EPTThe China Politics Thread - Page 43
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captainwaffles
United States1050 Posts
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KwarK
United States41928 Posts
GAME OVER! China Just Destroyed US Sanctions. US CEOs In Shock! How embarrassing it must be to be you. | ||
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Manit0u
Poland17182 Posts
On August 09 2023 08:28 KwarK wrote: Unironically posting a youtube video with the title GAME OVER! China Just Destroyed US Sanctions. US CEOs In Shock! How embarrassing it must be to be you. It seems really surprising. Account with >1k posts and all the posts in this thread seem to be just bot-generated stuff with YT video and its description/synopsis if you can even call it that (headline more like it?). It's an account created 14 years ago and it doesn't really match old posting history (with the exception of recent postings in all the politics threads but that makes me think the account was taken over by a bot or something). | ||
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captainwaffles
United States1050 Posts
On August 09 2023 09:53 Manit0u wrote: It seems really surprising. Account with >1k posts and all the posts in this thread seem to be just bot-generated stuff with YT video and its description/synopsis if you can even call it that (headline more like it?). It's an account created 14 years ago and it doesn't really match old posting history (with the exception of recent postings in all the politics threads but that makes me think the account was taken over by a bot or something). Yeah, I said in my first post back, I was feeling nostalgic about Starcraft, I've been playing a bit again over the last month, and of course, I came back to TL. There's a 5 year gap in my posting history from when I last posted regularly, mostly just to promote my stream. What happened in that 5 year span, did my account get usurped by the scary Asiatic menace? Or, more likely, did I just evolve and change my views over time when presented with new information? Since you want to play detective, you can see my last blog post from 2018 about the US's occupation in the middle east, funny you didn't mention that. If you want to say I should be banned for having differing views, then just say so. You don't need to make shit up about my account being jacked by Russian or Chinese agents. | ||
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Manit0u
Poland17182 Posts
On August 09 2023 10:36 captainwaffles wrote: Yeah, I said in my first post back, I was feeling nostalgic about Starcraft, I've been playing a bit again over the last month, and of course, I came back to TL. There's a 5 year gap in my posting history from when I last posted regularly, mostly just to promote my stream. What happened in that 5 year span, did my account get usurped by the scary Asiatic menace? Or, more likely, did I just evolve and change my views over time when presented with new information? Since you want to play detective, you can see my last blog post from 2018 about the US's occupation in the middle east, funny you didn't mention that. If you want to say I should be banned for having differing views, then just say so. You don't need to make shit up about my account being jacked by Russian or Chinese agents. There's nothing wrong with having different opinion but when you see posts with just a YT video preceded by a headline from the video you begin to wonder if it's a real person behind it. | ||
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Magic Powers
Austria3709 Posts
On August 09 2023 10:36 captainwaffles wrote: Yeah, I said in my first post back, I was feeling nostalgic about Starcraft, I've been playing a bit again over the last month, and of course, I came back to TL. There's a 5 year gap in my posting history from when I last posted regularly, mostly just to promote my stream. What happened in that 5 year span, did my account get usurped by the scary Asiatic menace? Or, more likely, did I just evolve and change my views over time when presented with new information? Since you want to play detective, you can see my last blog post from 2018 about the US's occupation in the middle east, funny you didn't mention that. If you want to say I should be banned for having differing views, then just say so. You don't need to make shit up about my account being jacked by Russian or Chinese agents. You evolved and changed your views? If by that you mean you do what every propagandist does: selectively ignore information that contradicts yours. Then yes, I agree. You did evolve and you did change your views. You became a full-blown shill for a totalitarian regime. The question people are asking is how that happened. Was it because you were radicalized and you genuinely think you're on the right side of history, or is your TL.net posting history an extension of your propaganda work on other platforms? Which one is it? | ||
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Fleetfeet
Canada2477 Posts
It's just 'edgy teen' but presumably an adult now. | ||
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Manit0u
Poland17182 Posts
This is extremely sad if it's true. So many people left without homes, food and water. It'll take at least a month for the water to subside in some areas (if it doesn't get worse beforehand as there's new wave of rains incoming) and in the meantime relief supplies are being held up instead of being delivered to the victims as the government wants to distribute everything centrally. It seems that in many places rescue operations haven't even begun and people have been trapped for days... This is going to be a massive humanitarian crisis just from the people directly affected by the flood but considering the amount of crops being destroyed and drought earlier this year there's potentially famine looming on the horizon. This is really bad news, we have to remember that during the last famine in China under Mao nearly 40 million people died of starvation. | ||
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riotjune
United States3392 Posts
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Warfie
Norway2846 Posts
On August 11 2023 04:11 Manit0u wrote: This is going to be a massive humanitarian crisis just from the people directly affected by the flood but considering the amount of crops being destroyed and drought earlier this year there's potentially famine looming on the horizon. This is really bad news, we have to remember that during the last famine in China under Mao nearly 40 million people died of starvation. While I'm not trying to understate the significance of agricultural consequences and a potential famine, I think comparing this flooding to the man made disaster of The Great Leap Forward is fairly nonsensical and sensationalist? | ||
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Manit0u
Poland17182 Posts
On August 11 2023 05:54 Warfie wrote: While I'm not trying to understate the significance of agricultural consequences and a potential famine, I think comparing this flooding to the man made disaster of The Great Leap Forward is fairly nonsensical and sensationalist? Part of this is also a man-made disaster. Even if we disregard intentional flooding of nearby settlements to save Xi's precious vanity project (a super modern and expensive city district that's essentially a ghost town since no one wants to live there and no businesses want to move there) there's still a matter of dubious decisions that were made earlier in the year. Due to serious drought at the beginning of the year they were afraid there won't be enough crops to feed everyone so they started cutting down forests in the mountains (same forests that they were planting previously) and turning them into rice paddies. The problem with that is two-fold: for one those newly created terraces aren't the most sturdy thing as they didn't have time to settle properly and the second problem is that now you lost your natural protection from rainfall and mud slides in the form of forests. Sure, typhoon that came over the province is a natural disaster, but it is their rainy season and predictably all the new rice paddies on bare mountain tops got washed away and flooded the lower areas, destroying what meager crop was left there after the drought. Now they don't have their regular crops nor the new crops they were hoping for. I sure hope I am completely wrong in my reasoning here but from the videos of protesting farmers begging for help this doesn't look good at all. If we also take into account the fact that the rains have barely just begun, the water from the flood needs a month to subside, thousands of people were displaced and in a month or two is their harvest season the picture is pretty bleak. Keep in mind that provinces affected by the flood are the ones responsible for majority of their agriculture. Edit: According to the National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council (NDRRMC) 675,357 families, equivalent to 2,476,907 persons, have been directly impacted. Among the affected population, 15,566 families constituting 57,281 individuals sought refuge within 763 evacuation centres, while 62,825 families compromising 260,694 persons were served outside the evacuation centres. The casualties are reported as 26 deceased individuals, 52 injured persons and 13 missing. The infrastructure and transportation systems in the affected areas have sustained significant damage: 397 road sections and 33 bridges have been affected, impeding transportation, and posing challenges to the movement of people and transportation of goods. The power supply was disrupted in 306 cities/municipalities. A total of 38,855 houses have been reported as damaged. More than 50,000 people have been evacuated from the capital and 42,000 people from Shanxi Province, and approximately 125,000 people have been moved to shelters in Zhuozhou City (Hebei Province). In addition, more than 150,000 people were reported to be without running water and nearly 60,000 were affected by power outages. Source: https://reliefweb.int/disaster/tc-2023-000121-chn#overview If those are the official numbers (seems so judging by the number of fatalities/missing persons since there are videos of people begging for help as they can't find dozens of their own family members) we probably can't even imagine what the real numbers are... | ||
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captainwaffles
United States1050 Posts
Self-reinforcing propaganda: A new poll shows people dislike China, but there’s a catch Anti-Beijing pundits see no irony in the fact that their cartoonish views have actually rubbed off on the public > According to the views gathered from 27,000 adults, 67% of respondents have unfavorable views of the Asian country, while only 28% have favorable opinions. China observers in the West are blaming Beijing’s perceived threat and so-called ‘wolf warrior diplomacy’, but these takes are painfully ironic. > That last point is the most obvious criticism of the Pew report. The agency polled adults in 24 countries; there are 193 United Nations member states, which indicates that it does not show any serious global trend purely based on its methodology. There is also a strong selection bias for high-income countries and American allies. However, some middle-income and poorer countries were polled and the data reveals what many know to be true – the Global South largely has favorable views of China. > For example, the Pew survey found that countries such as Kenya (72%), Nigeria (80%) and Mexico (57%) hold favorable views of China, with India being an exception that has more negative views of China. Since poorer countries are the beneficiaries of bilateral cooperation with China, including on the Beijing-led Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), it is natural that they would have a higher opinion of Beijing. Pew, however, mostly did not select countries with high-level strategic cooperation with Beijing. > But aside from this opportunistic cynicism on Covid-19, there has been a steady downward trend fully in line with American foreign policy, e.g., after 2012 with former President Barack Obama’s ‘Pivot to Asia’, the Trump trade war, and whatever it is that the current administration of President Joe Biden is doing. The US national security state has exploited deep ideological biases in the media and is bankrolling countless think tanks, non-governmental organizations, and academic programs to churn out constant anti-China propaganda. https://www.rt.com/news/581076-china-negative-opinions-survey/ | ||
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Magic Powers
Austria3709 Posts
On August 11 2023 14:06 captainwaffles wrote: Good article from Bradley Blankership in RT today about how the media shapes the public's view of China, something that's self evident with the kind of posts I see in this thread; key takeaways below: Self-reinforcing propaganda: A new poll shows people dislike China, but there’s a catch Anti-Beijing pundits see no irony in the fact that their cartoonish views have actually rubbed off on the public > According to the views gathered from 27,000 adults, 67% of respondents have unfavorable views of the Asian country, while only 28% have favorable opinions. China observers in the West are blaming Beijing’s perceived threat and so-called ‘wolf warrior diplomacy’, but these takes are painfully ironic. > That last point is the most obvious criticism of the Pew report. The agency polled adults in 24 countries; there are 193 United Nations member states, which indicates that it does not show any serious global trend purely based on its methodology. There is also a strong selection bias for high-income countries and American allies. However, some middle-income and poorer countries were polled and the data reveals what many know to be true – the Global South largely has favorable views of China. > For example, the Pew survey found that countries such as Kenya (72%), Nigeria (80%) and Mexico (57%) hold favorable views of China, with India being an exception that has more negative views of China. Since poorer countries are the beneficiaries of bilateral cooperation with China, including on the Beijing-led Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), it is natural that they would have a higher opinion of Beijing. Pew, however, mostly did not select countries with high-level strategic cooperation with Beijing. > But aside from this opportunistic cynicism on Covid-19, there has been a steady downward trend fully in line with American foreign policy, e.g., after 2012 with former President Barack Obama’s ‘Pivot to Asia’, the Trump trade war, and whatever it is that the current administration of President Joe Biden is doing. The US national security state has exploited deep ideological biases in the media and is bankrolling countless think tanks, non-governmental organizations, and academic programs to churn out constant anti-China propaganda. https://www.rt.com/news/581076-china-negative-opinions-survey/ You wanna know who else holds negative views of China? Hong Kongers. Taiwanese. Ask them why. | ||
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Manit0u
Poland17182 Posts
I was talking to some friends from RSA and Zimbabwe and generally it's pretty much useless to ask about the public opinion there or the official one for that matter. Most governments in Africa are terribly corrupt and easily swayed (it blew my mind when RSA's foreign minister response to the potential terrorist threat was that they're not worried because ISIS, Al-Quaeda and such have training camps in their country so they're safe - at this point I'd be worried about USA taking note). As for the general population one of the biggest problems in Africa is very poor education levels. Most of them have no idea what's going on in their own country and asking them about broader geo-politics is futile. But it's clear to see all over the globe really. Most poorer countries where China has made investments due to the Belt & Road initiative for example are now in some deep crisis and facing bankruptcy. The only beneficiary of those "bilateral" investments is China. | ||
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Lwerewolf
Bulgaria78 Posts
On August 11 2023 17:14 Magic Powers wrote: You wanna know who else holds negative views of China? Hong Kongers. Taiwanese. Ask them why. ...and most of their neighbors. Plus RT is definitely not state media and their statements should be taken as true by default. | ||
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Salazarz
Korea (South)2590 Posts
On August 11 2023 18:38 Manit0u wrote: You can't really take poor African countries views as indicators here. China is doing a lot of investment there and using corrupt governments to for example build roads in exchange for mining rights on precious metals and gems. I was talking to some friends from RSA and Zimbabwe and generally it's pretty much useless to ask about the public opinion there or the official one for that matter. Most governments in Africa are terribly corrupt and easily swayed (it blew my mind when RSA's foreign minister response to the potential terrorist threat was that they're not worried because ISIS, Al-Quaeda and such have training camps in their country so they're safe - at this point I'd be worried about USA taking note). As for the general population one of the biggest problems in Africa is very poor education levels. Most of them have no idea what's going on in their own country and asking them about broader geo-politics is futile. But it's clear to see all over the globe really. Most poorer countries where China has made investments due to the Belt & Road initiative for example are now in some deep crisis and facing bankruptcy. The only beneficiary of those "bilateral" investments is China. Yeah, them poor people in third world don't know what's good for them and have no agency of their own, if they knew better they'd stick with white man's imperialism. /s Sarcasm aside, even Western scholars generally agree that despite its numerous flaws and challenges, Belt and Road Initiative is generally successful and continues to expand because it's seen as a superior alternative to IMF and other Western-led initiatives; even developed European nations are signing up to participate in BRI or BRI-related projects -- yet mainstream media in the West continues to drone on about 'Chinese debt traps' and folks on social media everywhere continues to parrot those completely nonsensical statements. There's absolutely a huge amount of negative bias on anything concerning China in Western press these days, doesn't take a 'tankie' to see that really. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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Salazarz
Korea (South)2590 Posts
On August 11 2023 21:41 JimmiC wrote: Wasn’t Italy one of the first and are they not trying to get out of it because it was not what they thought? Italy is looking to back out, meanwhile Ireland, Denmark, and I think it was Portugal? are looking for closer cooperation. Poland, Greece, Croatia, and some other countries that I can't remember names of in Eastern Europe are participating as well. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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Manit0u
Poland17182 Posts
On August 11 2023 21:48 Salazarz wrote: Italy is looking to back out, meanwhile Ireland, Denmark, and I think it was Portugal? are looking for closer cooperation. Poland, Greece, Croatia, and some other countries that I can't remember names of in Eastern Europe are participating as well. Sure, there are some higher profile countries involved in BRI but you can't ignore the fact that vast majority of countries involved in those projects are also topping the economic decline index. Just checked it myself and out of top 30 hardest tanking economies 27 are part of BRI (didn't bother to check the entire decline index). According to economics articles foreign debt is quite often one of the most impactful factors in killing low income/developing countries' economies. | ||
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