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Comment by FooBarWidget | Hacker News Reader

> 2) China trying to use soft power, but the whole drama feels fake. It is good that they are sending supplies (often faulty and not up to the quality, see dutch story around this) but it doesn't feel genuine.

Allow me to disagree with this one. I see people questioning China's motives on helping other countries, but in my opinion this is a baseless and overly cynical view of things, not truth. People want to buy into the "China has motives" story so much, that they jump on every incident that may imply that.

The Dutch situation is typical. FYI: I am Dutch. Research has shown that mistakes were made on the Dutch side: because of haste and pressure (because supplies are low), and because the buyers didn't fully understand Chinese mask standards, they ordered the wrong thing. China did not intentionally send bad masks, nor was it a manufacturing quality problem.

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Considering this is an English site, most of the participants here are probably from the Anglosphere which, being led by the US, would tend to mistrust China. It's interesting how you mention that as Dutch and European, you don't have the same level of mistrust. Without a measure of how China is viewed, not just in the Anglosphere, but in Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Islamic world, Central Asia, and other cultural and linguistic spheres that a typical native English speaker wouldn't be able to communicate with, it's really hard to tell how effective China's soft power moves are.

I don't think this has got anything to do with China's soft power. The Dutch generally look at things in a calm and less emotionally-loaded manner, at least compared to the Americans. There is still a slight slant towards mistrust but it's nowhere near how it is in America.

I see the US social media villanizing China for the most insane things that can be easily disproven. The Dutch at least make an attempt at being objective.

It's a matter of stakes. The Netherlands has no power and very few responsibilities globally. It's often easy to be objective about topics when your stakes are low and distant.

How's that supposed Dutch calm looking when it comes to Italy and fiscal matters these days? I've been following that closely, they've been anything but calm, rational, objective. They're being emotional and subjective, making poor decisions, because it's a very personal subject that is nearby.

The US directly leads the entire military power base of the Western nations, as represented by NATO. And it is the sole backbone to that system. The French and Germans barely have militaries that can project outside of their own borders at this point, and the British are not far behind. China is going the opposite direction, they're a rapidly expanding superpower that is about to project militarily to nearly every corner of the globe, with obvious consequences.

The Netherlands isn't militarily facing off against China in Asia. The US is, every day - and at the eager welcome of numerous nations including Vietnam, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan. The US is the only nation that has directly confronted China and slowed down their annexing of the South China Sea. It won't be the Netherlands that has to make a decision about going to war with China when or if China invades Taiwan to annex them. The Netherlands will barely so much as lift a finger to help; first, they can't do anything because they're weak compared to China; and second they have little real stake in the matter. The US has dozens of allies it is militarily responsible to, countries that count on the US to shield them; the Netherlands has no comparable situation.

The Netherlands has little at stake in the China matter, compared to the US. They're a small trader nation at this point, shielded by larger nations in numerous ways.

So yeah, having dramatically more at stake in every possible way, the US is more charged about the topic than the ... calm and rational Dutch (about a topic they have very little stake in) that don't have to militarily confront China every day.

What you say may have some truth in it. However, does having a stake mean that it is okay to act overly emotional and occasionally throwing out rational analysis?

I also disagree on one thing here: the claim that China is projecting power to the rest of the world, that is trying to conquer the world or becoming an American style militaristic empire. In my opinion this is pure projection (in the psychological sense). China wants to defend themselves from a US invasion or blockade. They are not interested in controlling or occupying other countries, they just want to be able to do business.

What about South China Sea you may ask? They do it in order to deny the US from using that area to blockade them, not to conquer other countries or deny other countries from normal usage. See https://www.quora.com/Why-does-China-want-to-control-almost-...

Note, I am not saying whether this is a good or a just thing. But it certainly is different from how most westerners understand it.

The topic is not Captain America saving the world again, it's Chinese medical supplies to Holland. That seems like something the Dutch have far more stake in than Americans.

And a country that has dramatically more at stake by permanently looking for fights all around the world should probably be more rational and calm than one that isn't.

>The French and Germans barely have militaries that can project outside of their own borders at this point

Pardon ? The French military is the one that projects the most in Europe.

Sorry posted in response to wrong comment and so not direct response to the comment replied to, more the thread above and editing this in as unable to delete and redo, sorry my bad.

When outsourcing of production and labour suits, it's ignored for the underlying issues, when those underlying issue come to the surface, the same people who shifted for a shareholder appeasement dividend are just as quick to point the finger in every direction apart form themselves.

That in many forms is how things have played out in resource supply chains, this with margin nibbling away and with that a shift from local sourcing todwards, saving some money short-term are only a disaster away from being seen. Alas even those disasters need to be blatant enough to get noticed and the response and excess transportation of products and true impact/cost upon the environment as bit by bit, gets slower in acknowledgement.

But easy to reduce everything as tribal politics when convenient and carry on paying lip service and then wonder why we are in the state we are in. Of course it is akin to claiming everything is down to aliens and when you look at it like that, it's crazy and ignores the real issue of accountable and responsible buying and selling, something that is hard to account and balance upon the company books and with that, the drive for profit being the goal, bad things happen and until the system truly accounts for such things and the impact - the same mistakes will carry on transpiring and the people blamed for crimes they did not commit and those that commit true crimes are allowed to carry on as the law and rules are so slow in catching up that by the time they do, the problems have shifted.

Maybe why tax havens and the like are still a thing as are many other forms of unfairness that play out in the world today.

But we do live in a society that is more geared towards reactive handling of issues over proactive handling.

You posted on the wrong comment mate

I did, sorry, my bad thank you for pointing out i'll fix that mess. ok added edit at start, can't delete now so fixed that context drift.

The soft power only works on those that haven’t been exposed to it long enough. If you’ve dealt with China for a while, you know the real deal.

Want to give which geographical region you're from so I can put it down as an anecdotal datapoint?

Lived in China. Also lots of African friends who don’t appreciate how the Chinese do business in their country.

How do they do business?

Are those Chinese representing private companies, or state companies?

Care to give yours?

Canada, currently working in the States.

The CCP don't have a great track record of giving a shit about people at home. What makes you think they care for anything but the opportunity/ability to project more power abroad?

I will also have to disagree on that one. I was born in China, I now live in Europe, and "CCP doesn't give a shit about people" is a bad western stereotype.

Of course, define "caring". Does any other government, including democratic ones, truly care about people? Debatable. But what I'm saying is that CCP is not the mass-murdering villain that Hacker News makes it out to be.

What about censorship, etc? Yes bad things do happen. Lots of good things also happen. Just like all countries, nothing is perfect. I don't need to remind you of all the human rights violations by the US. The point is: you need to have a more nuanced understanding of the CCP than that of a cartoon villain.

Here are some facts: all coronavirus patients got free treatment, free stays in isolation hotels, all Wuhan residents got free food delivered to their homes. In contrast to what happened here in Europe, the CCP took a strong stance to save as many of their own citizen as they can instead of worrying about economic impact.

You may not believe me. But take a look at these:

"I'm sitting home in Wuhan and eating free vegetables and fish govt sent me and you tell me it hurts my human rights???" -- https://twitter.com/ClaireRChen/status/1241971786062770176?s...

New Wuhan Doctor Speaks Out From Ground Zero -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyUHz62Uan8

American and Canadian, living & studying in China, talk about how it is actually like there -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufxfSJgQuSI

Agree but not the good hero you make them out to be either. Does any other nation have Muslim concentration camps. Invasive tracking? And extreme sensorships measures?

> Does any other nation have Muslim concentration camps

Burma / Myanmar.

EDIT:

https://news.un.org/en/focus/rohingya-refugee-crisis

> I have no doubt that the Rohingya people have always been one of, if not the, most discriminated people in the world, without any recognition of the most basic rights starting by the recognition of the right of citizenship by their own country – Myanmar.

> Secretary-General António Guterres in press remarks on his visit to Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh – 02 July 2018

https://www.un.org/sg/sites/www.un.org.sg/files/atoms/files/...

> [...] This led to the destruction of villages, numerous dead and wounded, and the internal displacement of up to 140,000 people, mostly confined to IDP camps, which persist to the present (and under the most deplorable conditions). [...]

It is not that they are a good hero. It is that they are a system, not an evil cartoonish villain as a few in the west seems to think.

You could argue that Guantanamo Bay is a Muslim concentration camp, and that the rendition program was (likely is) the most organised torture program since the Nazis.

You could further argue that the overreaching mass surveillance outed by Snowden is invasive tracking.

In a way, you could also argue that all the boogeyman-style news in the west is a form of censorship too - it keeps the masses focused on their hatred of communists, Russians, Chinese, Islam (or whoever), so they don't focus so much on real issues at home.

And all this is just in direct response to your comment - it doesn't even touch on racism (very much alive in the US in particular), wars started on false pretenses and/or for profit, the CIA being able to lie to congress, refusing to not use cluster munitions, etc.

I think sometimes we're so focused on the perceived evils of other nations, that we lose sight of the highly dubious things are own nations are involved in. Perhaps that's the point...

Part of the issue is that we tend to see things that are far away more clearly. It is that much harder to see things clearly up close. Outsider sees most of the game kind of deal. For the record, I am not defending Guantanamo Bay, but even simple things like discussing prison system in US is complicated with anyone, who was born here, because, and it is probably the worst human trait, it has always been this way.

> Does any other nation have Muslim concentration camps

India, according to John Oliver.

Of course, bring up India should not normalize the severity of locking people up in camps in China. This is the point: asking for examples of worse behavior is a moot point because camps are bad even if every nation in the world does it. At the same time, camps in China is not necessarily suitable context in all facets of discussion.

When it comes to topics (like whether supplying masks from China makes it a good actor) with too much subjective variables, I personally like to think about issues as independently as possible. Using this logic, PPE from China, whether purchased or donated, is an act of appreciable good gesture; regardless, hard condemnation is a must regarding their abuses.

I didn't claim they are heroes. I explicitly said that bad things do happen. I just want to stress that that doesn't negate the fact that good things also happen, and that all countries have good and bad things. Pointing out bad things is one thing; stereotyping and overly focusing only on the bad things is another.

As for Muslim camps: forced reeducation and deradicalization, yes; concentration/killing/genocide: no. Try these:

Daniel Dumbrill (Canadian living in China) on Uygurs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6grvHceQsQ

Kim Iversen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ff4YZBi4UTc

CGTN discussion on Xinjiang situation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2yMjbB1q24 (disclaimer: yes this is Chinese state media, believe whatever you want, but I think it's still worth it to have heard this viewpoint)

And then there is also the fact that tens of Muslim countries officially approved of the Xinjiang situation. That's a bit odd, isn't it?

Now let me be clear: I am not claiming it's all roses and sunshine over there. It isn't, there are real problems, and people are indeed forced into things (though not killed), which is not good. But this is a more complex, nuanced situation than "China doesn't like Muslims so they kill them all".

> "China doesn't like Muslims so they kill them all".

You should know that it's the han way or death for the CCP. I don't understand the point of to your posts. Whataboutism is a poor excuse.

The point is to provide a more balanced and fair view of things. Accusations of whataboutism is disingenuous, especially because I didn't even engage in it: I talked about China only. If anything, the parent I replied to is the one that talked about other nations.

And there you go with the "or death" thing. Forced reeducation and detention, yes. But where is the proof that systematic killing is happening? All the proof of the latter I've seen so far come from US government or US-funded sources with poor research methodology (see for example https://thegrayzone.com/2020/03/26/forced-labor-china-us-nat...).

And what do you say about the fact that a dozen of Muslim nations officially approve of China's conduct in Xinjiang?

>I don't need to remind you of all the human rights violations by the US.

Whataboutism

>And what do you say about the fact that a dozen of Muslim nations officially approve of China's conduct in Xinjiang?

That's completely irrelevant. Do the people being repressed approve because that's all that matters. And for the record they do not approve of their families being raped and basically held captive by CCP employees despite BS CCP propaganda to the contrary.

Whataboutism is dropping a dead cat on the table in order to steer the conversation towards that cat. I did not steer the conversation to the US, I stayed on the topic of China, therefore it is by definition not whataboutism.

You seem to say that whataboutism is anything that mentions similar crimes committed by another party, implying that the actions of others are completely irrelevant. No. My criticism is not "China does no bad things". It is "China is not represented in a balanced manner and is not held to the same standards as other countries". Since the discussion is about standards, context absolutely matters.

> That's completely irrelevant. Do the people being repressed approve because that's all that matters [...] their families being raped

There you go with the "families being raped" thing. My point with the aprovals of Muslim countries is: maybe those allegations of rape are false?

Like I said: forced reeducation and deradicalization, yes. Rape/killing/concentration/genocide, no. The Gray Zone articles show that claims of the latter rest on shaky sources that are either circular, or funded by US interests and agendas.

We can debate whether forced reeducation and deradicalization is appropriate. But genocide/rape/murder/etc is false.

The CCP are an ideological cult who will stop at nothing until everyone conforms to their ideology. Yes they have created a system, a cold techno-dystopian system that is my worst nightmare. Just because Hitler also built autobahns doesn't mean he was a good guy or his systems were OK.

> "I'm sitting home in Wuhan and eating free vegetables and fish govt sent me and you tell me it hurts my human rights???"

Delivered via rubbish trucks.

https://mothership.sg/2020/03/garbage-trucks-wuhan/

> American and Canadian, living & studying in china, talk about how it is actually like there

Actual videos from china

https://archive.nothingburger.today/Videos/

> I was born in China

Did you earn your red scarf?

Yes I did. Not even kidding. You get it when you generally behave like a good student at school. Maybe you associate it with something else (probably Mao mass murdering or w/e) but most Chinese see it as a pretty normal school thing.

Slurs like this will get you banned here. Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22827309 also.

People have been hounded off this site because of their national origin. I'm sure you'll agree that that's utterly shameful. Unfortunately it's what we end up with when people allow baser instincts to drive their posts.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

I am quite surprised to see those stereotypes on hacker news . Looking at all the accounts with names like systemxxx and throwawayxxx, I feel conspiracy theory is no joke

Unfortunately, this kind of thing makes it on to HN. That's inevitable when a forum has millions of users, anonymity is ok, and the topic is divisive. We do what we can to try to convince people to follow the rules (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html), and we ban accounts that violate them repeatedly.

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

The amount of anti China sentiment in the US media is hyperbolic, that it is not possible to trust most US based media houses reports in this topic.

This topic has become too politicised by people and organisations with hawkish motives that sane discussion on this has become impossible.

> they ordered the wrong thing. China did not intentionally send bad masks, nor was it a manufacturing quality problem.

That doesn't align with what's being reported (by other countries as well):

> "Thousands of testing kits and medical masks are below standard or defective, according to authorities in Spain, Turkey and the Netherlands."

> "Dutch officials said that the masks did not fit and that their filters did not work as intended, even though they had a quality certificate,"

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-52092395

My sources: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22825391

That's what they initially said, before the research happened. That caused China to be upset. After the research it turns out to be an order problem on the Dutch side after all.

> “ but in my opinion this is a baseless and overly cynical view of things, not truth.”

It’s neither baseless or overly cynical if you’ve ever lived in China or have just spent enough time observing the CCP’s actions.

I was born in China. I have family there. My wife is Chinese. I disagree.

Anytime the CCP does something bad it's some systemic issue with insane conspiratorial motivation that every citizen is complacent in. Anytime the US does something bad it's 'realpolitik', or 'just a bad government, not everyone believes that'.

If you enumerate all the domestic human rights abuses of the US it doesn't look much better. Internationally, it's much worse. Hell, the US barely has 'democracy'. The chance of your vote _actually_ counting is small, and the two parties are barely better than a strict illusion of choice.

It's nothing more than another red scare. And before people jump down my throat... I don't think the CCP is _good_ either, I would dissolve both governments if it was up to me.

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