- cross-posted to:
- zhong1guo2@lemmygrad.ml
- globalnews@lemmy.zip
- cross-posted to:
- zhong1guo2@lemmygrad.ml
- globalnews@lemmy.zip
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/863209
Archived version: https://archive.ph/5Ok1c
Archived version: https://web.archive.org/web/20230731013125/https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-66337328
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PSA: these kinds of threads are a great way to create blocklists of western bootlickers and trolls.
I don't have any issue with that, the less toxic people I have to interact with on here the happier I'll be. I encourage anybody who finds my comments and posts upsetting to block me and move on.
Don't feed the troll. He's an actual professional troll who will try his hardest to drag you into a debate. I like to just keep editing my comments with new links that refute his claims, and that's when he totally loses it and gives me -30 and himself +55 updoots on a post with a grand total of 18 votes. He's really aggressive but he's not very good at his job.
Edit: I can see he has gone through my post history and downvoted everything so I have 0 or negative karma or whatever it's called.. and he did it a week afterwards. He's a spiteful little troll, isn't he? I don't care about updoots. You can't silence the truth, you dumb fuck.
Most notably, they will not actually engage in any real discussion on these topics. They only want to shut down discussion by calling everyone brainwashed. They will offer not a single critical word against China or Russia, past present or future. Obviously this analysis is very noteworthy, and the conjecture that these societies are above reproach makes for a very good faith argument. Especially when combined with the intellectually honest strategy of removing their opponent's agency by calling them brainwashed. Truly a master debater.
The guy you're replying to is litteraly responding with '🤡' to well written out responses.
It's proof of your integrity that you admit good things about China . . . Because surely you will eventually, right?
Nah, just people who uncritically regurgitate propaganda, and screech about everybody who disagrees with them being a Russian puppet and a tankie whatever that means.
The most offensive part of being called a tankie is being called British.
My friend, I would like to remind you as gently as possible that brainwashing does not exist and was in fact an orientalist lie popularized to explain away why US soldiers would support China.
Yeah, that's a fair point. It's important to keep in mind that people are accepting the propaganda because they want to believe it and they understand that it serves their selfish interests.
Yes, thank you for being understanding. I think it's better to avoid calling people brainwashed because -- as one liberal in this thread pointed out -- it denies agency which our interlocutors plainly do have which makes them much more responsible for their bad epistemology than the theory of "brainwashing" allows for.
If we want to persuade people -- and I've seen that you have incredible enthusiasm for that cause! -- we must do our best to meet them where they actually are rather than where we imagine them to be.
I'll get off my soapbox here, I just wanted to mention it. I wish you all the best in your efforts!
Sample size: 58 people
18 in the U.K., 28 in Turkey, and 12 in Thailand.
The authors wish to extend their gratitude to the individuals and organisations who supported this research by providing concrete feedback for revisions on the report, offering suggestions and advice at the planning stages, and offering ongoing collaborative and moral support while conducting this research: Elise Anderson, Campaign for Uyghurs, Freedom House, Tim Grose, Ondřej Klimeš, Julie Millsap, David O’Brien, the Rights Practice, Radio Free Asia, Isabella Rodriguez, David Stroup, Hannah Theaker, Emily Upson, the Uyghur Human Rights Project, the Uyghur Transitional Justice Database, the World Uyghur Congress, the Xinjiang Documentation Project, the Xinjiang Victims’ Database, and Adrian Zenz.
Author
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Yes, very trustable! /s
This is so key to propaganda. When researchers do a study on 58 people, you can barely claim you have a good representation of the population. And even in that case, if they are good, high quality researchers, they aren't pushing any opinion, just stating facts. It's just that 58 people can't represent the population well, It's just a starting point.
Now if we're talking about an opinion and not just stated facts, 58 people is hardly representative, easy to manipulate, especially when you don't have to cite specifics, just conclusion.
Okay, let's assume these are facts. 58 people were threatened, etc. This is still propaganda. Opinion, and interpretation can push the conversation in one direction or the other very heavily.
For example, let's draw a comparison to a system that people find more familiar (For westerners, at least), such as the united states police system or the FBI. How many US citizens are threatened to stop talking when pushing the limits of conversation publicly (Say, about calling out the inhumane treatment of others by the US military)? How many people have talked publicly about being approached by the FBI, or said they can't comment on their interactions with the FBI, or of some private corporation that paid them off to keep their mouths shut about some insider deal, money laundering, or underage sex scandal? Governments and even private citizens coming after people who are talking shit publicly happens in capitalist states all the time.
And that's just taking into account regular people who live in western countries. How about an even more direct comparison? The Uyghurs are Muslims that participated in terrorism in China, but the United States had Muslim terrorists of their own, what did they do? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_post-invasion_Iraq You can find all kinds of resources about the human rights violations that the united states participated in against the muslin people, even in western sources such as wikipidia, and others https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/03/iraq-20-years-since-the-us-led-coalition-invaded-iraq-impunity-reigns-supreme/ have lots and lots of facts surrounding this.
"rules for thee, but not for me" comes to mind.
Sorry didn't mean to unload on you. I'm vehemently agreeing!
Well I, as a former citizen of China, do "speak out" against CCP as in family discussions, in online forums, and sometimes with classmates in school, but I don't "speak out" as in actually participate in protests. Demonstrations just isn't my thing. Protesting against CCP gets you labeled a "race traitor". I mean honestly, with all the racial problems in the US, and having to deal with my abusive family, I really don't have to energy care about CCP anymore. It's dead to me. I view China just like how an anti-fascist German view Nazi Germany. There's no point of protests. It's beyond anything a protest can fix. Like... why do I even care, it isn't even my country anymore.
Edit: Also, it isn't a conspiracy that ethnic Chinese (I'm gonna use the term "ethnic Chinese" because this applies regardless of citizenship status) people don't "speak out". People just value "Social Harmony" more than being correct. Like if you live abroad, why care about what happens back in China? Most ethnic Chinese people who lives abroad don't really feel welcome in their new country, so why be against your former country if you aren't even sure if you are actually safe in your new one? You don't end up in a situation where you have no safe harbor in the world. Ethnic Chinese people living abroad believe China will accept them again in-case their living situation abroad goes south, so they don't want to get on the bad side of the Chinese government. Like what happened with the Chinese Exclusion act in the US more than 100 years ago, and also the Japanese Internment Camps. Maybe you disagree with the thought process, but that is what most ethnic Chinese people think.
If your comment (the top-level one) was supposed to be sarcasm, you need a /s tag because there are people actually being serious saying that "it's a conspiracy, couldn't be any other possible explanation" stuff.
But also, the "hostage" thing is not entirely false, just very exaggerated. They only take your family "hostage" if you are like a leader of a protest or something. But I doubt they care if you are just some forum user that has no followers and "protesting" online. They got too many dissidents within their jurisdiction to care about those abroad.
Can't you guys just stop using Adrian Zens? Is no one else able to make up unhinged nonsense about China? Literally all it takes is for him to adopt a pseudonym and the credibility of the propaganda increases entirely for free.
What does he have to do with this story? His name isn't mentioned in the article.
I'd like to draw attention to how every tankie who commented in this thread actually looked at the sources whereas the liberals mostly read the headline.
Hey, tbf some of them probably read it without looking at any sources for their claims
Did you really look at the sources? Because the first source in the article links another BBC article (which links to another article) that ultimately sources research from the Uyghur Human Rights Project. That project does not appear to have any connection to Adrian Zenz. So my original question still stands what does Adrian Zenz have to do with this?
You say every tankie who commented actually looked at the sources but, as far as I can tell, they are just parroting propaganda talking points that they are accusing everyone else of falling for.
Look, I get being skeptical of what the West says about China but I don't think anyone can deny that anything anti China gets quickly astroturfed on Lemmy. I'm seeing lots more knee jerk reactions from tankies that obviously did not read the article and are accusing everyone else of just falling for Western propaganda without doing some real introspection that they are basically just doing the same thing.
Adrian Zens is integral to the Uyghur Human Rights Project. I suppose I don't do new research, I just follow links until I find something I've judged as untrustworthy before. He's not directly credited as a contributor, but Uyghur Human Rights Project uses him as their source for all their publishing, and invites him to their events.
Well, I don't know what else to tell you. I couldn't find anything about him on their site or him being used for any of research that I looked into. Now, I didn't go over everything so it is possible he's worked with them in the past but I don't think that would be a reason to discredit all the work the UHRP.
What am I seeing is anything critical of China getting downvoted and a bunch of people congrating themselves for not falling for the propaganda when I literally looked and could not find anything they were claiming as part of the article.
I encourage anyone seeing all these comments discrediting this story and look into the details yourself. I could not find any evidence for all the claims they are making to discredit this. There has been some good thoughtful discussion and I appreciate that but lots of knee jerk reactions that people not doing proper research when even just a cursory check doesn't back up what they are claiming.
Anyone reading the above comment, simple Google "Uyghur Human Rights Project Adrian Zenz" and investigate how involved he is with the links on their own website that show up. It will be obvious how full of shit this poster is.
Okay. I think this is a very fair and good comment. So this is their most recent published work. https://uhrp.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/UHRP-Humanitarian-Needs-Report_2023-02-01.pdf.pdf
Ctrl F, RFA 7 matches, RFERL 6 matches, radio free 7 matches, uhrp.org to see how many times they source themselves. There are 23 matches but only 19 instances of them using circular sourcing. ASPI 1 match. Jamestown 2 matches. There are some better sources in there, like Human Rights Watch, but the HRW article in question uses Adrian Zenz as their source. The only source I'm seeing quickly that isn't directly with zero steps of separation tied to a NATO member spy agency or propaganda agency is NY Times.
For the New York Times article though be careful following their Tinyurl link because it goes through a Viglink reroute that is unlikely to be safe. I can't imagine why else they'd find it appropriate to use a tinyurl link in their paper if not to attack readers. You can use an extractor service. But anyway if you read that article you'll see that their source is only Uyghur Human Rights Project so it's a circular citation again. No I don't check stuff like this every time. But by now we should know that Uyghur Human Rights Project is an untrustworthy front for Adrian Zenz and stop when we encounter it.
That's not their most recent published work. That was published in Feb 2023 and they released a more recent report on Jul 2023 (and I believe it has less troublesome references but I'll admit I don't have the time to go through them all):
https://uhrp.org/statement/uhrp-submits-comprehensive-report-for-un-consideration-of-chinas-human-rights-record/
Regardless, your point still stands, there's likely more circular referencing than I originally believed. I'm still not convinced it is as much of a conspiracy as others have claimed, but it is food for thought. I appreciate the less combative tone and a willingness to discuss in good faith.
Well I followed the citations in this article and he did not come up so I'm not sure what you are talking about.
Adrian Zens is integral to the Uyghur Human Rights Project.
This is honestly pretty dismaying. This isn't meant as a put down because it is outside of your control but we've got to work on investigative literacy as a country if so many people are having a hard time doing simple stuff like this.
How is he so integral? I've looked all over their site and at a few of their reports and there's nothing about it him or his findings? Look, I'm willing to hear people out but I've looked and I can't find anything that backs up what people are claiming here so I don't think it's me that needs to work on investigative literacy.
I encourage anyone on the fence about this to do their own research. His Wikipedia article has some interesting points:
"As a result of his work on Xinjiang, Zenz has become a target for coordinated disinformation attacks from pro-Beijing and Chinese state-run media, as well as other state-affiliated entities. Zenz and his work on Xinjiang have been criticized by the Chinese government, which, according to The Globe and Mail, "has called his findings 'lies'—even when it confirmed them."
"During an interview with The Daily Telegraph published in May 2021, Zenz defended himself against allegations of fabrication, noting that 95% of documents he has analyzed are publicly available government records."
Plus his findings have been corroborated by lots of reputable reporters. I've seen a lot of claims that people need to stop believing the lies and look at the sources. I've done that and not found what they are claiming so what exactly am I missing here?
Did you google "Uyghur Human Rights Project Adrian Zenz" before replying to my previous comment?
Also did you look at who funds the org? Because it is the US government through NED through only one shell, it isnt hard to look up.
His Wikipedia article has some interesting points:
As hopefully your high school librarian has explained to you already, Wikipedia is not a good source.
Yep, I googled it and I encourage everyone else to do it too. There was nothing. I did see a few Chinese sources calling him out as fraud but nothing unbiased. I did see lots of other credible organizations backing up his findings too.
The Wikipedia article was simply a good starting point that I encouraged people to check out. There's tons of citations in there that back up their points.
A UN Resolution of global south nations:https://undocs.org/pdf?symbol=en/A/HRC/41/G/17
We express our firm opposition to relevant countries’ practice of politicizing human rights issues, by naming and shaming, and publicly exerting pressures on other countries. We commend China’s remarkable achievements in the field of human rights by adhering to the people-centered development philosophy and protecting and promoting human rights through development. We also appreciate China’s contributions to the international human rights cause.
World Bank Investigation of Xinjiang:https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/statement/2019/11/11/world-bank-statement-on-review-of-project-in-xinjiang-china
When allegations are made, the World Bank takes them seriously and reviews them thoroughly. In line with standard practice, immediately after receiving a series of serious allegations in August 2019 in connection with the Xinjiang Technical and Vocational Education and Training Project, the Bank launched a fact-finding review, and World Bank senior managers traveled to Xinjiang to gather information directly...The team conducted a thorough review of project documents, engaged in discussions with project staff, and visited schools directly financed by the project, as well as their partner schools that were the subject of allegations. The review did not substantiate the allegations.
Organization of Islamic Cooperation praises Chinese handling of Xinjiang:https://www.oic-oci.org/docdown/?docID=4447&refID=1250
Welcomes the outcomes of the visit conducted by the General Secretariat's delegation upon invitation from the People's Republic of China; commends the efforts of the People's Republic of China in providing care to its Muslim citizens; and looks forward to further cooperation between the OIC and the People's Republic of China.
http://www.inp.net.pk/china-lauds-oics-resolution-on-xinjiang/
Egyptian media delegates visit Xinjiang: https://www.thenews.com.pk/latest/430738-egyptian-media-delegates-provide-a-detailed-insight-of-the-situation-in-xinjiang
The recently published report also brings forth some interesting facts related to the religious freedom as opposed to the western propaganda. The report provides a strong testimonial by the visiting delegates who clearly state, “the in houses of worship such as the Id Kah Mosque in Kashgar, modern facilities abound, providing water, electricity and air conditioning. Local clerics told the visitors that their religious activities had been very well protected”. "The conditions here are very good," said Abdelhalim Elwerdany, of Egypt's Al-Gomhuria newspaper. "I could feel that local Muslims fully enjoy religious freedom."
Also Adrian Zenz is a complete moron:
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Its a very weakly sourced state sponsored media article reporting on their state enemy. You have to be willfully credulous to believe their claims without further proof.
It doesn't mean that reports are false just because two states are enemies (which is an exaggeration).
"Just because the last 100 articles were bullshit doesn't mean this one is too!"
No. It does.
It really is. Try it, next time you read a China Bad article, just decide that it's bullshit first, then check into it and you'll be proven right.
Come in with preconceived notions and never second guess yourself? Sure, whatever.
Doing research to prove your assumptions correct or incorrect is literally how science works.
A black and white world where objective measures of press freedoms are apparently inversely proportional to trustworthiness of said journalists.
Random blog with a Soviet flag? Impossible to be propaganda, because only capitalism can do a propaganda.
Some of the world's oldest free media with a long history of investigating the British government? Literally nothing but propaganda.
A black and white world where objective measures of press freedoms are apparently inversely proportional to trustworthiness of said journalists.
Oh my god, are you seriously claiming you can objectively measure press freedoms while saying socialists live in a black and white world? Just want to give you a chance to walk back your statement
I am quite curious to know your methodology for measuring press freedom so we can compare and perhaps find something which can be considered locally objective.
You're retreating into "locally" objective. In this topic you're not going to get agreement on what constitutes press freedom, so it is pointless. My point is that the claim of objective press freedom existing is ridiculous. You walked it back, but to a position that still seems ridiculous to me.
For example, I dont believe there is such thing as a free press. Any org that can produce a press machine is going to influence that press, whether that is a government or private interests. Editorial freedom isn't possible, editorial control just ranges from the subtle to the overt.
That statement is illogical. You must have huge problems with the simplest logic to argue that. You can't bent logic by twisting what I said. Stop clowning.
Just because all the other times this faulty logic was used doesn't mean this one is illogical too!
There's literally memes about the bullshit about North Korea. Stop believing the news about America's targets, they'll make a fool of you.
Some North Korean stories may be exaggerated, but it's a known fact that they use families as hostages.
Some North Korean stories may be exaggerated, but it's a known fact that they use families as hostages.
I'm just gonna sit back and enjoy the tankies from lemmygrad denying or trying to justify this one as well. 🍿
Imagine defending Russian and Chinese imperialism because "the enemy of my enemy is my friend".
Neither China not Russia are imperialist. China is a socialist state so by definition cannot be and Russia is an immature industrial capitalist state.
China is a socialist state so by definition cannot be
Can you elaborate on that? I agree that China is not imperialist, but I don't see how socialism by definition precludes that possibility.
Imperialism is the final stage of capitalism. Finance capitalism takes over from industrial capitalism and seeks out markets abroad, having exhausted the internal ones. It teams up with other finance capitalism to become a global force, the export of capital becomes the most prominent feature of the economy rather than the export of raw materials or finished goods. The states they come from tend to become fascist in nature, or as some people put it, "fascism is imperialism turned inward".
Even if China was a capitalist country as some people claim, it still wouldn't be at that stage yet. Russia might wish to one day be there, but it too has a long way to go.
You didn't answer what I asked.
You said that capitalism by definition leads to imperialism. I asked how socialism by definition precludes imperialism.
Because you need to get to imperialism via capitalism. There is definitively no other way.
I would suggest reading "Imperialism, the highest stage of Capitalism"
Imperialism has a highly specific definition.
Ask Taiwan if if they think China is imperialistic. I'm sure you'll get an answer.
Do you know what the KMT did to the indigenous people who occupied Taiwan before the KMT retreated there?
Imperialism does not mean "of empire". It is an economic system, the highest stage of capitalism.
https://www.dictionary.com/browse/imperialism
Yes. Yes it does.
Also, you're trying to challenge the definition of the word, but you're not arguing with about China and Taiwan.
