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Comment by padmanabhan01 | Hacker News Reader

Ok. A devil's advocate question. If US government can monitor US citizen's emails, why shouldn't Chinese govt monitor the emails of Chinese citizens? Of course, there is difference in what the monitoring will lead to in the 2 cases, but the ability to monitor is what it is. right?

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In China you would not be able to report on or criticize the monitoring, nor could you take legal action against it. In fact you could be thrown in jail for years just for complaining. In the United States and many other countries you would be free to challenge the government in a court of law and the government would have to defend their actions. It doesn't necessarily mean that they would lose their case, but a citizen can confront the state.

Neither of them should. China, in using the US as precedent for doing so, is merely finding an excuse for something it wanted to do anyways - this is not a situation of looking at the US and trying to match capabilities, as you seem to be implying (if the US installed death collars on all citizens, would other nations have some reason to keep up with US capabilities, and therefor need to institute their own death collar plan?)

> why shouldn't Chinese govt monitor the emails of Chinese citizens?

At least the US had a freaking law about the action. The prc government on the other hand, plays trinity in market: rule maker, judge, and player.

There's a joke on twitter, the government rape you, then sue you for prostitution

> At least the US had a freaking law about the action

Not on wire tapping, they made a law afterward though to forgive everyone.

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