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Tiktok and their relationship with CCP is something anyone can see plainly. I mean, if the US government was installing implants (snowden leaks) at US tech comp

by _8j50 3y ago

Tiktok and their relationship with CCP is something anyone can see plainly. I mean, if the US government was installing implants (snowden leaks) at US tech companies, if you disagree with my first statement then you must believe China is an even more free society than the US. The biggest tragedy in america right now, one that fuels the apathy and national self-destruction is the lack of gratitude and appreciation of just how precious and priceless the peace, stability and prosperity we have now (not decades ago but today) is. Americans just simply don't know the levels of poverty and desperation much of the world has seen, it is just impossible here. They don't know that just in the 70s and 80s China was having mass starvations. Their appreciation of their government's ability to lift them out of that and the century of humiliation they had before that is not small (unlike americans). The world is not a nice place, the CCP is much worse than putin and their goal is not to coexist with the west. And if tiktok ends up giving the CCP an advantage, whether in the 2024 elections or future cold/hot conflict with the PLA, I for one would lay significant blame on HNers who rallied against Biden's attempt to block tiktock because of b.s. slipperly slop fallacies. They already ban US social media there! This would have been reciprocal, it might have been one of the smallest things that could have been done to avoid possible chaos and carnage in the future. The government does have power to censor foreign companies's speech. Matter of fact, the first amendment does not apply to companies, it applies to people, and no one who uses tiktok would be prevented from using another platform to make the same speech! This about tech companies and startups worried about "what if I am next". Your opinions have consequences because people consider many of you on HN knowledgable or experts in tech.

logicchains 3y ago
>They don't know that just in the 70s and 80s China was having mass starvations. Their appreciation of their government's ability to lift them out of that and the century of humiliation they had before that is not small (unlike americans). The mass starvations in the 70s and 80s were because of that same government; while Taiwan, South Korea, Japan and Hong Kong were rapidly developing, China was putting people in jail for trying to sell their goods and agricultural products on the private market. The GDP per capita of Taiwan is still three times higher than that of mainland China, which wouldn't be the case if China didn't have a government that made private enterprise illegal for a few decades.
- hmm37 3y ago
  This isn't exactly correct, because of the differences between the countries. China and Taiwan are completely different with a different set of populations. Taiwan was colonized by Japan, and thus industrialized up until WW2 was over. Then it got an influx of the richer and more educated class from China after the '49 revolution. In addition to that Chiang Kaishek took most if not all of China's gold reserves and placed it in Taiwan, thus taking all of China's wealth that it had and allowing it to service a mere 20M+ population, rather than 500M people left in China who no longer had any reserves to trade with the world. Taiwan is much smaller in geography therefore infrastructure building requires less capital, and population was much higher educated from the get go, so it can't serve as a direct comparison. Japan was already industrialized prior to WW2, and was basically complete in its industrialization by around WW1 if not earlier by a couple decades. S. Korea could serve as a comparison, but there's a big difference in that it got massive influx of foreign investment from the US, with a major reason being that it serve as outpost against Communism spreading. When the geopolitical situation started to change between US and China in the late 60s-early 70s, Mao sensed it and already started to have talks with the US as seen with Nixon + Kissinger, which later became the foundation that allowed the influx of foreign capital into the country. Prior to this, China was basically like NK today, with absolutely no outside support whatsoever, with an economy, infrastructure, etc., which includes even basic stuff like irrigation destroyed from civil war, WW2, etc. It was extremely capital deficient. People act like China prior to '49 was some wonderland, and that once the Communist came in, they destroyed everything and therefore there was mass starvation. Not really. China sucked prior to '49, and reading e.g. some statistics from American sinologists like e.g Jonathan Spence, you know that the basic peasant (which represented the large majority of China's population) daily diet consisted of almost no meat, and simply what they called gruel, every day of the year. A peasant normal diet would simply be e.g. sweet potatoes flour mixed with water everyday with maybe some vegetables.
JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> CCP is much worse than putin and their goal is not to coexist with the west The CCP has honestly been fine. (See: Jintao and Xiaoping.) The problem is Xi. He is a dictator. He repeatedly makes decisions that benefit him in the short term and the expense of China’s long-term prospects. This is very different from his predecessors, and requires treating China differently than we did when they had political competition and the capacity for reflection.
- beeboobaa 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    Wait, out of genuine curiosity, who do you think I’m shilling for?
    - beeboobaa 3y ago
      The CCP
      - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        I generally consider myself a China hawk. (Look at my comment history.)
        15457345234 3y ago
        Some threads attract significantly more 'dedicated' commenters than others. You're not going to find a lot of nuance and understanding here, I'm afraid. FWIW I largely agree with what you've said above. The 'threat' narrative grows because the west likes the unipolar consensus, with no other economic powers having enough status and power to challenge that hegemony. Of course when other powers come to the fore they will be declared as an existential threat; nobody wants to share a throne they sat on alone.
nebula8804 3y ago
>The biggest tragedy in america right now, one that fuels the apathy and national self-destruction is the lack of gratitude and appreciation of just how precious and priceless the peace, stability and prosperity we have now (not decades ago but today) is. Americans just simply don't know the levels of poverty and desperation much of the world has seen, it is just impossible here. This sounds entirely ripped off from a Joe Rogan podcast. Sounds like you are in the WASP bubble. You likely haven't experienced living in the hood, having to be treated like a Muslim in the US, having to deal with MAGA people bitching about your existence as a Mexican migrant and many other scenarios. There is plenty to improve in the US and your mentality would have ensured that we never would have gotten things like the Civil Rights act, interracial marriage, or even the immense progress made in favor of LGBTQ rights. Its not the people that are thankful to their country that enact change. Its the rebels who go against the mainstream and demand justice that eventually make history. They are always called ungrateful haters...at least until they win.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > You likely haven't experienced living in the hood My poorest (growing up, as in not concerned about no food, but actually no food and sometimes no housing) friends who travel internationally come back grateful for where they are. > your mentality would have ensured that we never would have gotten things like the Civil Rights act, interracial marriage, or even the immense progress made in favor of LGBTQ rights 100% agree. That said, there is middle ground between bootlicking gratitude and cynicism that borders on complacency.
- sciolist 3y ago
  We shouldn't reduce or avoid removing any of the struggles you've brought up - those are real and we need to remove them. With that being said, most of what OP said is true: Americans are in a good position because of many factors - national security being an important one. I interpret OP's comment not as a call to rest on the US's good position, but to fight for it and improve it. We can both hold that the US has major issues that need to be fixed, while saying we need to fight against countries that would work to destabilize the US. If we don't fight for the struggles you've mentioned (and other ones!), the US won't improve. But, if we don't also recognize our worldwide position and work to prevent countries from destabilizing it, everything will get worse for everyone. > Its not the people that are thankful to their country that enact change. I disagree, we can be recognize some aspects of a country and be thankful (fighting to keep the good we have) while still improving on others. I hope it is clear I'm speaking in good faith
ewweezdsd 3y ago
If CCP really was "worse than Putin", they would have invaded Taiwan a long time ago already, and killed a couple of hundred thousand people in the process, as Putin is perfectly content to do in Ukraine. But they haven't, which shows that its leadership has at least some competence. My country shares 1300km of border with Russia, and I would choose China over Russia as a neighbour any day. China might be an oppressive dictatorship, but its still more civilized than Russia, which frankly has never left the Middle Ages in terms of mentality. Apart from perhaps North Korea, there is no worse neighbor in the world than imperialist Russia.
- _8j50 3y ago
  Look up the 100 year marathon and mao's plan. Russians are not patient or long term strategizing like CCP. They know they have the population and capability and a head-on conflict in the short term undermined their long term goals. If they have their way, they would win many wars without a single shot being fired. Look at how mighty american companies grovel at the CCPs feet, that's how they fight. Russia tries this also by implementing puppet regimes but their approach is too bold and aggressive and requires too much tongue-in-cheek from regular people. Look at how efficiently China subdued hong kong vs Russia's attempts with ukraine prior to zelensky (his predecessor was a russian puppet).

by _8j50 3y ago

logicchains 3y ago

>They don't know that just in the 70s and 80s China was having mass starvations. Their appreciation of their government's ability to lift them out of that and the century of humiliation they had before that is not small (unlike americans). The mass starvations in the 70s and 80s were because of that same government; while Taiwan, South Korea, Japan and Hong Kong were rapidly developing, China was putting people in jail for trying to sell their goods and agricultural products on the private market. The GDP per capita of Taiwan is still three times higher than that of mainland China, which wouldn't be the case if China didn't have a government that made private enterprise illegal for a few decades.

hmm37 3y ago
This isn't exactly correct, because of the differences between the countries. China and Taiwan are completely different with a different set of populations. Taiwan was colonized by Japan, and thus industrialized up until WW2 was over. Then it got an influx of the richer and more educated class from China after the '49 revolution. In addition to that Chiang Kaishek took most if not all of China's gold reserves and placed it in Taiwan, thus taking all of China's wealth that it had and allowing it to service a mere 20M+ population, rather than 500M people left in China who no longer had any reserves to trade with the world. Taiwan is much smaller in geography therefore infrastructure building requires less capital, and population was much higher educated from the get go, so it can't serve as a direct comparison. Japan was already industrialized prior to WW2, and was basically complete in its industrialization by around WW1 if not earlier by a couple decades. S. Korea could serve as a comparison, but there's a big difference in that it got massive influx of foreign investment from the US, with a major reason being that it serve as outpost against Communism spreading. When the geopolitical situation started to change between US and China in the late 60s-early 70s, Mao sensed it and already started to have talks with the US as seen with Nixon + Kissinger, which later became the foundation that allowed the influx of foreign capital into the country. Prior to this, China was basically like NK today, with absolutely no outside support whatsoever, with an economy, infrastructure, etc., which includes even basic stuff like irrigation destroyed from civil war, WW2, etc. It was extremely capital deficient. People act like China prior to '49 was some wonderland, and that once the Communist came in, they destroyed everything and therefore there was mass starvation. Not really. China sucked prior to '49, and reading e.g. some statistics from American sinologists like e.g Jonathan Spence, you know that the basic peasant (which represented the large majority of China's population) daily diet consisted of almost no meat, and simply what they called gruel, every day of the year. A peasant normal diet would simply be e.g. sweet potatoes flour mixed with water everyday with maybe some vegetables.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago

> CCP is much worse than putin and their goal is not to coexist with the west The CCP has honestly been fine. (See: Jintao and Xiaoping.) The problem is Xi. He is a dictator. He repeatedly makes decisions that benefit him in the short term and the expense of China’s long-term prospects. This is very different from his predecessors, and requires treating China differently than we did when they had political competition and the capacity for reflection.

beeboobaa 3y ago
[flagged]
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  Wait, out of genuine curiosity, who do you think I’m shilling for?
  - beeboobaa 3y ago
    The CCP
    - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
      I generally consider myself a China hawk. (Look at my comment history.)
      - 15457345234 3y ago
        Some threads attract significantly more 'dedicated' commenters than others. You're not going to find a lot of nuance and understanding here, I'm afraid. FWIW I largely agree with what you've said above. The 'threat' narrative grows because the west likes the unipolar consensus, with no other economic powers having enough status and power to challenge that hegemony. Of course when other powers come to the fore they will be declared as an existential threat; nobody wants to share a throne they sat on alone.

nebula8804 3y ago

>The biggest tragedy in america right now, one that fuels the apathy and national self-destruction is the lack of gratitude and appreciation of just how precious and priceless the peace, stability and prosperity we have now (not decades ago but today) is. Americans just simply don't know the levels of poverty and desperation much of the world has seen, it is just impossible here. This sounds entirely ripped off from a Joe Rogan podcast. Sounds like you are in the WASP bubble. You likely haven't experienced living in the hood, having to be treated like a Muslim in the US, having to deal with MAGA people bitching about your existence as a Mexican migrant and many other scenarios. There is plenty to improve in the US and your mentality would have ensured that we never would have gotten things like the Civil Rights act, interracial marriage, or even the immense progress made in favor of LGBTQ rights. Its not the people that are thankful to their country that enact change. Its the rebels who go against the mainstream and demand justice that eventually make history. They are always called ungrateful haters...at least until they win.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> You likely haven't experienced living in the hood My poorest (growing up, as in not concerned about no food, but actually no food and sometimes no housing) friends who travel internationally come back grateful for where they are. > your mentality would have ensured that we never would have gotten things like the Civil Rights act, interracial marriage, or even the immense progress made in favor of LGBTQ rights 100% agree. That said, there is middle ground between bootlicking gratitude and cynicism that borders on complacency.
sciolist 3y ago
We shouldn't reduce or avoid removing any of the struggles you've brought up - those are real and we need to remove them. With that being said, most of what OP said is true: Americans are in a good position because of many factors - national security being an important one. I interpret OP's comment not as a call to rest on the US's good position, but to fight for it and improve it. We can both hold that the US has major issues that need to be fixed, while saying we need to fight against countries that would work to destabilize the US. If we don't fight for the struggles you've mentioned (and other ones!), the US won't improve. But, if we don't also recognize our worldwide position and work to prevent countries from destabilizing it, everything will get worse for everyone. > Its not the people that are thankful to their country that enact change. I disagree, we can be recognize some aspects of a country and be thankful (fighting to keep the good we have) while still improving on others. I hope it is clear I'm speaking in good faith

ewweezdsd 3y ago

If CCP really was "worse than Putin", they would have invaded Taiwan a long time ago already, and killed a couple of hundred thousand people in the process, as Putin is perfectly content to do in Ukraine. But they haven't, which shows that its leadership has at least some competence. My country shares 1300km of border with Russia, and I would choose China over Russia as a neighbour any day. China might be an oppressive dictatorship, but its still more civilized than Russia, which frankly has never left the Middle Ages in terms of mentality. Apart from perhaps North Korea, there is no worse neighbor in the world than imperialist Russia.

_8j50 3y ago
Look up the 100 year marathon and mao's plan. Russians are not patient or long term strategizing like CCP. They know they have the population and capability and a head-on conflict in the short term undermined their long term goals. If they have their way, they would win many wars without a single shot being fired. Look at how mighty american companies grovel at the CCPs feet, that's how they fight. Russia tries this also by implementing puppet regimes but their approach is too bold and aggressive and requires too much tongue-in-cheek from regular people. Look at how efficiently China subdued hong kong vs Russia's attempts with ukraine prior to zelensky (his predecessor was a russian puppet).