Interesting you think that way. From my observation in China government controls the media yes, but here capital controls the media no less. You can speak freely but the media wont necessarily distribute truth, they are free to distribute what makes the most money.
Even so, I think the CCP is making a big mistake with these camps.
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I wonder if the techno-fascist system might actually turn out to be more stable than the techno-democratic. (I don't like that but I've read enough sci-fi to be willing to consider it.)
Certainly the "fake news" attack is so effective precisely because so much of Western "free" media actually IS fake news. (I read Chomsky at an impressionable age, to me the mainstream media in America has always had a blindingly obvious blackout policy for anything too embarrassing.)
In any event, if the CCP can revive the Silk Road and partner with the nations of Africa, the Space Age may be Communist after all.