Hacker News Reader

Comment by network2592 | Hacker News Reader

> It apologised last month for the "trouble" it had caused, saying that its commitment to avoid supply chains from Xinjiang was an expression of compliance with U.S. law, rather than a statement of its position on the issue.

So is the position of Intel that slave labour in concentration camps is an acceptable means of production?

To what extent are Intel chips designed and manufactured in China? Presumably, they are primarily designed in the USA and manufactured in Taiwan. And Intel is opening chip factories to boost production in the USA [0].

Why would Intel not take a position against Xinjiang slave concentration camps if presumably most of the supply chain does not depend on it? Would it be that much "trouble"? Or has some unrelated "trouble" been created for Intel that was not discussed in the article?

[0] https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/newsroom/news/intel-...

View on HN

Just yesterday someone commented on the google's union efforts with the following:

> Imputing altruistic morals to profit-seeking entities and then continually being surprised and offended when companies act shady puts employees in a pointlessly weak position.[1]

The discussion whether it's true or not is less important at this point than the fact that Governments is responsible for making sure that there are rules to be followed. The main problem here is that most governments themselves are also run by the same profit-seeking entities/people. The whole situation right now is based on the fact that everyone moved their production to china with complete disregard for everything but short term gain.

Amazons Bezos is in fact not wrong when he says that he's not going to pay tax out of some altruistic ideas, but that it is in fact up to governments to make proper legislation. It's just that governments are busy doing nothing but talking for the most part(or at least have learned to do nothing over the past decades). I actually had a social democrat party member tell me a couple years ago, that the politicians have a really hard job travelling around talking, and having to read consultant written legislation. This is in effect not that different from tech ceo's scheduling 4 hours of meetings every day and calling it work.

Most people don't actually want to change the status quo, they just want to put blame on someone.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29876934

Intel and most multinationals' sanitized position is going to be "slave/coerced labour" doesn't exist in their supply chain according to their (lax) audits and oversights. But they're forced to comply with US blanket sanction on the region. Because at the end of the day, a US company operates no differently than a PRC company that is completely beholden to the state security apparatus. Sorry to PRC market for being US SOE and arm of US foreign policy.

> Intel not take a position against Xinjiang

Because PRC position is coerced labour doesn't exist. It's decades old rural labour transfer programs + vocational training that pays multitudes more than regional norms and competitive with national wages is being portrayed as slave labour by US propaganda. If you want to make money in PRC, comport with PRC position or at least figure out messaging to pave over contradictions and save face. Ergo, US companies are forced to comply with US laws and holds no position on which narrative is correct.

Just because they take no outward "position" ... doesn't mean that internally they are not perfectly aware of what is happening in Xinjiang - and of the moral dimensions of their complicity in it.

Or internally these companies could be aware that US propaganda perpetuated under Mike Pompeo as head of state is just that, propaganda for US interests and there's no point attaching any morality and complicity to it. It's about compliance and drafting up PR to minimize fallout from useful idiots in both markets. Any company operating in PRC for 20+ years knows of rural labour transfer programs, even have reluctant suppliers pressured to take Uyghur workers by CCP because they're over compensated and underqualified. Half the reason terrorism exploded in XJ 2009 is due to drama caused by one of these programs (Shaoguan Incident). Companies with established supply chains in PRC knows these coerced labour stories are bullshit. There's about 400M other rural poor Chinese who will work for less than how much these transfer programs designed to boost minorities are paying. And they don't even need to be retrained for literacy skills.

It’s economic warfare against a destabilized region that only recently quelled constant terrorism.

The US casts a blanket assumption that ALL products from the region are produced by slave labor unless proven otherwise. That’s backwards.

And meanwhile US government and corporations have no problem buying products produced by US prison slave labor, or overseas child labor.

It’s absolutely not backwards. When you have a million people in a concentration camp in a given region, and China is known for shipping these slaves around their country to work in factories, to make sanctions and targeted policies more difficult to apply, can you maybe see why a rule of thumb has been created black listing an entire region? This is their choice. Cause. Effect.

Is that why US also sanctions John Deer from selling tractors to XJ when XJ wanted to automate cotton harvesting because paying "slave" labours high wages was unprofitable. Almost like US wants to XJ to rely on manual labour to perpetuate coerced labour myth. Cause. Effect.

“A million people in a concentration camp” says US state agencies who tried to prevent the UN from investigating and Adrian Zenz commissioned by the BBC.

Let’s ask the UN what they think about China’s response to terrorism in Xinjiang after investigating.

> Faced with the grave challenge of terrorism and extremism, China has undertaken a series of counter-terrorism and deradicalization measures in Xinjiang, including setting up vocational education and training centers. Now safety and security has returned to Xinjiang and the fundamental human rights of people of all ethnic groups there are safeguarded. The past three consecutive years has seen not a single terrorist attack in Xinjiang and people there enjoy a stronger sense of happiness, fulfillment and security.

> What they saw and heard in Xinjiang completely contradicted what was reported in the media. We call on relevant countries to refrain from employing unfounded charges against China based on unconfirmed information before they visit Xinjiang.

https://undocs.org/pdf?symbol=en/A/HRC/41/G/17

So not "the UN" as you misrepresent, but rather: some operatives from some of the planet's most brutally repressive regimes (after the PRC, of course) -- specifically: Bahrain, Belarus, Cuba, Eritrea, Djibouti, Iran ... there's too many to list, but I'll just add one more: the DPRK -- get together and sign a petition denying the abuses happening in another country (China) which just so happens to be a big, rich, pal of theirs, and on top of that, praising its leadership to the rafters, as it were:

"We commend China’s remarkable achievements in the field of human rights by adhering to the people-centered development philosophy and protecting and promoting human rights through development. We also appreciate China’s contributions to the international human rights cause."

And you're suggesting that we're supposed to take this seriously?

Every country and company on the planet should of course assume the worst - until free and independent media is free to report on it.

Are Intel execs given objective reports by independent journalists who are given access to all areas and are free to write an report as they want on it? Until then, Intel execs should assume that any rumor of wrongdoing in the province is true. It's as simple as that.

One simply doesn't get the benefit of "no wrongdoing until proven" without a free media.

Why doesn’t the US impose sanctions on Saudi Arabia for their genocide of Yemen?

We are cracking down on slave labor supply chains. We are merely starting with the worst offender: China.

The US imprisons 5x as many people per capita as China and buys billions of dollars of products made by US prison slave labor.

They could start there.

You can't know that because China doesn't publish stats for it's secret ethnic genocide program.

If you want to petition for better prisons, please do so. Please do not detract from the campaign of ethnic cleaning the rest of us are talking about.

Look at this from a larger perspective. US killed a million random civilians in an attempt to to squash terrorism - and largely failed. China appears to have achieved this in an incomparably more humanitarian way. If this works out, this means:

1. USA failed (again)

2. They committed world's largest genocide since WW2

3. For no good reason

This is an absolutely terrible outcome from PR point of view, so it's natural for US to try to prevent China from being successful in doing that. And pretending that temporarily imprisoning people is somehow more evil than killing them seems to be working, even here on HN.

This has absolutely nothing to do with Intel or Xinjiang.

It is just a common whataboutism technique used by Wu Mao [0].

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29893724

> To what extent are Intel chips designed and manufactured in China? Presumably, they are primarily designed in the USA and manufactured in Taiwan.

Intel has fabs all over the world, including many in the US and some in China[1]. Whenever people talk about chip manufacturing they seem to only think about high-end cutting edge processes, when in fact the majority of quantity of chips produced are at non-cutting edge fabs that are spread all over the world and made by many companies that you haven't heard of, but also Intel.

However this was never about Intel manufacturing chips in Xianjing, it was about the long long tail of supply chain that goes into these ships from mines through to chemical supply companies up to industrial machinery supply and everything in between.

[1] https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000...

Is there any critical non interchangeable raw material that goes into Intel chips for which CCP has exclusive global control?

Xinjiang has some silica mines [0] which may go into silicon production. Presumably, that is a critical material for Intel. Can it be sourced elsewhere? Is that the leverage the CCP has over Intel?

[0] https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3139062/u...

Silica is not an issue. Intel executives getting kidnapped(err arrested for illegal blah blah), local managers disappearing, sudden "corruption" investigations etc.

There are 2 choices, clear out everything and everyone associated with Intel out of PRC or comply.

Funny how China doing something are always in the future tense. Whereas the ones who have committed the atrocity of actually illegally detaining an executive by putting pressure on a friendly country is the USA.

Illegally detaining an executive is not an "atrocity". Violation of international norms, perhaps, but not an atrocity. Atrocity takes a lot higher standard than that.

Weren't Canadian tourists arrested with bogus charges in response?

So? A criminal country with the worst instances of human rights violations and violation of international law all across the world illegally detains the CFO of a company because of their country; and you expect that her country is not going to take action on that?

It wasn't an illegal detainment. The company was working with Iran. Oh and she lived in a mansion in Vancouver throughout the whole thing. I'm sure she had endured much hardship getting a free vacation for a couple years.

Illegal by violating what laws?

ah yes, equating the detention of a rich person in a mansion with an industrial scale genocide operation.

Intel doesn't have any fabs in China, the Dalian facility is for NAND and was sold to SK Hynix recently. Shanghai/Chengdu are assembly/test.

It's just Chinese politics, and a very large market. It was a huge mistake to use the term 'Xinjiang', one that other companies like Apple are careful to avoid.

Looks like you skipped their revised statement.

I would also ignore or mildly chuckle at any government that thinks they can force me to have an opinion. Ignore for small market, mildly chuckle at big market.

If they want me to color an island on a map the same color as another landmass, or make a statement about my extended supply chain, I will do so and not pretend like it's any different just because some of my friends happen to respect one country slightly more all because they repeated a creepy chant every day as children in grade school.

Intel apologized specifically for mentioning Xinjiang. This implies that there are no slave concentration camps in Xinjiang. Otherwise, there would be no need to apologize.

There are two dimensions to that revised statement. If it had not been accompanied by an apology, then it could be taken as clarification of a genuine position.

As it stands, it is a contradictory mish mash of public relations that suggests there are no slave concentration camps in Xinjiang while saying generally Intel is against slave labour.

A clarification of the Intel position is in order. More to the point, Intel should be asked whether it deems Xinjiang to have slave concentration camps. What made it explicitly specify Xinjiang as an example of slave labour? Does removing Xinjiang reference mean that Intel now believes there are no slave concentration camps?

Hence, the clarification question about Intel's position is in earnest. But, it was just a succinct form of all these follow up questions. Sorry if that was unclear.

Associated Press says those camps are closed and that was back in October.

It is entirely possible that the US Congress was just too late on their grandstanding, yet their addition to the US law requires companies to say in/accurate things anyway.

So which is true? A Congress operating on outdated information just because they have a laundry list of fairly inconsequential laws to pass for their constituents who also have outdated information, or the Associated Press reporting up to date things with their own limitations on gathering information in Xinjiang.

I don't think it matters, same for Intel who just is in a place to respond.

Apologizing is the way to maintain standing in China, whether the statement is accurate or inaccurate. The Chinese constitution is being leveraged in a clear way that explains the behavior of everyone that has to make a strange-to-us apology. Specifically, if you read it, is the part about treating China as inseparable and not doing anything that would undermine that idea. It allows for broad interpretations on every action on every facet of life. Think about it like a super-interstate commerce clause, but maintaining status in that society is not that confusing to me.

The corporation and the management have no actual opinion and I don't require they do. They're apathetic and respond to regulation. They responded, and then responded better. Everyone else now knows how to respond better, in order to avoid the PR issue.

If you think this fiasco requires them to make an opinion, for you, its not going to happen, and hopefully the above explains why.

> The corporation and the management have no actual opinion and I don't require they do.

You presumably want capable management as leadership of a corporation. The issue is whether Intel really needed to apologize.

Most chips are not manufactured in China. Foreign access to Chinese market is heavily restricted by CCP. There does not seem to be much to gain from apologizing for calling out slave concentration camps.

When considering this latest Xinjiang issue, as well as growing competition from Arm and the lack of a meaningful response from Intel, from a purely financial perspective, you can question the leadership of Intel.

If you are holding some Intel stock, it is probably time to revisit that position regardless of your views about corporations and ethics. Incompetence in public relations statements does not mean there is not general incompetence that can adversely affect the bottom line.

That's an interesting point, I think it comes down to nobody knowing what contractors in their extended supply chain do.

This also moves Intel's problem to their first shareholder letter. Basically they should have never said it if it didn't apply to them. Then they chose to apologize to maintain standing in China for who knows what reason.

Whats clear to me is that they realize it is basically inconsequential in the US and their other markets, while it is consequential in the China market. It's easy calculus. Sure some people want it to be consequential but nothing is going to happen, a few patriotic fellows are going to put them on the same mental list they have Lebron James on and you'll just hear about it at a party or in a bar a few times. That's the definition of inconsequential to me.

You need to factor in time horizons. Things can be inconsequential for a while and then become very consequential.

Yes, in the short term, there are consequences in China for Intel in terms of speaking out against slave concentration camps. Medium and long term, CCP will champion a national chip that will replace Intel. No amount of CCP praising or glossing over slave concentration camps will prevent this outcome for Intel.

So choosing to bend the knee for CCP will not net a gain in a longer time horizon. And with the rise of ARM, Intel is no longer the only chip on the block.

The Intel leadership may think things are inconsequential outside of China. But, this might push them to not consider alternative supply chains. With increasing trade wars, and the CCP looking to be very aggressive with trade policies as a foreign policy instrument, it is probably a good idea to divest from China supply chains.

Yet, Intel seems to really value their China supply chain. So it is reasonable to expect them to face the adverse consequences in the future. This can be very swift just like the sidelining of Jack Ma and AliBaba as well other Chinese tech giants.

In other words, just because you do not see the consequences now, it does not mean that there will not be heavy consequences later. You can have some basic human empathy for Uyghurs in slave concentration camps. Or you can evaluate the competence of Intel leadership in a cold manner. Either way, things seem to point to a sell order for Intel stock if you trade.

It is for it's suppliers and partners. Examples of this would be Intel supplying chips to Lenovo, who are based in Beijing and who may have some components sources from that region, or Intel's fabs sourcing Silicon or other manufacturing materials (or their suppliers) from that region.

Supply chains are broad and it's not hard to have goods that pass through or originate in those regions even if all your parts are produced outside that and you have no direct partnerships there.

Partners is a separate issue from suppliers. The letter was to suppliers. However, partners may have indeed caused "trouble" for Intel by threatening to source chips from somewhere else. But as far as suppliers, and chips in particular, CCP has very little leverage. Most chips are manufactured in Taiwan [0].

[0] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/16/2-charts-show-how-much-the-w...

That graph says nothing. It's just talking about revenue. TSMC obviously has the biggest slice of the cake, but they produce the highest volume of premium chips. Most of what the world consumes are not in fact premium chips.

Pie charts gone wrong. You think there's meaningful information in there, but there isn't.

Do you have data on the quantity of chips rather than overall revenue? You claim this figure is meaningless. In the absence of reliable data, we can make a reasonable assumption, perhaps flawed, that revenue is matched by quantity of chips. But, it is certainly not meaningless.

> we can make a reasonable assumption, perhaps flawed, that revenue is matched by quantity of chips

No, most institutions don't publish what their production capacity is. There is an article claiming that TSMC makes "92% of world's most sophisticated chips". Define most sophisticated. You can't just throw in revenue graphs and pretend they show anything of value, just because north america measures success solely in revenue and growth.

The burden of proof is not on me, it's for you to substantiate your claims.

EDIT: Interesting to see people bring in random graphs from CNBC. Things that would not even be considered investment advice and present it as scientific evidence without any sort of due diligence on their. Sad that this is the kind of discourse that we have to have.

Things are not automatically true, valid, or contextual just because a big media corporation published them.

Your claim is that revenue evidence is meaningless. The burden of proof is on you.

You are suggesting that the majority of low quality chips are manufactured outside of Taiwan. You have not defined your operational definitions for chip quality. You do not even have evidence on the quantity of chips.

In the absence of any data that would contradict this, we can reasonably assume revenue figures are a sensible proxy for quantity of chips.

The goal is that both partners (downstream) and suppliers (upstream) are aware that they should not be sourcing/supplying these regions, and that if Intel is made aware of it, they will have to enforce such embargos in both directions.

One company, two truths.

>slave labour in concentration camps

Not an english speaker, so is Is "slave" correctly used here or is more like a "metaphor"?, In my mind a slave is someone you own, you can sell or kill. Someone you keep in prison is called different and people kept in prison for political reasons have also different label, religions/race imprisonment might also have a different label.

Yes I would say it is used correctly here, with the definition you mentioned. And your english is good for not being an english speaker!

> In my mind a slave is someone you own, you can sell or kill.

It varies a lot place to place and era to era what exactly is a slave and what isn't. Servants? Serfs? Even in a single era and a single place, as soon as one of the laws changes, things are not the same. Like in China, after the Unification, Chin Han called his administers what Westerners call "servants" or "slaves". I think this is a Western thing. Really, a better translation would be they were his "perkins," a Chilean word that basically means "someone who does what someone else says." But it doesn't have a definition, don't think in terms of definitions, think in terms of the relationship between words. That's the thing, the West is big on titles, I suppose the East is to a degree, but it's really meaningless. I wonder what they call Emperor Augustus in Chinese, what else it means. Ultimately, it's not what your title is, it's what you can do. Same with slaves, the word is just a word, the question is what will you have to do.

EDIT: In general there actually are laws against killing them. Sparta declared war on the Helots about every year, because killing just like that, openly, for no reason, just raw murder, was just too gross. Just the level of cruelty. Even in the American South there were laws that said if a master just can't get a slave to submit, he's tried everything (I can't get an authoritative quote on this, what I'm giving you is the desert island version[1]), then in that case, the master can kill them. But I think it doesn't say kill, it's some other word. Of course, that's the law, the reality is different, the limit is far too low but there is a limit. Super basic stuff and difficult to prove, but for another example masters couldn't practice Satanism with their slaves, we're talking like egregiously egregious stuff. Which does occasionally happen.

[1] The desert island version of a text is what you remember without being able to search for it online, or review your notes, nothing. Like if it were you and I, dear reader, on a desert island, the Bible is what we remember, that's it.

No - it's a pretty bad use of language here. You have a better grasp of english than a lot of english speakers!

Traditionally if it's a prison the term is prison labor.

In a concentration camp you'd have forced labor. That is probably the language that would be used by groups actually working in this space.

The term slavery is used in the correct way. It is not only labor rights that are denied in Xinjiang but every other right. Uyghurs essentially have no rights. Slaves have no rights. Therefore, Uyghurs in Xinjiang can be considered slaves.

Modern slavery is a fact [0]. China is not the only country concerned. But it does not mean that it does not apply to China or that we are forbidden from using the term when describing Xinjiang.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_21st_century

> Not an english speaker, so is Is "slave" correctly used here or is more like a "metaphor"?

"Slave labor" is a phrase used in English to express morally unacceptable working conditions where the workers have little to no power, as if they were slaves. It's commonly understood that those workers are not slaves in the legal sense.

The way I would define it is that if a person is told to do some job and they literally aren't allowed to quit and/or are physically disallowed from leaving the premises, then they're slaves.

There are also what are called "wage slaves" who can quit in theory but can't afford to.

Literally owning a person or having the right to kill them are kind of an extreme form of slavery. I think situations could be considered slavery even in situations where those don't apply.

There are some situations that are like slavery but they're kind of corner cases that society handles differently. Soldiers generally aren't allowed to quit in the middle of a war. H1B visa workers in the U.S. have more severe repercussions if they quit a job than ordinary workers; they can be kicked out of the country. I don't know what the legal status of forced labor in the U.S. prison system is, but I wouldn't be surprised if some of those situations are effectively slavery. The people who employ undocumented workers can use the threat of reporting the workers to the authorities as leverage to get them to do what they say and not complain.

> I don't know what the legal status of forced labor in the U.S. prison system is, but I wouldn't be surprised if some of those situations are effectively slavery.

Don't ever forget that the part of the US constitution banning slavery has an explicit carve-out for this.

This comment seems in earnest. So I will assume, as a non native English speaker, you have probably heard the expression "that I feel like a slave at work".

This is not what is meant by slave in this context. It is not a feeling. Modern slavery is a fact [0]. Xinjiang concentration camps count as modern slavery. Of course, China is not the only country concerned. But it does not mean that we should not point it out in China.

There are some comments that this should be described as something else - perhaps forced labor. Uyghurs in Xinjiang are deprived not only of their labor rights but also every other right from reproductive to cultural and everything in between.

Slaves essentially have no rights. Uyghurs essentially have no rights. So no, forced labor is not the right term.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_21st_century

>correctly used here

It's atrocity propaganda exaggerate by useful idiots, even if out of genuine ignorance. The perpetuator of the original allegation, Zenz, used the label of "coerced labor", which goes through the euphemism treadmill to become forced labor by state department and now slave labor by the even less informed, because that's how propaganda snowballs.

Labour transfer programs in XJ, like elsewhere in PRC are employment programs. Yes there's pressure by recruiters to fill roster. Or it could be part of parole / work release programs. And there may be exploitation, but that's statistically inevitable for a social program that employs 10s of millions from every region of PRC over decades. Also consider these programs are typically well compensated compared to west due to economic disparity of developed and underdeveloped regions in PRC. And they're contracts with limited duration measured in months.

Analogue example is work program that recruits from rural town /rust belt with zero prospects and average income of 20k and paying them 45k to do manufacturing in a more well developed state for a year. Or apply that to work/release for an inmate incarcerated on low level drug charges. Some of these placements are exploitative because capitalism. In aggregate the programs alleviate poverty and promote development. That's the tier of exploitation being misconstrued as slave labour with the XJ propaganda push.

Modern slavery is a fact [0]. Wikipedia specifically mentions Xinjiang. Wu Mao also has an entry on wikipedia [1].

You are calling people idiots. Please be respectful. This is not in the spirit and guidelines of hacker news.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_21st_century

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29893724

Not idiots, "useful idiots" who can be and are frequently intelligent. It's not meant to be disrespectful, but as a descriptor like WuMao. Who BTW only operates domestically, within PRC and not abroad. And even then WuMaos don't write analysis, they distract with platitudes.

>In political jargon, a useful idiot is a derogatory term for a person perceived as propagandizing for a cause without fully comprehending the cause's goals, and who is cynically used by the cause's leaders.

Wikipedia mentioning a thing and citing the same propaganda does not make it so. Forced labor in laogai sure. Claiming XJ is a parallel laogai program when it's part of Rural Labour Transfer Program is misinformation. It's a paid work program with contracted terms. It's far removed from Laogai slave labour on the spectrum of slave-voluntary work. It's also one of the interventions that aligns with poverty / development strategies around the world versus actual cultural genocide / security state shenanigans going on. But it gets disproportionately maligned regardless.

E: over comment limit, it's not splitting hairs, it's accepted jargon/term. But apologies if it offends, the same way calling/insinuating POVs from PRC perspectives are wumao. Which you have been doing throughout this entire thread. As for sources, I've dropped the relevant subject matter for those interested to research on their own. The fact people can comfortably allege XJ is slave labour based on western sources and have no passing familiarity with context of transfer programs in PRC for poverty alleviation reflects how staggering gap in understanding is.

Idiots or useful idiots. You are splitting hairs. Do not call people idiots period. You should apologize for that.

You still have not specified your sources of facts. So it does not seem to be worthwhile to engage in a genuine constructive conversation on your points.

This is unbelievable. When the dictatorship controls the only "truth" about its country--shutting down dissent internally; preventing access to outsiders...--calling any negative information as propaganda; effectively whitewashing history in the making, etc. It is understandable that there are gaps in knowledge by design, as it helps to control the narrative.

I'm still puzzled how/why some of these comments on here are down-voted; e.g. the comment pointing to wikipedia articles and asking for better discourse.

The tier of exploitation is forced relocation, analogous to PoW camps. PRC makes use of capitalism to develop and grow while relying on force (through coercion, intimidation, violence, discrimination...) for "efficiencies"--for the greater good.

We've seen this kind of thing many times before. Rule with an iron fist; if caught, deflect, lie, blame it on low-level leadership, corruption, or just statistics.

> capitalism to develop and grow while relying on force (through coercion, intimidation, violence, discrimination...) for "efficiencies"--for the greater good.

This is why the entire PoW/force labour accusation is entirely stupid.

Undereducated/underqualified Uyghurs with poor mandarin skills are frankly shit workers that's a massive hassle to exploit for economic efficiencies. There's a reason XPCC had a hard time developing XJ. On top of onerous security, movement, reeducation and other requirements, the amount of money poured into these labour transfer programs for Uyghur worker opportunities are much better spent on Han/other integrated minorities. It doesn't pass the most basic of smell test except by useful idiots who don't know the economics behind labour transfer programs, that again, affects 10s of millions from every province (45M across country in just 2000s). There are 100s of millions poor rural Chinese idle workers with prerequisite language skills that could fill theses roles easier and cheaper. XJ labour transfer is an expensive privilege - these programs are publicized by CCP loudly as wank for poverty alleviation, which is what they are considering the amount of subsidies required to rationalize giving XJ these programs in the first place. It takes extreme ignorance and brainwashing to misconstrue it as PoW slave camps for capitalism. Which is what you'll find on wikipedia citing propaganda sources that some people post like it's impartial while claiming anyone who disagrees is a wumao.

What sources are you referencing that make your argument impartial?

> So is the position of Intel that slave labour in concentration camps is an acceptable means of production?

This is the very definition of a straw man argument.

Very few people actually cares about what really do happen in Xinjiang, hopefully this relatively balanced reporting by Associated Press can shed some light:

https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-lifestyle-ch...

Most people would be unequivocally against slave concentration camps. Do not confuse lack of action with lack of caring.

Effective action may require collective action. But individually, most people care. Yet, collectively, they cannot seem to do anything meaningful. You are making a statement that is the definition of an ecological fallacy [0]

The article you pointed out is hardly balanced. The access of journalists is heavily restricted. Naturally, any information that comes out from a standard news outlet with government sanctioned offices like Associated Press will sound like government propaganda. CCP will not let AP have access to any information that counters the narrative of the propaganda.

For a different take on things, and an outlet that does journalism differently without official representation with CCP, have a look at this piece from VICE [1].

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecological_fallacy

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7AYyUqrMuQ

>Most people would be unequivocally against slave concentration camps.

When they exist. We know they exist in the US (private prisons), but there are no reliable sources that confirm they still exist in China.

Private prisons are well on their way to extinction in America [0]. They're hardly the same issue they were in the 90s.

[0]https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/brea...

The "look at your own backyard first" is a common technique used by Wumao [0].

It is used to reduce the force of any criticism of CCP. Human rights are universal and know no national borders [1].

That being said, thanks for qualifying the often repeated statement in this thread about US prisons. Surely, more needs to be done. That does not mean we need to be silent about Xinjiang slave concentration camps.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29893724 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29893855

There are numerous reliable sources that have confirmed the existence of Chinese Concentration Camps.

Whether you dismiss them is up to you, but the fact remains that numerous sources have reported on the existence of Chinese Concentration Camps.

We have satellite photos, eye witness testimony and even the Chinese government admits the facilities are there but has some nonsense about the people there choosing to be in a barbed wire facility with armed guards.

Are you really suggesting keeping criminals who have had a trial and been found guilty by a jury of their peers is at all the same as a genocidal racial based campaign to remove an ethnic minority?

[1] - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xinjiang_internment_camps

[2] - https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2020/02/asia/xinjiang-china-...

[3] - https://www.rand.org/blog/rand-review/2021/04/chinas-disappe...

[4] - https://2017-2021.state.gov/ccpabuses

[5] - https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/chinas-repression-uyghurs-x...

I'm sorry, but your state media lied to you again: nobody is claiming those institutions don't exist. They do exist - and they are mostly similar to western youth correctional facilities. (Except in China you can't get imprisoned there simply because you wealthy parents wish so - differently from the US, where the "troubled teen camps" are a proper industry.)

Sure, every country on earth keeps their ethnic minorities in a barbed wire facility where they can't leave and are kept under watch by armed guards. Yes, very normal. Nothing to see here. Ignore the DOZENS of facilities with tens of thousands of inmates who have stories of forced sterilization.

This description matches American prisons pretty well. Of course US puts many more people there.

You most likely don't care, but if you want to be educated, here are some Vice documentaries: https://www.vice.com/en/topic/uighur

Parent comment may not care. But just wanted to thank you for the link. Had just seen one documentary piece on VICE. I was not aware of these other pieces.

> So is the position of Intel that slave labour in concentration camps is an acceptable means of production?

It would be very important to have some movement to avoid and boycott products made with slave labour from prisions, including the hundreds of thousands of slave labour from US prisions. This would be an important movement to end remaining slavery.

> So is the position of Intel that slave labour in concentration camps is an acceptable means of production?

Maybe their position is that they have not established as a fact that there is slave labour in concentration camps in Xinjiang? Have you considered that as an alternative possibility?

From the article:

> The letter now reads that the company prohibits "any human trafficked or involuntary labour such as forced, debt bonded, prison, indentured, or slave labour throughout your extended supply chains."

That automatically covers Xinjiang is there is slave labour there, in additional to all other instances of slave labour, no? That sounds like a better wording than the original.

I can believe the Earth is flat if I avoid the evidence and don't care about congruence - especially if financially motivated.

I could not agree with you more, it amazes me the mental gymnastics some will go through in the quest to convince themselves otherwise of something wholly obvious. Sure, you could take the CCP’s word for it (because their behavior is not at all suspicious and they have a great track record when it comes to human rights). And sure, to some that might hold a lot of weight. However, even if rumored, don’t you want to be the one that doesn’t support genocide regardless?

The even bigger tell is when the UN wanted to go into China to independently investigate, the CCP denied access. They don't want to be a team player in the global society/economy.

Engaging in epistemic and semantic hair splitting does not alter the reality of slave concentration camps or make it any less worse.

Here is a recent article [0] on rape and forced sterilization of Uyghur women.

[0] https://nypost.com/2021/12/18/uyghur-women-recall-horrors-of...

Here's an article on the same thing happening in the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison_rape_in_the_United_Stat....

from the NYPost article

"The year after she was arrested off the street, still in China, she was summoned to a police station and told that she needed to complete her training. "

if it's the same as prison rape in the US then what prison is she in? Further, prison rape is a crime.

"Her story is, tragically, not uncommon for members of the minority Uyghur religion, with Turkish roots, in President XI Jinping’s China. Since around 2016, they have been pulled off the street and sent to reeducation camps — where reports have surfaced about people being tortured, raped and even killed. They are sent there under the auspices of learning a trade and having their patriotism reinforced."

your attempt at equating this with the crime of prison rape in the US is reprehensible.

Interestingly enough, if something is bad in the US, it can also be bad elsewhere.

Even worse though, there are indications that this behavior is institutionally supported and desired in China. After all, if the local governors make rules to force non-Uyghur men to sleep in the bed of Uyghur women (even married ones) and offer forced sterilization otherwise, perhaps - just perhaps - you are peddling a false equivalence.

By the way, the latter meets the definition of genocide. In case you care.

I'm not sure what you're saying here. The parent is talking about rape and forced sterilization by people in positions of power in these camps. Your link is just talking about prison rape. There's no mention of forced sterilization. There is discussion of it talking about guards (4% of inmates are sexuality assaulted and <10% of those cases are by facility members) but the data is both old and low and the article talks about the US extending legal rights to inmates (2003 Prison Rape Elimination Act) whereas China's official claim is that there's nothing bad happening (they're just "reeducation campus"). No one is condoning prison rape in the US, especially prison rape by facility members. But these are drastically different things.

I don't know how someone can compare these things with a straight face.

This is just whataboutism. You can care about both these issues, it's allowed.

sterilization as well: https://www.npr.org/2020/09/16/913398383/whistleblower-alleg...

Intel has no motive to falsely allege forced labor use in China. In fact, Intel has every motive to ignore abuses so as not to alienate the CCP. So, your implication that Intel jumped the gun and made false accusations without proof lacks motive, at the very least.

The motivation was likely some compliance move with the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act according to the TFA. There is no indication that Intel's initial wording was prompted by their own investigations in Xinjiang.

Clearly they believe (as do you) that specific mention of Xinjiang was not required for compliance. Is the theory that Intel intentionally added the word to make some moral or at least political point, at China's expense? I guess I don't buy that, because one of the upsides of being a ruthless corporation out only for profit is that you don't do things that risk profit.

So is the position of Intel that slave labour in concentration camps is an acceptable means of production?

You read correctly. That is exactly their position.

Not that they are fans of slave labour or of what is happening to the Uyghur people, per se. Just that in the scheme of things - as long the sales channels remain open and unimpeded - they consider it perfectly acceptable to do business in countries where genocide is happening right there, in plain view, for all to see. And will even go so far as to obsequiously apologize to the authorities in these countries for showing event the slightest hint of a suggestion that they felt otherwise.

Very much like back in ... certain countries at certain times that we're not supposed to make comparisons to.

If slavery, segregation, religious prosecution, mass killings and forced sterilizations took place in the West at some point, does it make those things OK for the remainder of humanity’s history?

No one was perfect at all times from day 1, but we should try to hold our partners, and by implication ourselves, to higher standards now that we have agreed to put the aforementioned actions at the extreme left side of the bad-to-good scale.

Wait and see. Maybe they just need to get their version of the Holocaust to get it out of their system. Deep down, they are good people doing horrific things. So, we just need to let them catch up while they repeat history's horrific acts with impunity.

It’s unclear whether without strong worldwide recognition and condemnation it will ever be out of the system, and I’m afraid what made Holocaust to be recognized and condemned is that those who did it started and lost a violent war against other nations.

(I know you jest.)

Indeed. Thanks for that perspective. Sad but true.

It's fascinating how one can actually believe Intel is manufacturing stuff using "slave labour in concentration camps" purely because his state propaganda tells them so.

>Why would Intel not take a position against Xinjiang slave concentration camps if presumably most of the supply chain does not depend on it? Would it be that much "trouble"?

Why would they? Corporations have two choices now. Bend the knee and stay in the good graces of a government that controls access to the largest consumer market in the world, or take a moral stance and win meaningless social brownie points. There's not even a decision to be made.

CCP may arguably control the world's largest consumer market. That is debatable when considering the European Union as a single market or even India. Considering either consumption level or sheer number of consumers, it is not entirely clear that China is the world's largest consumer market.

But, let's presume that it is. CCP simply does not allow genuine access to sell goods or services. There is a reason why Google and Facebook and so many other dominant companies are practically non existent in China.

So the benefit of access to a supposed largest consumer market that is heavily restricted to foreigners seems largely inconsequential. Is this a wrong interpretation?

It's still accessible to Intel and Microsoft. I don't think China is capable yet of producing equivalent goods.

On the other hand, what Google and Facebook did can be done just as well by others.

Actually, maybe China is indeed able to produce decent Intel-compatible processors. Not sure.

How much longer will it be accessible for Intel and Microsoft though? CCP does not think twice about pulling the rug on local tech giants [0]. Why would it hesitate for Intel and Microsoft? It seems like only a matter of time.

As far as chips in particular, CCP is pushing hard to make chips locally [1]. So again, just a matter of time before Intel gets replaced in China.

Is the Intel leadership being incredibly short-sighted besides of course being devoid of ethical common sense?

[0] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-06-24/how-xi-an...

[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/10/25/china-pushes-to-design-its-o...

> There's not even a decision to be made.

Look at e.g. Google. Yes, they've had some trouble sticking to their decision over the years, but they have so far. Corporations staying out do exist.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com