So, what’s up with the Great Firewall? What I’ve been told:

  • Google is blocked
  • Whatever VPN is blocked
  • kimjong_ill
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    3 years ago

    disregards individual freedom of choice

    as this is lemmygrad, i’m gonna point out that “individual freedom” is liberalism

    freedom of choice

    ehhh…

    1. it’s not like there is only a single chinese website and zero others

    2. are users free using software made by corporations like google? absolutely not.

    Wouldn’t it be possible to make those incentives without putting up barriers?

    does it matter? why shouldn’t they put barriers? the barriers need to be up. back to the “individual freedom” point, “free speech” is a bad thing (yes, you read correctly). china is right to censor their internet. why should the chinese people suffer the same fate as those in the west who are constantly being marketed to, being ingrained with false propaganda, encouraged to develop hatred and prejudice?

      • kimjong_ill
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        3 years ago

        That’s great, but then you are limited to Chinese options, hence your choices are being limited. No?

        users outside china are limited, too. if a web result cannot breach the first page of google, does not have paid advertising, and is not tossed around by whatever communities you are in, how will you know about it? no matter how good it may be?

        the “choice” of websites in many ways is an illusion. like news websites. sure you can choose between le monde, bbc, the guardian, reuters, cnn, foxnews, ap, the intercept, nyt, etc but if they are all using the same sources and giving the same stories (as they so often are), are you really getting a choice?

        i also think you may not have a good idea of what the internet in china is like. not all non-chinese websites are banned. and sometimes websites that were banned become unbanned. also china has equivalent counterparts to the “big” sites (like google, youtube, twitter, etc). and they are not limited to one choice there either, though just like in the west some are more popular than others.

        I feel this is sidetracking the conversation, that is a conversation on freedom of data and privacy, I’m talking about having the options to choose what is available everywhere - even if those options are from evil corps.

        i disagree. this is what i mean by “illusion of freedom”. the large majority of users have no idea they are in fact surrending freedoms when visiting those sites.

        china is protecting its citizens from things that could harm them. including things like american corporations data mining. the internet would be better elsewhere if everyone had a similar attitude toward the net.