History suggests that China's main problems in the last couple of centuries were Japan and the West themselves. (Not that one can wish others out of existence.) Curtailing the influence of Western ideas makes perfect sense for them.

> History suggests that China's main problems in the last couple of centuries were Japan and the West themselves

Individuals take responsibility for themselves. Countries can too

> Individuals take responsibility for themselves. Countries can too

Sure. Controlling the influence of Western ideas seems to be exactly they way they're doing it. Reasonable IMO.

It is not reasonable to round up protesters and throw them in jail. That's an authoritarian regime who's afraid of its population. At the same time, they ask this population to lead China to greater economic growth. It does not make sense.

That's an entirely separate matter - and kind of off-topic, considering how this thread is about Internet censorship, not treatment of dissenters.

It's totally related. Protesting is speech that is censored when the government throws people in jail.

It has the same effect as internet censorship. People who speak up are prevented from communicating with the rest of society.

China definitely has its problems but my point is that there are problems everywhere and we shouldn't single-out any specific country because we think that their problems are worse than ours (maybe they have the opposite opinion).

The reality is that no one has the moral high ground; we are all competing for resources and relevance and every country is willing to resort to dirty tricks to get ahead.

China has the Great Firewall, the US has the NSA...

One is allowing free information while the other has the great firewall and random arrests for people writing negative comments about the party in power.

Although the US is not as democratic as it should be your comparison is not even laughable.

I find it hard that people can be so misled, or maybe you are just trolling. China has a brutal dictatorship that executes people for trying to get more power and were responsible for the Tiananmen massacre and still will not even admit it happened.

If you think you could live in China and even write anything about the party the way you write about the US government from your comment you are delusional. The US has a very free press and free speech for everyone.

> If you think you could live in China and even write anything about the party the way you write about the US government from your comment you are delusional.

Censorship in China Allows Government Criticism but Silences Collective Expression

Contrary to previous understandings, posts with negative, even vitriolic, criticism of the state, its leaders, and its policies are not more likely to be censored. Instead, we show that the censorship program is aimed at curtailing collective action by silencing comments that represent, reinforce, or spur social mobilization, regardless of content.

Source: http://gking.harvard.edu/publications/how-censorship-china-a...

Yeah. Combine that with the fact that protesters are thrown in jail willy nilly and the above comment still stands

No; we should single them out in this thread. Because this thread is about them.

We talk about the NSA about five times as much as about the Great Firewall. And when we do, it's off-topic to butt in with "but China has TGF!" Just as much, this is not the place to dismiss anything based on the NSA.

This is as literal an example of changing the subject as you can get. A hypocrite isn't wrong. He's just a hypocrite. Everybody is. Can we please move on and actually discuss the subject at hand instead of deflecting?

OP is completely right.

(Btw I thought your gp comment was good, this is just about the "hypocrisy means you can't criticise" part. +1 man!)

> No; we should single them out in this thread. Because this thread is about them.

Amen! In my experience, on articles critical of China, 90% of the comments are deflections about the West. Here's one thread that's easy to count [1]. 9/10 comments talk about how the West does it too

[1] https://archive.is/HnyDk

Here is a general argument for giving more criticism to countries (or, in general, bad actors) who do worse things: It provides a better incentive gradient to avoid doing bad things than complaining equally about all countries that do at least some of a bad thing.

If there is no-one who has the moral high ground isn't a universal and free internet all the more important?