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I believe in the United States, and the egalitarian enlightenment era principles upon which it was founded. It's a flawed nation, but any human project, certain

by voz_ 3y ago

I believe in the United States, and the egalitarian enlightenment era principles upon which it was founded. It's a flawed nation, but any human project, certainly one of this size, is bound to be flawed. What I do not believe in is the ethno-fascist state of China, run by the CCP, nor do I believe in the kleptocratic crony carnival that is Russia. So, if there is to be an AI arms race, then I do hope that the West will win. It is good to have qualms, it is right to have reservations, but to over enthusiastically hamstring our own efforts here will give us a momentary peace from ourselves until we are devoured by nations (note, nations, not people, I firmly believe that both the Chinese and Russian people are trapped by their government) whose values and morals do not, at all, align with ours. If it is time again for us to build a new Arsenal of Democracy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arsenal_of_Democracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arsenal_of_Democracy) let us do so with a weary sigh, but own the responsibility fully and not shy away from it.

hef19898 3y ago
All shiney and good, until you end up on the receiving end of said arsenal of democracy. You, necause the government of your country refuses to sell oil for dollars or some other reason, that absolitely requiers "liberation". But yes, the democratic west should aim for weapon and capability parity. We just should not get on too high a moral horse so.
- voz_ 3y ago
  But we do have a moral high ground, and to lose it means to have lost our way. And we certainly have lost our way before. The fact that you and I can speak freely about it, and turn around and critique our own nation in order to make it better, is a sign that all is far from gone.
  - themodelplumber 3y ago
    Yep, people love to "whatabout" it but qualitatively speaking there is an argument to be made for a rather magnificent piece of moral high ground. Even inasmuch as it annoys a lot of people who don't appreciate this perspective--they tend to overrate it as if it must equate to perfection, a nation without problems, etc.
    - FpUser 3y ago
      >Yep, people love to "whatabout" Americans sure love "whatabout". Every time when pointed to their problems you would hear but look at China / Russia / etc. >"rather magnificent piece of moral high ground" I guess crusaders are not yet extinct
    - foverzar 3y ago
      > Even inasmuch as it annoys a lot of people who don't appreciate this perspective It annoys everyone because it's based on a false pretense. In terms of morals, the US didn't turn up any better than the USSR, judging by how it acted when it became uncontested.
  - lostlogin 3y ago
    If you’re talking about the US, it’s a delicate thing. Books are being removed from classrooms and inconvenient history is being rewritten by the state in Florida and other states. However Florida’s governor seems to be eying a run at the White House. It seems unlikely to succeed, but the unlikely has happened before.
    - nickpeterson 3y ago
      You’re comparing a mountain and a molehill. Some conservative US states are attempting to curtail freedom of speech in schools and will likely fail ultimately. China arrests people’s family members who speak out against the regime. We are very definitely better than them.
      - waboremo 3y ago
        When I read comments like this, I am reminded of how deeply ingrained nationalism is for Americans. Where even if one admits something is a problem, it's simply a temporary problem not worth paying any mind, hey look, China is doing something! Hopefully soon more Americans realize how similar your country and China are, the differences are minor, not major.
        nickpeterson 3y ago
        The US government shouldn’t have invaded Iraq, toppled most of the regimes in the Cold War, interned Japanese citizens, or dropped the nuclear bombs during WW2. They should have never had slavery or poor treatment of indigenous tribes. Today we need better election laws, gun laws, separation between church and state, tort reform etc. My username is my real name and I live in Toledo, Ohio. typing that gives me no pause or concern. So if you’re a Chinese citizen, go ahead and type out your name and where you live, along with a list of things you feel your government is wrong about.
        antisthenes 3y ago
        > My username is my real name and I live in Toledo, Ohio. typing that gives me no pause or concern. The issue isn't that you aren't writing this post with no pause of concern. The issue is that after writing it, and, presumably, comprehending what you, yourself wrote, you still harbor the delusion of maintaining some moral high ground (as are some other posters in this thread) The US maintains a lot more freedoms for its citizens simply due to exerting vast military power to siphon resources from the entire planet (with exceptions to China/Russia, obviously). Otherwise, it's entirely unknown and hypothetical as to whether it would or could be a "shining beacon of democracy" as so many would like to believe it currently is (which it very well may be, compared to CCP/Russia, which is not a very high bar)
  - JonChesterfield 3y ago
    Every group believes they hold the moral high ground. Mortality is subjective and perception flawed.
    - FartyMcFarter 3y ago
      There are plenty of dictators out there who just want to hold power at any cost regardless of morals. Sociopaths exist.
    - scrubs 3y ago
      Oh c'mon! Typing a two liner on HN like you're saying something is twaddle. Most guys try to gauge the relative stupidity or goodness of things by reading history, and getting some sense of the state of play from real people and facts. For most of us belief alone isn't good enough.
  - FpUser 3y ago
    >"But we do have a moral high ground" No, just killed slightly less people (maybe) while chanting "they asked for it" and "we are the good guys" mantras.
  - foverzar 3y ago
    > But we do have a moral high ground No, you don't. You have an excellent propaganda and a totally chauvinistic attitude.
    - xbar 3y ago
      Relative to Putin-Russia and CCP-China? The US maintains moral high ground.
      - foverzar 3y ago
        Try asking people outside the western bubble. Relative to Russia/China, you just tell yourselves and everyone around that you are the good guys more often and much more stubbornly. To put it simply, you are just biased because you can't see yourself from the outside.
        voz_ 3y ago
        I am from outside that bubble, and you are wrong.
        hef19898 3y ago
        One could, of course, ask memebers of one of the following groups of what they think about Western moral superiority: Afghans, Pakistanis living in the border region to Afghnistan, Iraqis, the Shiit minority living in Southern Iraq, Palestinians, people Lebanon and Lybia... The list of wars the West (TM), as in NATO and various allies, have started over the last decades is way too long to claim any moral superiority when it comes to foreign policy. And the way we, especially in Europe, treat refugees from various countries differently certainly doesn't help. One group is allowed to drown in the Mediteranean, while certain other grouos get easy entry and extended stay visas. Nothing againstvthe latter, thaz was quite necessary, bit entities as rich as the EU could offer the same thing to all people in need, right?
        foverzar 3y ago
        Where are you from exactly? Would you deny it being a rather common opinion?
  - jakeinspace 3y ago
    The country that invaded Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan , destabilized countries on 3 continents, and dominates the world economy, all at the cost of millions of lives, doesn’t have so high a moral ground. We only look good compared to China if one chooses a recent slice of history and ignores foreign wars and intervention.
    - martindbp 3y ago
      As compared to a nation that killed thousands of student protesters, ran over their bodies with tanks until they turned to mush, flushed it down the drain and then banned anyone from mentioning it for 30 years I'll take the good old US thank you very much.
      - antisthenes 3y ago
        What about a nation that was committing systemic genocide from coast to coast over the course of 150+ years, and after that put the people it didn't manage to kill in reservations?
      - FpUser 3y ago
        >"ran over their bodies with tanks until they turned to mush" Can I have more details please >"I'll take the good old US" I would choose the US as well. Because the US treats their own citizens better (at least for now). Not because it stands on "high moral ground" - it does not.
        martindbp 3y ago
        "They had orders that nobody in the square be spared, and children and young girls were slaughtered, anti-personnel carriers and tanks then ran backwards and forwards over the bodies of the slain until they were reduced to pulp, after which, bulldozers moved in to push the remains into piles which were then incinerated by troops with flamethrowers." https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-03/bob-hawke-tiananman-classified-cable/100184916 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-03/bob-hawke-tiananman-c... I love a lot about China, love Chinese people, but we have to be realistic about the differences in governance and its capacity for acts like this. We (non-Americans) are very lucky that the US became the world hegemon after WW2 and the sole superpower after the fall of the Soviet Union. For all its faults and mistakes, it usually recognizes them eventually and tries to improve over time. So, while it annoys me a bit that young Americans are so anti-US, it's a very healthy sign that there is so much criticism.
- coffeebeqn 3y ago
  If we really get advanced AI then I can’t imagine the US will use oil for fuel very much longer. Too messy geopolitically. Can you imagine if we didn’t have to care about the big oil producers of the world? But you know whatever little known mineral will be needed to run the new generators - you better sell it to them
Convolutional 3y ago
> nor do I believe in the kleptocratic crony carnival that is Russia. The rush to privatize everything in Russia came from the West - particularly the US. The US encouraged Yeltsin (who Putin was a protege of) to use tanks to shell Russia's parliament - which was celebrated on US news shows, in government etc. You're upholding the beacon of the US to militantly right what it had a hand in creating in the first place.
- voz_ 3y ago
  Bullshit. I was there. I remember. The crony capitalism came from Russia's own spirit. I remember watching the "new style businessmen" in their leather jackets try to intimidate family members into giving up their apartments. All the criminals and thugs that had heretofore operated in the shadows, smuggling and working around the systems, came out into the open and became the new economy. All the brains and talent fled, and as things settled and shook out, a sort of mob-capital hybrid emerged that has to the kleptocratic paradise we now see today.
  - foverzar 3y ago
    Oh please, you are mixing things up. Leather jackets mafia types have nothing to do with the topic at hand. Source: i was there.
- themodelplumber 3y ago
  Uh. Privatization in RUS has stimulated the propagation of kleptocracy which was _systemic_ in CCCP times to a magnificent extent. To relate it solely to or even just directly with privatizing things in the US is not only not necessary, but misleading, especially given the near 1:1 relationship of the de facto world Putin operated in early in his career as compared to what is being exposed to the west about his government's operating style right now.
- dmix 3y ago
  Plenty of other post-soviet countries rushed to privatize too and it worked out fine. At least far better than what it was before. Russia doling out their biggest companies to their friends turning them into oligarchs was probably a predictable outcome in retrospect. The difference between Russia and the surroundings smaller states was that it was the power center of that entire part of Europe and beyond. That huge amount of backroom power structures (not to mention the KGB) were far larger and not things that were going to fade away easily. It was primed to turn into a pseudo mafia state without proper reforms... By the people themselves, not some foreign overlord (although good advisor's always helps). The responsibility is always ultimately going to rely on people caring internally, as we saw in Afghanistan/Iraq you can't externally prop up democratic/fair organizations without local buy in and local cultural adhesion. So it comes down to what Russia could/would do themselves. I'm curious what the alternative would have been given Russia's sovereignty. The west not getting involved and pushing raw privatization and not pushing back during the power struggle by the communist factions... I guess it would be more like a modern extreme top-heavy state-capitalism. So basically China? The oligarchs would have to do their deals via gov annoited monopolies, being run by princelings. Elite party members rather than Oligarchs. Or maybe best case scenario some top heavy EU style country like Belgium (53%) / France (58%) . Finland (54%) / etc where >50% of GDP is via gov (Russia is currently 36%) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_government_spending_as_percentage_of_GDP?wprov=sfti1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_governmen...
MrBuddyCasino 3y ago
> egalitarian enlightenment In other words, communism with extra steps if you think it through to its logical conclusion.
- voz_ 3y ago
  I think you either have not read Enlightenment era philosophy, or you have not read Communist theory, because this comment is woefully off the mark. Communism's entire thesis (which, frankly, I agree with) is that all historical conflict is class conflict. I have my disagreements, however, with (1) how much of a problem it is purported to be and (2) with both the theory and the implementation of the solutions offered.
psb 3y ago
I'm not sure Peter Thiel believes in anything resembling "egalitarian enlightenment era principles" unfortunately
- sershe 3y ago
  I think this is a blind spot from American civics classes. Democracy is assumed to be synonymous with/inextricably connected to liberty, whereas in reality liberty, at most, either requires democracy at some point in history to change the culture; or it's possible that they merely correlate. My impression is that Thiel thinks (as do I - and as did, to a lesser extent possibly due to inability to envision mass media and administrative state, the Federalist Papers) that liberty is far, far more important than democracy. Given that it would be nice to have both, but then he would probably argue that the combination of constantly bribing the voters and the ratchet effect of the administrative state makes the increasingly direct democracy in the US a threat to liberty. He supports enlightenment principles, he just thinks the civic culture has degraded so far that the best bet to get them is to enforce them from above. It's not unprecedented - that is what Supreme Court was doing when it shut down things like FDR's price and wage fixing, segregated schools, and many more. Thiel wants to do the same kind of thing more, and I agree - wouldn't it be wonderful if a non-democratic, liberal (in the original sense) court could also throw away e.g. internment camps during WW2, instead of bowing to "democratic" pressure? There's a risk here, obviously, but the tradeoff in my view is increasingly (and in Thiel's view, I assume, completely) on the side of taking a risk of having little less democracy in order to get more liberty.
- deleted 3y ago
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- Fomite 3y ago
  I was legitimately expecting "I believe in the United States, and the egalitarian enlightenment era principles upon which it was founded..." to end in "...but Peter Thiel..."
- MichaelZuo 3y ago
  Yeah, it's so against the grain of the usual sentiment on HN regarding Thiel that it immediately made me skeptical. There is the possibility that Thiel genuinely believes in such principles but voz_ would need a lot of evidence to convince the majority of the usual commentators.
strangattractor 3y ago
The rumor that FDR had his head frozen and has been brought back as chatGTP must be true:)
byyyy 3y ago
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- mach1ne 3y ago
  >Eh there's a lot of propaganda from the US about China I wouldn't buy into it. I feel these statements at least partly stem from contrarian origins. We have a huge supply of facts as to why China indeed is a fascist totalitarian state - look at what happened to Hong Kong as an example. Pooling these facts into ”US propaganda” is borderline intellectually dishonest. >People in China are generally happy In happiness, China ranked 82nd out of 146 countries in 2023.
  - Convolutional 3y ago
    > look at what happened to Hong Kong as an example You mean the violent breaking off of it from China by the imperial "enlightened" United Kingdom? Its massacre of Chinese protesting UK imperialism in the 1960s? What a hilarious joke it is to see the westerners finally kicked out of their imperial colony taking some self-righteous posture of supposed concern about the Chinese there. What a laugh. Sandwiched between posts complaining about African "vagrants" begging for food in San Francisco.
    - lostmsu 3y ago
      I hope you realize that militialism under excuse of historical revisionism is a fascist thing, right? Look up what fascism is.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
  - byyyy 3y ago
    >I feel these statements at least partly stem from contrarian origins. We have a huge supply of facts as to why China indeed is a fascist totalitarian state - look at what happened to Hong Kong as an example. Pooling these facts into ”US propaganda” is borderline intellectually dishonest. Of course theirs plenty of evidence. There's also plenty of evidence that the US is a nation of violent psychopaths: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_war_crimes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_war_crimes. That's just one example of the bad things in the US. The US is far from great and when viewed through the right lens there's tons and tons of stuff. The Chinese are fed this stuff and all of it is true. All of it. The problem here is that this information isn't a full characterization of the US. It's a small slice of the pie. What I'm saying is that the information you are being fed is also a small slice of the pie. It's nearly impossible to prove this to both you and your Chinese counterpart being fed anti-American propaganda. So I can only tell you about my perspective and hopefully you can at the very least consider the fact that your universe of information is limited. I'm a Chinese American. Meaning I was born in the US to immigrant parents from China. I have many immigrant friends from China, many friends that were born here and lived in China (myself included) and I can only tell you that if you lived in China and it's not what you think. It's quite normal living in China, it's not some imagined fascist dystopia so many misinformed Americans fantasize about. It's unlikely you'll change your opinion based off this one post. But perhaps this post can be a seed for the future where you might become more informed about what it's really like. Perhaps I can convince you to at least mistrust western propaganda. Western propaganda is highly, highly sophisticated because it's fed to you under the guise of Freedom of the press. It's more sophisticated then Chinese propaganda because the Chinese on a certain level are aware of lies and censorship. It's actually not violating any freedom of press policies. Government sponsored lies in the press is still technically freedom of the press. Take a look at these sources: https://graphika.com/reports/unheard-voice https://graphika.com/reports/unheard-voice https://cyber.fsi.stanford.edu/io/news/sio-aug-22-takedowns https://cyber.fsi.stanford.edu/io/news/sio-aug-22-takedowns https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7z77m/facebook-twitter-take-down-us-propaganda-operation-targeting-russia-china-iran https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7z77m/facebook-twitter-take... I guess the best way to break out of that mode is to have several Chinese friends from china here. Ask them what it's like. >In happiness, China ranked 82nd out of 146 countries in 2023. If you lived in China you'll know it's not because of the government. It's actually because of capitalism. China is a dog eat dog competitive society. People are overworked there. The unhappiness is the same sort of unhappiness that corporate drones feel here for their 9-5 job but 1000x worse. The Chinese aren't unhappy because of "lack of freedoms" or anything like that.
foverzar 3y ago
Us good, them bad. Typical nationalist.
anigbrowl 3y ago
I believe in the United States, and the egalitarian enlightenment era principles upon which it was founded. Peter Thiel has a very different worldview from you. Essentially he believes that the US should have an industrial policy, but that it should be run by someone like Vannevar Bush in the same manner that he ran the Office of Scientific Research and Development during WW2. So not a command economy or an autocracy, exactly, but with maximal autonomy and minimal external accountability. It's understandable to be hostile to bureaucracy in general, but my impression is that Thiel strongly believes in the 'noble lie' and considers that the public doesn't really know where its own interests lie. This is based on a presentation he gave at a private event some years ago. I have a lot of respect for Thiel's intellect but have some fundamental differences with his values. Anyway, don't fall into the trap of assuming that because some of your opinions/outlook are aligned with his, that you're necessarily on the same page overall.
somesortofthing 3y ago
To be honest, I trust the CCP to have my best interests at heart more than I do tech executives. One side is driven by straightforward, predictable self-interest while the other has spent the past decade looking for elixirs of immortality and trying to replace what little is left of our society and institutions with subscription services and payments platforms. I'd rather be ruled by Xi than Peter Thiel.
- jgalt212 3y ago
  Peter Thiel vs Xi. What a choice to make.
- huijzer 3y ago
  At least Thiel has no monopoly on physical force.
hayst4ck 3y ago
We are ideological allies. I agree with the sentiment. I agree that sometimes conflicts an only be resolved with force and that it is better to have the force than have force used against you. Philosophically, I have some dissonance. My first piece of dissonance is that if we model the world under the game of prisoners dilemma, having too much relative power creates a situation where our optimum strategy is to defect, because even when someone else defects, we can still win through superior force. This is the mathematical model behind "absolute power corrupts absolutely." So if we generate an arsenal of democracy, which is at it's core power, what prevents us from arbitrarily using it? What prevents an arsenal of democracy from becoming an arsenal of totalitarianism through democratic decay and fascist seizing of power? My second piece of dissonance is that on one hand I believe in the 2nd amendment, but on the other hand, if we bring the idea of the 2nd amendment to the world stage, using the same logic, every country should be well armed and have nukes so that they can fight the oppressors of their state. Every country should be able to practice MAD. Why not? Who shouldn't get nukes (and using that same rule, who shouldn't get guns?)? The third piece of dissonance is mostly pedantry: A democracy could choose to oppress or enslave others. The US was founded as a democracy, yet we had slaves. If our founding fathers had an "arsenal of democracy," what prevents them from using that arsenal to go to Africa, load people into boats, and make them labor with the threat of force here? The 3/5ths compromise is a product of flawed democracy, so "democracy" seems like a philosophically flawed idea to reference. What is good in America is rule of law (prevention of arbitrary uses of power) and human rights protected by that law. Democracy allows for a tyranny of the majority. "Equal rights under law" is the idea that gives us freedom. My core critique of your post, while still agreeing with it and still considering myself your ideological ally, is that we have an unhanded fascism problem at home and it is very much a larger problem than a genocidal China. Without dealing with our problem at home this "arsenal of democracy" seems too easily turned into the "aresenal of oppression." Furthermore, if we dealt with this problem at home, those same power structures we have to deal with are the one's that result in Chinese and Russians being slaves to their governments. In summary: "leading by example" is probably going to have better outcomes when our example is fighting fascism at home and having the highest quality of life rather than if our example is "build the most amazing tools of destruction so that when there is a conflict about freedom, we get to be the arbiter."
surgical_fire 3y ago
I have no love for Russia or China, but to be frank, as someone who comes from a "shithole country", I also have no love for the US. The US has a long history of being exploitative and by flexing it's oppressive military muscle, without anyone calling it out. In a fight between China/Russia and the US, I support the fight.

by voz_ 3y ago

hef19898 3y ago

All shiney and good, until you end up on the receiving end of said arsenal of democracy. You, necause the government of your country refuses to sell oil for dollars or some other reason, that absolitely requiers "liberation". But yes, the democratic west should aim for weapon and capability parity. We just should not get on too high a moral horse so.

voz_ 3y ago
But we do have a moral high ground, and to lose it means to have lost our way. And we certainly have lost our way before. The fact that you and I can speak freely about it, and turn around and critique our own nation in order to make it better, is a sign that all is far from gone.
- themodelplumber 3y ago
  Yep, people love to "whatabout" it but qualitatively speaking there is an argument to be made for a rather magnificent piece of moral high ground. Even inasmuch as it annoys a lot of people who don't appreciate this perspective--they tend to overrate it as if it must equate to perfection, a nation without problems, etc.
  - FpUser 3y ago
    >Yep, people love to "whatabout" Americans sure love "whatabout". Every time when pointed to their problems you would hear but look at China / Russia / etc. >"rather magnificent piece of moral high ground" I guess crusaders are not yet extinct
  - foverzar 3y ago
    > Even inasmuch as it annoys a lot of people who don't appreciate this perspective It annoys everyone because it's based on a false pretense. In terms of morals, the US didn't turn up any better than the USSR, judging by how it acted when it became uncontested.
- lostlogin 3y ago
  If you’re talking about the US, it’s a delicate thing. Books are being removed from classrooms and inconvenient history is being rewritten by the state in Florida and other states. However Florida’s governor seems to be eying a run at the White House. It seems unlikely to succeed, but the unlikely has happened before.
  - nickpeterson 3y ago
    You’re comparing a mountain and a molehill. Some conservative US states are attempting to curtail freedom of speech in schools and will likely fail ultimately. China arrests people’s family members who speak out against the regime. We are very definitely better than them.
    - waboremo 3y ago
      When I read comments like this, I am reminded of how deeply ingrained nationalism is for Americans. Where even if one admits something is a problem, it's simply a temporary problem not worth paying any mind, hey look, China is doing something! Hopefully soon more Americans realize how similar your country and China are, the differences are minor, not major.
      - nickpeterson 3y ago
        The US government shouldn’t have invaded Iraq, toppled most of the regimes in the Cold War, interned Japanese citizens, or dropped the nuclear bombs during WW2. They should have never had slavery or poor treatment of indigenous tribes. Today we need better election laws, gun laws, separation between church and state, tort reform etc. My username is my real name and I live in Toledo, Ohio. typing that gives me no pause or concern. So if you’re a Chinese citizen, go ahead and type out your name and where you live, along with a list of things you feel your government is wrong about.
        antisthenes 3y ago
        > My username is my real name and I live in Toledo, Ohio. typing that gives me no pause or concern. The issue isn't that you aren't writing this post with no pause of concern. The issue is that after writing it, and, presumably, comprehending what you, yourself wrote, you still harbor the delusion of maintaining some moral high ground (as are some other posters in this thread) The US maintains a lot more freedoms for its citizens simply due to exerting vast military power to siphon resources from the entire planet (with exceptions to China/Russia, obviously). Otherwise, it's entirely unknown and hypothetical as to whether it would or could be a "shining beacon of democracy" as so many would like to believe it currently is (which it very well may be, compared to CCP/Russia, which is not a very high bar)
- JonChesterfield 3y ago
  Every group believes they hold the moral high ground. Mortality is subjective and perception flawed.
  - FartyMcFarter 3y ago
    There are plenty of dictators out there who just want to hold power at any cost regardless of morals. Sociopaths exist.
  - scrubs 3y ago
    Oh c'mon! Typing a two liner on HN like you're saying something is twaddle. Most guys try to gauge the relative stupidity or goodness of things by reading history, and getting some sense of the state of play from real people and facts. For most of us belief alone isn't good enough.
- FpUser 3y ago
  >"But we do have a moral high ground" No, just killed slightly less people (maybe) while chanting "they asked for it" and "we are the good guys" mantras.
- foverzar 3y ago
  > But we do have a moral high ground No, you don't. You have an excellent propaganda and a totally chauvinistic attitude.
  - xbar 3y ago
    Relative to Putin-Russia and CCP-China? The US maintains moral high ground.
    - foverzar 3y ago
      Try asking people outside the western bubble. Relative to Russia/China, you just tell yourselves and everyone around that you are the good guys more often and much more stubbornly. To put it simply, you are just biased because you can't see yourself from the outside.
      - voz_ 3y ago
        I am from outside that bubble, and you are wrong.
        hef19898 3y ago
        One could, of course, ask memebers of one of the following groups of what they think about Western moral superiority: Afghans, Pakistanis living in the border region to Afghnistan, Iraqis, the Shiit minority living in Southern Iraq, Palestinians, people Lebanon and Lybia... The list of wars the West (TM), as in NATO and various allies, have started over the last decades is way too long to claim any moral superiority when it comes to foreign policy. And the way we, especially in Europe, treat refugees from various countries differently certainly doesn't help. One group is allowed to drown in the Mediteranean, while certain other grouos get easy entry and extended stay visas. Nothing againstvthe latter, thaz was quite necessary, bit entities as rich as the EU could offer the same thing to all people in need, right?
        foverzar 3y ago
        Where are you from exactly? Would you deny it being a rather common opinion?
- jakeinspace 3y ago
  The country that invaded Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan , destabilized countries on 3 continents, and dominates the world economy, all at the cost of millions of lives, doesn’t have so high a moral ground. We only look good compared to China if one chooses a recent slice of history and ignores foreign wars and intervention.
  - martindbp 3y ago
    As compared to a nation that killed thousands of student protesters, ran over their bodies with tanks until they turned to mush, flushed it down the drain and then banned anyone from mentioning it for 30 years I'll take the good old US thank you very much.
    - antisthenes 3y ago
      What about a nation that was committing systemic genocide from coast to coast over the course of 150+ years, and after that put the people it didn't manage to kill in reservations?
    - FpUser 3y ago
      >"ran over their bodies with tanks until they turned to mush" Can I have more details please >"I'll take the good old US" I would choose the US as well. Because the US treats their own citizens better (at least for now). Not because it stands on "high moral ground" - it does not.
      - martindbp 3y ago
        "They had orders that nobody in the square be spared, and children and young girls were slaughtered, anti-personnel carriers and tanks then ran backwards and forwards over the bodies of the slain until they were reduced to pulp, after which, bulldozers moved in to push the remains into piles which were then incinerated by troops with flamethrowers." https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-03/bob-hawke-tiananman-classified-cable/100184916 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-03/bob-hawke-tiananman-c... I love a lot about China, love Chinese people, but we have to be realistic about the differences in governance and its capacity for acts like this. We (non-Americans) are very lucky that the US became the world hegemon after WW2 and the sole superpower after the fall of the Soviet Union. For all its faults and mistakes, it usually recognizes them eventually and tries to improve over time. So, while it annoys me a bit that young Americans are so anti-US, it's a very healthy sign that there is so much criticism.
coffeebeqn 3y ago
If we really get advanced AI then I can’t imagine the US will use oil for fuel very much longer. Too messy geopolitically. Can you imagine if we didn’t have to care about the big oil producers of the world? But you know whatever little known mineral will be needed to run the new generators - you better sell it to them

Convolutional 3y ago

> nor do I believe in the kleptocratic crony carnival that is Russia. The rush to privatize everything in Russia came from the West - particularly the US. The US encouraged Yeltsin (who Putin was a protege of) to use tanks to shell Russia's parliament - which was celebrated on US news shows, in government etc. You're upholding the beacon of the US to militantly right what it had a hand in creating in the first place.

voz_ 3y ago
Bullshit. I was there. I remember. The crony capitalism came from Russia's own spirit. I remember watching the "new style businessmen" in their leather jackets try to intimidate family members into giving up their apartments. All the criminals and thugs that had heretofore operated in the shadows, smuggling and working around the systems, came out into the open and became the new economy. All the brains and talent fled, and as things settled and shook out, a sort of mob-capital hybrid emerged that has to the kleptocratic paradise we now see today.
- foverzar 3y ago
  Oh please, you are mixing things up. Leather jackets mafia types have nothing to do with the topic at hand. Source: i was there.
themodelplumber 3y ago
Uh. Privatization in RUS has stimulated the propagation of kleptocracy which was _systemic_ in CCCP times to a magnificent extent. To relate it solely to or even just directly with privatizing things in the US is not only not necessary, but misleading, especially given the near 1:1 relationship of the de facto world Putin operated in early in his career as compared to what is being exposed to the west about his government's operating style right now.
dmix 3y ago
Plenty of other post-soviet countries rushed to privatize too and it worked out fine. At least far better than what it was before. Russia doling out their biggest companies to their friends turning them into oligarchs was probably a predictable outcome in retrospect. The difference between Russia and the surroundings smaller states was that it was the power center of that entire part of Europe and beyond. That huge amount of backroom power structures (not to mention the KGB) were far larger and not things that were going to fade away easily. It was primed to turn into a pseudo mafia state without proper reforms... By the people themselves, not some foreign overlord (although good advisor's always helps). The responsibility is always ultimately going to rely on people caring internally, as we saw in Afghanistan/Iraq you can't externally prop up democratic/fair organizations without local buy in and local cultural adhesion. So it comes down to what Russia could/would do themselves. I'm curious what the alternative would have been given Russia's sovereignty. The west not getting involved and pushing raw privatization and not pushing back during the power struggle by the communist factions... I guess it would be more like a modern extreme top-heavy state-capitalism. So basically China? The oligarchs would have to do their deals via gov annoited monopolies, being run by princelings. Elite party members rather than Oligarchs. Or maybe best case scenario some top heavy EU style country like Belgium (53%) / France (58%) . Finland (54%) / etc where >50% of GDP is via gov (Russia is currently 36%) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_government_spending_as_percentage_of_GDP?wprov=sfti1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_governmen...

MrBuddyCasino 3y ago

> egalitarian enlightenment In other words, communism with extra steps if you think it through to its logical conclusion.

voz_ 3y ago
I think you either have not read Enlightenment era philosophy, or you have not read Communist theory, because this comment is woefully off the mark. Communism's entire thesis (which, frankly, I agree with) is that all historical conflict is class conflict. I have my disagreements, however, with (1) how much of a problem it is purported to be and (2) with both the theory and the implementation of the solutions offered.

psb 3y ago

I'm not sure Peter Thiel believes in anything resembling "egalitarian enlightenment era principles" unfortunately

sershe 3y ago
I think this is a blind spot from American civics classes. Democracy is assumed to be synonymous with/inextricably connected to liberty, whereas in reality liberty, at most, either requires democracy at some point in history to change the culture; or it's possible that they merely correlate. My impression is that Thiel thinks (as do I - and as did, to a lesser extent possibly due to inability to envision mass media and administrative state, the Federalist Papers) that liberty is far, far more important than democracy. Given that it would be nice to have both, but then he would probably argue that the combination of constantly bribing the voters and the ratchet effect of the administrative state makes the increasingly direct democracy in the US a threat to liberty. He supports enlightenment principles, he just thinks the civic culture has degraded so far that the best bet to get them is to enforce them from above. It's not unprecedented - that is what Supreme Court was doing when it shut down things like FDR's price and wage fixing, segregated schools, and many more. Thiel wants to do the same kind of thing more, and I agree - wouldn't it be wonderful if a non-democratic, liberal (in the original sense) court could also throw away e.g. internment camps during WW2, instead of bowing to "democratic" pressure? There's a risk here, obviously, but the tradeoff in my view is increasingly (and in Thiel's view, I assume, completely) on the side of taking a risk of having little less democracy in order to get more liberty.
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Fomite 3y ago
I was legitimately expecting "I believe in the United States, and the egalitarian enlightenment era principles upon which it was founded..." to end in "...but Peter Thiel..."
MichaelZuo 3y ago
Yeah, it's so against the grain of the usual sentiment on HN regarding Thiel that it immediately made me skeptical. There is the possibility that Thiel genuinely believes in such principles but voz_ would need a lot of evidence to convince the majority of the usual commentators.

strangattractor 3y ago

The rumor that FDR had his head frozen and has been brought back as chatGTP must be true:)

byyyy 3y ago

[flagged]

mach1ne 3y ago
>Eh there's a lot of propaganda from the US about China I wouldn't buy into it. I feel these statements at least partly stem from contrarian origins. We have a huge supply of facts as to why China indeed is a fascist totalitarian state - look at what happened to Hong Kong as an example. Pooling these facts into ”US propaganda” is borderline intellectually dishonest. >People in China are generally happy In happiness, China ranked 82nd out of 146 countries in 2023.
- Convolutional 3y ago
  > look at what happened to Hong Kong as an example You mean the violent breaking off of it from China by the imperial "enlightened" United Kingdom? Its massacre of Chinese protesting UK imperialism in the 1960s? What a hilarious joke it is to see the westerners finally kicked out of their imperial colony taking some self-righteous posture of supposed concern about the Chinese there. What a laugh. Sandwiched between posts complaining about African "vagrants" begging for food in San Francisco.
  - lostmsu 3y ago
    I hope you realize that militialism under excuse of historical revisionism is a fascist thing, right? Look up what fascism is.
    - deleted 3y ago
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- byyyy 3y ago
  >I feel these statements at least partly stem from contrarian origins. We have a huge supply of facts as to why China indeed is a fascist totalitarian state - look at what happened to Hong Kong as an example. Pooling these facts into ”US propaganda” is borderline intellectually dishonest. Of course theirs plenty of evidence. There's also plenty of evidence that the US is a nation of violent psychopaths: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_war_crimes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_war_crimes. That's just one example of the bad things in the US. The US is far from great and when viewed through the right lens there's tons and tons of stuff. The Chinese are fed this stuff and all of it is true. All of it. The problem here is that this information isn't a full characterization of the US. It's a small slice of the pie. What I'm saying is that the information you are being fed is also a small slice of the pie. It's nearly impossible to prove this to both you and your Chinese counterpart being fed anti-American propaganda. So I can only tell you about my perspective and hopefully you can at the very least consider the fact that your universe of information is limited. I'm a Chinese American. Meaning I was born in the US to immigrant parents from China. I have many immigrant friends from China, many friends that were born here and lived in China (myself included) and I can only tell you that if you lived in China and it's not what you think. It's quite normal living in China, it's not some imagined fascist dystopia so many misinformed Americans fantasize about. It's unlikely you'll change your opinion based off this one post. But perhaps this post can be a seed for the future where you might become more informed about what it's really like. Perhaps I can convince you to at least mistrust western propaganda. Western propaganda is highly, highly sophisticated because it's fed to you under the guise of Freedom of the press. It's more sophisticated then Chinese propaganda because the Chinese on a certain level are aware of lies and censorship. It's actually not violating any freedom of press policies. Government sponsored lies in the press is still technically freedom of the press. Take a look at these sources: https://graphika.com/reports/unheard-voice https://graphika.com/reports/unheard-voice https://cyber.fsi.stanford.edu/io/news/sio-aug-22-takedowns https://cyber.fsi.stanford.edu/io/news/sio-aug-22-takedowns https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7z77m/facebook-twitter-take-down-us-propaganda-operation-targeting-russia-china-iran https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7z77m/facebook-twitter-take... I guess the best way to break out of that mode is to have several Chinese friends from china here. Ask them what it's like. >In happiness, China ranked 82nd out of 146 countries in 2023. If you lived in China you'll know it's not because of the government. It's actually because of capitalism. China is a dog eat dog competitive society. People are overworked there. The unhappiness is the same sort of unhappiness that corporate drones feel here for their 9-5 job but 1000x worse. The Chinese aren't unhappy because of "lack of freedoms" or anything like that.

foverzar 3y ago

Us good, them bad. Typical nationalist.

anigbrowl 3y ago

I believe in the United States, and the egalitarian enlightenment era principles upon which it was founded. Peter Thiel has a very different worldview from you. Essentially he believes that the US should have an industrial policy, but that it should be run by someone like Vannevar Bush in the same manner that he ran the Office of Scientific Research and Development during WW2. So not a command economy or an autocracy, exactly, but with maximal autonomy and minimal external accountability. It's understandable to be hostile to bureaucracy in general, but my impression is that Thiel strongly believes in the 'noble lie' and considers that the public doesn't really know where its own interests lie. This is based on a presentation he gave at a private event some years ago. I have a lot of respect for Thiel's intellect but have some fundamental differences with his values. Anyway, don't fall into the trap of assuming that because some of your opinions/outlook are aligned with his, that you're necessarily on the same page overall.

somesortofthing 3y ago

To be honest, I trust the CCP to have my best interests at heart more than I do tech executives. One side is driven by straightforward, predictable self-interest while the other has spent the past decade looking for elixirs of immortality and trying to replace what little is left of our society and institutions with subscription services and payments platforms. I'd rather be ruled by Xi than Peter Thiel.

jgalt212 3y ago
Peter Thiel vs Xi. What a choice to make.
huijzer 3y ago
At least Thiel has no monopoly on physical force.

hayst4ck 3y ago

We are ideological allies. I agree with the sentiment. I agree that sometimes conflicts an only be resolved with force and that it is better to have the force than have force used against you. Philosophically, I have some dissonance. My first piece of dissonance is that if we model the world under the game of prisoners dilemma, having too much relative power creates a situation where our optimum strategy is to defect, because even when someone else defects, we can still win through superior force. This is the mathematical model behind "absolute power corrupts absolutely." So if we generate an arsenal of democracy, which is at it's core power, what prevents us from arbitrarily using it? What prevents an arsenal of democracy from becoming an arsenal of totalitarianism through democratic decay and fascist seizing of power? My second piece of dissonance is that on one hand I believe in the 2nd amendment, but on the other hand, if we bring the idea of the 2nd amendment to the world stage, using the same logic, every country should be well armed and have nukes so that they can fight the oppressors of their state. Every country should be able to practice MAD. Why not? Who shouldn't get nukes (and using that same rule, who shouldn't get guns?)? The third piece of dissonance is mostly pedantry: A democracy could choose to oppress or enslave others. The US was founded as a democracy, yet we had slaves. If our founding fathers had an "arsenal of democracy," what prevents them from using that arsenal to go to Africa, load people into boats, and make them labor with the threat of force here? The 3/5ths compromise is a product of flawed democracy, so "democracy" seems like a philosophically flawed idea to reference. What is good in America is rule of law (prevention of arbitrary uses of power) and human rights protected by that law. Democracy allows for a tyranny of the majority. "Equal rights under law" is the idea that gives us freedom. My core critique of your post, while still agreeing with it and still considering myself your ideological ally, is that we have an unhanded fascism problem at home and it is very much a larger problem than a genocidal China. Without dealing with our problem at home this "arsenal of democracy" seems too easily turned into the "aresenal of oppression." Furthermore, if we dealt with this problem at home, those same power structures we have to deal with are the one's that result in Chinese and Russians being slaves to their governments. In summary: "leading by example" is probably going to have better outcomes when our example is fighting fascism at home and having the highest quality of life rather than if our example is "build the most amazing tools of destruction so that when there is a conflict about freedom, we get to be the arbiter."

surgical_fire 3y ago

I have no love for Russia or China, but to be frank, as someone who comes from a "shithole country", I also have no love for the US. The US has a long history of being exploitative and by flexing it's oppressive military muscle, without anyone calling it out. In a fight between China/Russia and the US, I support the fight.