8 ms·

US companies have been doing the same thing all over the world. Outside the west, everyone can see the hypocrisy. Ban it by all means, but you will become just

US companies have been doing the same thing all over the world. Outside the west, everyone can see the hypocrisy. Ban it by all means, but you will become just like China: a state that censors information and speech from its citizens because the government is scared of it.

_8j50 4y ago
Are you saying there is some speech allowed on tiktok but banned elsewhere? Outside the US there are a lot of envious people that scream hypocrisy and act anti-US at every opportunity so what you're saying isn't surprising. Americans shouldn't care what "the world" thinks when it comes to trade policy. Personally I couldn't care less if the US is like or not like China. Xi's regime is very anti-us and any state controlled companies can get bent. The nerve on some people. They want you to apologize for banning a service controlled by the CCP which is talking about actual war against the US.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
_-david-_ 4y ago
>US companies have been doing the same thing all over the world. Outside the west, everyone can see the hypocrisy It is not necessarily hypocrisy. I haven't paid too much attention, but does the US say China banning Facebook or Google is anti free speech? If not, then the US is not being hypocritical. Perhaps, double standards or something like that is more of what you were looking for? >Ban it by all means, but you will become just like China China builds roads. If the US builds roads it will become just like China. >a state that censors information and speech from its citizens because the government is scared of it. You think Europe is doing this when they banned RT, right?
JohnFen 4y ago
> but you will become just like China: a state that censors information and speech from its citizens because the government is scared of it. There are several legit arguments against banning, but this isn't one one of them. Banning Tiktok is not censoring information and speech, let alone doing it because of fear. If it were, then they'd also ban all of the numerous other methods by which people can talk to each other.
egourlao 4y ago
China bans platforms because they give access to information that embarrasses those in power. The US, here, is planning to ban a platform because it's a propaganda vector, and because its popularity has gotten to a point where we - as a society - at a serious risk of propaganda campaigns. All the information on TikTok is still available elsewhere - but we mitigate the opportunity for the Chinese Communist Party to mold what information is serviced to our constituents, and how that information is shaped. I just don't think those two are the same.
bequanna 4y ago
This isn’t a free speech issue. This is an enemy foreign government collecting information on US citizens.
- macinjosh 4y ago
  Why are they our enemy? They are our most important trading partner.
- Spivak 4y ago
  So to be consistent here, every country outside the US should ban all software originating in the US that collects user information. If the answer is yes then by all means, but I think it makes for atrocious foreign policy relations.
  - morelisp 4y ago
    This is a short summary of the Schrems II decision, yes.
  - disgruntledphd2 4y ago
    Well, there's definitely a strong argument that none of the data of EU residents can be processed in China or under Chinese jurisdiction, based on previous court rulings.
    - theGnuMe 4y ago
      The EU has GDPR. The US has refused to consider similar legislation but that would be a way to keep TikTok and limit data collection on US citizens and require it stay in the USA.
  - mint2 4y ago
    That argument doesn’t make sense as it assumes the governments of the other countries are equally at odds as China is with the US. Western Europe and US are generally wanting each other to succeed as friends and allies. China wants the us market but also wants the US to be weaker and not pose an example as a democracy. It also assumes a lot about level government control in each country that is highly dissimilar.
pictureofabear 4y ago
Countries outside the US are free to ban US-owned platforms, and many countries do. It's not hypocrisy. One of the CCP's goal is to destabilize the Western Liberal order. This is, of course, bad for the West. It's not unreasonable to take actions to prevent this.
- 8note 4y ago
  The question is whether what you care about is the order's power or the order's values If you care more about the values, it makes no sense to drop the values to retain the power
  - barrysteve 4y ago
    If you don't have the power to protect the values, what difference does it make?
- Spivak 4y ago
  I really don't think the west needs any help destabilizing itself. I wouldn't really worry even if we fuck ourselves politically, as long as the US military continues to playing in an entire other league and the ever-present threat of either side escalating to nuclear weapons out of desperation there's not a whole lot of realistic risk.
- yucky 4y ago
  Which leads us to the very uncomfortable fact, we want to ban TikTok for the same reason they ban the likes of Facebook, Google etc - because governments (including ours) uses it for citizen data-mining and mass crowd control. We know how dangerous TikTok is in their hands because we know how valuable Facebook, Google etc is in ours.
  - _8j50 4y ago
    Except for the crucial fact that unlike China US law protects US companies from state interference. The EU for example fines US tech companies left and right and enforced EU data privacy law and US companies pay up or comply. The dispute with China and US tech companies was never about privacy but about censorship (censoring what the state tells you to), there is no such dispute between tiktok and the US gov.

_8j50 4y ago

Are you saying there is some speech allowed on tiktok but banned elsewhere? Outside the US there are a lot of envious people that scream hypocrisy and act anti-US at every opportunity so what you're saying isn't surprising. Americans shouldn't care what "the world" thinks when it comes to trade policy. Personally I couldn't care less if the US is like or not like China. Xi's regime is very anti-us and any state controlled companies can get bent. The nerve on some people. They want you to apologize for banning a service controlled by the CCP which is talking about actual war against the US.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

_-david-_ 4y ago

>US companies have been doing the same thing all over the world. Outside the west, everyone can see the hypocrisy It is not necessarily hypocrisy. I haven't paid too much attention, but does the US say China banning Facebook or Google is anti free speech? If not, then the US is not being hypocritical. Perhaps, double standards or something like that is more of what you were looking for? >Ban it by all means, but you will become just like China China builds roads. If the US builds roads it will become just like China. >a state that censors information and speech from its citizens because the government is scared of it. You think Europe is doing this when they banned RT, right?

JohnFen 4y ago

> but you will become just like China: a state that censors information and speech from its citizens because the government is scared of it. There are several legit arguments against banning, but this isn't one one of them. Banning Tiktok is not censoring information and speech, let alone doing it because of fear. If it were, then they'd also ban all of the numerous other methods by which people can talk to each other.

egourlao 4y ago

China bans platforms because they give access to information that embarrasses those in power. The US, here, is planning to ban a platform because it's a propaganda vector, and because its popularity has gotten to a point where we - as a society - at a serious risk of propaganda campaigns. All the information on TikTok is still available elsewhere - but we mitigate the opportunity for the Chinese Communist Party to mold what information is serviced to our constituents, and how that information is shaped. I just don't think those two are the same.

bequanna 4y ago

This isn’t a free speech issue. This is an enemy foreign government collecting information on US citizens.

macinjosh 4y ago
Why are they our enemy? They are our most important trading partner.
Spivak 4y ago
So to be consistent here, every country outside the US should ban all software originating in the US that collects user information. If the answer is yes then by all means, but I think it makes for atrocious foreign policy relations.
- morelisp 4y ago
  This is a short summary of the Schrems II decision, yes.
- disgruntledphd2 4y ago
  Well, there's definitely a strong argument that none of the data of EU residents can be processed in China or under Chinese jurisdiction, based on previous court rulings.
  - theGnuMe 4y ago
    The EU has GDPR. The US has refused to consider similar legislation but that would be a way to keep TikTok and limit data collection on US citizens and require it stay in the USA.
- mint2 4y ago
  That argument doesn’t make sense as it assumes the governments of the other countries are equally at odds as China is with the US. Western Europe and US are generally wanting each other to succeed as friends and allies. China wants the us market but also wants the US to be weaker and not pose an example as a democracy. It also assumes a lot about level government control in each country that is highly dissimilar.

pictureofabear 4y ago

Countries outside the US are free to ban US-owned platforms, and many countries do. It's not hypocrisy. One of the CCP's goal is to destabilize the Western Liberal order. This is, of course, bad for the West. It's not unreasonable to take actions to prevent this.

8note 4y ago
The question is whether what you care about is the order's power or the order's values If you care more about the values, it makes no sense to drop the values to retain the power
- barrysteve 4y ago
  If you don't have the power to protect the values, what difference does it make?
Spivak 4y ago
I really don't think the west needs any help destabilizing itself. I wouldn't really worry even if we fuck ourselves politically, as long as the US military continues to playing in an entire other league and the ever-present threat of either side escalating to nuclear weapons out of desperation there's not a whole lot of realistic risk.
yucky 4y ago
Which leads us to the very uncomfortable fact, we want to ban TikTok for the same reason they ban the likes of Facebook, Google etc - because governments (including ours) uses it for citizen data-mining and mass crowd control. We know how dangerous TikTok is in their hands because we know how valuable Facebook, Google etc is in ours.
- _8j50 4y ago
  Except for the crucial fact that unlike China US law protects US companies from state interference. The EU for example fines US tech companies left and right and enforced EU data privacy law and US companies pay up or comply. The dispute with China and US tech companies was never about privacy but about censorship (censoring what the state tells you to), there is no such dispute between tiktok and the US gov.