Ah, it's a conspiracy when these countries 'do well' but everything you are told in the West is true huh?

Even if everything stated in western journalism were complete lies, I don't see how that would make the reporting out of autocratic dictatorships any truer.

Do you know anyone in China? Just ask them what life was like for most of zero-CoVID. Most people didn't even know a single person who had gotten infected.

You don't have to arbitrarily trust some authority. Everyone in the country could see from their own experience that spread of the virus really was being effectively controlled.

Depends if you believe everything that comes out of a dictatorship is a lie. How untrue is it? We know it's under-reported, but who do you trust to find the truth?

The question is, do you think it is easier or harder to spot the lies of Western journalism, and what problems does that cause in forming a base to judge others?

Pointing at flaws in Western journalism is a red herring. Using it as a whataboutist talking point is a favorite these days of dictatorships and their apologists.

No, it's not 'the question' whether it's easier or harder to spot the 'lies' of Western journalism. That has no bearing whatsoever on the obvious, cut and dry reason for the underreporting of covid deaths in China.

But it is worth pointing out that, unlike the "news" propaganda organs of dictatorships, Western journalism is in no sense a monolith that speaks with one voice. Not even mainstream media in the US speaks with one voice (because yes, Fox is the MSM too). So while it may require a bit more sophistication to pick out truths, it is at least not a one-sided distortion of history in favor of the rulers.

Pointing out flaws is a red herring?

No, finding the flaws in western journalism takes more effort because it's not as obvious. Which means the rulers can get away with propoganda and manipulation much more easily than one who provides a direct, complete and obvious propoganda.

I think people would be wise to be equally critical of left and right MSM, not just assume they aren't propoganda because they are on different 'sides' (hint, they're not really)

It's a red herring because this article is about reported statistics from country to country. When the media in one relatively free country skews statistics, that is generally reported by opposition media in the same country and in other free countries abroad. Certainly it's right to point out that some "free" media has skewed statistics or parroted an establishment line about covid, and pointing it out is exactly what a free press is for. And if you read news from alternative and European and Latin American outlets as well, you can spot the biases of some MSM reporting in the US. But what is a red herring is pointing out MSM bias in the same breath as Chinese propaganda, presenting it in a context by which it is somehow meant to excuse the total top-down censorship of an unfree press. The attempt to draw draw that equivalence is the favorite tactic of dictatorships. It's not just a matter of detecting lies, but of exposing truth. For instance, the lab leak hypothesis would never have even been mentioned in an unfree press; to simply know that your government is lying via press manipulation only tells you that you don't know anything. It doesn't tell you what they're hiding from you. Yet the American press has shown itself free enough to expose these things, giving one the opportunity to determine what may or may not be true. That opportunity simply doesn't exist in the Chinese media ecosystem.

China didn't suffer greatly (until now) because it didn't allow the virus to spread.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. If you keep the virus out of the country, you don't need great hospitals.