I’m curious. When you read articles about how great the economy in the US is and it’s just the voters that don’t understand, do you agree? Do you believe the US government no matter how badly they do? If you don’t believe the US government on this, why do you believe what their propaganda says about their enemies?
It’s because they were never that effective before. But with the advent of drones, they have suddenly become a wildly important protection. This is cause the drones can get stuck in those slat gaps. No other weapon before had this kind of weakness. They were all basically just ballistics before drones.
Oh thank God for a moment there I thought we might actually do the right thing. Thank God for our global leaders assuring the universe will be safe from the disease that is humanity. /s
I don’t know why this isn’t talked about more, but the reason for the disconnect is that USA has become a petrostate. As a petrostate, the rich get wildly rich and makes the economy look good, while the citizens are fed a bunch of religion to keep them from protesting.
Except by your own argument it really is. The UK has blocked many sites for many reasons. However, none of those reasons are for crowd control. Your example is ironically proof of the statement. This is the first time a western nation has banned media for the explicit purpose of quelling a protest and suppressing speech. Your example is a government banning a site not to quell a protest or to suppress speech, but instead because of a governmental disagreement between two nations. Now which one you think is valid for suppressing speech is a totally different question, only that they are two separate and completely different reasons.
The truth is it’s all propaganda from both sides and no one actually knows what’s going on. And because I’m saying this anywhere I’m probably going to be downvoted to oblivion as either side will downvote me. However, what we do know is:
China has admitted there are training camps in the Xinjiang Area.
The training camps are mandatory and people have been forced to go there.
The graduates have been spread all over China gaining employment in pretty much every factory in China (This imho is because it makes things impossible to sanction)
The people are compensated for their time in the training camps (This is what makes them forced labor camps in theory)
It is a cultural thing where guests in Xinjiang are invited to sleep in the same bed. This has lead to many stories of Chinese people forcing themselves into the bedrooms of Xinjiang people.
What we are sure isn’t quite right:
They are not genociding the people in the camps. This is why the conversation has turned to “cultural genocide” whatever that means. I believe this is propaganda to reinforce that they could be genocide when there is no evidence.
There is a lot of fake evidence for the genocide. For example the prison camp image or the truck that is censored but has red liquid leaking out of it were all doctored. Just this alone has to make you question the truth of those claiming genocide.
The “leaked list” of prisoners is fake. It contains HK movie stars and actors.
What we could probably conclude:
I’d argue that there is forced labor occurring as they are literally being forced into training camps and getting paid for it.
There is no forced labor in the factories USA is claiming there is. After graduating, the students are welcome to move and work where they want, so this can’t be forced labor.
Final questions:
What happens to those who won’t participate in the forced training camps? We don’t know, and that’s ultimately where the disconnect and miscommunication is coming from. The west is claiming they’re being killed. China isn’t saying anything but then are at a minimum keeping them locked up indefinitely. So, in the end, it’s a bad situation for sure but it’s likely not as bad as the western propaganda makes it look.
It’s a hot take because while you are right, it’s something that all countries do. It’s just not necessarily the government that does it. Just look at the culture wars in the US. China’s biggest difference is it’s controlled by the government. But it also has nothing to do with Xinjiang. They do it to everyone, Hans Chinese inclusive. Technically that’s what the great leap forward was. First forcing the Hans Chinese people to assimilate to the government’s idea of a unified country. It worked, so they’re pushing it everywhere.
Also, it’s important to note that the only violent enforcement of this was on the Hans Chinese. This was Tian an men. After that they’ve gotten really good at subversion. There was only one suspicious killing in the HK riots for example. For as large a protest as it was, it was largely nonviolent. Compare that with BLM in the States.
Well a problem with your argument is that assimilation is not only not unethical, but absolutely necessary for a functioning society. Imagine if you will for a second if our culture accepted racism and bigotry. It would be necessary to force assimilation on people to stop racism and bigotry. Oh wait, that’s happening right now. We’re literally forcing a culture of acceptance on a culture of racism and bigotry. Is that unethical? Should we stop? Perhaps we should have colored drinking fountains.
The problem you’re having with China is:
The government is the one that’s doing it, instead of naturally letting companies like Disney shove it down people’s throats.
The assimilation is over reaching.
The biggest problem is #2. We don’t know what the fuck that means. Should I be allowed to say the N word if there’s no other racism or bigotry? If there’s no racism and bigotry, is the N word even racist? Yet we enforce word usage today, just words that only have meaning because we give them meaning. yet it’s quite over reaching to censor words no? Where’s the line drawn?
Unfortunately I can’t find articles talking about bed sharing without it being from western media. It’s obviously not something that’s news worthy to begin with. I only know this because of my friends from the Xinjiang region.
The problem with the concept of cultural genocide is that there’s a culture to genocide. Culture is defined by the situations and effects of the moment. Culture changes, ebbs and flows. The Menorah is as much a part of Jewish culture as the Torah. But the Menorah was created out of what we today would call cultural genocide. You can’t genocide culture that idea is ridiculous, instead the culture will adapt and change with whatever is happening at the moment.
The question then isn’t is there cultural genocide, but what if anything we should protect in a culture. USA used to have a culture of racism, we obviously went out of our way to “culturally genocide” that. Should we have not done that? Should the fact that it was part of our culture mean we should protect oppressing black people? In reality, by our own definitions, some cultures do need to be genocided.
I mean if that’s your definition, then China is not doing cultural genocide. They aren’t separating children from parents and re-educating the children to assimilate. They’re taking the parents, re-educating them and telling them to tell their children to be like them moving forward. That’s what the whole sleeping in the beds thing is about. They’re going family to family to make sure they don’t break up families and make the whole family accept a new way of living.
Also, the destruction of racism was targeting white people. Heck that’s what they’re complaining about. They even had traditions and parties based on racism, least we forget who the KKK is So unless black people were also the target of anti-racism, then it was very much just the white people. Also, it was very much a movement from the government. It’s why it lead to a civil war where the south said they could not abide by the northern government.
*Edit: In fact there’s video after video of families in XInjiang asking the people who fled to come home. NOW, that said, it’s entirely possible and likely they were forced to do this. But what I’m pointing out is, they’re absolutely making sure that the families stay together and change as a unit, not forcing separation like what Canada did.
Uh yea, it’s very much the swatstika is my heritage. And it really shows how your just dismissing cultures you don’t like.
We both agree Nazi swastikas should be banned, your just trying to argue that it wasn’t cultural when it absolutely is. Just as it’s literally part of Chinese and Indian culture. But suddenly when it’s applied to a group you don’t like you just dismiss it? That’s hilariously ignorant.
Also, what’s happening in China has nothing to do with Uigurs. Famously they did it to Hans Chinese first, which lead famously to Tiananmen. Then they did it to the Tibetans, and we made movies like 9 years in Tibet. Now they’re just expanding it. There is no cultural target, it’s just whatever group is next.
Edit. BTW that’s why it was called the cultural revolution, they were trying to wipe out Hans Chinese culture.
It’s not a bubble, it’s much much worse. You only hear of it in whispers among the financial world. It’s stagflation. Japan seen this story before, they call it their lost decade that has been going on for nearly half a century. It’s when you deficit spend like crazy to prop up the economy and that leads to high inflation and stubbornly high costs (IE: Housing). It’s coupled with basically no wage growth and high underemployment. Does any of this sound familiar? It buried Japan, it might bury USA.
Actually it exactly resembles stagflation. It’s one of the reasons I said underemployment and not unemployment. During the 90s, Japan’s inflation rate was around 3% and they couldn’t get it under 2%. Sound familiar?
The other part was low unemployment, but mostly government jobs that didn’t do anything. But it did create historically low unemployment and higher than average labor force participation.
What you are seeing is USA doing exactly what Japan did in the 90s, which is have a target inflation rate of 2% that they can’t reach and hiding the high unemployment numbers with underemployment in crappy jobs.
Edit: just look at this rocketing government employment.
It’s good that you point that out. Because it shows US really can’t sanction China and only entities within it like it does to its own allies as opposed to straight country sanctions like Iran and North Korea.
Bizarrely there are, that’s what black water essentially is, a paramilitary group that can hold off a military. If you think it’s insane that we allow private companies own their own military, well it is. They of course not allowed to operate on US soil, but they exist.
Even Russia has laws against this, it’s kind of nut USA allows it. Of course, Russian law is one thing and wagers existence shows how well that law is followed. But even the Russian founders understood having a private military is insane.
*Edit arguably, Putin flaunting the law and creating Wagner is a reason he became a dictator and what the country was trying to prevent when they made the laws.
President Joe Biden has just signed the so-called TikTok ban into law, meaning that the popular social media app’s parent company must now sell the app or face a ban across the US,...
What’s more interesting to me is USA keeps whining about how China’s changing the world order. Yet, their actions show that they approve of it and are running full steam in trying to implement China’s new world order. Let’s list what USA complains about:
China’s trade practices are unfair and they subsidize their companies - USA is now desperately trying to out subsidize China on chips.
China censors foreign media and has no freedom of speech - USA is banning Tik Tok because it promotes China’s speech
China is committing genocide - USA helps Israel commit genocide
I could go on. But what it all means to me is USA has totally given up on it’s beliefs on human rights, freedom of speech and free trade. Instead it’s trying to poorly imitate China. This is the conflict China wanted and USA is giving it to them on a golden platter.
Which is exactly what you’d expect if they ran AI to ask questions? Topics and controversies are going to pop up a lot. A bot would obviously re-ask about it as they see many people talking about it. It would be more surprising if it didn’t ask about issues that were stirring controversies.
This is the poorest understanding of AI I have ever read. The whole point of AI is that it can create things that it’s original creator would not have. The whole fear of AI is even though it’s created by humans we question if we can control it. And that fear is what leads people to talk about how it’s mysteriously deciding to do things that could be unethical.
So, learn how AI works before opening your mouth.
*Edit. Also, this fear of AI magically doing unethical things is the one thing China and USA agrees on.
Oh my god, machine learning is not AI. It’s a subset of AI. Do you not understand intelligence? It’s not just the learning aspect. Yes, you need to learn to be intelligent, but you also need to generate. I’m giving you a hint to the other subset of AI that you don’t seem to know about.
Russian smugglers are using the cryptocurrency tether to circumvent Western sanctions and purchase weapons and drone parts, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on April 1.
D’uh, this is literally what bitcoin was created for. An untraceable currency that can be used without any government control. It would be stranger if Russia didn’t do this. It’s proving the value of bitcoin.
This makes me question what it takes to be a super power. Between this and the leading cause of US bankruptcies being medical related, it’s almost as if super powers can only be super powers if they don’t give any of their citizens healthcare. It’s as if working their citizens to death is the only way for them to maintain their hedgemony.
Edit: It looks like the argument here is that the US is not calling for an instant ceasefire, but instead saying that one is very important to have. China and Russia say it should be immediate. The US also tied it to hostage talks....
Well we can only speculate, which is why I said IF I WERE TO SPECULATE. However, Algeria also vetoed, a primarily Muslim nation and Washington is calling them out as representing Arab nations.
Monthly drop hints that China’s CO2 emissions may have peaked in 2023 (www.carbonbrief.org)
Ukrainian M1 Abrams Tanks Get Elaborate 'Cope Cages,' Soviet Explosive Reactive Armor (www.twz.com)
Countries Fail to Agree on Treaty to Prepare the World for the Next Pandemic (www.nytimes.com)
Nearly 3 in 5 incorrectly believe US is in economic recession (fox59.com)
Fascinating little window...
French Tiktok ban makes VPN usage soar in New Caledonia (www.techradar.com)
China is burning all its bridges with Israel (asia.nikkei.com)
US home prices have soared 47% so far this decade, outpacing all of the growth seen in the 1990s and 2010s (www.businessinsider.com)
US home prices have soared 47% so far this decade....
Why the US Can NEVER Sanction China - YouTube (www.youtube.com)
Is This A Game? (lemmy.world)
Biden has signed a TikTok ban into law. Here’s what this really means (www.independent.co.uk)
President Joe Biden has just signed the so-called TikTok ban into law, meaning that the popular social media app’s parent company must now sell the app or face a ban across the US,...
China tests US voter fault lines and ramps AI content to boost its geopolitical interests - Microsoft On the Issues (blogs.microsoft.com)
WSJ: Russia using cryptocurrency to avoid sanctions (kyivindependent.com)
Russian smugglers are using the cryptocurrency tether to circumvent Western sanctions and purchase weapons and drone parts, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on April 1.
Migrant workers who helped build modern China have scant or no pensions, and can't retire (apnews.com)
At 53, Guan Junling is too old to get hired at factories anymore. But for migrant workers like her, not working is not an option....
Lawmakers Make Their Fortunes Investing Bribe Money in Insider Trading (lemmy.world)
Russia and China Veto U.S.-Led Cease-Fire Resolution at U.N. (www.nytimes.com)
Edit: It looks like the argument here is that the US is not calling for an instant ceasefire, but instead saying that one is very important to have. China and Russia say it should be immediate. The US also tied it to hostage talks....