> Also, China isn't rural Alaska, it is a centralized authoritarian surveillance state and not the kind of place one can go off the grid and raise a family. Th

> Also, China isn't rural Alaska, it is a centralized authoritarian surveillance state and not the kind of place one can go off the grid and raise a family. Through some combination of state propaganda (their own and China's) and dystopian fiction like 1984, Westerners drastically overestimate the capabilities of the Chinese state. It would be more accurate to say that China wants to be perceived as a centralized authoritarian surveillance state, because that perception is valuable both domestically and abroad. They absolutely do have a broad surveillance apparatus, but they also have millions of square miles and more than a billion people to surveil and control. Don't forget that we're talking about the government that has been unable to pull together either the political will or the state power to enforce health codes that would be considered table stakes for any developed democracy, ignoring or tolerating disease-spreading wet markets. They appear to pick and choose their authoritarian battles, and if you're not a battle they've chosen you can probably go ignored for a lifetime.