Is it not allowed or frowned upon by the mods and maintainer of Lemmy? Although I do respect the technology and services that Lemmy and its community have provided, I’m still looking for answer on the fact whether it’s ok/allowed to have a vocal and confident opposing view.
Also, within this community (China), Am I allowed to post things that opposes the chinese government, such as, not liking their attitude towards a certain island in the south east of china?
The fact that you consider “media” an information source at all is rather amusing to me. “Independent” media has its own masters and those masters have their own reasons for media reporting the way it does. Personally, I talk to boots on the ground for that reason. “Media” is as bullshit as government propaganda (and indeed in many cases effectively is government propaganda for a wide variety of reasons, beginning with media sloth).
As a concrete example of what I mean, consider the “LOL THEM FURRNERS SURE IS FUNNAY!” reportage a few years back on the “hot new trend” “sweeping China’s beaches”: the so-called “facekini”. The way the breathless (and ever-so-slightly xenophobic) reportage surrounding that was provided, you’d think that everybody and their fucking dog was out at the beach wearing spandex balaclavas. And yet, in 20 years of living here, and in travelling around most of the eastern and southern provinces, I have not once, not even a single time seen a person wearing a “facekini”.
So what happened? A lazy-assed “independent media” representative went to a beach in Dalian. Where, yes, “facekinis” are a thing. For middle-aged women, mostly, and elderly people of both genders. (And any youngsters unfortunate enough to be forced to go to the beach with their grandparents.) When you pay attention, you’ll see that the shots of all the “facekini”-wearing people are carefully cropped to conceal the literally THOUSANDS of people on the beach behind them who don’t wear “facekinis”. It’s purest condescending, xenophobic reporting passed off as fact. A tiny (oh-so-fucking-tiny!) kernel of truth gets magnified into a “craze that is sweeping China”.
That is the quality of most (perhaps even all) reportage. Not of China. All of it. Anywhere. If your sole source of information is media, you’re an ignoramus. (Not using the term judgmentally but rather descriptively. It’s not your fault you’re being lied to by people who largely range between lazy and malevolent.)
My trusted sources of information, as a result, are my eyes and are people. My family, for the latter. My friends. My former students. My neighbours. (And the families and friends of all of these.) Wuhan being a major university centre, those students come from literally all over China (including, yes, places like Tibet and Xinjiang), while my family is mostly from central China, esp. Hubei province. So I’m not talking “media” (state or “independent”, or otherwise) as information sources. I’m talking things I see with my own eyes, or things that I hear about from ordinary people who live here. THOSE are my extra sources of information you literally have no access to.
The Great Firewall is an idiotic thing. If I were placed in charge of China, the absolute first thing I would do with it is tear it down. (Not for the reasons you’d likely think, mind, but that’s a different question.)
The Great Firewall is trivially circumvented (Source: waves from behind the Great Firewall) by anybody who wants to. My 13 year old son could figure out how to circumvent the Great Firewall without any input from me. (Source: he did.) It serves no purpose but to make China’s leadership look weak and fearful of people saying bad things about them.
So you won’t see me defending your straw man because, well, it’s a fucking straw man now, isn’t it?
This one is far easier.
There is no “Social Credit System”. Not in the way that it’s been reported in the west. As I said, the reportage over “Social Credit” is the reporting equivalent of dumping car parts on a table and calling it a television. There is only one possible answer to your (implied) question here: 无. (Look it up, specifically in its 禅/Chan/Zen usage.)
I can’t answer this question because it is badly formulated. It would be like me asking you to defend the USA’s invasion of Moscow: you could not defend that which does not exist. (You think it exists? You’re certain it exists? If so, please tell me how my wife, my mother-in-law, my coworkers, my friends, et al can get their scores because they have no fucking idea what I’m even talking about when I mention it. I mean surely if you’re that certain you’ll have actual, concrete, solid information, right?)
Try wording the question differently. (Hint: Properly wording a question involves a question mark. Another hint: The style of question you want to be aiming for is one related to gathering information, not confirming your badly-constructed opinions.)
There is good information on so-called “Social Credit” out there, and the “Social Credit” system has troubling implications, but literally everything you have read about it in media is 100%, pure, unadulterated bullshit. (And as I said above, if you’re convinced it’s not, let me know how my wife can get her “Social Credit” score because she has NO fucking idea what you’re on about.)
Oh, as a side note, if you want to come across as actually knowing shit, getting the basics (like names!) right is a good start. There is no “CCP”. “CCP” is the initialization used by the wilfully ignorant. I’ll leave it as an exercise for the student to figure out what the proper initialization is. (Hint: It’s trivial to find the proper initialization and in the process you don’t come across as stridently ignorant.)
Thank you for the reply. Quite the response there, might need time to process. Although I will not ever discredit you for your source of information (which is family, friends, and colleagues), I didnt expect that you would go on the route of “independent media has their own master” and “media as a source of information is laughable”. It’s true that biases does exist, but it certainly is also true that we as a human being can process those biases out based upon the political alignment of each news source. I mean, I would expect that as a basic skill and conclusion that everyone would realize once they know news source are likely biased.
And about CCP, I suppose I use that term interchangeably with the chinese government and officials and I’m sorry if that’s not accurate enough to convey my intention.
Also, just as a note for the future, calling all of the things in media is “100% pure unadulterated bullshit” would only highlights your lack of skill in engaging with a society/system which has more than a single news source and narrative.
It’s easy enough to fix: CPC. Communist Party of China. CCP is what ignoramuses use because they literally don’t know the official name.
Just as a note for the future: not answering questions that were asked twice makes you look like a dishonest idiot.
Now that we’ve exchanged our ritual insults, let’s try to return to civil discourse.
And you can begin with, since you’re so certain that the reportage around “Social Credit” isn’t 100% pure unadulterated bullshit, your answering a simple question (repeated here for your convenience): How can my wife (or my mother-in-law or my son or my friends or my colleagues or my …) get their “Social Credit” score? Please be specific, since, apparently, expats who’ve lived here 20 years (that’s me), and people who were born here need some “informed” American to tell them how to do it. (They don’t even know that such a score exist, those ignorant fools!)
When you answer that question—on a topic that you’re “confident” of, recall—perhaps we can go on to continued conversation. But without answering it, or without admitting that you don’t actually know shit about it, there’s really no point in continuing a conversation. You’re convinced you know it all and there would be no point in talking further.
(For bonus points, what’s the Chinese name for this “Social Credit” program?)