I've been seeing a huge amount of anti-Chinese sentiment online, from obvious places like reddit, to even misinformed friends on social media falling victim to viral posts filled with misinformation.
What are we to make of this? Is this the slow march to war, by portraying them as pure evil, à la the fake story of Iraqi soldiers killing Kuwaiti babies to help get the public on board with our military response? It seems disadvantageous for the US and their allies to fight China, as we are incredibly reliant upon them economically and don't stand to gain much from the conflict.
Are these the irrational decisions of a dying empire? Or is there something else at play?
People joke about China becoming Communist "any day now", but I think Xichas actually taken some steps towards not only economic reforms that help the workers, but also cultural reforms that make China a more hospitable place for non-chinese workers. There's still a ton of nationalism, but that can't be fixed in a day. Everyone knows that. At least they're trying though.
Someone on the Sino subreddit linked to a Chinese rap contest where the top 2 contestants were both Uyghur muslims. Which I think is a great way to try and shift the public opinion from negative to positive. Like they're actually trying to incorporate Uyghur culture without making them an "other". It's a very hard beam to balance on.
If this trend continues, China will be a pretty awesome place for inclusivity and worker rights sooner rather than later.
Edit: for some reason that Uyghir rap video is tagged as "sensitive content" by Twitter.
That is slave labor, they are forced to perform there, you can see how he hates it.
Lol that's what I would've said if I'd be a lib. But in all honesty that is pretty dope, I have to look into chinese hip hop.