Do you mean that Western leaders started to turn their backs on freedom, too? You are absolutely right, I fear. So much of the talk about China in the West doesn't even mention human rights, just trade imbalance or cyber security. In an age of nuclear detente, I suppose it was inevitable that democracy's most potent opponents would be homegrown. I never considered that this also means abandoning imperiled democracy abroad, but it surely does.

It's actually not true. They did talk about human rights. The German embassy in China specifically released a statement on Xinjiang and how it's discussion should be based on mutual respect. It's not that the West isn't talking about human rights, it's actually that they seem to be more jealous if anything of how China does things.

Oh and if you want to check on how much a country cares about their relationship with another country all you need to do is check which diplomats send there. As an example all the ambassadors Germany sends to Taiwan are completely useless bums which are just wasting oxygen and tax payer money.

Germany has currently a tendency to excel in corruption and nothing else, without it having any consequences. On the topic of surveillance they also fail at every level. The left wing of our government behaves like the Stasi. This is no exaggeration, they will send the police to your home if you say something on twitter. At least judges ruled a case as blatently illegal. No consequences again... The right wing just wants to access any form of encrypted communication.

China is well loved because it is an important market for the largest car manufacturers, so politicians love China too. I really hope they just ignore intellectual property in this case... It is not that laws are currently taken seriously anyway.

'Freedom's' problem has always been that it's a very loose term. Freedom to do what? I can't even go into a grocery store after the federal government said i don't have to wear my mask if i'm fully vaccinated, without my mask. Virtue signalling by other Americans has become more powerful than the centralized federal governments ability to restrict my rights. I believe the US is scarier because it's more akin to mob rule. China is going to collapse when they get a very weak leader but the US is going to tear itself apart.

> Do you mean that Western leaders started to turn their backs on freedom, too?

The last time the Western leaders actually cared about freedom and values instead of resources in a major conflict was 1939-1945... there was no "turning their backs", as said backs were turned all the time. The Western world never had a major problem cooperating with dictatorships, military regimes or other autocracies as long as they either were somewhat (far) right or supplied cheap oil.

China is no different, the whole world is looking away from their attempt to re-enact the Holocaust upon Uyghurs and other minorities as long as China supplies them with cheap crap and/or cheap, no-strings-attached funding for infrastructure and bailouts.