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I'll give you something much simpler than all of those things: having enough food, having housing that doesn't leak, having running water, having electricity, h

I'll give you something much simpler than all of those things: having enough food, having housing that doesn't leak, having running water, having electricity, having access to schooling, having toilets, not having nearly every street in the city be a dirty mud pool full of trash, having safe streets mostly devoid of violent crimes. None of those things were a given when I grew up. Those things ard still not a given in many countries in which the west tried to forcefully introduce western liberal democracy, where they all focus on things like "freedom of association" at the expense of freedom from poverty. When you are poor, you are not free, no matter how much you can voice your opinion. I am sorry but seeing my parents and grandparents working their asses off in a society where your next meal is not guaranteed, lifting 800M people out of poverty, seeing my hometown stop being a trashy mudpool and seeing the elimination of child abductions, count for much more to me than any amount of VPN annoyance. In the grand scheme of things, these are still literally the best 30 years out of 3000 years.

catiopatio 3y ago
Why are you pretending these things are mutually exclusive? You can, in fact, lift a country out of poverty without also inflicting an authoritarian state on the populace. Half the world managed it — you’re just making excuses for authoritarianism. We’re discussing basic human rights, not “VPN annoyance”.
- FooBarWidget 3y ago
  If you truly want to know what I think and why I think it, feel free to email me and take this discussion off HN. You can find my contact through my profile.
  - catiopatio 3y ago
    If you can’t make the case for China’s authoritarian capitalism here, I don’t see how picking it up over e-mail is going to help. It’s also counterproductive to take the debate offline, as further discussion would be for the benefit of anyone else that might read this thread. I’ll never agree that lifting people out of poverty requires authoritarian control over the populace.
    - DiogenesKynikos 3y ago
      It's not necessarily that it requires authoritarian rule, but rather that if you grew up in a rich country, you have a very different view on what is important. Internet censorship generally ranks very low on your list of concerns if you're struggling to put food on the table. People in China have seen a complete transformation of their lives for the better, in just a few decades. They've gone from bicycles to electric cars, from not having reliable electricity to paying for everything with 5G-connected smartphones. From the point of view of how people live their everyday lives, things are better than ever. Issues like censorship will become more important over time, but right now, they're still secondary. There are other issues at play as well, such as the legitimacy the Party still enjoys from the revolution and from its management of the economic boom of the last few decades, and people's fear of the sort of chaos that consumed China for much of its modern history.
    - FooBarWidget 3y ago
      It's not a case of not having arguments. HN moderators told me not to talk too much about China on HN. It's just me following the rules.
- l3mure 3y ago
  > You can, in fact, lift a country out of poverty without also inflicting an authoritarian state on the populace. > Half the world managed it — you’re just making excuses for authoritarianism. You mean the half of the world that enriched itself by inflicting "authoritarianism" on other populations - or indeed, their own populations too - unless you don't consider the treatment of Black and Native people in the US to be authoritarianism, or the Irish in the UK, etc etc?

catiopatio 3y ago

Why are you pretending these things are mutually exclusive? You can, in fact, lift a country out of poverty without also inflicting an authoritarian state on the populace. Half the world managed it — you’re just making excuses for authoritarianism. We’re discussing basic human rights, not “VPN annoyance”.

FooBarWidget 3y ago
If you truly want to know what I think and why I think it, feel free to email me and take this discussion off HN. You can find my contact through my profile.
- catiopatio 3y ago
  If you can’t make the case for China’s authoritarian capitalism here, I don’t see how picking it up over e-mail is going to help. It’s also counterproductive to take the debate offline, as further discussion would be for the benefit of anyone else that might read this thread. I’ll never agree that lifting people out of poverty requires authoritarian control over the populace.
  - DiogenesKynikos 3y ago
    It's not necessarily that it requires authoritarian rule, but rather that if you grew up in a rich country, you have a very different view on what is important. Internet censorship generally ranks very low on your list of concerns if you're struggling to put food on the table. People in China have seen a complete transformation of their lives for the better, in just a few decades. They've gone from bicycles to electric cars, from not having reliable electricity to paying for everything with 5G-connected smartphones. From the point of view of how people live their everyday lives, things are better than ever. Issues like censorship will become more important over time, but right now, they're still secondary. There are other issues at play as well, such as the legitimacy the Party still enjoys from the revolution and from its management of the economic boom of the last few decades, and people's fear of the sort of chaos that consumed China for much of its modern history.
  - FooBarWidget 3y ago
    It's not a case of not having arguments. HN moderators told me not to talk too much about China on HN. It's just me following the rules.
l3mure 3y ago
> You can, in fact, lift a country out of poverty without also inflicting an authoritarian state on the populace. > Half the world managed it — you’re just making excuses for authoritarianism. You mean the half of the world that enriched itself by inflicting "authoritarianism" on other populations - or indeed, their own populations too - unless you don't consider the treatment of Black and Native people in the US to be authoritarianism, or the Irish in the UK, etc etc?