Personally, I'm slowly coming to terms with the idea that I simply like China as a country

for all it's flaws and contradiction, I like reading about it, and I'm curious to see how it's gonna develop. I think I will eventually learn the language.

I know it is not any helpful for you, but it i a sentiment I wanted to share :)

How many people actually know enough about China? Everyone here knows plenty of U.S. history (+ their own Western country if they aren't a yank) and can read, write and speak its language. Its culture is everywhere, people here follow its news and they roughly know the mentality of various U.S. population groups. Can anyone say the same about China? You'd have to live there in order to consume as much media about China the way we do about the U.S.

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You aren't the only one and I will admit my own reservations, but as I have decolonialized and removed myself from Western propaganda, those reservations have shrunk to the size of a thimble. I have capacity for critical support.

Have you gone and read what Deng Xiaoping said in his speeches? What do you have reservations about? Have you read what Xi Jinping said and upholds? Socialism with Chinese Characteristics is socialism. It is a socialism that develops within capitalism and uses it as a lever; it lets capitalists exist, but not control the economy. https://dengxiaopingworks.wordpress.com/ I think articles like these: https://dengxiaopingworks.wordpress.com/2013/03/18/to-uphold-socialism-we-must-eliminate-poverty/ say it all. A good review of China's Xi and the direction it is taking, for starters, and from the enemy's mouth, is here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Sino/comments/i9l1v0/faith_in_the_coming_collapse_of_china_is_shaking/ Since it's from 'the economist', overlook any nonsense like "Nothing good, say critics at home and abroad. He has brought reforms that liberalised the economy to a halt and has smothered market forces, returning to a top-heavy state-dominated growth model which looks distinctly creaky. Private companies have rushed to set up party committees with an increasing say over strategy. Their once-swashbuckling bosses have adopted lower profiles. The title of a recent book by Nicholas Lardy of the Peterson Institute, an American think-tank, sums up the worries: “The State Strikes Back”." In which 'nothing good' means 'nothing bad' because all he describes is literally stifling the right-leanings of the Party and society. Anyways, just pop around r/sino and read Deng and Xi as well as seeing how the market is controlled by the State and you'll see how 'Marxism changed China; China changed Marxism'. I think it's also important to mention that 2020/2021 is China's zero poverty target, while 2049/2050 is China's 'moderately prosperous society' target, which means a modern, developed to the extent of the great capitalist countries, in which everyone enjoys, yes, a moderately prosperous life, and is corresponding with the end of the first stage, aka socialism. Xi really talks about this and it's not just for show, you can tell he's read and he knows. Playing within capitalism is risky, and Deng knew it, but I think generally the direction they are going in is spectacular.

Lots of people wanting to decide whether China is good or bad, very few actual analyses that are relevant to their audience. I don't get the impression that people stanning or attacking China (on this site) have any damn clue what it's like, what the internal political workings are, what social currents are at play, etc. Just idealism.

They're just another empire, in the same category as the USA, really. In a few hundred years, we will probably view the 20th century as an unusual period, because it was a time of Chinese weakness. Should you support them because they are a rival to America? IDK I'm pretty sure America's dominance will naturally fade due to internal contradiction and changing world conditions, so I don't see why you would.