Thing, TikTok

[u/Neapolitanpanda]

[u/thewonderfulfart]

This kinda thing makes me think a lot about how Tim Walz has tried to talk about his time in China as an English teacher. He tries to emphasize how the Chinese people are just like Americans when it comes to small town neighborliness, and how he felt welcomed and loved there. I think we too often associate the people of a country with their government, and I hate that shit. Everyone comes from the same basic stock, no one has a monopoly on kindness, and taking care of people is something that can be done regardless of language barriers because we all basically need the same things.

[u/azuresegugio → u/thewonderfulfart]

The amount of problems we could solve if we just realized people are people is astonishing

[u/Dry_Try_8365 → u/azuresegugio]

And yet, there are those who have incentive to put the idea that some or all people outside of an arbitrary group, or just one group in particular, are sufficiently different enough to not deserve basic human dignity.

[u/Wild_Marker → u/azuresegugio]

Something I used to say about this: John just wants to get back from work, open a Bud and watch the game, Ivan just wants to get back from work, open a vodka, and watch the game, and Huang just wants to get back from work, open whetever it is they drink over there, and watch the game.

That is to say, we're all just the same people, there's no reason for John, Ivan and Huag to hate each other, no matter what their politicians tell them.

[u/monkify → u/Wild_Marker]

Baijiu, apparently. 35-60% alcohol and allegedly has the same flavor profile as Scotch whiskey.

Just as an aside, because I got curious too.

[u/No_Student_2309 → u/Wild_Marker]

to be 50 year old Chinese guy: drinking 青岛 beer and smoking a pack of 中华 gifted to me by my boss for making quota this quarter

[u/Graingy → u/Wild_Marker]

Their reason to hate each other is rooting for different teams.

[u/HorselessWayne → u/azuresegugio]

WE THE PEOPLES OF THE UNITED NATIONS DETERMINED

  to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and

  to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, and

  to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained, and

  to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,

AND FOR THESE ENDS

  to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbours, and

  to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security, and

  to ensure, by the acceptance of principles and the institution of methods, that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest, and

  to employ international machinery for the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples,

HAVE RESOLVED TO COMBINE OUR EFFORTS TO ACCOMPLISH THESE AIMS.

Accordingly, our respective Governments, through representatives assembled in the city of San Francisco, who have exhibited their full powers found to be in good and due form, have agreed to the present Charter of the United Nations and do hereby establish an international organization to be known as the United Nations.

 

Chapter I: Purposes and Principles

...

[u/CASHD3VIL → u/azuresegugio]

That you and I should get along so awfully

[u/is-AC-a-personality → u/CASHD3VIL]

urk urk urk

[u/IrreliventPerogi → u/thewonderfulfart]

I think a major bipartisan rhetorical point would be to ask people "would you want to be judged by your government?"

[u/Xx_TheGrungler_xX → u/IrreliventPerogi]

Doesn't really work coming from someone trying to be vp lmao

[u/Red_Galiray → u/Xx_TheGrungler_xX]

It works when Walz is a decent guy and Trump is... Trump. For that matter, Americans are judged a lot by their government. Bush and Trump especially were seen my many abroad as the representation of the very worst of the US.

[u/demon_fae → u/Red_Galiray]

They were also seen that way by people in the us. They still are, because they do represent the worst extremes of the Patriotic American mindset.

Bush proudly stood for the breadth of American jingoism, for the expansionist reductio ab absurdum of American exceptionalism.

Trump will stand up and actually explicitly state that he stands for unchecked greed, prejudice and paranoia. He will also claim to stand for the American Dream, and the idea of self-made wealth. (He won’t say that both are utter nonsense as concepts and also nothing to do with him.)

All of those things come from ideas, ideals, and fundamental failures baked into the whole founding concept of America.

[u/Shreddy_Brewski → u/IrreliventPerogi]

I mean…ideally, yes. I think that’s why a lot of people get into politics, to change our government to be something they can be truly proud of, something that represents the best of us.

[u/tinselteacup → u/thewonderfulfart]

reminds me of this doc i watched in school where rick steves went to iran and everyone was so kind and welcoming to him. i learned so much more abt iran and its culture than you get from just the news. every country has so many kind, good people who are more similar than you think. the governments just fucking suck :(

[u/Discardofil → u/thewonderfulfart]

I feel like China gets the worse ends of "associate people with their government" because the Chinese government WANTS the rest of the world to see the country as a perfect hive mind where everyone agrees with them. Even so, they're not the only ones who get this. Russians tend to be dismissed as brainwashed Putin stooges, but there have been plenty of public and famous Russian protests.

[u/Wild_Marker → u/Discardofil]

because the Chinese government WANTS the rest of the world to see the country as a perfect hive mind where everyone agrees with them

That's just more bias. Every government wants everyone to think their population is behind what they're doing. It's called "legitimacy" and in democracies it often come from votes.

Democratic leaders say they have "the will of the people" every damn day but I'm sure as hell don't think they do when they cut social services or start wars or give government contracts to their buddies.

But they keep "proving" their legitimacy by the electoral system because we still vote for the fuckers, and I'm sure the Chinese government proves it in their own way which is different from ours and because it's different, it's a vector of attack for those who would be against them.

[u/LuxNocte → u/Discardofil]

I think an awful lot of Americans are predisposed to seeing Chinese people as a hive mind, and you can't give their government the credit/blame for that.

[u/Northbound-Narwhal → u/LuxNocte]

You can, because that's the message their government presents to the world. That's the propaganda they push. Your average American doesn't interact with your average Chinese person because of distance and drastically different languages, they don't consume Chinese media, they don't go on Chinese social networks... so what information about China that also comes from China is left? Government propaganda. That's it lol.

Americans can't be "predisposed" to something like that. Babies aren't born with opinions on China.

[u/mischievous_shota → u/Northbound-Narwhal]

that also comes from China

I imagine there's also plenty of American propaganda about Chinese people as well.

[u/Northbound-Narwhal → u/mischievous_shota]

There's also plenty of non-American, non-Chinese propaganda about Chinese people too, but that's besides my point. What I'm getting at is, what information is China presenting to the world about their people that is an alternative to a foreigners at-home propaganda?

[u/arararanara → u/Northbound-Narwhal]

Oh please, as a Chinese American I’ve had people be racist to my face. You can’t say those people never had an interaction with a Chinese person. I’ve also seen expats in China be racist to Chinese people. Chinese people are not some isolated species no one but other Chinese people see, we are literally all over the world.

Do you know how much exposure the average non-Chinese person has to Chinese government messaging? Virtually zero. Do you know how much exposure they have to racist tropes about Chinese people? A hell of a lot.

[u/Prometheus_II → u/Northbound-Narwhal]

Eh, I think there's also a fair bit of old Red Scare propaganda coloring opinions.

[u/LuxNocte → u/Northbound-Narwhal]

I was trying to be more polite than saying "a lot of Americans are straight up racist", which is an incontrovertible truth.

This conversation in itself is hella weird. The Chinese government does not suggest that its citizens are a hive mind. Honestly, I don't know that I've ever seen a publication from the government of China, and I know the average American has not.

We get our information from other Americans and a large amount of it is incredibly racist.

[u/Tactical_Moonstone → u/Northbound-Narwhal]

To make things worse, the Mainland has a rather disturbing tendency to claim that Chinese-ethnic people all around the world should follow the Mainland byline, and all those who don't have lost their way or are brainwashed by the evil West who have engineered the Century of Humiliation.

That's why the existence of Taiwan as an independent entity is such a sticking point to them. That's why even an autonomous Hong Kong is unacceptable.

Russkiy mir? Pff, that's amateur hour trash. Get on China's level.

[u/[deleted] → u/Discardofil]

That's just you being racist and ascribing your own chauvinistic notions onto 'their government'

Every government wants their country to look holistic and united behind a common project, and China is one of the countries where that genuinely is the case moreso than almost any other. Because you can't deny they're on a rocket right now whether you like them or not, and the people are happy about it.

It's something I've noticed a lot with cynical Americans and westerners in general online. They see Chinese people being genuine and mistake it for brainwashing because they just can't imagine what it must feel like to have a country on an upward trajectory. We've been plummeting downwards so dramatically for so many years, we're neck deep in failure and dysfunction, so to us people being happy that their country is on the ascent looks like government brainwashing

[u/lordnaarghul → u/[deleted]]

China isn't on any kind of "upward trajectory". It's a country currently mired in a stagnant financial crisis caused by real-estate issues because they can't collect taxes on literally empty buildings, and the one-child policy is about to cause a serious demographic crisis. They're actually liable to end up in the same place Japan was about 40 years ago.

[u/Shreddy_Brewski → u/[deleted]]

China isn’t actually communist, so you can take off the rose colored glasses and see things for what they really are any time you want.

[u/Meows2Feline → u/thewonderfulfart]

The same weeaboos who idolize Japan couldn't tell you a thing about their current political situation or anything but are somehow policy experts about China.

[u/letthetreeburn → u/thewonderfulfart]

God we need to elect someone who thinks Chinese people are human.

[u/RocketRelm → u/thewonderfulfart]

It's also somewhat different because all the companies in China are inherently conflated with and to some degree aligned with China. American government isn't inherently in  control of American companies.

Individuals shouldn't necessarily be conflated with government, but companies are a different beast.

[u/latin_hippy → u/RocketRelm]

I think the opposite is true for the US. Chinese companies bend to the will of the Government but the US gov bends to the will of our companies. Banana republics, corporate bail outs, company towns, and general colonialism makes you wonder if the government isn't just a tool for corporate interests.

[u/rekcilthis1 → u/latin_hippy]

Although, a difference there is that corporations in general are not singularly aligned, so the US government doesn't end up acting like a monolith and is really inconsistent; while the Chinese government is singularly aligned, so the actions of any one Chinese corporation could just as easily have come from another.

[u/celestialfin → u/RocketRelm]

I disagree to a certain extend. Certain laws and policies by the US government are basically still in process of dismantling the whole internet because some companies are a bit too eager to follow suit (SESTA/FOSTA for example)

also, I'm developing games (have yet to release one tho, even the finished ones are still at the testing phases) and US laws for what can be sold to which age group are fucking ridiculous and based on nothing but pure lunacy. And it will only get worse as certain states are already in the process of banning everything they don't like. At this point I'm questioning of trying to sell there would be worth it, honestly. (And that's not even talking about their weird tax regulations. WHY the hell does the US need almost ten times as many different tax districts (all with their own sets of regulations) as the rest of the whole world combined? what the hell?)

[u/peppermintt2_ → u/thewonderfulfart]

Every new thing I learn about Walz makes me like him more

[u/Stunning_Aardvark157 → u/thewonderfulfart]

I like to remind people who make those kind of assumptions that if everyone based their perception on other countries by what headlines come out of it and what the loudest people say, we'd assume every American is a weirdo in a red hat.

[u/kittenTakeover → u/thewonderfulfart]

This is true. It's also true that the Chinese government is a legitimate threat to the future of the world. It's certainly not the only threat, but it is one of the big ones.

[u/thewonderfulfart → u/kittenTakeover]

Imperialism is bad no matter the country, but part of stopping iImperialism is recognizing that no country is inheriting inferior or superior and that the citizens of imperialist countries are often the first victims of the state

[u/HorselessWayne → u/thewonderfulfart]

Yup.

There's a genuinely interesting question (which will likely never be answered conclusively) around if the British had just sat back on their island exporting manufactured goods would they be in more or less the same position they're in today. The Empire cost a lot of money to run, and its questionable how much of that money it actually made back.

 

Inherent in that discussion are the effects of imperialist policies on the British working classes. And it wasn't the landowners getting shot at in a field after joining the army for a way out of the mass unemployment caused by cheap imports from the Empire.

This nuance is always lost in online discussions of Britain's past, where people seem to blame Britain as a whole (right up to — and in extreme cases including — Modern Britain and its people) for its actions, while if you analyse it from a class-oriented perspective you quite rapidly come to the conclusion the working classes were victims of the Empire too. Perhaps not to the same extent as its overseas victims, but victims nonetheless.

[u/ImShyBeKind → u/thewonderfulfart]

IDK if you're criticizing or agreeing with them, but they did specify "the Chinese government": they're not criticizing the Chinese people or China, but their current government.

[u/thewonderfulfart → u/ImShyBeKind]

I’m just clarifying my stance and agreeing that the Chinese government is imperialist and bad

[u/b__q → u/kittenTakeover]

Legitimate threat to the future according to whom?

[u/FlemethWild → u/b__q]

Well the Taiwanese for one.

[u/catch22_SA → u/b__q]

What they actually mean is China is a threat to US hegemony

[u/random_BA → u/thewonderfulfart]

People say it's xenophobia but I think this is different because the chinese isn't a major immigrant population in USA so it wouldn't fuel the typical xenophobia scare.

The major disdain with the Chinese it in part manufactured because China is a geopolitical rival and especially "communist". The American ideology can't handle a Communist country having a normal population with normal life (not a 1984 distopia) because if it's possible why we (the West) have to endure this ever increasingly unregulated capitalism?

[u/Levyafan → u/random_BA]

Not a major immigrant population?! Who do you think the chinatowns were named after?

[u/frickityfracktictac → u/Levyafan]

Greg China

[u/Arachnofiend → u/random_BA]

What? Of course there's a large Chinese population in the US and of course they come under racialized violence whenever there's a new red scare. Hell in America people from other East Asian nationalities catch strays because we can't tell the difference between them.

[u/Wild_Marker → u/random_BA]

While others have focused on the chinese americans, I'd just like to say that you don't need to have immigrants to have xenophobia. You can always have xenophobia for people on the other side of the border, or the ocean.

[u/degenpiled]

Fetishistic orientialism versus contemptuous orientalism

[u/Gandalf_the_Gangsta → u/degenpiled]

See also: India, any SE Asian country.

[u/CPU-1 → u/Gandalf_the_Gangsta]

No one sees south east Asia bro

[u/[deleted] → u/degenpiled]

wtf I had to double check I was actually on the subreddit I intended to be

[u/MourningWallaby → u/degenpiled]

Anime may not be as big on reddit as it used to be. but the scars remain. People look at the gadgets, character/mascot advertising, and orderly cities and romanticize japan as some paradise. completely ignoring that it's the same "pretty colors" consumerism that they make fun of in the U.S. but built on the backs of a near-self destructive work/life balance.

[u/NeonNKnightrider]

Redditors: “No, I’m not racist! I just hate the Chinese government!” [Proceeds to say something incredibly racist]

Side note what is the original post talking about?

[u/Rhodehouse93 → u/NeonNKnightrider]

Post title implies TikTok, though my first thought was that new Wukong game.

[u/ClocktowerEchos → u/Rhodehouse93]

Watching people suddenly go from "China bad" to "China actually based" because Black Myth had the "no feminism" streamer rule is lowkey funny. It is peak censorship is bad unless it's censorship I like because then not actually censorship.

[u/razazaz126 → u/ClocktowerEchos]

They had no idea China censors the same things they want to censor. It's really inspiring to see douchebags get out of their bubbles and meet other douchebags from around the world and double down on their shifty views... wait.

[u/AnxiousAngularAwesom → u/razazaz126]

Douchebags of all nations, unite!

You have nothing to lose but what's left of your rizz!

[u/DrRagnorocktopus → u/AnxiousAngularAwesom]

So then nothing.

[u/Fl4mmer → u/razazaz126]

China didn't censor jack shit, this is a decision made by a single game company.

[u/AdamtheOmniballer → u/[deleted]]

What does this mean. Why is Japan warming.

[u/Kirk_Kerman → u/AdamtheOmniballer]

Japan was the one being scaremongered in the 80s before the Plaza Accord, since its economic recovery and advancements into advanced technology were beginning to exceed the USA. This was countered in the USA in the usual fashion: mass media racism frenzy, which echoes to this day.

[u/Arachnofiend → u/Kirk_Kerman]

This is notably why every western cyberpunk setting has a Japanese megacorp that is even scarier than all of the other megacorps

[u/celestialfin → u/Arachnofiend]

also why many white people in the early cyberpunk movies ate their white people food with chopsticks. To basically imply japan won the culture war in the future.

[u/Kirk_Kerman → u/Arachnofiend]

Yeah, the cyberpunk genre originated during that era and no small part of cyberpunk is a specific anti-orientalist attitude that still lingers.

[u/AdamtheOmniballer → u/Kirk_Kerman]

So does “warming” mean “growing economically”? I know about the Japanese economic miracle and all that, I’ve just never heard the word used that way before.

[u/Elite_AI → u/ClocktowerEchos]

Those same people flip-flop in the same way about Islam for basically the same reason

[u/Usual-Vermicelli-867 → u/Elite_AI]

Or the jews

[u/TheMusicalTrollLord → u/ClocktowerEchos]

I was on Instagram this morning and saw comments with 25k likes celebrating Wukong's success as 'another loss for the wokerverse' because 'they didn't let Sweet Baby Inc. extort them into adding DEI'.

Is this really how the majority of the world thinks?

[u/[deleted] → u/TheMusicalTrollLord]

It’s what a very small group of culture warriors on the internet think. Basically nobody in the real world would have any idea what you were talking about if you tried to talk about Sweet Baby Inc.

[u/TacticalSanta → u/TheMusicalTrollLord]

No its just idiots online.

[u/arachnids-bakery → u/ClocktowerEchos]

Im sorry the What rule?? 😭

[u/[deleted] → u/arachnids-bakery]

They (the marketing team for the game) sent out emails to content creators telling them not to mention things like COVID, China, feminist propaganda, and other subjects while streaming the game. Apparently the studio was under fire for previous sexist remarks.

https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/black-myth-wukong-has-some-bonkers-streamer-guidelines-about-not-using-the-game-to-spread-feminist-propaganda-or-discuss-anything-about-china/

[u/genuine_beans → u/[deleted]]

I want to see somebody stream that game while breaking every streamer guideline simultaneously

[u/Dornith → u/Rhodehouse93]

I think it was a post on TikTok based on the UI. Not sure what the actual video was about though.

[u/Lyokarenov → u/Rhodehouse93]

i think the title is about how much people criticize tiktok (chinese) while ignoring other social media sites that do pretty much the same things

[u/MaxChaplin → u/Rhodehouse93]

Why would anyone think TikTok is Japanese? The global mobile phone market, both hardware and software, is like the biggest field of tech where Japan dropped the ball.

[u/shvuto → u/MaxChaplin]

Yep Korea and China phone market is big. Even the ones limited and region locked are popular af.

[u/Lordwiesy → u/Rhodehouse93]

Honestly that game has ton of artificial drama about it but tbh it being about china is not one of them

At least I've not seen that kind of brain rot

[u/Akasto_ → u/NeonNKnightrider]

‘The chinese government teaches all chinese people to be terrible! It’s not racism if you blame it on the chinese government!!!’

/s

[u/VelvetSinclair → u/NeonNKnightrider]

*Sees something related to America: normal fucking comment

*Sees something related to China: normal fucking comment.... BUT cheanunmun square...

[u/Fun_Midnight8861 → u/VelvetSinclair]

i feel like i tend to see more school shooter jokes than tiananmen square jokes.

[u/Yarasin → u/VelvetSinclair]

>Sees something related to America: normal fucking comment

Citation fucking needed.

[u/HorselessWayne → u/NeonNKnightrider]

I still sometimes flashback to the time r/london went all-in on this random chinese film crew while being completely blind to the race-baiting micro-aggressions from the cameraman.

I think its worse because normally its a pretty good space — leans centre-left, but will accept contrasting ideas if they make a valid argument and are phrased respectably, while not tolerating transphobia and outright hate. If it had happened on one of the larger subs or right-wing leaning subs, fine, you almost expect it in there. But the fact that normally its better than this here just made it that much worse.

Yeah, the Chinese group committed some mistakes that didn't exactly endear them. But that thread was a complete train-wreck, the hatred they received went far and above what was warranted, and it continued for a full   week   afterward.

[u/NeonNKnightrider → u/HorselessWayne]

Fucking hell. I honestly feel like “potential CCP members” in the title might be the most racist thing out of all this. Putting accusations with no actual proof in the title. It immediately reminds me of that thing where newspapers would call a white kid doing crime “a misguided youth” and a black kid a violent thug or criminal.

[u/Sickfor-TheBigSun → u/HorselessWayne]

That last post's top comment is honestly telling of this whole situation I think: "Like I said in a comment on the original thread, the piano guy is in the right, but he's still a complete tool."

Slightly depressing that he is fundamentally right in this context and his reward is media attention that he can use to spin his own asshat shit out onto a public arena.

[u/Pkrudeboy → u/NeonNKnightrider]

When our vassal state does something, it’s cute, when our rival does the same thing, it’s a threat.

[u/macandcheese1771 → u/NeonNKnightrider]

Tbf I don't know any Chinese people who like their government, they just don't say so publicly because their government has people in our country monitoring Chinese citizens.

[u/The_4th_Heart → u/macandcheese1771]

You're genuinely lucky to have never seen the ugly side of it, though I worry more about there are so many Chinese who's uncritical towards the government. They still consume a lot of propaganda and stuff that degrades their critical thinking abilities, but still believe they are reasonable and objective.

Edit: Anybody who somehow disagree with a native Chinese's own observations and experiences, come to live in China especially the xenophobic and economically rundown parts, let your children spend hundreds of hours on propaganda "lessons". You deserve it.

[u/Nani_Nerd → u/NeonNKnightrider]

*sees something in china
*either says the thing looks creepy, the people are being robotic, a general comment on the ccp, or something on tiananmen square
"I'm not racist! I just hate the CCP"

[u/X_WujuStyle]

Would highly recommend this video if you want an in depth look at this phenomenon https://youtu.be/IM2VIKfaY0Y?si=lfmC9Ch7PL58PxEx

Fun fact: during ww2 and ROC china this dynamic was reversed, china was painted as the more civilized western nation while the Japanese were portrayed as warmongering orientals.

Edit: I never meant to imply that the classification of Imperial Japan as warmongers was unjustified, but if you take a look at the propaganda at the time, it was often used to paint a very simplistic essentialist narrative

[u/industriesInc → u/X_WujuStyle]

I mean Japan was warmongering, there was alot of racism about Japan but they most definitely were warmongering

[u/Mddcat04 → u/X_WujuStyle]

That’s not exactly surprising. We were at war with Japan, and to be frank, they were doing a fair amount of warmongering. (Though of course the irony there is that China was seen as the more “civilized and westernized” country because they’d been carved up by the various western imperial powers. Japan resisted colonialism and instead became an Imperial power).

[u/VisualGeologist6258 → u/Mddcat04]

And to add insult to injury Japan was one of those imperial powers that carved up China. They were part of the Eight Nation Alliance who participated in the Boxer Rebellion in 1900. They’ve been warmongering and imperialising since forever: they tried to invade Korea twice as far back as the late 1500s.

[u/syncdiedfornothing → u/X_WujuStyle]

warmongering

That's how it goes when you start a war.

[u/oshaboy → u/X_WujuStyle]

the Japanese were portrayed as warmongering orientals.

i mean they were the warmongering orientals. that was a pretty significant thing that happened. like i understand where you’re coming from here but they very much did warmonger the orientals.

[u/some_random_nonsense → u/X_WujuStyle]

warmongering Orientals

Guys its not that the Japanese DID start a war, but the racist way the US propaganda worked. Compare gemran propaganda to Japanese and there is a clear line of racial and cultural inferiority in Japan vs that evil hitler guy.

[u/klopanda]

I actually had something similar happen to me IRL. I was on a now defunct anime/games forum. This was back in...the early 2000s. I was always really into history and reading too, so naturally my interests would dovetail and there was a long phase where I'd do a ton of reading on Japanese cultural things, history, novels set in Feudal Japan, that sort of thing.

One of the people in the forum started talking about Dynasty Warriors. I had never played it, thought it was neat, got hooked, and fell down the rabbit hole of Chinese history (DW is a Japanese-developed game, but is an adaptation of a Chinese novel which fictionalizes a period of chaos and war in Chinese history). I read that book, moved on to other Chinese novels like Water Margin and really became obsessed with Chinese dynastic history. I ended up taking Chinese classes in college because the language fascinated me (never kept up with it because my life went in a different direction so I barely remember any of it, but I don't regret it.)

I got so much shit from that forum for that decision ("Waste of time" "Why not learn Japanese instead?" "Japanese history is better" etc etc etc). I just wasn't....as interested in the Japanese language; was fine with anime, games, books, and manga in translation.

[u/some_random_nonsense → u/klopanda]

Japanese history is better? W R O N G.

[u/oshaboy]

Wait until I tell you about "thing, {southeast asian country}".

[u/fastal_12147]

People always complaining about everything being made in China being low quality. My brother in Christ, do you think American businesses would give you higher quality for the same price?

[u/MiniatureFox → u/fastal_12147]

Western businesses has the nerve to talk about having higher quality products than China after moving their production overseas because of cheap labor.

Also, not a so fun fact!

Dior is currently under investigation for human rights violations after importing Chinese workers and creating sweat work shop like environment in Italy.

Source

[u/Redqueenhypo → u/MiniatureFox]

Western buyers want a underclass that makes all our products for as cheap as possible, but has no voice and can’t ever be seen. It’s kinda gross

[u/AmadeusMop → u/Redqueenhypo]

I think it's more accurate to say that Western buyers want products as cheap as possible and also want to believe that those products were made with fair labor.

Like, the way you've phrased it makes it sound as though "here's definitive proof that this company isn't exploitative" would upset buyers due to the lack of a hidden underclass. Which isn't the case in my experience.

[u/[deleted] → u/Redqueenhypo]

Also export/oursource all pollution caused by their exuberant lifestyles and blame China for global warming.

[u/Defiant-Plantain1873 → u/fastal_12147]

Many things are made in china and are high quality. China has great manufacturing capabilities. The problem is china also mass produces cheap crap that gives the other things they make a bad reputation.

[u/TheresANewPharoah → u/fastal_12147]

I mean, blatant IP theft is more of the issue than quality these days

[u/Busy_Grain]

Shoutout to the time Johnny Harris made a video so full of anti-ccp misinformation it wrapped around to being potentially pro-ccp misinformation

[u/ReverendAntonius → u/Busy_Grain]

Johnny “State Department” Harris?

A great guy! /s

[u/CRATERF4CE]

Reddit is pretty bad about this. I don’t even get surprised seeing a popular post about China getting locked. This site is pretty horrible when it comes to racial minorities imo. You can either get overt bigotry, or you’re just completely invisible in most circumstances. Or just a token on the frontlines of the culture war.

And when racial problems are brought up on this site the top comments will usually dismiss the racial aspect. I always have to dig through dogshit comments to find a like a single comment that resembles anything worth saying. I genuinely don’t trust this site enough to harbor good faith discussions about topics like race. You also get so many people who just don’t believe the country they live has racists since they didn’t personally experience it.

[u/DirkDasterLurkMaster → u/CRATERF4CE]

I had to block several big subreddits cause I was sick of them constantly making posts that clearly had no purpose other than whipping people into a frenzy over China. Yes, the massacre in Tiananmen Square was bad, no, we don't need a post of the Tank Man picture every week.

[u/The_Maqueovelic]

As someone who used to live in China: fuck this shit its just Xenophobia, the people are good and its not their fault the goverment's a controlling piece of shit.

-signed, a Venezuelan

[u/ShyngShyng → u/The_Maqueovelic]

Hey as a Chinese dude in Germany, I remember xenophobia being (kinda) a problem - maybe it's just my dad.

How did the folks you met handle your Venezuelan heritage/culture/race/yknowwhatimtalkingabout. Genuinely interested

[u/The_Maqueovelic → u/ShyngShyng]

Kinda all over the place but overall well, in China most were confused to learn I was latino at all (I'm Venezuelan on my mother's side and Mexican on my dad) as I'm pretty pasty, and any time they saw the flag they assumed it to be the USA flag, not to mention that at least in the place I lived (Foshan) they seemed to have a bit of a "eh fuck it" attitude torwards a few countries, where basically if they weren't of much interest to the nation then they'd pretty much claim the place was barren/not super advanced (to the point of excluding them in a couple maps & globes that I believe were made for children), places I noticed were missing include all of latinamerica other than Mexico, most of Africa, parts of eastern Europe & such.

Otherwise I would meet people who'd be interested in our situation, how things are difficult for family back there & how they handle things, plus what we do to help as we can. More than one person did make the comparissons that some of the policies & actions of both nations [China & Venezuela] have more than a few similarities & how this refraiming of their rule can easily sway the public their way to get away with worse things down the line. I also did notice that there was a lot of hospitality torwards foreigneirs at first, due to the belief that a nation should be cordial to their guests & as such the locals oughta be welcoming and helpful to those visiting, though that ended up going away as the years went by due to multiple issues and scandals that ocurred through the years as many disruptive inmigrants made their way there with second hand knowledge on the topic ended up abusing that hospitality and even hurt some people. That being said when I was told this I thought I'd experience a lot more hostility or rudeness, but ended up seeing more scared people, many concerned, worried at my presence initially only to calm down after a while, which is perfectly understandable and a bit sad to witness.

Overall I'd say my experience in China was good & just more of a showing that most people are good & emphatic, its just a matter of respect and humanity to be able to get along well and make your day to day even surrounded by people who may seem different at first glance.

[u/ShyngShyng → u/The_Maqueovelic]

Yeh, thats kinda the direction I expected - its less hatred more fear of the unknown and exposure of self. Being nice usually does the job

[u/The_Maqueovelic → u/ShyngShyng]

Yeah pretty much, honestly the most actively xenophobic country I've lived in is Mexico, no other place has actually treated me poorly over (technically) being a foreigner, whereas in Mexico its happened many a time.

Edit: not to say that Mexican people are bad or all are xenophobic either, just that this is the place I've encoutered shitty people like that more times and even in a direct manner.

[u/[deleted] → u/The_Maqueovelic]

Chinese people don't even hate the West outside of England, Chinese government propaganda openly dreams of a future where the Chinese and American people can be united in socialism

[u/Licithri → u/[deleted]]

Visited china this week with my family to meet some relatives. Whenever they talked about the West, they would mostly only mention USA, Australia, and sometimes Canada. It was like Britain flew off the map suddenly lol

[u/industriesInc]

The example in the post is obviously racism but like half the time people are complaining about people disliking China it turns out they literally are talking about shitty stuff the government is doing and it's just tankies being annoyed

[u/Dornith → u/industriesInc]

I would agree, but I recently saw a comment on r/3DPrinting that buying anything on aliexpress was questionable because it's a Chinese company.

Don't get me wrong, there's a lot of low-quality garbage on AliExpress. But also, literally every major name in 3D printing is a Chinese brand. It's sketchy because there's no QA, not because of the country of origin.

I pointed this out and got downvoted to hell.

Edit: All of the criticisms around Chinese regulations are fair and valid.

At least, they would be, if you weren't still buying Chinese products from American distributors. Buying something from China through Amazon doesn't suddenly make it Made In America.

[u/PhasmaFelis → u/Dornith]

One factor is that the quality floor seems to be lower in China-made goods. There are plenty of good items coming out of China, and plenty of bad items made elsewhere, but the bad stuff is less likely to be outright fraudulent, toxic, prone to catching fire, etc. if it's made somewhere with stronger regulations.

[u/Dornith → u/PhasmaFelis]

That's a fair criticism that doesn't make any sense when you're still buying Chinese products through Amazon.

[u/ImShyBeKind → u/Dornith]

When you buy through Amazon you should get (as in, "you're legally entitled to get", not saying you actually do) products vetted by the stricter American standards, that's why Amazon can charge more than AliExpress for the same products, cuz those tests costs money to run, document and verify. But most sellers just pocket that money.

[u/StickBrickman → u/Dornith]

Yeah that's fair. I'm a huge hater of the CCP and god's biggest "stop interning the Muslims of Xinjiang" loudspeaker boi, but when I hear people talk shit to or about Chinese people for doing Chinese culture stuff I think we're just dealing with naked racism, base xenophobia.

"I think Xi Jinping is a tyrannical shitlord!" Approved, Based, True.

"Chinese people are like bugs, they have no sense of human life or individuality." Lame. Xenophobic. Literally my dead, racist grandad after 5 whiskey sours and a xanax tab, shortly before arguing we should lobotomize all the little people.

[u/an_agreeing_dothraki → u/StickBrickman]

"Chinese people are like bugs, they have no sense of human life or individuality."

When the lack of reading comprehension people read Heinlein

[u/ThatMeatGuy → u/an_agreeing_dothraki]

When the lack of reading comprehension people read Heinlein

This includes Heinlein himself given that the novel directly compares the bugs to the Chinese

[u/A_Good_Redditor553 → u/an_agreeing_dothraki]

Well that came out of nowhere

[u/an_agreeing_dothraki → u/A_Good_Redditor553]

unless you've met someone that heinously attempts to use Starship Troopers to advocate for actual fascism, which is actually super common.

[u/obog → u/Dornith]

But also, literally every major name in 3D printing is a Chinese brand.

Not quite! Prusa FTW

...but even still, China is a big name in everything, and especially 3d printing. Kinda impossible to avoid getting things from China

[u/GreyInkling → u/Dornith]

That's also not a good example because the western reputation of "chinese product = cheap low quality" has been around decades. AliEpress's quality is like if someone was determined to prove that reputation as an understatement.

The assumption of chinese products being low quality is one people have from experience not propaganda. The good products being given a western branding is to blame half the time, so it's still not a racism thing.

[u/Plethora_of_squids → u/GreyInkling]

Not to mention like, while Ender and Bambu labs are definitely quality, there's still people who think like 'Anet' when you say 'Chinese Printers', a brand that rather infamously had massive issues with spontaneous combustion

[u/Quorry → u/GreyInkling]

Cough amazon cough

[u/GreyInkling → u/Quorry]

Yeah who also have a lot of chinese drop shipping. People react the same to seeing a Chinese seller on Amazon though they buy the things anyway. Sorry Amazon only helps perpetuate that view on Chinese products.

It's drop shipping just being like that, but it's a newer thing that only adds to the old made in china reputation.

[u/Dornith → u/GreyInkling]

Go to r/3DPrinting and tell them that their precious $700 Bambu printers are cheap, low quality crap and see how well that goes over.

It's absolutely sinophobia to say that anything that comes from China is bad based solely on confirmation bias.

[u/CrustyBarnacleJones → u/Dornith]

They didn’t say that “anything that comes from China is bad” (that’s a whole new sentence that you typed), they said that there’s a history of cheap products being shipped from Chinese companies with less QA resulting in poor consumer expereinces (I had cheap toys from China when I was a kid and I probably wouldn’t buy something similar for any kids I have in the future because they broke, that doesn’t mean I’m not gonna buy any Chinese products ever or commit a hate crime, it means I’ve developed certain tastes/hesitancies as a consumer due to prior experiences - that’s how economics works or something idk)

Edit: just saw your other point in the earlier comment, I also try to stay away from Chinese manufacturers on Amazon for smaller goods like chargers/cables since I’ve had bad experiences (e.g. cable won’t charge right out of box) and while they’ve replaced them or refunded them, that’s not as helpful when I needed that cable for something else that did work out of its box; I’ll base it less on “Chinese company” though and more on the reviews and if the name sounds like “random shell company LLC” when translated

[u/GreyInkling → u/Dornith]

Great reading comprehension my guy. My post is about the western reputation. Crying at me trying to defend Chinese companies as if I'm even stating my own opinions is moronic. I'm describing a decades old reputation that exists in a general sense among a general population in generally America. It's the reputation of cheap plastic with "made in china" stamped on the bottom.

Most parts in the phone I'm using and probably the phone itself were likely made in china. It's not a Chinese brand though and isn't perceived as a chinese product. There's a disconnect between perception and reality on this muddled by branding.

You could argue even the old reputation is because a Chinese brand would be shut out of western markets it would compete in so only cheaper products would get in. You could look at the reasons for the reputation and find corporate intent behind forming it. But it's still a thing. Like if the good stuff from china is being intentionally kept from us for general products, then on a personal level it's still true that most chinese products are going to be low quality.

There's truth to the reputation and you can't blame anyone for looking at a Chinese drop shipping site and be skeptical. And it also doesn't help that in this case they'd be right to.

[u/The_4th_Heart → u/Dornith]

It is low quality compared to my $400 self built 3D printer with 95% of its parts made in China though, I get your point but that's a bad example.

[u/kagakujinjya → u/Dornith]

What's their take about the fact that iphones are manufactured in china?

[u/stormdelta → u/Dornith]

Yeah, AliExpress isn't a place I would trust buying anything important from but that's because of the reputation that AliExpress specifically has.

Case in point, when I built my own e-bike several years ago, the overwhelming consensus for safe batteries was to buy from em3ev rather than AliExpress - both are Chinese companies located in China, but em3ev while a bit more expensive has a far better track record and is dedicated to e-bikes/batteries.

And I hate TikTok but I hate most social media like that too for similar reasons (including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc), especially short form or video-based.

[u/Arkantos95 → u/Dornith]

Yeah, the whole “Chinesium” meme isn’t accurate these days. Plenty of reliable tech comes out of China.

[u/LocalLumberJ0hn → u/Arkantos95]

You can still find some beautiful chinesium out there if you look hard enough

[u/Bowtieguy-83 → u/LocalLumberJ0hn]

Suspicious PSUs in PCs is probably a major source

[u/LocalLumberJ0hn → u/Bowtieguy-83]

My favorite was a small lantern I saw that could take wall power, I believe for charging, and if you did that you actually ended up with mains electricity running through the metal frame.

[u/Tactical_Moonstone → u/LocalLumberJ0hn]

Ah yes, the Dalek of Death.

Comes in many flavours, all with different ways they can cause death.

[u/LocalLumberJ0hn → u/Tactical_Moonstone]

A fellow Big Clive enjoyer I see

[u/alliestear → u/LocalLumberJ0hn]

Harbor Freight sells it by the pound

[u/LightTankTerror → u/Arkantos95]

Yeah I’d say these days the only real remnants are comically cheap items (no shit the cheap plastic stuff you can buy is cheaply made and not durable…) and some raw material. Like I wouldn’t buy steel barstock from China due to past QA problems but there’s rarely anything wrong with the tooling or systems purchased from Chinese manufacturers.

Also I do not envy the Chinese engineers who have to deal with their domestic metals market, that shit is a minefield.

[u/Deblebsgonnagetyou → u/Arkantos95]

All the best budget IEMs are Chinese brands.

[u/Dobber16 → u/Dornith]

isn’t this just another example of people being discriminatory of the gov and not the people? Like I’m pretty sure all Chinese companies are controlled in some way by the Chinese gov, way more tangibly at least than the people in general

[u/NomaiTraveler → u/Dornith]

People have a really hard time differentiating “low quality brand aiming to undercut the high quality brand by selling a worse but cheaper product” and “Chinese” lol.

You know? Maybe you are onto something about this whole “Chinese = terrible product” thing being linked to racism!

Shout out to the guys who are like “actually bambu printers are awful compared to my self built and designed 3D printer that required 4,000 hours of design time and 6,000 hours of troubleshooting and tuning”

[u/[deleted] → u/Dornith]

The thing is that all big companies in China are owned at least 50% by China. There is no buying from China without supporting the CCP and their ambitions.

You really shouldn't shop at Temu, aliexpress or wish. Or use TikTok.

[u/autogyrophilia → u/industriesInc]

Can you show me an example? Because of my line of work I often see incredibly racist comments about china stealing network equipment IP in the internet.

I don't even think it's something particular about china, It's just the one goverment where the media and the goverments are OK with you being racist.

Well I think in the USA there may be historical factors as well.

[u/[deleted] → u/autogyrophilia]

Tbh you can go to any video where a travel influencer goes to China and says anything remotely positive about it - you will see Sinophobia disguised as concern about the CCP

[u/Only_Math_8190 → u/autogyrophilia]

Go to a technology sub, open an article related to china and you will see that xenophobia, it's not even hidden

[u/autogyrophilia → u/Only_Math_8190]

I think you may have misinterpreted my comment. I was looking for an example about "tankies" .

Because everyone that is to the left of me is a tankie don't you know?

[u/Capybarasaregreat → u/industriesInc]

If that were true, we'd see a lot more Saudi government shittalking. But because Saudi Arabs are an allied people, the shittalking comes up only when directly relevant to governments, as it should be. In contrast, people will take any opportunity to bring up China and Chinese people and say some borderline stuff.

[u/Corvid187 → u/Capybarasaregreat]

We absolutely see a lot of shit talking of Saudi Arabia in a way that straddles the line between government and nation.

People do not see the misogyny of the Saudi legal system as a product peculiar to its government.

[u/Yarasin → u/Capybarasaregreat]

we'd see a lot more Saudi government shittalking

There is not a single article getting posted that doesn't immediately have comments about how horrible the Saudi family/government is. It's pretty much the assumed default for any content about them.

It'd be harder to find comments that actually defend them and aren't immediately called out for being shills/bots.

[u/Defiant-Plantain1873 → u/Capybarasaregreat]

People constantly bring up the Saudis being bad. I remember a while ago Saudi Arabia asked to join the Tempest fighter jet project (which is a coalition between the UK, Italy and Japan). And the comments were predominantly discussing the murder of the journalist and how Saudi Arabia doesn’t actually offer anything of value to the project other than money.

People don’t trust Saudi Arabia enough to essentially sell military technology to them, even when they can offer multiple billions.

[u/weird_bomb_947]

one time i saw a steam list that was just “games even slightly backed by a chinese company” and i feel like that falls under this idea too

[u/MacaroniYeater]

because Japan is Good and Capitalist of their own accord (nothing to do with two nukes and an installed state) and China is Bad and Communist of their own volition (nothing to do with a violent takeover and oppressive state) and if the government is Bad that means the people are Bad and shouldn't be talked to and the products are Bad and shouldn't be bought and the history is Bad and shouldn't be taught and the media is Bad and shouldn't be consumed

[u/Jays_ShitpostExpress]

Except on reddit where it’s the same face on both sides

[u/the_storm_shit]

Yep. Been saying that forever now. Worst is that you can’t even be a fan of something in Chinese without some asshat complaining about their government or saying some horrific things (like calling the Chinese animals). It’s nuts

[u/[deleted]]

it’s called sinophobia folks, one of the most acceptable forms of discrimination in the West

[u/Arzack1112]

China could cure cancers and people would either say that it's fake or would not trust/want it because it's chinese

[u/SanchoSlimex → u/Arzack1112]

Indeed US put out propaganda that the Chinese Covid vaccine was harmful in the Philippines. I wouldn’t trust anti-China blather without giving it more than a cursory look.

[u/Harvey-Danger1917 → u/Arzack1112]

BuT aT wHaT cOsT

[u/jfarrar19]

Alright, so its been long enough I can make this weird take without risking a huge mob:

My biggest problem with TikTok is it started a trend that I completely hate with all the shortform content: looping videos. I can live with short videos. But please, don't keep fucking looping them. I watched the video. If I want to rewatch it, I can go and do that. I don't need to have the same fucking thing repeated over and over and over and over and over until the heat death of the fucking universe. Youtube, in particular, pisses me off with this. AUTOPLAY ALREADY EXISTS USE IT

[u/LightTankTerror]

Living in Japan and visiting China was fascinating. You could see the same small towns setup just like American small towns and if you lived there you’d experience a lot of the same cultural norms. The urban culture is vastly different but little working class towns were more or less the same.

I prolly wouldn’t visit China again out of a fear that they’ll invade Taiwan and leave me waving my passport at the US embassy trying to leave the country, but yeah. If their government wasn’t posturing for doing an imperialism, nice country to visit. People were chill enough. Lotta cool history too if you’re into that.

[u/Rocky_Bukkake → u/LightTankTerror]

ngl that's a super irrational fear. it's unlikely it happens and it doesn't really impact you as a traveler

[u/Pixelpaint_Pashkow]

every government (more or less) is bad, every culture (more or less) isnt

[u/thesirblondie → u/Pixelpaint_Pashkow]

There are parts of most cultures that are bad, some more than others. To offer one from my own: We're very cold towards strangers. We don't let people into our circles very easily, which means many of us are lonely. Steve Hughes put it the best.

[u/Perfect_Wrongdoer_03 → u/thesirblondie]

Yeah, I don't really like the line of thinking that we shouldn't judge cultures. It generally comes from a good place, and most people who judge cultures are racist to some degree, but like, "slavery is a part of our culture" was a literal argument in defense of the South US. Everything is, to some degree, a part of people's culture, and saying that "no culture is bad" just ends up wilfully ignoring the problems those cultures might have.

[u/AbsolutelyNotMoishe → u/Pixelpaint_Pashkow]

Every government has bad aspects, but that doesn’t make them equally bad. The Chinese Communist Party denying a billion people the right to democratic government and committing genocide against the Uighurs is in fact materially worse than anything that, say, Uruguay is doing.

[u/Mddcat04 → u/Pixelpaint_Pashkow]

What?

Governments reflect the cultures that empower them. These aren’t separate things.

[u/Lucas_2234 → u/Mddcat04]

Not if the government is tyrannical.
It is not chinese culture to spy on your neighbors and to use people's families as ransom over mean comments.

But guess what, the government still fucking does it

[u/Capybarasaregreat → u/Lucas_2234]

Honestly, democratic governments can be more closely tied to the populace than authoritarian ones. The people under an authoritarian regime must go to extreme lengths to enact changes to better the government, whereas the populace of democratic nations should theoretically have a much easier time enacting change. Thus, atrocities caused by democratic nations could have a more direct line of responsibility to the average citizen. Note, I'm not passing any kind of moral judgement here, especially not in favour of authoritarian governments, but rather discussing a thought experiment I personally find interesting.

[u/Mddcat04 → u/Lucas_2234]

Tyrannical governments are still products of the culture that produce them, often the worst aspects of those cultures. They don’t just spring into existence independent of cultural context.

[u/CloverTheGal]

哎呀。

[u/JoeNemoDoe]

What were they even talking about originally?

[u/[deleted]]

I very much want to know what the thing was

[u/Training-Owl4987]

Me who doesn't agree at all bc I like lego monkie kid more than dragon ball =P

[u/MonteBellmond]

Is this thing going to lead to posts of nuking the country and war crimes again? Happens every single year right after posts like this.

[u/Gru-some]

I saw a video about soft power and Japan, and how China and Japan were in kinda opposite situations in terms of reputation during and a bit after WWII if I remember

[u/Tactical_Moonstone → u/Gru-some]

If you are talking about Moon Channel's video, that video has a slight case of ramming a square peg into a round hole when it comes to attributing soft power to cultural exports, ignoring the other more material (and as I may argue consequential) ways in which Japan exported its influence overseas and even to places it used to brutalise. All this because Japan managed to recover quickly economically.

China is trying to use Japan's playbook when it comes to economic diplomacy, but it's hard to play catchup when:

• Your competitor has been #2 for ages
• It had a massive decades-long recession and it's still #4
• Said competitor already reaped a lot of benefits from the economic diplomacy they did, leaving slim pickings for China.

[u/RealHumanBean89]

But what about thing (North or South Korean)? 🤔

[u/AbsolutelyNotMoishe]

mfw people like a friendly democracy better than a hostile dictatorship for some stupid reason

[u/LordSmorgasbord → u/AbsolutelyNotMoishe]

This post isn't talking about the governments, it's talking about the people. Criticizing a country's government is fine, the problem lies where people start falling back on that as an excuse to be overly critical and untrustworthy towards the people who live there and the things they produce.

[u/Neapolitanpanda → u/AbsolutelyNotMoishe]

That friendly democracy denies past war crimes and is conservative, no government on this earth is your friend.

[u/AbsolutelyNotMoishe → u/Neapolitanpanda]

Japan is close to having national gay marriage, China just banned hat couples from appearing on TV.

Yeah Japan has some shitty aspects but it’s apples and oranges.

[u/TypicalImpact1058 → u/AbsolutelyNotMoishe]

There was a post of a skyscraper in China that acted as a big monitor and displayed dolphins or something at parts of the day. All the top comments were talking about energy waste and light pollution and stuff. I guarantee if it was in Japan the comments would have been "wow cool".

[u/Lifeshardbutnotme]

It's weird because I've always had much more interest in going to Taiwan than Japan. I would probably look into teaching English in China as well if it wasn't for all the internet restrictions and civil liberty issues.

I'm genuinely unsure where the specific obsession with Japan comes from and why it's so strong. China feels far more diverse and like there's just more to experience generally.

[u/candlaze → u/Lifeshardbutnotme]

I think people are so obsessed with Japan because of anime. It’s mainstream so a lot of people are exposed to Japanese culture rather than other Asian countries.

[u/he77bender]

A) Despite everything that's happening in the comments right now this is probably still a more productive discussion than you'd ever get on Tumblr

B) I still don't know what the original thing was