• Sodium_nitride@lemmygrad.ml
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    8 months ago

    Virtually everything you state is false. China does not technically have a command economy, but this is not necessary for socialism in the first place. China engages in plenty of economic planning, far more so than capitalist states. That is precisely why China can build 45,000 km of unprofitable high-speed rail in less than 20 years and install more solar generation capacity than all other countries combined in 2023.

    Industries in China are also far more worker-controlled than they are in capitalist states. Estimates for the level of state-ownership range from 20-40%. Much of the remaining “private sector” is composed of worker cooperatives. Search up “Farmer specialized cooperatives”, which comprise of more than 100 million households (not people, households).

    As for the Uyghur thing, even western media has largely abandoned that point since it was too easy to see that no one was being killed. I mean, you can buy a plane ticket to Xinjang right now and see for yourself. Now the smarter ones have downgraded it to “cultural genocide”. In a few years, when the Uyghur language and culture will still be around just fine, they will quiet drop the whole topic.

    they could access the internet

    They can

    • wtry@lemm.ee
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      8 months ago

      Have you not heard of the great firewall. Do you think Nike and iPhone factories are coops? Furthermore genocide does not explicitly have to be killing civilians. Xi did things such as forcefully reeducate children, force Muslims to eat pork, and forcefully sterilize them, thereby making them and their culture die out. Source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Uyghurs_in_China

        • wtry@lemm.ee
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          8 months ago

          I’m not trying to own you. I’m trying to get a meaningful argument which isn’t me being talked about as an animal.

          • cfgaussian@lemmygrad.ml
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            8 months ago

            I’m sorry that some comrades here have been dismissive toward you, but you seriously need to educate yourself more on a subject before you speak on it thinking that you have understood it. There are plenty of resources that the Lemmygrad community can offer you to further your knowledge about China if you leave your preconceptions at the door and come at this with some humility.

            • DamarcusArt@lemmygrad.ml
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              8 months ago

              This lib refusing to educate themselves is how this whole thing started, I doubt they’ll change their mind now, unless they want to prove me wrong about them.

              • cfgaussian@lemmygrad.ml
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                8 months ago

                Yeah, when i wrote that there were still fairly few substantial responses compared to mocking ones. But by now i see they’ve been offered plenty of good, comprehensive sources of information, and now that they’re banned and can’t waste as much time saying ignorant things here maybe they will have more time to read the material that they’ve been so helpfully provided with. Probably not though…they’re probably allergic to reading as most libs are…

                • DamarcusArt@lemmygrad.ml
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                  8 months ago

                  I was hoping they’d be sincere and honest and would actually ask “how can you support such regimes?!” honestly and earnestly, but it wasn’t a question, it was smug pretending to be questioning.

                  I find it hilarious that I dropped multiple sources that countered what they said, but because I didn’t treat it as a “gotcha” but just supplemental to what I was talking about, they didn’t even notice. 100% debatebro brained.

                  • cfgaussian@lemmygrad.ml
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                    8 months ago

                    Well, you did what you could. Can’t reach everyone right away. Sometimes people need to have time to stew a bit and process new information. Sometimes it takes repeated exposure to the new ideas before they become more open to them. Which is why we should never stop explaining, even if it’s frustrating.

        • wtry@lemm.ee
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          8 months ago

          Whether it prevents bourgeois propaganda or western propaganda, it’s not worth it when the people aren’t free. I also find it to be very opposite to Marx implying that the Chinese government wouldn’t try to control their people if they could.

          • MeowZedong@lemmygrad.ml
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            8 months ago

            Here’s a paper covering the topic from a few years ago.. It goes through the history, motivations, and effects of the Golden Shield Project. It also briefly covers the opinions from people on both sides of the firewall and tries to remain neutral as it’s a research communication. Download the PDF to read.

            What the paper doesn’t cover deeply is what information the CPC has chosen to censor and why. Materials subversive to the stability of their country. From whom? Of what nature? What historical precedent exists that would have made them want to do this in the late nineties?

            Exploring the history of interactions between socialist countries and liberal countries will shed light on this. I’d also suggest looking into examples of censorship in western liberal countries and contrasting them with censorship in China.

            Your reply pointed to a lot of assumptions from the Western liberal perspective, which is actively antagonistic and hostile towards China. If the only perspective you ever consume is from states who consider China a threat to their power, then of course you will hold a negative bias towards China.

            The more you study, the better you will understand. If you approach the topic wanting to demonize China, you won’t learn anything. There’s a lot more to unpack here including Western media bias and leftist theory beyond Marx. This is just a stepping stone to understanding.

            If you don’t know the purpose and goals of the project that the firewall is part of, then you don’t understand why China has a firewall.

            Tell me, are you really free or do you assume you are free because you’ve always been told you are free and you’ve only ever heard one definition of freedom? To me, the illusion of freedom of speech, the illusion of freedom of choice, and being told to choose between a handful of shitheads who don’t represent or act according to how I would like to see our society run is not freedom. It’s just authoritarianism from a different source. It’s who has power that matters to me. I’d rather be held accountable by my peers than by a bunch of chucklefucks who only see me as an expendable resource.

            • RedClouds@lemmygrad.ml
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              8 months ago

              This weak ass liberal may not be reading anything, but I am eating up all these sources. Thank you, everyone. Also, God damn it, now I have hours more of reading any to do. At least I’ve covered some of these topics before, so some of them might be review.

            • ComradeSalad@lemmygrad.ml
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              8 months ago

              “Becuase Carl Mank is whatever I say he is. Have I ever read his work? No. But I’m sure he said something similar to my position somewhere.”

            • wtry@lemm.ee
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              8 months ago

              Marx said that the state was inherently oppressive. But I guess I missed the part where he said that it doesn’t matter if the party brands itself as communist.

              • ComradeSalad@lemmygrad.ml
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                8 months ago

                If you bake a cake and you have this magnificent idea in your head; do you gather all the ingredients and then presto magic you have a beautiful cake in front of you? Or is there some sort of process that’s missing? Some sort of transitionary period?

                There’s a reason it’s called Marxist-Leninism too, older works can be superseded or reanalyzed by newer works in a more refined context.

                • wtry@lemm.ee
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                  8 months ago

                  Baking doesn’t cook down the ingredients and claim it’s heating them up.

                • wtry@lemm.ee
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                  8 months ago

                  The executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie.

                  • the Communist manifesto
                  • ExotiqueMatter@lemmygrad.ml
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                    8 months ago

                    That very out of context quote is saying that under capitalism the state is used by the bourgeoisie to advance their common interests, not that the state “is inherently oppressive”.