Not just here, but also on reddit and other social media.
Sure, there is a propaganda war brewing wherein a lot of Western media are pushing exaggerated narratives, Adrian Zenz is a theological dope of an academic, and the CIA has a vested interest in accelerating conflict, etc. but surely there’s got to be room to also address the shortcomings of China as well? Whether it’s about LGBTQ+ issues, or the exploits of Chinese capitalism, or being able to criticize or make fun of Xi, I see posts here routinely and systemically brigaded and comments downvoted to oblivion that even sniff at criticism of China.
I consider myself a free agent, and China’s meteoric rise gives me some hope for a brighter tomorrow (in contrast to the US), but this blatant campaign of social media manipulation gives me pause for concern. It just screams insecurity and makes me not trust what feels like a counter-propaganda narrative. (Mods, please never get rid of the downvote counter.)
Anyway, here’s hoping for a brighter future, but please let ideas breathe.
Thanks for listening.
It’s because the vast majority of the criticisms of China and Xi Jinping are unsubstantiated horseshit, because condemning China when the US is increasingly antagonizing them is reinforcing imperialist propaganda, and because Reddit and every other damn website is constantly frothing at the mouth over how much they hate China, which a lot of us are sick of.
And what do you mean by “brigading”? That implies that it’s being coordinated.
And what do you mean by “brigading”? That implies that it’s being coordinated.
nods
Unless it’s one or two overzealous chapos with several sockpuppets, there’s some disturbing fluctuations in comment scores.
Tbh as an Asian person living in Asia, i dont care about your opinion on China if you are a westerner, it is irrelevant, regardless of which “side” you are on.
I think I can count on one hand the amount of times those topics are brought up about China in good faith. Maybe you’ve seen it more often and seen the brigades more than me
My thing is, why is it always China lol. No one comes into these spaces with scorching hot takes about the LGBTQ rights in Laos or the economic systems of Cuba. It’s a lot of CHINA CHINA CHINA, which between the current culture, and trying to deprogram baby leftists, it’s really hard to spot good faith discussions/let them grow. And the thing that really sucks is every good China discussion is like 1 rogue comment away from name calling, it’s hard to stay on track
My thing is, why is it always China lol. No one comes into these spaces with scorching hot takes about the LGBTQ rights in Laos or the economic systems of Cuba.
Because China’s economic and LGBTQ+ circumstances will have a much, much, much more appreciable impact on my life in the coming years than Cuba or Laos.
They increasingly own a lot of media and exert influence around the world. Tencent, Huawei, partnerships with Disney, etc. These things don’t happen in a bubble.
If they don’t live in Cuba or Laos either, then why are you requesting hot takes?
Honestly…why shouldn’t they?
What’s the point in being critical of China when the entire apparatus and society around you is quadrupling down on that effort?
You can be neutral if you want. Just remember that if 95% of the population has an opinion value of -50, and you have a neutral “I’m so enlightened and criticize everything” value of 0, the average isn’t 0. Instead it ends up being -49. (and that’s generous, since way less than 5% of the population actually has fair views on China)
First of all leftists being critical of China on leftist forums is completely irrelevant to imperialist policy towards China. Secondly you can be critical of the path China is pursuing without advocating for regime change, just like you can be critical of religious fundamentalism in Iran without advocating for any action on the part of the American MIC and their allies. Otherwise it’s too close for comfort to the “shut up and vote for the lesser evil” rhetoric that stifles any analysis and debate.
I see your point, but when you’re exposed to the sheer amount of hypocrisy/violence and reality-denial of white westerners, it becomes hard to suppress the amygdala. That’s just how humans work. Not reacting emotionally takes energy.
Eventually that energy budget is surpassed and “China good no matter what” because fuck it, 99% of the world is shitting putrid diarrhea out of their mouths anyway. They go low, you eventually go low as well, or else you will be driven insane. For the record, that’s where I stand, both on a rational level and when I feel outburst-y.
Otherwise it’s too close for comfort to the “shut up and vote for the lesser evil” rhetoric that stifles any analysis and debate.
this is a false equivalence, it assumes every lesser evil is lesser by the same amount.
Biden is barely better than trump. The only way he’s better is he says less overt dogwhistle racist shit. Harris is just as bad. Biden would be as bad if not worse globally.
China on the other hand, is leagues and leagues and leagues better than the west. And no, the US is not the analogy to China, but rather the entire west. The US is just a small fraction of the west, which population-wise is equivalent to China.
The west administered a continental-scale genocide on hundreds of millions of Americans. They emitted 90% of our current CO2 burden. They committed 95% of animal extinctions/declines of the last century. They starved 100,000,000+ across Africa and India and SEAsia, and are responsible for the early deaths of billions of people suffering the effects of colonialism to this day. The west owns 60% of world GDP, China owns 15%.
Now contrast with China’s crimes, which are…they might be putting 1,000s of Uyghurs in reeducation camps, at least if you believe the nazi cryptofascist Zenz who is the sole source of this entire rumor. So we have thousands as opposed to BILLIONS, being reeducated as opposed to EXTERMINATED, and even this comparatively benign accusation comes from a literal fascist nazi who unironically believes that white Jesus will magically pop out of Krakatoa and smite the CCP–meaning it’s probably bullshit.
China is MULTIPLE orders of magnitude preferable to and more blameless than the west. It’s the same as comparing Jeff Bezos+BillGates+Musk to an office worker who makes $50k. Sure, you can be critical of the office worker because he lives in a nice-ish house, or eats steak, but this issue literally could not fucking matter in any conceivable way whatsoever when compared to the scale of what’s happening above it.
Sure, there is a propaganda war brewing wherein a lot of Western media are pushing exaggerated narratives, Adrian Zenz is a theological dope of an academic, and the CIA has a vested interest in accelerating conflict, etc. but surely there’s got to be room to also address the shortcomings of China as well?
There you go. I have literally no influence on Chinese policy so offering any criticism, deserved or otherwise adds to the CIA propaganda war. If you don’t think the CIA doesn’t have people criticizing china from an “ultra-left” perspective just to dissuade people from offering critical support then you are a fool.
“Chinese capitalism” is not my problem as I live in the heart of the imperial hegemon, the U.S. The U.S hegemon murders, exploits, violates, plunders, and pillages countries on a far grander scale than Chinese international companies could. Chinese companies are not denying me healthcare, polluting my city, running roughshod over wetlands, and decreasing flooding prevention in my city. I literally do not have a vested interest in seeing China go down while the U.S is still standing.
I understand the argument you’re making, but isn’t the sentiment that “Chinese capitalism” is not my problem” just a complete abandonment of proletarian internationalism?
Like if you’re drawing your thought from Marx and Engels at the baseline, they are pretty damn clear that “The working men have no country.”
This isn’t an idealist position in either sense of the word—capital doesn’t respect national boundaries and literally treats the working class as an international pool of labor power:
Hundreds of thousands of workers thus wander hundreds and thousands of versts. Advanced capitalism drags them forcibly into its orbit, tears them out of the backwoods in which they live, makes them participants in the world-historical movement and brings them face to face with the powerful, united, international class of factory owners.
- Lenin “Capitalism and Workers’ Immigration”
Just as the development of capitalism leads to an international capitalist class, the working class, too, is an international class, with international class interests. “An injury to one is an injury to all” is not limited to workers of “your” nation: the victories of the working class in China (or Bangladesh or Burkina Faso or Chile or wherever) are the victories of your class, and their defeats are your defeats.
What you lose when you take the position that “Chinese capitalism is not my problem,” is the internationalist perspective that is an essential part of what it means to be a communist—it’s all part of the same struggle, and the solution is an international working class solution.
“The Communists are distinguished from the other working-class parties by this only: 1. In the national struggles of the proletarians of the different countries, they point out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat, independently of all nationality.”
- Communist Manifesto, Chapter 2
I feel like that argument ignores the material analysis that would need to be made before settling on what needs to be dismantled. American capitalism is the hegemon. It is, in no uncertain terms, the center from which all other systems of capitalist currents flow out of (Read Long Twentieth Century). We are operating in America’s world system, a system that ideologically claims to be a free market while imposing tariff and protections to stop other countries from benefiting wholesale from American markets - in the process of “loosening tariffs” the American diplomatic body pressures, and bribes other countries to adopt neoliberal reforms; neoliberal reforms come in the way of laws, and market systems, those economic systems give rise to neoliberal politicians, which oppress and pillage their own people, and rotten cultures that treat their workers as disposable. China opened up to America and had to make certain agreements, like market reforms. Countries that refuse to adhere to these neoliberal policies end up isolated and cut off from other countries unless they are willing to play politik with America’s opponents.
So if I am seeking to end capitalism as a whole, and we are really playing by America’s rules, what cause do I have to focus on Chinese Capitalism (I’m using your terms, I don’t think China is, in my dumbass opinion, wholly capitalist). Especially as someone that lives, breathes, and exists within the imperial core?
Chinese Capitalism (according to you) exists because America exists and sets the rule of the game. Putting pressure and collapsing the American center, pulls the rug on the entire system. If I want to show solidarity with the Chinese worker, then I want them to survive in a stable country (not one balkanized and turned into a warlord’s paradise, like America wants to do). I want them to assert their rights to their labor and all it creates without the U.S putting pressure on China to suppress, an alleged, communist reemergence.
Hundreds of thousands of workers thus wander hundreds and thousands of versts. Advanced capitalism drags them forcibly into its orbit, tears them out of the backwoods in which they live, makes them participants in the world-historical movement and brings them face to face with the powerful, united, international class of factory owners.
- Lenin “Capitalism and Workers’ Immigration”
The Communists are distinguished from the other working-class parties by this only: 1. In the national struggles of the proletarians of the different countries, they point out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat, independently of all nationality.”
- Communist Manifesto, Chapter 2
The headquarters of the international class of factory owners (and financial capital) rests in America. So again, the only way to destroy the system is to advance the collapse in America, insofar as it weakens the leash with which they control other countries and their workers. As someone born in Venezuela and has experienced this firsthand. It’s very clear that as long as America exists my people won’t have the economic siege warfare placed upon them (see UN Human Rights report on Venezuela) lifted. Thus my criticism should not go towards the Maduro government doing the best it can with the material conditions as controlled by America, but America itself.
I mean, there’s some interesting points in there, but I’m not really persuaded to abandon the Marxist perspective in favor of your analysis.
Capitalism is a world system, but moreover it is a set of productive and social relationships that grew over time into a world-encompassing system. The US is, for the time being, the most dominant capitalist nation within that world system, but it hasn’t always been, and may not always be, given US capitalism is either on the precipice or has already begun its decline. We already see how US imperialism is less effective now than 100 years ago: trade agreements are not so one-sided, the US hasn’t decisively won a war in decades, regional powers Outside of the US sphere are exerting more influence in places like the Middle East.
America sets some of the ground rules for how capitalism operates, but again, capitalism predates the US dominance of the system and, to some extent, does not require the US to dominate the system.
If I want to show solidarity with the Chinese worker, then I want them to survive in a stable country
More than that, I want the working class in China to take power, just like I want the working class in Italy to take power, or Chile, or South Africa. I want the international working class taking power and building international socialism, because that is the only way to transform and overthrow the existing international capitalist order. We need not only an international perspective, but international coordination.
The headquarters of the international class of factory owners (and financial capital) rests in America
I mean, a good bulk of capital is based in the US, but this is mostly plainly incorrect. Of the 10 largest companies in the world by revenue, only 2 are based in the USA. Many large companies not only operate globally but are conglomerations of capital from different nations. The company that makes Budweiser, the quintessential American beer, is actually a conglomerate of US/Brazilian/Dutch capital, and has headquarters in all three nations.
Thus my criticism should not go towards the Maduro government doing the best it can with the material conditions as controlled by America, but America itself.
How are you appraising that the Maduro administration is “doing the best it can?”
