Hacker News Reader

We've banned this account for repeatedly breaking the site guidelines.

Complaining about how you'll get banned doesn't immunize you against getting banned, btw. You have to actually follow the rules, and this sort of flamebait and nationalistic battle is well outside the line.

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

I haven't seen anybody "support" WeChat on HN, and even Zoom has been catching a lot of flack here. More than that, though, your jump from the users of a site supposedly supporting certain products to the site itself being owned by the Chinese is hilariously absurd. Maybe you should actually think about what you're saying before the next time you yell "Wake up, sheeple!"

It is no coincidence, when Chinese companies decide to invest in western culture (and subsequently decide you cannot flash certain flags, show certain teddy bears or express your opinion on whether you think a city should be free or not), buy a hotel near a naval base or push cheap network equipment.

The doctrine is commonly known as 3 warfares and was drawn up by officers in the Chinese military in the beginning of the 90'ies. The success of the officers behind the strategy have since moved on to become high ranking military officials, which should give you an idea about how their work was received within the Chinese government.

Looking for classic cold war patterns is not going work with China.

Downvotes don't mean censorship. You clearly made your point with complete freedom of speech. Agreeing with you is another thing.

> Downvotes don't mean censorship.

Good question. I think it does if downvotes result in inability to express an opinion (as opposed to simply having downvotes shown).

If downvotes are used to suppress freedoms then downvoting is a means of censorship. In other words, there is no big difference between prohibiting something by one person (dictatorship) or by 10 persons (collective dictatorship) (if it is not prohibited by law of course).

The problem is that downvoting alone doesn't really tell you anything meaningful other than someone didn't like your post. You can say something completely factual and logical but just because someone didn't like your tone, they can turn your post invisible. This does not promote healthy discourse. This also means that for any topic that is super controversial, the thing that determines whether the post gets seen or not is whether a majority group is able to downvote the post into oblivion early enough. Because once a post is greyed out, very few people are going to read it at that point and it will stay grey. At the very least, downvoting should require providing reasoning for the downvote so people can defend their argument.

What's censorship and what is not seems to always change depending on convenience https://i.imgur.com/xTCKWNM.jpg

> You can see the pro-chinese propaganda on this site alone.

Actually, most of the propaganda here and in social media has been anti-chinese. Obnoxiously so.

> The number of people supporting Zoom, WHO, WeChat, etc is enough to conclude with near certainty this site as well is owned by the Chinese.

What? Almost everything about Zoom, WHO, WeChat, etc has been negative. Even this thread has been negative.

> What you're speaking is truth. It's a shame this site will censor you.

Don't. The obvious victimhood propaganda won't get you very far here.

> It is no coincidence so much information suppression has gone on the last 3 months...

3 months? It's been going on for many years. And I don't think it is the chinese behind it.

People like you tell us that the russians and now the chinese control propaganda in the US and yet everything I read, see or hear is anti-russian and anti-chinese. Either the russians and chinese hate themselves or they are just terrible at propaganda or you are simply wrong.

The issue I see is not related to whether a site contains a balanced view point or not. That is up to honest moderation based on the site's guidelines.

The main issue is how a site provides tools for promoting healthy discussion. As long as a submission cooperates with a site's guidelines, the site's (moral) duty after that is to ensure that people that make good use of logic, reason, facts, and sources have their voices heard. What I see sometimes on this site is that people that have legitimate arguments and authoritative sources have their posts silenced (greyed out) or flagged just because a majority group of users disagreed emotionally. To me, that is a red flag. I believe that HN tries it's best to promote healthy discourse but I also believe that there is more they can do to optimize it.

> Actually, most of the propaganda here and in social media has been anti-chinese. Obnoxiously so.

yes, exactly. hacker news, even more so than other sites i visit, has a very anti-chinese bend to it. however, the parent article is indeed interesting.