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That the US is illegally spying on its own citizens is bad, but not as bad as allowing an explicitly hostile, autocratic foreign power to turn a massive propaga

That the US is illegally spying on its own citizens is bad, but not as bad as allowing an explicitly hostile, autocratic foreign power to turn a massive propaganda and surveillance platform on US citizens. The US has many problems, but I'd still rather live in its admittedly somewhat rough approximation to transparent liberal democracy than under a completely and explicitly unaccountable regime like the Chinese Communist Party. It would be foolish to allow the CCP to abuse our liberal values in a way which undermines the security upon which liberal society depends.

JohnFen 3y ago
> the US is illegally spying on its own citizens is bad, but not as bad as I disagree. I think they're both roughly equally as bad. > I'd still rather live in its admittedly somewhat rough approximation to transparent liberal democracy Me too! I'm not sure what the relevance of that is, though.
- AlexCoventry 3y ago
  The relevance from my perspective is that I'm much more alarmed by spying and manipulation by a hostile foreign entity which explicitly places securing its own power above all else, than I am by spying and manipulation by agents of the US government, which is explicitly founded on principles of transparency and accountability to its citizens and has many institutional guardrails intended to serve those principles, even if those guardrails aren't fully effective. At least in the US there is the ideological possibility of peacefully voting in representatives who would strengthen and improve those guardrails. That's not something an agent of the CCP is even supposed or motivated to think about.
drekk 3y ago
The US has the grasp and reach to punish me based on things about my privately generated data. The CCP has the grasp but not the reach. They are entirely different threat models. Neither one is excusable, but the US spying on me is a lot more immediately applicable. Also I find it funny to the point of parody that China is the country under an unaccountable regime when they are signatories to the Hague System. The United States and Russian Federation are not, and the US goes so far as to have an affectionately nicknamed "Hague invasion clause". In my lifetime the US has invaded several countries and replaced their democracies with friendlier governments. I'm not sure how we get to stand on any moral high horse about "liberal values". I'm not sure how leaving Libya with open-air slave markets is reconciled under said values. I hope one day people can look at their own governments more critically than foreign ones, not least because our own government is at least on paper allowed to exist via consent of the governed.
- AlexCoventry 3y ago
  I agree that these are all terrible things about the US which need to change, but at least we have the institutional tools to effect that change, if we can muster the political will. Any power the CCP establishes will be far more immutable and hostile to critique or adjustment.
- throwawaymaths 3y ago
  > The CCP has the grasp but not the reach. CCP has extraterritorial police stations that regularly surveil the Chinese diaspora and have sent agents to assault individuals. It's particularly bad for expats with domestic families, expats are known to be challenged or coerced using the threat of harm to family members. It's especially bad for uighur and tibetan expats. Here's the thing. The US has certainly done bad shit. By and large it reckons with it and is subject to corrective action. And we see the effects of that: The current administration (so far) and the previous administration have not started wars in any new countries. Libya was less bad than Iraq was less bad than Vietnam. The direction of us policy is getting better. The direction of Chinese foreign policy is getting worse and their domestic policy is trending genocidal, and there is limited internal dialogue and thus less of a forcing function for amelioration (Hard to make that comparison since CR policies killed millions more than genocide, albeit indiscriminately) > I hope one day people can look at their own governments more critically Yes, I hope that one day too, Chinese citizens can look at their country in as critical a way as us citizens can.
  - zanellato19 3y ago
    > By and large it reckons with it and is subject to corrective action. What kind of corrective action? The US has never faced any backlash for helping Brazil (my country) to maintain a dictatorship because of communism fears, for example.
    - throwawaymaths 3y ago
      Corrective action != Punishment. The US really doesn't seem to do as much of that stuff these days. It's very unpopular and not doing these things any longer is in bipartisan political discourse. Do you disagree?

JohnFen 3y ago

> the US is illegally spying on its own citizens is bad, but not as bad as I disagree. I think they're both roughly equally as bad. > I'd still rather live in its admittedly somewhat rough approximation to transparent liberal democracy Me too! I'm not sure what the relevance of that is, though.

AlexCoventry 3y ago
The relevance from my perspective is that I'm much more alarmed by spying and manipulation by a hostile foreign entity which explicitly places securing its own power above all else, than I am by spying and manipulation by agents of the US government, which is explicitly founded on principles of transparency and accountability to its citizens and has many institutional guardrails intended to serve those principles, even if those guardrails aren't fully effective. At least in the US there is the ideological possibility of peacefully voting in representatives who would strengthen and improve those guardrails. That's not something an agent of the CCP is even supposed or motivated to think about.

drekk 3y ago

The US has the grasp and reach to punish me based on things about my privately generated data. The CCP has the grasp but not the reach. They are entirely different threat models. Neither one is excusable, but the US spying on me is a lot more immediately applicable. Also I find it funny to the point of parody that China is the country under an unaccountable regime when they are signatories to the Hague System. The United States and Russian Federation are not, and the US goes so far as to have an affectionately nicknamed "Hague invasion clause". In my lifetime the US has invaded several countries and replaced their democracies with friendlier governments. I'm not sure how we get to stand on any moral high horse about "liberal values". I'm not sure how leaving Libya with open-air slave markets is reconciled under said values. I hope one day people can look at their own governments more critically than foreign ones, not least because our own government is at least on paper allowed to exist via consent of the governed.

AlexCoventry 3y ago
I agree that these are all terrible things about the US which need to change, but at least we have the institutional tools to effect that change, if we can muster the political will. Any power the CCP establishes will be far more immutable and hostile to critique or adjustment.
throwawaymaths 3y ago
> The CCP has the grasp but not the reach. CCP has extraterritorial police stations that regularly surveil the Chinese diaspora and have sent agents to assault individuals. It's particularly bad for expats with domestic families, expats are known to be challenged or coerced using the threat of harm to family members. It's especially bad for uighur and tibetan expats. Here's the thing. The US has certainly done bad shit. By and large it reckons with it and is subject to corrective action. And we see the effects of that: The current administration (so far) and the previous administration have not started wars in any new countries. Libya was less bad than Iraq was less bad than Vietnam. The direction of us policy is getting better. The direction of Chinese foreign policy is getting worse and their domestic policy is trending genocidal, and there is limited internal dialogue and thus less of a forcing function for amelioration (Hard to make that comparison since CR policies killed millions more than genocide, albeit indiscriminately) > I hope one day people can look at their own governments more critically Yes, I hope that one day too, Chinese citizens can look at their country in as critical a way as us citizens can.
- zanellato19 3y ago
  > By and large it reckons with it and is subject to corrective action. What kind of corrective action? The US has never faced any backlash for helping Brazil (my country) to maintain a dictatorship because of communism fears, for example.
  - throwawaymaths 3y ago
    Corrective action != Punishment. The US really doesn't seem to do as much of that stuff these days. It's very unpopular and not doing these things any longer is in bipartisan political discourse. Do you disagree?