On the topic of queerness in “popular republics”, you can’t exactly deny there’s a strong history of repression. If you’re interested, there’s very good articles about the varying history of homosexuality throughout USSR history (from the first wave of revolutionary feminism in 1917 to the gulag-steering policies of Stalin). I don’t know of good resources about this topic in China, which is why i found this article interesting: in it you learn that homosexuality was decriminalized “only” in 1997 (which is not so much later than western Empires like France), which could explain how queerphobic sentiment/repression is still widespread.

It’s also worth mentioning how queerness can be framed as an anti-materialist mental framework (though large sections of the queer crowd are also materialist feminists), and how it’s been weaponized by western empires in their colonial enterprise. Just like feminism historically (“white men saving brown women from brown men”), LGBT issues are being framed as if the West is really open and tolerant and human rights are respected here (which is blatantly false in many regards), and African/Asian countries are backwards people full of prejudice that need to be educated for their own good.

All in all, the article doesn’t seem to push a specific colonial/racist narrative, and appears to paint a factual portrait of the political situation in China surrounding organization and public debate around queerness. I say this as someone who hasn’t been to China (and therefore really has no clue), but who heard similar accounts from chinese speakers involved in LGBT communities.

Well how are you going to get a non-anonymous source for news like this.

Thanks for the insight. To be fair, i don’t know this Sophie Schmidt but if restofworld.org is her project then she deserves some recognition for making one of the only techno-political publications online, and for directly betraying the interests of her father/class in maintaining the status quo of technological fascism.

As for the article you link to about techno-colonialism in Africa (actual link from twitter), i really don’t like the phrasing because it’s a nationalist perspective (“digital sovereignty”) which does not concern with free/open science and software and schematics. However, the article paints a good picture of how African continent is badly underserved technologically, and of the power imbalance due to who controls the tech stack. The article also points out the same issue applies with US tech:

Africa has less than 1% of total available global data center capacity, according to Xalam Analytics, and about 17% of the world’s population. (…) “This feeds into the myth that storing data locally makes it more secure, even if the whole technical and support package is provided by foreign firms.” The U.S. has supported similar plans, with the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation

The article also acknowledges the difficulties faced by eg. Huawei due to western Empires closing down their borders on them:

“The world is becoming a lot smaller for companies like Huawei that are being pushed out of Global North countries,” he said. “So regions like Africa, even though nowhere near as lucrative, have become much more important.”

The conclusion is very reasonable and advocates for local development:

African governments should learn from China’s own experience (…) these governments should ensure there is significant knowledge transfer, retention of corporate control, and sharing of IP. “We should be requiring joint ventures with Chinese tech companies, as China did with the likes of IBM and others in the 1980s”

All in all, and although i partly disagree with the framing of the issue (because as an anarchist i strongly disagree with national sovereignty at all) that’s clearly not anti-chinese propaganda as we have seen in some western media during the Huawei ban stories.

Now, to broaden the debate a little, i think it’s important to point out the scale on which the Chinese empire is slowly building/acquiring infrastructure on the African continent. It’s not just about new datacenters/airports but also about existing infrastructure such as ports being bought off from western Empires (eg. Bolloré as French neo-colonialism). This enterprise is draped in the same “win-win” humanitarian colonial narrative that the western empires have used to colonize Africa in the first place (“they need to be civilized and can’t build their own societies”), and the local relationships are tense, not only because Chinese companies are importing tons of workers instead of employing a local work force, but also because of the overt racism (you may have seen those viral videos of chinese people in Africa calling the locals “monkeys”).

Fuck all empires, burn all borders! Death to the Nation States, long live the internationalist Commune!

Haha, i can add one new entry to my collection of colonial empires and intelligence services who’d like me shut down ;)

Yes of course. And let me guess, when the French empire censors anti-racist human rights organizations, it’s Daech propaganda? Not every power abuse has to be an elaborate hoax mounted by foreign powers, you know. Power structures are really good at producing abuse in the first place.