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Comment by FooBarWidget | Hacker News Reader

If only we are consistent in applying this standard. Are Hawaiian, native American, Puerto Rican, Ryuku etc independence activists' wish also important or is only Taiwan's wish important? If only Taiwan, then we do truly believe in this standard or is it just a moral cover for geopolitical interest?

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This is kind of a silly comment. Of course the US interest in Taiwan has to do with geopolitical interest rather than a moral standing.

That doesn't stop me (or anyone else) from believing that the Taiwanese should be entitled to self-determination. Or the Hawaiians, Indigenous peoples, or Puerto Ricans for that matter. If support for that aim happens to come from the US then that's fine by me. Moral consistency from a national government is not something I require or expect.

Or Eastern Ukraine for that matter. If there were actually concern about the self-determination of people who lived there, they would have been asked. We don't ask, because we know what the answer would be.

Well they were asked. They voted to be part of an independent Ukraine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_Ukrainian_independence_re...

Should they be asked again? Maybe. But it’s impossible to do fairly at the present time.

Taiwan has been independent in fact for a long time. Changning the status quo seems to require more justification. If large majorities of Taiwanese want to join China than that is their prerogative.

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