General News Thread

[LegalLoliLover]

Sooooo... basically,

• Nukes aren't a sufficiently significant threat, don't let them stop you
• Learn more about how China operates and thinks
• Fight the CCP ideologically by:
  
  • Promoting nationalism
  • Promoting hero worship (which would presumably extend to the current leadership and generally involves glossing over or denying negative aspects of those glorified, which also applies to nationalism)
  • Quash dissent using force (so more authoritarian tendencies)

Not really seeing near-term suggestions. Those that are there sound... unpleasantly familiar.

Nationalism in moderation is just called patriotism. It's only a problem when it goes overboard into nativism. Denying negative aspects is very different from putting them into the context of setting and even human nature. In terms of dissent, force is only appropriate when used to combat force. Also, have you seen the hypocrisy of ACAB people asking for help from police, despite their rhetoric? Pretty sure that Hong Kong protesters would never call for help from CCP enforcers.

[Altima of the Gates]

Man, it's like you try to tell them "don't do it, it's a trap" and they fall for it anyways. It truly puts me de mala hostia in multiple ways. I just kind of wish people saw that movements are never really interested about their well being: they want power. While said power grab can be advantageous, it often only works to your favor when the authorities choose to act on them. Otherwise, they pretty much turn on each other and cannibalize themselves.

Remember Occupy?

Occupy would be a bad example for a couple reasons that ring true when we are talking about many movements, including BLM, and with the idea of defunding the police.
Its disingenuous to try to say a movement is misguided purely for reasons such as some extremists or people with different opinions say they work under the same banner.
Let's use "Defund the Police" as another example, people can see if they use rational thought that some people mean reallocation of funds of departments in order to better serve the community with programs better suited to tackling these issues, and not just a purely anarchy driven abolitionist movement.

It seems more and more that people are tired and want messaging condensed so it's easier to digest, and bad actors use that apathy for egregious spin.

[Twelveseal]

Thinking is hard. It's much simpler and easier to find a voice you trust and do what it says.

I don't really see people changing in this regard.

[LegalLoliLover]

Also, China is a dictatorship, while the US is a democracy. China can praise the collective "people" all they want, but none of them are even allowed to dream of becoming "heroes". Meanwhile, in the US, there is a chance, however small, of anyone becoming a "hero". Therefore, hero worship in the US is essentially just praising a fellow citizen for getting that far. Also:

[OverMaster]

At least people all over the world actually bother to know where Hong Kong is.

We (Venezuela) ve been dragged through the shit for more than twenty years now and nobody really fucking cares. Or even notices to begin with.

This world's going to end up collapsing because the First World has its collective head stuck too far up its collective ass to supply enough support to qualify as the guidance force they claim being entitled to be.

[RacingeR]

Honestly I'd actually love less of that "guidance force" that gave us jewels like Macri and Bolsonaro, and historically things like the genocidal dictatorships. Yep, would like to see less of that 'round these parts.

[OverMaster]

Honestly I'd actually love less of that "guidance force" that gave us jewels like Macri and Bolsonaro, and historically things like the genocidal dictatorships. Yep, would like to see less of that 'round these parts.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

Genocidal dictators also can and often do pop up on their own if smaller, weaker nations are just left to waddle on their own while the bigger countries turn their backs and count their money.

Edit: It's almost as if "Please be a positive force and example on your fellow man while not propping tyrants up or sin by inaction" is too much to ask from the higher powers, amirite?

[Twelveseal]

Basically. Scum will be scum, especially when they can get some degree of power out of being so.

And while there's orders of magnitude difference in scale, you don't have to be a world power to utterly ruin the lives of ordinary people.

And the retaliation against Beijing begins.

[forumghost]

Basically. Scum will be scum, especially when they can get some degree of power out of being so.

And while there's orders of magnitude difference in scale, you don't have to be a world power to utterly ruin the lives of ordinary people.

And the retaliation against Beijing begins.

Too bad it won't amount to anything.

The West is ruled by corporations, and corporations are ruled by money. China is simply too big a market for them to allow significant enough government sanctions to matter.

[LegalLoliLover]

[AsGryffynn]

Honestly I'd actually love less of that "guidance force" that gave us jewels like Macri and Bolsonaro, and historically things like the genocidal dictatorships. Yep, would like to see less of that 'round these parts.

Missing: Videla, Pinochet, whoever coup'd Goulart, Rios Montt... Honestly, "guidance" is about the opposite I'd describe it as, especially in the last case.

- - - Updated - - -

Too bad it won't amount to anything.

The West is ruled by corporations, and corporations are ruled by money. China is simply too big a market for them to allow significant enough government sanctions to matter.

Yup. People really have short memory if they think the "nuclear option" is even viable. The US doesn't control it, and they refused when Russia entered Crimea because even they would trigger a second Great Recession.

You just don't sanction 110 million+ markets. It's literally putting the world economy in the chopping block.

[Twelveseal]

So basically, China won, end of story. GG.

[LegalLoliLover]

Re-militarize Japan:

[AsGryffynn]

Re-militarize Japan:

Then SK does the same and Russia starts building up the long neglected Kuriles and why were we doing this again?

The issue is essentially that China can militarize itself because their big brother USSR gave authorization to and Russia held this promise. They never allowed JP or SK to rearm and even the US discouraged this.

Even if the US did, Putin would throw a tantrum and so would SK, since anything usable against China is doubly effective against SK. China fears them more because if they did, it'd mean bye bye any claims to the East for several years and because China is still shipbuilding a navy.

I mean, it's kind of hard to genuinely be afraid of a country even as big as Japan when you're literally 10 times their size, weight and maximum potential, such that a behemoth like China with the development level of Italy would be able to roll over ANZUKNATOJapanKorea several times over.

And let's be honest, for better or for worse, this is kind of China's "true" place in the world. The Chinese were the world's most massive economy for centuries till the emergence of the British Empire and the US, which have only had a tenuous leadership for around one century. Kind of hard to see this being reversed.

[LegalLoliLover]

It looks like most of China's "advancements", military or otherwise, come from stealing other people's shit. Maybe, people should just stop sharing stuff with them?

[Twelveseal]

They won't because there's too much money in it. Like I said, it would require total isolation economically, but it's true that this isn't feasible and there are 60 or so nations that are fine with them regardless that would need to be isolated as well. Globalization has made this unrealistic, and Capitalism will continue to keep feeding itself to the CCP.

Literal war is also unrealistic; the nation is too large, with too many people, enjoys Russian support, huge economic and financial clout it can use to cripple would-be opponents, and a powerful intelligence gathering system. Likewise, we can't exactly nuke them not just because of international law, but because the fallout and contamination threatens neighboring friendlies.

[LegalLoliLover]

First of all, Fallout. LOL. Secondly, again, are you saying that Hitler should have done all that before killing the Jews?

[Twelveseal]

So what? Honestly, your only suggestion so far has amounted to "hate them more, don't criticize yourself, and become more extremist." There's no actual course of action suggested here beyond a change in mindset coupled with doing nothing.

I'm not seeing anything except watch and basically do nothing.

[LegalLoliLover]

India has boycotted Chinese goods. China is apparently reliant on Australian iron. All foreign arrests, such as with the new laws in regards to Hong Kong, and all military trespasses should be treated as full-on acts of war. Like I said, China responded with Japan's re-militarization, not with aggression, but with fear, so the world as a whole should be more aggressive. Be grateful that I'm not suggesting the methods of Leonidas or Uncle Vlad.

[asterism42]

Alternate headline: Idiots actually listen to the lyrics of what is ostensibly their favorite song