, 20 years later, 27 of them have never been charged with any crime, the others have been cleared for transfer years ago, but are still there. Imagine if China did something like that what the US would be saying about it. That's the moral short circuit: if it's wrong it must be wrong for everybody, especially for those claiming to hold in high regards human rights, not only if China or Russia do it.
- FabHK 4y ago> What aspect of China makes the West look like a 'backwater'? Growth, for one.
- mensetmanusman 4y agoIt’s easy to grow with such a low gdp/capita.
- cpursley 4y agoTell that to the nations who've been in a cycle of abject poverty for centuries.
- DiogenesKynikos 4y ago> What aspect of China makes the West look like a 'backwater'? Transportation infrastructure. 5G connectivity.
- jahnu 4y agoWe do plenty of uncivilised things in the democratic world. Casting China as uncivilised empowers the CCP to point at our prejudices and argue that their way is better and any Chinese who support democracy are self-hating traitors.
- peoplefromibiza 4y agothen USA should not be considerd part of the civilized World. A country where it is acceptable to have workers forced to pee in bottles or bullied by their new CEO (who's also a pathological liar)
- radicalbyte 4y agoYeah considering that China for about 2000 years was the leading civilisation I'm not sure why people use that term.
- qwytw 4y ago> Yeah considering that China for about 2000 More like 500 years (1000 years at best if you stretch it very hard)
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- mensetmanusman 4y agoChina harkening back 2000 years is like the US harkening back to Rome. Fact is modern communist China is actively erasing its history and is quite new on the world stage.
- DiogenesKynikos 4y agoIt's more like the British harkening back to Chaucer's England. The problem with the Rome analogy is that China has had much greater continuity than Europe. China is what Europe would have been, if the Roman Empire had been reconstituted each time it collapsed. Imagine if there were still one political entity ruling the entire Mediterranean basin and Western Europe, calling itself "Rome," speaking a Romance language, and in which every educated person was still capable of reading the Latin classics (with some difficulty).
- DiogenesKynikos 4y agoChina's recorded history goes back more than 3000 years. Granted, it was only unified 2200 years ago. I don't know if any possible interpretation of Chinese history that puts China's formation a mere 500 or 1000 years ago. The Qin dynasty (3rd Century BC) is really the absolute latest point at which you could say China came into existence.
- flandish 4y ago
- FollowingTheDao 4y ago> I suggest "democratic world". That's funny. Where is that? Not the U.S., that is for sure. Look how the government just screwed over the rail workers: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/dec/01/joe-biden-rail-strike-labor-unions https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/dec/01/joe-bi... There is a one world government and it is a oligarchy.