Raenir Salazar posted:

China basically admits that these are nuclear silos.

quote:

It's unknown whether the Washington Post report corresponds to the real situation. But generally speaking, silos are normally used for liquid-fuel intercontinental missiles. Such missiles are high-thrust and long-range, and could carry higher-yield nuclear warheads. Silos provide good conditions for the storage and maintenance of missiles and are able to shorten launch time under emergency situations. However, Lewis assumed that the "silos" in Gansu are intended for DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missiles. In reality, DF-41 is solid-fueled and is loaded on high-mobility launcher vehicles. The necessity of putting it inside a silo is questionable. Therefore, the latest accusations by Washington Post and the US State Department over China cannot hold water.

Plastic_Gargoyle posted:

Nothing says "celebrating culture" like removing the domes from the mosques to make them "more Chinese."

XMNN posted:

One thing I always wonder about the supposed US tolerance of political dissent (cf the USSR, DDR etc), is how much credit you can give a country for not locking up people who are basically no threat to power in the imperial core, when it is perfectly happy to orchestrate mass killings of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of political dissidents in the imperial periphery.

Like just because you have a passable impression of freedom and democracy at home, surely the lack of respect for it abroad sort of negates that almost entirely? Maybe you wouldn't get locked up for advocating communism in Jacksonville in 1965 (although you would probably be spied on by secret police agencies like the FBI), but if you tried it in 1965 Jakarta then you would absolutely get murdered with the full blessing of the CIA, so surely it's not really a system tolerant of anything other than limited forms of political dissent (i.e. in specific geographical locations) when considered in aggregate?

It's one of those things I always think about when you read about e.g. UK police spying on environmentalist groups via extremely intensive and gross methods. Clearly, our commitment to allowing political dissent, even at home where nominally we're supposed to be a liberal democracy is already limited, and I always suspect the reason MI5 isn't murdering communists like MI6 is less because of any unshakable moral principle of the British government and more just because they don't need to. Like you only have to look at the British security state's activities in Northern Ireland to see that they're perfectly happy to pretty openly kill people on allegedly British soil for political reasons.

Mulva posted:

the idea that 'communists' were a single thing that existed in some meaningful group sense, rather than being like 9 million disparate groups which often hated each other.

Vincent Van Goatse posted:

I was assured China didn't do this sort of thing with their African loans.

MarcusSA posted:

That was my understanding as well!

quote:

The survey, conducted on December 10-18, asked respondents, among other questions, how they viewed Lithuania's policy on China. Only 13 percent said they supported it, while 60 percent had a negative opinion.

Plastic_Gargoyle posted:

You're also not recognizing that the ability to even say this undermines your whole point.

Acebuckeye13 posted:

well they're certainly responsive when high-profile members are accused of sexual assault

Thorn Wishes Talon posted:

Debate & Discussion > China Megathread - What even is authoritarianism, maaaan?

Jarmak posted:

Talking about politics is rude in the US because it's contentious, and people don't want to have fights with people they consider friends.

You just said made the assertion that a floor of 80% of people support CCP policy... where's the contention?

Kavros posted:

We can similarly concede that the DPRK has the support of its population. Overwhelming, even.

How are u posted:

Sure, but in absence of polling of the North Korean populace what could be more indicative of their support and feelings than the election results themselves? Nearly unanimous support!

MikeC posted:

Scale. And. Scope. You still haven't found me a relevant and current Jimmy Lai/Appledaily comparison in the West despite your sixer after accusing the West of the same thing. I guess since you dodged the banhammer from a month ago, you figure exactly how much bad faith shitposting is acceptable and keep toeing that line.

Neurolimal posted:

He can say this because he is not a significant threat; the last time US hegemony was meaningfully challenged, being sympathetic to Communism was seen as seditious behavior worthy of not only ostracization from job & society, but of active surveillance and even imprisonment. When racial supremacy was challenged, numerous black leaders were assassinated, jailed, and openly discredited. We can even see hints of this today among subjects that US interests are losing control over, like with Palestine & BDS.

The reason, outside those listed examples, that freedom of speech is permitted is because:
1. It serves as a safe release-valve for tension; that which bends does not break, it's better to have citizens vent on Twitter than to let their grievances foment
2. The west has a monopoly on the global culture, and to an extent can shape these winds as desired, in turn allowing passive influence over countries that do not censor. In this sense it becomes valuable as a tool to sway public opinion towards market reforms, getting suckered into capitalism, and shaping what today's villains look like. The modern, enlightened individual can watch a drama on Chernobyl, root for a techbro's intern, then watch a superhero movie where they depose Castro.

Quick thought exercise: if the nazis had won WW2, became a dominant superpower instead of the US, encircled America, and started mass-producing thinly-veiled & extremely accessible media on how great & noble nazism is, the benefits of being a german satellite state, and how great being racially pure is, would the US have as much of an open adoration for freedom of speech & proliferation of ideas? What does our history say? Would we want that?

I wouldn't be surprised if we reach a point, as US influence continues to wane & as China continues to grow as a global superpower, that the tables are turned and heavy-handed moderation wanes as it becomes unnecessary. On the other hand, a lot of modern China has been defined by observing the USSR's mistakes, and the conquering of eastern europe probably has them cautious on this front.


All that was to say, "liberalism vs authoritarianism" is far more defined by a culture-war over which superpower controls the global narratives, than of any real ideological foundation. A 'liberal' state will turn 'authoritarian' as it loses control over the influence and power of ideas (as seen during both Red Scares and the Civil Rights era), and an 'authoritarian' state may turn 'liberal' as it marginalizes dissenting ideals.

Plastic_Gargoyle posted:

And, you know, the genocide thing.

MikeC posted:

But as always, if people are dying and the US is even remotely involved in some way shape or form in that and/or not gloriously riding in like a benevolent white knight - its loving genocide by the US/West/Capitalism what have you.

quote:

The modern, enlightened individual can watch a drama on Chernobyl, root for a techbro's intern, then watch a superhero movie where they depose Castro.

WAR CRIME GIGOLO posted:

In China a cop can kill anyone to anything at any time. In America that would never happen because we're free and stuff

Daduzi posted:

Is it not even possible to laugh at clunky censorship in China without invoking "well actually, in America a complex relationship between government, business, and media means..."

It's crude, "Poochy died on the way to his home planet"-level censorship that people in China are laughing at. It's spectacularly unsubtle, that's why it attracted comment, so I'm bemused as to why subtle forms of message manipulation elsewhere (oh, who am I kidding, just in the US) needs to be brought up.

Atopian posted:

lightrook posted:

I'm morbidly curious now, since all I know about the shows are memes about the ubiquity of their advertising. What exactly do you mean by "bonkers?"

quote:

I felt my forehead. The dances continued, sleeves swirling, skirts rippling. A man came onstage to sing a song in Chinese, which was translated on the screen behind him. “We follow Dafa, the Great Way,” he began, singing about a Creator who saved mankind and made the world anew. “Atheism and evolution are deadly ideas. Modern trends destroy what makes us human,” he sang. At the end of the song, the row of older white people sitting behind me clapped fervently. In the final dance number, a group of Falun Dafa followers, who wore blue and yellow and clutched books of religious teachings, battled for space in a public square with corrupt youth. (Their corruption was evident because they were wearing black, looking at their cell phones, and, in the case of two men, holding hands.) Chairman Mao appeared, and the sky turned black; the city in the digital backdrop was obliterated by an earthquake, then finished off by a Communist tsunami. A red hammer and sickle glowed in the center of the wave. Dazed, I rubbed my eyes and saw a huge, bearded face disappearing in the water.

“Was that . . . ?” I said to my brother, wondering if I needed to go to the hospital.

“Karl Marx?” he said. “Yeah, I think that was a tsunami with the face of Karl Marx.”

Vincent Van Goatse posted:

I went to a Shen Yun show years ago because I thought "Chinese ballet? Sounds worth a look."

Flipping through the program I realized it was sponsored by the Falun Gong, but they didn't do the Evil Karl Marx monster at the show I saw. I mean there was a flying Buddha-looking statue that knocked over some Chinese riot cops but I still feel profoundly ripped off.

quote:

The vocal numbers, though, were different from the Houston production—instead of the song about atheism and evolution, a soprano in an evening gown sang a song that began, “Many today are far from the warmth of home / Separated by great distances from those they love.” It seemed likely that this was Shen Yun’s way of molding the production to local tastes; the other vocal number bemoaned the busyness of modern life.

Mulva posted:

Nobody needs to dedicate that much more focus to containing Russia, Ukraine as is is losing exceptionally slowly. And it's just Ukraine, versus a sizable percentage of all of Russia's forces.

Frosted Flake posted:

Also … they could not have planned for a 3 day operation because:




It takes more than 3 days to get there…

Crosby B. Alfred posted:

After reading this article once more, is anyone surprised and could explain the tone? It almost seems as-if China is completely indifferent to the war itself and honestly doesn't care about the human suffering or trajectory of the Ukrainian people.

dr_rat posted:

You'd think the Chinese government would be trying to do a hell of at lot more, at the very least just to avoid a food riot.

Smeef posted:

Something I've noticed is that the central government gets credit until there's a failure, and then it becomes the local government's fault. At some point, the central government is also accountable for outcomes at the local level. It's not like the central government has been detached from what's happening in its leading city, or if it has been, then it's neglectful. It's not like they get an annual report, and that's it. This observation isn't just about Covid but rather drat near everything.

The HK government has (rightly) been criticized for its handling of Covid in recent months, but everyone seems to have forgotten that the central government audited the strategy and systems in November of last year, gave it a good review, and was planning to reopen the border with HK weeks (days?) before it all went to hell.

Slow News Day posted:

Okay but the only way to prevent those deaths is for everyone to become a bunker-dwelling doomer. Does it surprise you that virtually no one wants to live like that?

ronya posted:

a set of translated Chinese takes on current events:

https://twitter.com/GeringTuvia/status/1524768280942153729

(bringing up the topic of blocking tanks unprompted seems a little on the nose, tbh)

Soviet literati often credited the 1957 World Youth Fair instead, allowed by a somewhat optimistic Khrushchev.

Despera posted:

Ukraine was dependant on the russian economy untill it wasnt.