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>But in order to live everyday life, most people living in China find it necessary to turn a blind eye until it affects them directly. That became impossible du

>But in order to live everyday life, most people living in China find it necessary to turn a blind eye until it affects them directly. That became impossible during the Covid-19 pandemic, when the force of China’s technocracy was on full display it's amazing how people were able to delude themselves for so long, Tiananmen should have been enough to make people and governments realize things weren't going to change

FpUser 4y ago
Things do change over the time. And if you are so willing to look back I am sure you'll find enough trash in a history of your own country.
- simonh 4y ago
  They do change, in mainland China they have devolved considerably under Xi. I have Family over there, and a lot of the optimism of a decade ago was already being squeezed out of the country before the pandemic.
  - FpUser 4y ago
    Yes things devolved, and they might get better over the time. Or not. Nobody knows.
    - simonh 4y ago
      I’m not sure what point you are making. Things change is such a trivially obvious point, that could be made about anything in any context, that it seems basically irrelevant to any reasoned discourse. We all know that things change, so stating that fact communicates no useful information. It’s why and how things change that is interesting. In China things have changed because Xi and the Chinese communist party have chosen to change them in particular ways. It’s these choices and the consequences of them that we are discussing.
  - EFreethought 4y ago
    I have never been to China, but to me it seems that with all their faults that ultimately Deng, Jiang and Hu wanted what was best for China. But Xi seems to care about Xi.
    - re-thc 4y ago
      Not exactly. Jiang / Hu were of a similar faction and were already secured. Xi came own his own and had to secure his place. A lot of policies were done in that direction. Instead Jiang / Hu had their own agendas including moving vast amounts of capital outside and also for themselves e.g. some of the largest VCs there. Some of Xi's policies e.g. restricting movement of capital has to do with this.
    - chii 4y ago
      It may also be possible that Xi is imagining the revival of china as a world empire that would rival that of the USA today, and this is born of both hubris, as well as egomaniacal desire of "washing away the shameful century". I think people like that are the reasons why the world isn't at peace. China could've become the next japan. They could've probably overtaken the US that way too. But now, they've "alerted" the eagle, and the US will never let china become a superpower.
      - FpUser 4y ago
        >"the US will never let china become a superpower." It already is. To the less degree than the US for now. Could go either way in the future. But if you think that the US could go on forever dictating what other countries allowed to do I think you are wrong.
    - Vt71fcAqt7 4y ago
      I think Xi also cares about China, and he truly believes that a fully managed state and economy is better than democracy and free markets. Also note that Deng was in control in 1989. It's a bit more complicated than good vs evil here (which is true generally).
    - ospider 4y ago
- ren_engineer 4y ago
  I mean change in the talking point at the time that if we just kept throwing money at China they'd magically become a democracy. As long as the CCP is in charge that's not happening and should have been clear based off Tiananmen. Allowing them into the WTO and continuing to trade with them just made their power stronger. Going to be seen as a huge blunder historically
  - SkyMarshal 4y ago
    Completely agree. There was even historical evidence that narrative was wrong and that an authoritarian government could co-exist with an industrial economy - pre-WWII Germany and Japan. Development, industrialization, and capitalism don’t automatically bring democracy, freedoms, and political liberalization. That was all just a BS fiction foisted on the US public and policy class by voracious banks, corps, and their media. That was a decision that never should have been taken, due to the terrible risk of how things would turn out if it failed, as it did. This was possibly the most disastrous strategic blunder in America’s history. Like yanking defeat from the jaws of victory in the Cold War.
    - throwawaymaths 4y ago
      But consider that economic development helped turn south korea and Taiwan from brutal dictatorships to relatively stable and sustainable democracies. It wasn't crazy to think it would work in China, and it looked like there was buy-in and progress for an (if slow) gradual bringing into the fold process that suddenly t reversed course in 2016-ish
      - FpUser 4y ago
        >"It wasn't crazy to think it would work in China" Maybe eventually it will, would just take long time. There are always ups and downs.
        throwawaymaths 4y ago
        Exactly what I think. Nonetheless I will continue to criticize the current regime in the hopes of helping it along
RedCondor 4y ago
[dead]
- VK538FY 4y ago
  Thank you for your comment with relevant citations. The dominant version of the story in western circles is too often accepted uncritically. There are many other elements to consider. Same for many stories regarding China.
- meh8881 4y ago
  Are you citing the Chinese government as the best source on supposed Chinese government atrocities?
  - RedCondor 4y ago
    Absolutely. If the accusation is "the Chinese government denies it!" the best way to demonstrate the falsehood is by citing the Chinese government not denying it. It seems pretty straightforward.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - fortuna86 4y ago
      > Are you citing the Chinese government as the best source on supposed Chinese government atrocities? > Absolutely. He's telling you what he is. If you continue to engage, it's on you.
- nebukhadnezzar 4y ago
  What do you win or get out of the attempts to rewrite atrocities like they have never happened in history? What did the victims that died that week do to you? https://imgur.com/a/q8ZIS https://imgur.com/a/q8ZIS
  - RedCondor 4y ago
photochemsyn 4y ago
It's not that amazing, it's just that American investors wanted to cut labor costs in the late 1990s and China was offering dollar-a-day workers. The claim that opening up trade with China would have a 'liberalizing influence on the country' was one of the key selling points back in 2000-2001, pushed by both Clinton and GW Bush: https://edition.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/asiapcf/east/09/18/china.wto.timeline/ https://edition.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/asiapcf/east/09/18/china.... See Clinton's Mar 2000 speech: > "By joining the W.T.O., China is not simply agreeing to import more of our products; it is agreeing to import one of democracy's most cherished values: economic freedom. The more China liberalizes its economy, the more fully it will liberate the potential of its people — their initiative, their imagination, their remarkable spirit of enterprise. And when individuals have the power, not just to dream but to realize their dreams, they will demand a greater say." Of course it was all nonsense, Clinton and Bush were just listening to Wall Street interests who saw massive profits in moving US manufacturing overseas to cheap labor zones. (Importing cheap labor to do jobs that couldn't be outsourced, in agriculture, construction, etc. was the other side of that coin).
- light_hue_1 4y ago
  > Of course it was all nonsense, Clinton and Bush were just listening to Wall Street interests I'm not a fan of either Clinton or Bush, but this is unfair. There was far more going on. At the time, there was a strong sense that democracy had won, and that it was inevitable. That empowering people economically would eventually, without fail, lead to democratic reform. Fukuyama's "The End of History and the Last Man" is one of the most influential books of the period. But, Fukuyama and people like him (Reagan, necons, Bush, Clinton, etc.) turned out to be fatally wrong. They created an incredibly unequal world that has eroded democracy to the point where we can seriously discuss a US that isn't a democracy anymore in our lifetimes. You should read the book. It's an interesting case of someone who originally set out to help people, but who created a hellscape instead.
  - mettamage 4y ago
    > They created an incredibly unequal world that has eroded democracy to the point where we can seriously discuss a US that isn't a democracy anymore in our lifetimes. Could you elaborate? I find this too much of a stretch to think about and am not knowledgeable enough on the topic
onethought 4y ago
But Taiwan, HK, Singapore, and Melbourne all did the same thing, extended lockdowns. This wasn't autocracy, this was logical health policy: Do you overwhelm hospitals, potentially causing them to fail, or do you limit personal freedom? That's the question that they had to answer. China had the added complication of not having a vaccinated population. Partly due to them having too many people, partly due to their population being skeptical of "Western Medicine".
- ninjin 4y ago
  > This wasn't autocracy, this was logical health policy: Do you overwhelm hospitals, potentially causing them to fail, or do you limit personal freedom? That's the question that they had to answer. Except, the choice was nowhere as binary as you present and/or perceive it. If you look across the world you will see many different responses to the very same problem, but with different answers based on political, cultural, etc. differences. I kept and keep hearing the usual responses as to why the PRC had to respond in a highly authoritarian manner: the citizens can not handle freedom as they are morally weak. This may be true, but is it not awfully convenient that this always leads to the answer being politically empowering the CCP? Cui bono?
  - onethought 4y ago
    I didn't say it was anything to do with being "Morally weak". And you didn't see a "many different responses" -- you saw 1: Lockdowns. The whole world did them. Where they didn't do them, hospitals got trashed and lots of people died. Lockdowns ended when vaccines began, China never got that option, because its population didn't take up any of the vaccines to a high enough percentage. Also, there was never enough mRNA vaccines available to supply the whole world + china, until recently (maybe still not even now). It 100% was as binary as I present it. Italy, UK, Canada, US, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Japan, Korea... the list goes on: They all did lockdowns to some degree to slow spread, and help their hospitals. It had nothing to do with culture or politics... except in the US.
    - ninjin 4y ago
golem14 4y ago
I don't know. Many people fleeing the DDR (East Germany) to West Germany were shot dead by DDR border guards, yet the Wall eventually fell. Things can still change.

FpUser 4y ago

Things do change over the time. And if you are so willing to look back I am sure you'll find enough trash in a history of your own country.

simonh 4y ago
They do change, in mainland China they have devolved considerably under Xi. I have Family over there, and a lot of the optimism of a decade ago was already being squeezed out of the country before the pandemic.
- FpUser 4y ago
  Yes things devolved, and they might get better over the time. Or not. Nobody knows.
  - simonh 4y ago
    I’m not sure what point you are making. Things change is such a trivially obvious point, that could be made about anything in any context, that it seems basically irrelevant to any reasoned discourse. We all know that things change, so stating that fact communicates no useful information. It’s why and how things change that is interesting. In China things have changed because Xi and the Chinese communist party have chosen to change them in particular ways. It’s these choices and the consequences of them that we are discussing.
- EFreethought 4y ago
  I have never been to China, but to me it seems that with all their faults that ultimately Deng, Jiang and Hu wanted what was best for China. But Xi seems to care about Xi.
  - re-thc 4y ago
    Not exactly. Jiang / Hu were of a similar faction and were already secured. Xi came own his own and had to secure his place. A lot of policies were done in that direction. Instead Jiang / Hu had their own agendas including moving vast amounts of capital outside and also for themselves e.g. some of the largest VCs there. Some of Xi's policies e.g. restricting movement of capital has to do with this.
  - chii 4y ago
    It may also be possible that Xi is imagining the revival of china as a world empire that would rival that of the USA today, and this is born of both hubris, as well as egomaniacal desire of "washing away the shameful century". I think people like that are the reasons why the world isn't at peace. China could've become the next japan. They could've probably overtaken the US that way too. But now, they've "alerted" the eagle, and the US will never let china become a superpower.
    - FpUser 4y ago
      >"the US will never let china become a superpower." It already is. To the less degree than the US for now. Could go either way in the future. But if you think that the US could go on forever dictating what other countries allowed to do I think you are wrong.
  - Vt71fcAqt7 4y ago
    I think Xi also cares about China, and he truly believes that a fully managed state and economy is better than democracy and free markets. Also note that Deng was in control in 1989. It's a bit more complicated than good vs evil here (which is true generally).
  - ospider 4y ago
ren_engineer 4y ago
I mean change in the talking point at the time that if we just kept throwing money at China they'd magically become a democracy. As long as the CCP is in charge that's not happening and should have been clear based off Tiananmen. Allowing them into the WTO and continuing to trade with them just made their power stronger. Going to be seen as a huge blunder historically
- SkyMarshal 4y ago
  Completely agree. There was even historical evidence that narrative was wrong and that an authoritarian government could co-exist with an industrial economy - pre-WWII Germany and Japan. Development, industrialization, and capitalism don’t automatically bring democracy, freedoms, and political liberalization. That was all just a BS fiction foisted on the US public and policy class by voracious banks, corps, and their media. That was a decision that never should have been taken, due to the terrible risk of how things would turn out if it failed, as it did. This was possibly the most disastrous strategic blunder in America’s history. Like yanking defeat from the jaws of victory in the Cold War.
  - throwawaymaths 4y ago
    But consider that economic development helped turn south korea and Taiwan from brutal dictatorships to relatively stable and sustainable democracies. It wasn't crazy to think it would work in China, and it looked like there was buy-in and progress for an (if slow) gradual bringing into the fold process that suddenly t reversed course in 2016-ish
    - FpUser 4y ago
      >"It wasn't crazy to think it would work in China" Maybe eventually it will, would just take long time. There are always ups and downs.
      - throwawaymaths 4y ago
        Exactly what I think. Nonetheless I will continue to criticize the current regime in the hopes of helping it along

RedCondor 4y ago

[dead]

VK538FY 4y ago
Thank you for your comment with relevant citations. The dominant version of the story in western circles is too often accepted uncritically. There are many other elements to consider. Same for many stories regarding China.
meh8881 4y ago
Are you citing the Chinese government as the best source on supposed Chinese government atrocities?
- RedCondor 4y ago
  Absolutely. If the accusation is "the Chinese government denies it!" the best way to demonstrate the falsehood is by citing the Chinese government not denying it. It seems pretty straightforward.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - fortuna86 4y ago
    > Are you citing the Chinese government as the best source on supposed Chinese government atrocities? > Absolutely. He's telling you what he is. If you continue to engage, it's on you.
nebukhadnezzar 4y ago
What do you win or get out of the attempts to rewrite atrocities like they have never happened in history? What did the victims that died that week do to you? https://imgur.com/a/q8ZIS https://imgur.com/a/q8ZIS
- RedCondor 4y ago

photochemsyn 4y ago

It's not that amazing, it's just that American investors wanted to cut labor costs in the late 1990s and China was offering dollar-a-day workers. The claim that opening up trade with China would have a 'liberalizing influence on the country' was one of the key selling points back in 2000-2001, pushed by both Clinton and GW Bush: https://edition.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/asiapcf/east/09/18/china.wto.timeline/ https://edition.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/asiapcf/east/09/18/china.... See Clinton's Mar 2000 speech: > "By joining the W.T.O., China is not simply agreeing to import more of our products; it is agreeing to import one of democracy's most cherished values: economic freedom. The more China liberalizes its economy, the more fully it will liberate the potential of its people — their initiative, their imagination, their remarkable spirit of enterprise. And when individuals have the power, not just to dream but to realize their dreams, they will demand a greater say." Of course it was all nonsense, Clinton and Bush were just listening to Wall Street interests who saw massive profits in moving US manufacturing overseas to cheap labor zones. (Importing cheap labor to do jobs that couldn't be outsourced, in agriculture, construction, etc. was the other side of that coin).

light_hue_1 4y ago
> Of course it was all nonsense, Clinton and Bush were just listening to Wall Street interests I'm not a fan of either Clinton or Bush, but this is unfair. There was far more going on. At the time, there was a strong sense that democracy had won, and that it was inevitable. That empowering people economically would eventually, without fail, lead to democratic reform. Fukuyama's "The End of History and the Last Man" is one of the most influential books of the period. But, Fukuyama and people like him (Reagan, necons, Bush, Clinton, etc.) turned out to be fatally wrong. They created an incredibly unequal world that has eroded democracy to the point where we can seriously discuss a US that isn't a democracy anymore in our lifetimes. You should read the book. It's an interesting case of someone who originally set out to help people, but who created a hellscape instead.
- mettamage 4y ago
  > They created an incredibly unequal world that has eroded democracy to the point where we can seriously discuss a US that isn't a democracy anymore in our lifetimes. Could you elaborate? I find this too much of a stretch to think about and am not knowledgeable enough on the topic

onethought 4y ago

But Taiwan, HK, Singapore, and Melbourne all did the same thing, extended lockdowns. This wasn't autocracy, this was logical health policy: Do you overwhelm hospitals, potentially causing them to fail, or do you limit personal freedom? That's the question that they had to answer. China had the added complication of not having a vaccinated population. Partly due to them having too many people, partly due to their population being skeptical of "Western Medicine".

ninjin 4y ago
> This wasn't autocracy, this was logical health policy: Do you overwhelm hospitals, potentially causing them to fail, or do you limit personal freedom? That's the question that they had to answer. Except, the choice was nowhere as binary as you present and/or perceive it. If you look across the world you will see many different responses to the very same problem, but with different answers based on political, cultural, etc. differences. I kept and keep hearing the usual responses as to why the PRC had to respond in a highly authoritarian manner: the citizens can not handle freedom as they are morally weak. This may be true, but is it not awfully convenient that this always leads to the answer being politically empowering the CCP? Cui bono?
- onethought 4y ago
  I didn't say it was anything to do with being "Morally weak". And you didn't see a "many different responses" -- you saw 1: Lockdowns. The whole world did them. Where they didn't do them, hospitals got trashed and lots of people died. Lockdowns ended when vaccines began, China never got that option, because its population didn't take up any of the vaccines to a high enough percentage. Also, there was never enough mRNA vaccines available to supply the whole world + china, until recently (maybe still not even now). It 100% was as binary as I present it. Italy, UK, Canada, US, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Japan, Korea... the list goes on: They all did lockdowns to some degree to slow spread, and help their hospitals. It had nothing to do with culture or politics... except in the US.
  - ninjin 4y ago

golem14 4y ago

I don't know. Many people fleeing the DDR (East Germany) to West Germany were shot dead by DDR border guards, yet the Wall eventually fell. Things can still change.