I get the impression that we're now in an undeclared Cold War with China.
This is certainly not a cold war - it's a trade war, it's competition, it's different cultures... but it is not war frozen in place by the threat of annihilation.
It's more than just a traditional (import/export) trade war. It's very economically driven, with government-backed businesses buying up businesses all over the world and then trying to exert (economical) control via those, while they barely allow businesses to do the same in China.
I've visited China nearly every year for the past 6 years and never had any sort of issues. I thought all the security personnel I encountered at the airport, immigration, subway stations etc in China were very professional and respectful. In contrast to one of the last times I was returning from China to the U.S. and witnessed a highly unprofessional U.S. CBP officer who was yelling and berating incoming internation…
In China if you're a (especially white) foreigner/tourist you tend to be treated better than the locals might be. But you should remember that you're a guest and not push your luck.
The current administration has been bullying China incessantly. I'm not going to say if the reasons were justified or not because it's complicated, but we shouldn't be surprised by China's response. It's not like we're actively trying to improve relations either.
China's state-sponsored IP theft has been called the largest transfer of wealth in history. I'm honestly curious what the best diplomatic strategy is to combat it, other than declaring war.
There's no good way of combating it that doesn't end in war. Sanctions will lead to more Chinese public support for that war. Perhaps this leads the CCP to become complacent and fight us before they can win. That's probably the best conventional scenario (for the West)
Unconventional scenario: We steal traditional Chinese medicine and deny we took it. It achieves pretty much nothing but hopefully some Chinese people will understand why we did it and realise their government was naughty.
I've been to China a few times, most recently in late 2018. I traveled overland by train from Beijing to Xian and then to Shanghai. Everything as a non-chinese citizen was just harder than it was when I visited in 2014. Buying train tickets was a massive hassle without a Chinese ID. Paying for anything was difficult because many places no longer take cash and you can't really get a proper WeChat account as a foreigne…
Posted 10 mins ago and already downvoted. Do HN not have algos to stop this astroturfing behaviour? It’s becoming very prevalent for anything that criticises the CCP.
That would risk interfering with the astroturfing that our own intelligentsia does here and across the entire internet. In fact, our own government probably has an interest in obscuring what they are doing in China -- the facial recognition and AI research.
I suspect if people were to look at the contents of the TPP we "pulled out of," they might determine we just turned around and did all that stuff anyway.
So yeah, I'm guessing it creates problems for astroturf world, i.e. hn, if they try to stop foreign interests from violating FTC laws because whatever measures taken would also stop Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and gestapoville, i.e. sv, from protecting the interests of our own intelligentsia who want to do exactly the same stuff here they are doing abroad.
Use this to negotiate hazard pay with your company when traveling to China. There's money to be made by leveraging the difference between perceived and actual risk.
Posted 10 mins ago and already downvoted. Do HN not have algos to stop this astroturfing behaviour? It’s becoming very prevalent for anything that criticises the CCP.
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If you can't see the astroturfing that happens everywhere online, you are the idiot who is incapable of comprehending things. I promise.
Posted 10 mins ago and already downvoted. Do HN not have algos to stop this astroturfing behaviour? It’s becoming very prevalent for anything that criticises the CCP.
This is by design, there's a lot of money in Chinese startups so it makes sense for YC to try and appease the regime. There are a couple superusers who will send this post to 3rd page in an hour or less. And everyone who speaks out gets a ban or warning from dang because of "rule violation". At the same time if you post anything, no matter how unsubstantiated, that criticizes US or liberal democracies or their tech c…
Wow, nobody's scolded you yet for breaking site guidelines.
I'm amazed the subject of vote manipulation is so taboo on this site, especially when half the people here know how easy it is to do, given the proper resources.
Not just arrested but tortured, as we've seen with the two Canadian Michaels and the British Simon Cheng. Edit: British-employed not actually British
Leaving the discussion on right or wrong aside, the 2 Canadians were not targeted at random and were clearly on a Chinese government list of foreigners with close links to foreign governments' agencies that the Chinese let operate "at their pleasure". A bit like when e.g. Russia arrests and expels/imprisons Western spies the US/UK immediately know which Russians on their soil to target in the same way in a tit-for-ta…
But this is the same faulty reasoning that led the press to underestimate the danger of covid19. The probability of arbitrary and unbounded detention and torture is very small, but the change in personal utility would be so terrible that you have to consider the risk profile of travelling to China to be similar to wingsuit-skydiving or exposure to radiation.
Not just arrested but tortured, as we've seen with the two Canadian Michaels and the British Simon Cheng. Edit: British-employed not actually British
Chinese government is constantly challenging the validity of foreign passport if the person is ethnically Han Chinese. Governments must apply diplomatic pressure go get their citizens free.
This is also something Iran does - in theory someone can renounce Iranian citizenship, but it never really happens.
Essentially, if your father is Iranian, you are Iranian, even if you were born outside Iran, and you must go to Iran to request renunciation - which can be denied, and is hardly inviting for someone criticising the regime.
I would say only 1 Michael, The other one sold drugs in a country that specifically banned drugs
This is incorrect. The two Michaels have been accused of spying. You're thinking of a third Canadian Robert Schellenberg. His punished was suddenly changed from 15 years in prison to a death sentence after a recent retrial. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-53104303 https://globalnews.ca/news/5257482/robert-schellenberg-death...
IIRC, Schellenberg requested re-trial to try to take advantage of the politics despite that a re-trial had the possibility of increasing the penalty to death penalty even without political motivation. That is, he gambled and lost.