That when we talk about China, we see all of their flaws as completely damning them and everything they do as a country, but in the same breath we speak of the rule of law in the USA as if that means something when it comes to mass surveillance (it does not - the USA is a pioneer in illegal mass surveillance). This is a particular problem when it comes to TikTok, because senators look at TikTok collecting data and influencing Americans and they say "We cannot let China do this to us!" while completely ignoring Facebook and Microsoft doing all of the same to us. This leads to harmful bills like this TikTok bill when what we really need are protections from all mass surveillance, foreign and domestic.

But that will never happen as long as the good citizens of the USA continue to pretend that the rule of law has any meaning in the USA when it comes to mass surveillance, and we point at China and chide them for the millions they have imprisoned as if that is not the pot calling the kettle black.

Calling out China will change very little there, and serves mostly to distract the conversation from the problems we really have the power to solve. We only have the power to change ourselves. The people in the USA and around the globe who suffer from US surveillance will continue to suffer all the while.

And what is worse, China will simply start running domestic companies and collecting our data all the same, because these bills aren't solving the real problem.

Blindly pointing the finger at China causes real harm to us.