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Comment by Natsu | Hacker News Reader

> claiming that any company who decides to operate in China is compromised

This, honestly, is the correct approach. For example, it's hard to see otherwise why the NBA is banning anyone affiliated with them from supporting Hong Kong.

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1. Who has been banned? AFAIK the league has actually incurred large monetary losses for their position on China.

2. On the contrary, it is very easy to see why the NBA is cautious. The Chinese care about it and so the NBA does not want to spark any more controversy. Can you explain how this isn't just common sense re: operating in a foreign country? Are international companies operating in the US "compromised" if they don't comment on US affairs?

> Who has been banned?

Various fans have been banned - https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/skbaer/hong-kong-nba-fa...

Daryl Morey (disputed) - https://qz.com/1730643/china-asked-nba-to-fire-daryl-morey-f...

There was also Adrian Wojnarowski but I'm not sure about counting that because there were other factors in play. There may be others that I have missed.

> Can you explain how this isn't just common sense re: operating in a foreign country?

The fact that China makes it in their financial interests to restrict people on being able to comment on matters of international importance is exactly the problem, because this is a classic chilling effect. And, as pointed out, given our lax privacy laws, now China has all of the info they do. Given that they're happy to roll out, e.g. facial recognition and social credit scores, this isn't something to be happy about.

China is a beautiful country with many wonderful people. But I doubt I'll ever visit it as long as I could end up locked up for an old internet comment, like say, this one.

> Are international companies operating in the US "compromised" if they don't comment on US affairs?

You'll find no shortage of criticism of the US government from foreign companies and their workers in private capacity. To make this comparable, imagine if we had CFIUS rules whereby nobody operating in a foreign-owned company (including yours truly, a US citizen) could criticize, say, Trump or any other part of the government without risking their ability to do business.

I don't think anyone would say that it's "common sense" that I can't criticize Trump or the US government while working for a foreign-owned company subject to CFIUS rules, would you?

I think there would, rightfully, be a backlash if Trump tried to change these rules and the companies were put under a chilling effect. So I don't see why Xi should get a pass for that.

Touche on the fans, but that is very arguable as those actions are taken by the arenas. Considering that Morey is Rockets GM to this day, he is definitely not banned. Wojnarowski was suspended by ESPN for a brief period, and for reasons only tangentially related to China.

> You'll find no shortage of criticism of the US government from foreign companies and their workers in private capacity.

Aren't we talking about a public capacity?

I don't think it's fair to say there is no chilling effect in the US currently. I'd expect some severe US backlash if some foreign company was very publicly opinionated about gun control. There is an implicit understanding that certain topics are taboo. Does it really matter whether this effect arises from the local population or the local government?

edit: I don't even agree with the people/government distinction in this case. The Chinese people largely support their government's stance against HK.

I did mark those two as such, so I won't argue that and I was just mentioning them for completeness. I'd note that this was just within the NBA, I recall quite a few gaming companies also banning HK-related stuff, though I don't have links handy. Some of those games had ties back to Ten Cent, a Chinese company, if memory serves.

With regard to fans, I haven't seen other political slogans restricted in any comparable way. The NBA, for example, is very happy to say that Black Lives Matter and I've never heard of anyone getting kicked out a ballgame for wearing, say, a MAGA hat despite both slogans causing some very strong political sentiments. So the fact that HK is somehow more of a concern to the NBA than these hot-button American issues seems like something that demands an explanation.

> Aren't we talking about a public capacity?

I think bans can be troublesome in either capacity, honestly, but I'm more disturbed by restrictions that hit people in their private capacity, even if either realm can create a chilling effect.

> I'd expect some severe US backlash if some foreign company was very publicly opinionated about gun control.

For the record, that has actually happened (I think it was MasterCard restricting certain gun sales & some sporting goods stores dropping guns, e.g. Dicks), but it wasn't government-driven and there was backlash. That's a wholly separate issue and may touch on monopoly concerns. I think some of it got shot down due to running afoul of banking regulations, but I don't know the precise details.

For a fair comparison,

> if they don't comment on US affairs?

should be:

> If they ban their associates from commenting on US affairs

but this is due to financial implications rather than an actual member of the chinese state telling them what to do

NBA is doing what they are to protect their growing revenue stream from China. They also have not "banned" anyone over this. Calling them "compromised" by the Chinese government is way too much of a stretch.

I posted a list of several bans up thread.

these are one off incidents in selected arenas. there wasn't a sweeping ban of these messages across the nba, in fact many attendees had pro-HK shirts and were never bothered.

Moreover, i would not be able to enter an arena with a MAGA, Trump, or a Biden poster (altough there was one incident with someone with a MAGA hat), so to imply that these one off incidents are actions that are due to the extensions of the CCP is very much in line with the propagandic rallying cry that we are seeing against China right now.

I agree with OP, this is much more of a financial issue to the NBA, than the NBA being an extension of the CCP which you are trying to imply right now.

I don't see those two things as being materially different. If the CCP is going to mess with their finances unless they make the right noises, that's a chilling effect.

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