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Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent

nytimes.com

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Re: Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent

#191

Post by olalonde »

em3rgent0rdr wrote: post #128
olalonde wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming it was a rhetorical question: I am basing my observation on many private conversations I had over the years (e.g. with my wife). I think most foreigners in China would agree with this as well. In case your question wasn't rhetorical: nothing would happen. That is, unless you were a very public figure or made it your life's mission. Fun fact: China has a very low incarceration rate, about 15% that of the USA.…

China has a lower incarceration rate, but they also have a higher rate of execution. Even for things like drug trafficking (which most of the US prison population consists of). These stricter punishments surely make people more afraid of breaking the law...and I'm sure many chinese are justifiably afraid of speaking out due to fear of the consequences. So the fact that there is a smaller prisoner population isn't tha…

I agree that incarceration rates alone don't paint the whole picture. The "hard pill to swallow" was that Chinese people don't value free speech as much as we do, even if you account for the deterrents. That's a hard pill to swallow, at least to a person like me who values free speech.

Re: Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent

#192

Post by shmerl »

Bakary wrote: post #162
shmerl wrote: post #99

Money talks, human rights walks.

Without a minimum threshold of money and power you can't maintain human rights, let alone turn them into international norms.

Isn't it the opposite case here? Lot's of power and money involved, while human rights are violated.

Re: Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent

#193

Post by smallnamespace »

euyyn wrote: post #143
smallnamespace wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While you may be right about the CCP's motives, China has its own long history of political thought, including the correct role of the State and public dissent. Guess what? For the vast majority of Chinese history, rulers viewed public dissent as tantamount to open rebellion and reacted accordingly. Political systems are in part products of their culture. Free speech is not part of the cultural or political history o…

For the vast majority of Spanish history, rulers viewed public dissent as tantamount to open rebellion and reacted accordingly. Same with most European countries, if not all.

And how many hundreds of years and how much blood was spilled before the principles of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution took root in Europe? Would it have happened faster if instead external parties tried to push it on Europeans?

Re: Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent

#194

Post by coldtea »

biggerbistro wrote: post #187
coldtea wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apartheid was the result of white western settlers screwing and mistreating over the local black population, after the region got colonized. This is a single country, with its own culture, history and tradition, minding its own affairs. And blacks were clearly against apartheid and fighting fiercely for decades. Have you talked to many locals in China and found out they were against their regime?

>And blacks were clearly against apartheid and fighting fiercely for decades. Have you talked to many locals in China and found out they were against their regime? No, they were all killed decades ago. Why does it matter if it is black vs white or chinese vs chinese? Sounds like a double standard to me.

>Why does it matter if it is black vs white or chinese vs chinese? Sounds like a double standard to me.

Because (a) the whites were colonizers, where Chinese are at home in China. And because in apartheid it was whites against blacks, whereas in China it's not "chinese vs chinese" -- chinese in general LIKE their government.

Re: Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent

#195

Post by thinkfurther »

sriku wrote: post #12

Apple stood for privacy in the US where privacy is part of law. It didn't stand by privacy in China where privacy in some forms is prohibited as part of law. Asserting the US law in China would discount China's sovereignty, implicitly declaring "your principles are inferior to ours". A global company needs to be sensitive to these political/cultural differences and accommodate them. Even in the US where "privacy" is…

The Eichmann defense for corporations. Lovely.

> unless the goal of your company is to champion a particular political ideology

The "Eichmann pathology" is even worse than most ideologies, since the content of the ideologies can change, but the conformism does not. By that logic, the problem with making deals with, say, the Nazis, was that it was illegal during war, nothing else, and if a company requires acceptance of that to exist, I require that company to not exist.

> for something that is not a universal law on the planet

Yes, and? Is there a universal law "on the planet" that you should only act according to some imaginary universal laws? Is there an universal law that a company should not "champion an ideology", or that companies just have to operate globally? Why can't people be restricted to acting in circles they are accountable in, why is that such a crazy idea?

Re: Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent

#196

Post by ksec »

int_19h wrote: post #146
coldtea wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The CCP restricts free speech because it fears losing its ruling status. And that's China's own problem (or lack thereof) as a sovereign nation, not something for Apple or the US to decide. Not every country wants (or even works better) with a US style system, and interventionism has led to disastrous results in the not that far past.

Apple is still a US company at the end of the day. If it makes profits from supporting censorship in China, that makes it a US problem. One way to not have that problem is to let China has its own Apple - how's that for non-interventionism and non-colonialism?

That means every single nation would have to have its own company in every industry. No US food company would operate in Europe by this standard. And no Chinese Companies should sell anything back to US due to what you just describe.

Re: Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent

#197

Post by thinkfurther »

coldtea wrote: post #183
nabla9 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So was apartheid.

Apartheid was the result of white western settlers screwing and mistreating over the local black population, after the region got colonized. This is a single country, with its own culture, history and tradition, minding its own affairs. And blacks were clearly against apartheid and fighting fiercely for decades. Have you talked to many locals in China and found out they were against their regime?

> Have you talked to many locals in China and found out they were against their regime?

The ones whose opinion would be interesting are in prison, or no longer locals.

There are whole bookshelves of books describing the wholesome family and city life people "on the right side" in Nazi Germany engaged in. They had their pleasures, their had their excuses, and I care not for either. The phrase "whitewashed tombs" comes to mind.

> blacks were clearly against apartheid

Blacks? Or "the blacks"? Because I'm sure I could find you Uncle Toms, there's always some. And since I also could find you people fighting against the Chinese regimes since Mao, the sentence "Chinese were clearly against oppression" would also be correct and we achieved nothing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1...

Really, the nerve. Did I ask the dead if they are against their regime?

Similarly, as a German I flat out don't care much for people from the GDR who aren't dissing it. I don't care if that was their "culture" (what a totally empty word, it's like a void pointer). They survived it with their blinders intact, and that says something about them, not the GDR. I feel the same way about "the West" before anyone asks, but that doesn't mean I find more backwards tyrannies cute. I don't need to borrow their blind eyes to see what I see, and if I have to be against thousands of them to be for those I HAVE to be for to not spit out when I look in the mirror, so be it. The more, the merrier.

Re: Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent

#198

Post by ksec »

qyv wrote: post #88
sriku wrote: post #12

Apple stood for privacy in the US where privacy is part of law. It didn't stand by privacy in China where privacy in some forms is prohibited as part of law. Asserting the US law in China would discount China's sovereignty, implicitly declaring "your principles are inferior to ours". A global company needs to be sensitive to these political/cultural differences and accommodate them. Even in the US where "privacy" is…

Apple is free to this move for business reasons, that is certainly true. But they can no longer also claim the moral high ground as a defender of personal liberty. Human rights do not stop at international borders. They cannot have it both ways.

You cant have an explicit define Set of Human Rights internationally.

Because most Chinese users are perfectly fine with the rule and law. They would rather follow what CCP said and have an Apple product.

Re: Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent

#200

Post by snakeanus »

coldtea wrote: post #183
nabla9 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So was apartheid.

Apartheid was the result of white western settlers screwing and mistreating over the local black population, after the region got colonized. This is a single country, with its own culture, history and tradition, minding its own affairs. And blacks were clearly against apartheid and fighting fiercely for decades. Have you talked to many locals in China and found out they were against their regime?

> Have you talked to many locals in China and found out they were against their regime?

I actually have. In fact, every single one that I talked with was against their regime.

The Chinese culture is not the victim here. The "evil whites" are not trying to mess with the eastern cultures in this case. Instead, the Chinese people are the victims, victims of the fascist regime that rules over them.

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