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Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

reuters.com

251–260 of 372 posts

Re: Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

#251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Think of a US media tycoon who went to China to meet with the Secretary of State, used the media to incite riots in his country, appeared on the streets of protest, and publicly called on China to intervene in the United States. What are the consequences of this? That would be a wonderful thing if my government were currently persecuting 1 million people solely based on their religious and cultural identity. The co…

Every time we discuss China's issues, some people always raise Xinjiang. The evidence presented was nothing more than the testimony of a few people and photos of unknown time and place. Chinese people who know technology can read these reports, and I can say that most of them will not believe them. Because the CCP has always promoted that 56 ethnic groups are one family. If these things happen, they will spread local…

One big family.

But what if you don't want to be in the family? In the west we have that freedom to be different.

We also have the freedom to say the equivalent of Bush did 9/11 : on June 4 1989 the CCP massacred thousands.

Now the point of one big family is that the stability of the family, keeping everything going together peacefully means you don't rock the boat, you have to not speak out about how your uncle is a criminal. One big family ensures family members voluntarily censor themselves and consider those saying June 1989 Tianamen Square as literal existential threats to the stability of the family. Where in the west we can say Trump is part of a global conspiracy to X,y,z in China to do the same means attacking the very identity and stability of your own person, your bio family, your town and your nation. The story that is believed is that this stability was won through so much bloodshed. Anything must be done to stop rocking the boat. Chinese people really cannot be free as they don't know what it is. They see HK as an alcoholic daughter that needs to be treated to get well and join the rest of the family. Same with the Muslims. They are both different and in China difference is a fundamental threat.

It's fascinating.

Re: Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

#252
post #231
post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is it useful? (Sorry for my ignorance)

I am more worried being implicated with distribution of child pornography. The government is watching what comes through the pipes, and it’s your name on the pipe.

Oh in my case it's an entry bridge I run, not an exit relay. That's the one you really need to worry about being. It's not recommended anyone does that (at least at home). What I'm recommending is very safe as it doesn't directly connect your computer or IP address to anything bad. I've run this node for about 2 years now. Tor project has excellent explainer pages about the risks and how it all works.

If however you mean not being involved with the Tor project in any capacity whatsoever, I really insist that that's the wrong, and a very dangerous anti-freedom philosophy to take.

At some point, we have to take a stand and defend the right to absolute encryption for anybody, no questions asked. Why? Because this is the normal human experience.

Privacy is normal and healthy. Having everything you do recorded and stored by others permanently, is not normal or healthy.

The more you use and promote the use of encryption, privacy and anti-censorship technologies in benign and good contexts like mine, the less it's dismissed as an automatic indicator of crime.

As far as I'm concerned, I consider myself lucky that I have legal freedom of association in my own country so that I can even safely run this Tor bridge. As to the court of public opinion on the social level in my community, all I need to do is explain this important humanitarian use case that I do it for.

Re: Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

#253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But when it comes to things that actually harm profits and challenge shareholder responsibilities, they stay mum. Cynical but this is why- it would cost them a lot , at least today. The Chinese government has zero reservations about sandbagging US corporations that publicly critique it or otherwise don't fall in line - just ask Google, Facebook, or the Houston Rockets. You wont hear a peep out of Apple until they'r…

If any firm in history has ever been rich enough to weather a bit of a business setback, surely Apple would be?

And what does Apple get in return? Some lip service praise from media? Would US government compensate Apple with tax break? What about the jobs that might be lost?

Think of Google then. Google's exit from China achieves one thing, that is becoming irrelevant to the Chinese people, while giving its competitor a free run of the world biggest internet market.

Control through market is a trick that US has been playing since WWII. It is proven to be effective.

Re: Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

#254
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That part is REALLY weird.

Isn’t that pretty standard? For example, Julian Assange, Kim Dotcom, and Richard O'Dwyer were all prosecuted for crimes committed outside the US.

Kim Dotcom and Richard O'Dwyer were pretty ridiculous, but Julian Assange was trafficking in what he knew were stolen U.S. government secrets. I think there's a good first amendment defence for Assange, based on the public good and his role in whistleblowing, but I can understand why the UK would extradite someone allegedly knowingly handling stolen state secrets of an ally.

Re: Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

#255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why?

Because the US won’t want to relinquish their global hegemony and PRC has been slowly preparing for the moment when they can make their move.

Both have nuclear weapons.

If the war is going to happen it will happen somewhere close to China, because the reverse isn't possible.

But if you are talking about winning a war that is close to China, against China, you are not in the right mind.

Truth to be told, not even US can afford to total war against China on its own. You need a WW3 to drag everyone into the battle.

Re: Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

#256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time we discuss China's issues, some people always raise Xinjiang. The evidence presented was nothing more than the testimony of a few people and photos of unknown time and place. Chinese people who know technology can read these reports, and I can say that most of them will not believe them. Because the CCP has always promoted that 56 ethnic groups are one family. If these things happen, they will spread local…

One big family. But what if you don't want to be in the family? In the west we have that freedom to be different. We also have the freedom to say the equivalent of Bush did 9/11 : on June 4 1989 the CCP massacred thousands. Now the point of one big family is that the stability of the family, keeping everything going together peacefully means you don't rock the boat, you have to not speak out about how your uncle is a…

Yes, diversity is crucial for the survival of our species. The more I learn and think about all things, I'm seeing it's linked to genetic diversity, and many other physical health issues.

Diversity is hard to swallow, given our tribalistic nature, but we have no choice but to foster and protect it, now that we're hyper globalised.

China's action to standardise and promote monoculture is a big failure that will eventually collapse in the future. It's just a question of when.

Re: Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

#257

This is going to be very unpopular. History repeats itself. Just 30 years ago the Soviet Union was dissolved. If you study this dissolution process, you see that demonstrations and the ambition to sovereignty was nothing new in the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, but in comparison to the 50s, 60s and 70s, Gorbachev did not use military force to prevent countries from splitting off. If China lets HK go independent,…

First of all, there are those who asked for independence but that is definitely not the majority.

Secondly, if we are looking at history, why would we look at USSR instead of the history of China? There is never a regime change until a civil war broke out, and there is always blood involved.

Re: Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

#258

As a Chinese, I think it is reasonable to arrest a leader who violated the national security law. Think of a US media tycoon who went to China to meet with the Secretary of State, used the media to incite riots in his country, appeared on the streets of protest, and publicly called on China to intervene in the United States. What are the consequences of this? Please read more media from a different standpoint and thi…

> What are the consequences of this?

His Twitter account would briefly get more clicks than Trump's, and a swarm of congress-critters would fight each other for the privilege of having him hauled in front of their panel for a grueling, multi-hour session of righteous posturing, all televised live. Then the late night shows would create condensed, only slightly exaggerated but far more entertaining versions of their performance. By day four, everybody would have moved on to the next outrage du jour.

Re: Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

#259
post #237
post #91

I highly recommend doing some reading about what Xi and the CCP are really thinking and planning. It's a fascinating situation, and I'm not sure we or even they precisely know. But there has been a feel of a very dark turn overall in recent years, where perhaps an alignment between an appearance of widespread and growing failures of the US-led world order combined with China's unabated growing power, has cemented in…

But how high is the ceiling? What are you allowed to express, even though it’s controversial? Westerners all know that the ability to criticize those above you is the only check valve in the system, what drives our society to fix its actual, true problems. Not the problems that the governing elite recognizes. Riots are an expression, and they were in Hong Kong too. But the CCP did not listen.

This is a very rosy presentation of westerners that I'd go so far as to say is a lie that western people tell themselves. Where is the protection for critics of progressivism when they lose their jobs in the US for example? Where is the outcry when Europeans advocating collecting racial information during crimes get blanketly labeled racist for something that's standard practice across the world? The west has rapidly been devolving into authoritarianism as well, it's simply social authoritarianism rather than government authoritarianism.

Re: Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai arrested under national security law

#260
post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also this. The Chinese communist party can't censor TLS 1.3 and ESNI. Update your website https://twitter.com/mrkoot/status/1292358618004828160?s=20 Also promote bitcoin in China. CCP survives on the money it can threaten and coerce out of its popularity. Bitcoin removes people's assets from CCP control

Little does it help you if they block it completely...

I don't know in Hong Kong but it's blocked already in the mainland since a week ago. There are currently workarounds but they will probably get around to blocking those as well.

Here is the article https://www.zdnet.com/article/china-is-now-blocking-all-encr...

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