i’m going to address your points one-by-one, but i have to sleep soon so it will be kind of scattershot and not that well-written.

the idea that ‘we can solve this if we just get people to vote properly’ is not correct. in fact, thinking that way makes it more difficult for us to change things, because it distracts…

they literally talk about the censorship in the video! like i said, it’s a balanced take on the situation, so hey, your choice to ignore it.

the person i was replying to earlier said that they support countries that dont genocide their ethnic minorities, which in my mind implies that china does so but the usa does not.

based on what i know, the pengshuai thing is a shitty situation. is there actually some evidence that china made her disappear though? i…

how is it unrelated? i initially replied to someone who compared chinese video game restrictions to the cultural revolution, so i feel like it was pretty relevant

it’s a thing that happens all the time with discussions of dprk. you get people who believe that kim jong un killed his family members with the bee laser from malcolm in the middle, and it’s like... it is honestly a waste of time at that point. like, china has no free speech? china has fake elections?? usa, the…

too many of the specific things youve mentioned here are just completely made up, so sorry that i’m not picking out each and every one of them.

i have zero interest in anyone praising china, actually. my only thing is avoiding people *demonizing* china. demonization of china worries me greatly because i believe many…

“I can point to a lot of ways that people in America can attempt to influence their government that people in China cannot do.”

i’m not alarmed in any way by china’s lockdowns. in fact, i think not having hundreds of thousands of people die to covid is a good thing.

here’s food for thought: imagine if china actually did fuck up the covid response as badly as the united states. mostly no lockdowns, not providing free food to people during rare…

“Ironically, the US’ issues right now are kind of proof of how much power average people have”

you should really reconsider this line of argument. you’re saying that corporations spending tons and tons of money to successfully influence politics, gerrymandering, rampant voter suppression, a horrible education system,…

you haven’t given any evidence at all that the chinese government is unresponsive to people’s wants/needs, when there is pretty reasonable evidence (opinion polls, lack of people dying massively to deadly virus) which shows that the government is, in fact, responsive. saying that you watch the news and “know how…

you say that people in china have no input on policies because they only have one party and can’t campaign for a guy. sure okay; in the usa we can campaign for a guy from one of two parties, both of which represent the same corporate interests. also, the guy lies and makes shit up, then does nothing the people…

what is the evidence that average people in usa have more ability to influence their government than average people in china? it’s a meme that everyone seems to just assume is true, but i do not know where it comes from other than ‘lol we can vote for the president’

i think it’s totally reasonable to want to be balanced about this and not fully accept research based on a small sample size etc. however, when you consider that this article (the kotaku one we’re commenting under) is based on a.... pretty uncharitable interpretation of chinese policy, it gets weird.

like this seems…

i mean yeah, i know you think this is a bad idea and won’t work or whatever, that’s fine. pretty unclear why a comparison to the cultural revolution, which was an extremely extremely different thing from “a pause in approval of video games,” is appropriate.

i get that you’re trying to lump them both in the same…

uh, yeah okay there. i’m the one simplifying and being disingenuous; you’re just doing reasonable shit like comparing a “ban” on video games (which is not actually even a ban) to the *cultural revolution.* makes sense

i mean yeah? i’m like 90% sure i’ve said something like “i am a communist” or “communism is good and i like it” in earlier posts lol.

but my point is: what does it say about the discourse surrounding china that there are people who literally go around calling anyone who says a positive thing about china “tankie”? even…

people who (accurately) understand that china has successfully contained covid to a far greater degree to the usa are automatically tankies now? that’s like some full-blown far-right stuff, honestly. way to undermine your own credibility, i guess?

based on your previous article about this, it looks like the government tends to be conflicted on the subject of video games. like, even the article that calls video games ‘spiritual opium’ was removed right away? that doesn’t seem to indicate that they’re hardline committed to destroying gamers or whatever, right?…

my guess is they’ll go outside and play, go to malls/concerts/etc/etc/etc. they actually will have way more things to do than usa children without risking covid, since the numbers in china are absolutely miniscule by comparison (of course the western media is pretending it’s pure pandemonium in china right now, big…

the way you said ‘prospective mates’ sounds like youre trying to make chinese people sound primitive or something. i dont know if that was intentional but i definitely got that vibe.

at the end of the day, your qualifiers dont do a whole lot for me. china very clearly is prioritizing economic inequality. they’re not…