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Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by nouveaux on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:49AM (#24106329)
As a Chinese person, I do not understand your reply. You're saying he is against impoverished people in China obtaining wealth but nowhere do I see him say that. Instead, he's saying he is afraid of the same oppression China is forcing on Hong Kong being forced on the rest of the world.

https://www.businessinsider.com/nba-china-feud-timeline-dary...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blitzchung_controversy

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/25/business/taiwan-american-...

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/12/fashion/china-donatella-v...

https://omaha.com/columnists/hansen/hansen-omaha-man-liked-a...

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/15/world/asia/abominable-vie...

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2011-11-01/china-say...

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by knzhou on Monday August 10, 2020 @03:02AM (#24106399)
All of these examples are pieces of entertainment being pulled because they offend Chinese sensibilities.

Here's the thing: pieces of entertainment are also pulled if they offend American sensibilities. In fact, American sensibilities have exclusively determined what is acceptable in big-budget entertainment for at least half a century. Crap like the Blitzchung affair just reflects this balance shifting to 99% America, 1% China.

Yes, China has the power to cancel one thing from time to time, but America constantly has the power to cancel everything. If a big-budget production isn't appealing to an American audience, it just doesn't get made, period. For example, when's the last time you saw a Chinese protagonist in a major film? Or even a single Chinese person who wasn't portrayed as a villain, a dope, or a sex toy?

In a world with equitable global development, influence would be proportional to population. America would have a 5% say, China 20%, Africa 20%, India 25%, and so on. So I'm not worried about the balance shifting towards that.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by jcytong on Monday August 10, 2020 @04:14AM (#24106802)
I think there's a lot of confusion between opposing the CCP and racism against Chinese. I'm Chinese as well.

I think we can fight for more Chinese roles in films, politicians, scientists, CEOs, more representation in all fields. However, I don't see how your argument about it being okay to "cancel" because China is just cancelling 1% and America is 99%.

I'd also not prefer to live in a CCP-centric world where Chinese people are not allowed to tell the truth without fear.[1][2]

We should call out Guantanamo Bay as well as the Xinjiang re-education camps, Liu Xiaobo, not allowing Hong Kong elections. It doesn't make either right because of the existence of the other. However, I have no fear of speaking publicly about Guantanamo Bay and then traveling to the US. But I have to make sure I remove all my private chat messages if I ever mentioned about the Xinjiang camps. That's the CCP-centric world that I see.

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chen_Qiushi#February_2020_disa...

[2]https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/3074622/coro...

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Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by nouveaux on Monday August 10, 2020 @04:04PM (#24113414)
I see your point regarding Qian Xuesen and that whole thing was a tragedy for United States. Similar things can be said about the US treatment of Japanese Americans and internment camps.

Your point is exactly why we need to be afraid of any government's suppression of free speech. We need to support people like Jimmy Lai so the likes United States and the CCP cannot suppress the voice of good people. We need to be fearful of any government arresting anyone advocating for freedom. Regardless of your government, the goal is to support free speech and the freedom of the press.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by Reelin on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:20AM (#24106147)
> if you sink to the 90th percentile of privilege from the 99th, you'll become a "second class human"

That isn't what the person you're responding to said at all. They were observing the discrimination against those who are not Han in China and extrapolating that it would apply to them as well in a China-centric world.

They don't want to be discriminated against. That's all that's being said. (Well also they're saying that they appreciate freedom of speech and some other stuff that China seems to be diametrically opposed to, but you didn't respond to that so I guess it's not relevant to my comment.)

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by knzhou on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:24AM (#24106185)
The "discrimination" they fear is no longer automatically being worshipped the second they step foot in a non-Western country, for being the richest guy in every room. In other words, what they actually fear is dropping from 99th percentile to 90th, and they think that possibility is worth starting World War III over.

That attitude is typical, and precisely why people in China find the West so unconvincing.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by throwaway1yf on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:53AM (#24106361)
> In other words, what they actually fear is dropping from 99th percentile to 90th, and they think that possibility is worth starting World War III over.

Classic siege mentality. First assume OP is white and rich, then accuse the West hindering China from getting powerful while OP is focusing on human rights and equity. To be frank your argument is no better than common cliches from Wumao and Xiaofenhong.

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Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by aww_dang on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:33AM (#24106240)
At this point you could create a drinking game based on each iteration of whataboutism or conflation of criticism of the CCP with racism.
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by Reelin on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:46AM (#24106311)
> conflation of criticism of the CCP with racism

Which is particularly ironic since it appears to have been pointing out the racism that currently exists within China that started all this.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by aww_dang on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:52AM (#24106355)
Irony abounds. The OP doesn't even mention a particular race in the comment. Yet the responses assume he is white with all of the trappings of privilege. Not impossible to characterize this assumption as racist on multiple levels.
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by knzhou on Monday August 10, 2020 @03:28AM (#24106532)
It was not a hard thing to infer. There is a very particular kind of deep ignorance one needs to write a comment like OP's.
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by knzhou on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:29AM (#24106216)
Do you really think agitating for World War III was productive to start with? I pointed out rationally and straightforwardly where such extreme opinions come form.
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by Reelin on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:33AM (#24106243)
> agitating for World War III

I read the original comment as being against it but wondering if it's an inevitable outcome. That's a very reasonable thing to want to discuss - many of the respondents here (including myself) appear not to share the view that it's inevitable.

> I pointed out rationally and straightforwardly

You mean the part where you literally made things up about what the other party thought?

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Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by Reelin on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:41AM (#24106284)
> he thinks the prospect of there being a single non-white country not being crushingly poor "makes his hair stand on end"

As I previously pointed out, that is absolutely not what was said. Please stop making things up.

Concern was expressed about the racism against those who are not Han which currently exists in China. The original commenter professed a fear of what that would look like for outsiders in a China-centric world.

You appear (IMO) to be trying to distract from the fact that there is racism within China today. (As there is, of course, in many other places to varying extents - including but certainly not limited to the US.)

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by knzhou on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:45AM (#24106304)
> The original commenter professed a fear of what that would look like for outsiders in a China-centric world.

Yes, and for the third time now: my point is that the absolute worst-case scenario for the original commenter is still miles better than what 90% of the world (i.e. everybody non-white) faces today.

The worst-case scenario in OP's book is that China joins the ranks of first world countries, which then go from being 100% white to 90%. He'd still be rich, and he'd still be comfortable, but he'd have to share first world status with others. And for some reason, that's unacceptable.

Worst case, he might miss out on one business deal because it was struck in Mandarin, which is an absolutely tiny reflection of the loss of opportunity faced today by everybody who doesn't know English. And that in turn is tiny compared to the reality that 100 million people died of starvation in the 20th century. Famine, disease, and poverty are global moral catastrophes of unimaginable scale. And OP just thinks a country managing to stop them for its citizens gives him the creeps.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by Reelin on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:52AM (#24106353)
> my point is that the absolute worst-case scenario for the original commenter is still miles better

So we shouldn't worry about something bad because worse has happened before?

> The worst-case scenario in OP's book is that China joins the ranks of first world countries, which then go from being 100% white to 90%.

You're making things up again. OP described living in a China-centric world, not one of equals. (Also your population statistics are _way_ off. 100% to 90%? The population of China is comparable to every other western country combined.)

> Worst case, he might miss out on one business deal because it was struck in Mandarin

Worst case, he might be actively discriminated against and passed over because in spite of investing considerable time in mastering Mandarin he's not Han.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by knzhou on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:55AM (#24106367)
> OP described living in a China-centric world, not one of equals.

Yes, but there's no evidence to suggest this will be the case. The average yearly income in China is not even half what a minimum wage worker gets in the US! And yet OP thinks China will promptly take over the world. That's yellow peril at work.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by Reelin on Monday August 10, 2020 @03:00AM (#24106392)
> Yes, but there's no evidence to suggest this will be the case.

Agreed, at least to the extent that I don't see a way to meaningfully predict that sort of outcome one way or the other.

> And yet OP thinks China will promptly take over the world. That's yellow peril at work.

On the contrary, that's just someone whose looked at recent economic trends and population statistics extrapolating from them intuitively.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by throwaway1yf on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:36AM (#24106254)
> a large group of non-white people has escaped crushing poverty, but at the very fucking least Chinese people are no longer starving to death by the millions.

I'm pretty sure skin colour isn't related to poverty, maybe you can blame chairman Mao for that.

> this tiny measure of progress and hope

So you suggest all the bad things happened to Uyghurs and Han people can be justified with economic growth? That's just a lame argument used by the CCP all the time.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by knzhou on Monday August 10, 2020 @03:30AM (#24106549)
When did I make that argument?
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by aww_dang on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:22AM (#24106170)
>You look at this tiny measure of progress and hope, and you declare it repulsive. You think if you're no longer standing far on top of everybody else ... you'll become a "second class human"

I didn't read that in the above comment at all.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by knzhou on Monday August 10, 2020 @03:26AM (#24106528)
Yes, you didn't, but you weren't really looking, were you?
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by zozin on Monday August 10, 2020 @09:26AM (#24108970)
I am an immigrant. Yes I am white, but my grandparents faced famine at the hands of Communism and my parents were poor, just like yours. If you go further back in my family history I'm sure you'd find generation after generation of serfs. If it wasn't for America I probably wouldn't be posting on HN. If it wasn't for America I probably wouldn't be as educated and as wealthy as I am. My comment was directed at the principles that the CCP seems to embody, and not Chinese people themselves. The fact remains that if China led a unipolar world during my upbringing, my rise from son of a simple farmer would likely not have been possible because of the color of my skin/ethnicity. That is the problem I have with the Chinese system.
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by knzhou on Monday August 10, 2020 @01:38PM (#24111842)
I'm glad we agree that development and opportunity are good things.

The average per capita income in China is lower than countries like Costa Rica or Venezuela. It's less than half of what a minimum wage worker gets in the US. Every year, hundreds of thousands of people still die in China due to preventable diseases like tuberculosis and hepatitis. About half the children in the countryside are malnourished, to a degree that would not be conceivable for anybody in the US. This is the actual situation China is facing, and it's still dramatically better than many countries that were similarly poor decades ago.

In response to this, you and HN in general immediately react with fears of imminent Chinese world domination. Once again I ask you: why does the prospect of a few non-white people not starving to death make you so afraid? Why is this so alarming, so abnormal? I encourage you to spend at least a moment thinking about it.

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by zozin on Monday August 10, 2020 @03:32PM (#24113116)
You keep bringing up racism and devolving the conversation. The entire gist of your argument seems to be that universal principles don't matter so long as progress is made. That's a shortsighted and fairly moronic point of view. Taiwan, South Korea and Hong Kong were able to develop and raise millions out of poverty in concert with universal principles and democracy. China and the China model does not have a stranglehold on development. They don't own some sort of secret sauce that cannot be replicated. You don't have to trade in freedom of speech and expression and the rule of law for an HDTV and a high-rise apartment.

I would argue that a democratic China would be further along in its development than it currently is. A democratic China would have not have had its development retarded by a megalomaniacal madman whose decisions led to the deaths of dozens of millions of souls. Were those deaths justified in the pursuit of growth and development?

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by ffggvv on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:14AM (#24106122)
how can you defend the uighur death camps? and organ harvesting of falun gong?
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by ken47 on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:20AM (#24106146)
Perhaps I'm missing something obvious, but the poster is not defending those things.
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Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by Johnjonjoan on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:23AM (#24106179)
There's no excuse for killing civilians in war but there's a definite difference between doing that and putting people in concentration camps because of their religion.
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by dqpb on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:51AM (#24106344)
Now that you got that out of the way, looking forward to your answer.
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by ffggvv on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:28AM (#24106208)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism

communist tactics haven’t changed

Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by aww_dang on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:37AM (#24106262)
It is a stock trope for these discussions at this point.
Re:Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national ... by dqpb on Monday August 10, 2020 @02:53AM (#24106359)
Judging by the downvotes, HN'ers seem to really dislike any mention of the Uighurs.