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Comment by swingandamiss | Hacker News Reader

No, because I'd rather not support our economic and military rivals.

I'm Canadian so this sentiment has little value in 2026 unfortunately.

Also, frankly, as a fellow Canadian it's pretty clear that the biggest "rival" the US has right now is itself. Just passed out in the corner puking on itself shouting about all the foreigners who won't talk to it.

Canadians warming up to China makes me think of Germany becoming increasingly reliant on Russia in the 2010s.

Yes, someone can still blow up a pipe and they look the other way. On the other hand, you can also draw parallels to themselves becoming increasingly reliant on US vs UK in the past.

Murica just has a MAGA problem. We can still be friends if and when you sort that out. Us Canadians like most of you quite a lot.

I'm from Europe and I hate America way more than China now. Used to be about equal but then Trump started extorting Ukraine, threatening their own allies and sending billions to Israel to help with a genocide. I think that exposed America for what it really is.

China is enabling russia way more than trump, China doesn't care too much about 'morals' either. Chinese companies have been quite important in the construction sector of the WB settlements. Even though I'm not a great fan of Trump I don't see a reason at all to prefer the chinese.

buy inference from european companies running open chinese (or that one from google) models

As a New Zealander, I would agree - no reason to prefer the Chinese. But Trump's America is not an attractive option either and there's no reason to prefer it. And given the choice between two ugly options, the rational choice is the cheaper one, surely.

China is a somewhat neutral player, supplying both Russians and Ukrainians. Their attitude and action is way less one-sided than Trump's; especially in the first year of his latest presidency.

With trump his actions being one sided you mean one sided towards ukraine? They still get lots of Intel from Americans and Americans hardly but anything from Russia. But you're right that china supplies both I wouldn't exactly call that neutral as much as just in their self interest.

How is China supplying Ukraine?

Fiber optic cable for one

Drone components and electric batteries

we don't really know if Ukrainians buy it on aliexpress or through European supply chains.

>China is enabling russia way more than trump, China doesn't care too much about 'morals' either

The difference is China has a good reason to. China doesn't look appealing because they're more moral than anyone else, but what they have going for them is that they still behave like a rational actor. At least their behavior is intelligible in terms of their own interests. The world can deal with a long term selfish superpower but not an unhinged one

I don't think there's a person in China that has as much of a seething hatred for America's 'allies' in Europe as J.D. Vance or half of the American techbro commentariat does

As much as the US has been easy to hate lately, I don't hesitate to say Xi Jinping as the most powerful man on Earth would be much, much worse.

He is the most powerful man on earth. He’s just smart enough to let the US get as fucked as possible before making a move.

I agree but I like to take the time to remind the Americans how far they’ve fallen.

When was the last time China bombed another country?

Does it count as supporting a rival if your an American using an American inference provider self-hosting an open weight model from a Chinese lab?

Agreed, and also because I support freedom of speech!

Neither the US nor the Chinese companies are on your side then. They both censor, just different topics.

But at least I can run Chinese models locally, and strip a lot of that censorship/refusal.

As long as that speech doesn't come from CNN or criticise Charlie Kirk, Israel or Trump? I'm sceptical about how much the US really values free speech

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