China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization • Hacker News Board

Re: China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization

#71

Post by twofornone » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:10 PM UTC

unethical_ban wrote: post #44

twofornone wrote: post #12

My only surprise is that China hasn't mentioned the rabidly biased cabal of editors that gatekeep any remotely political article and bully any "non-pc" editors off the platform. Probably because the divisiveness is useful to China's rise, and it wouldn't surprise me if they are behind some of the editing. It's kind of offensive that wikipedia still has an image of neutrality when the entrenched activist editors refus…

Your post is deceptively vague. What "perspective" (dogwhistle for opinion) do you feel Wikipedia isn't validating for you?

I mean this post is literally it. Look at the talk page of literally any remotely politicized article and you will see a consistent, massive power imbalance in one direction, enforced with implicit conflations like the one you're making with your reference to dog whistling.

Given the wide range of policies on which the American left and right differ, "perspective" is an appropriate and unloaded term. Perhaps you are offended my gall to suggest that we treat right and left leaning perspectives on equal footing, but there is no deception on my part here. There is far more to "right of center" than racism and so called whiteness, but reading from "authoritative" institutions like wikipedia, you'd never know it. And that's entirely due to bullying and bias from entrenched activist editors. It's telling that what is excluded under the guise of "trolling" almost exclusively leans in one direction.

It's not just wikipedia and it is disenfranchisement, to the degree that recent polls suggest approximately a majority of republicans and something like 35% of democrats are supposedly starting to look at balkanization/secession favorably. Is this really the path you want to go down?

Re: China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization

#72

Post by GauntletWizard » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:13 PM UTC

satao wrote: post #67

perihelions wrote: post #38

Of course Wikimedia won't take any action to appease this totalitarian nonsense. But, most for-profit companies do exactly that. When was the last time any Hollywood movie or mainstream entertainment mentioned Taiwanese conflict? When do you last remember seeing "Free Tibet"? Or any Tibet? Chinese film censors can apply billions of dollars of pressure, simply to change a single word. Who can withstand that? Wikimedia…

It's even crazier because when you are not american you realize that Hollywood is also the biggest soft propaganda agency for the USA. When have you seen a movie about the USSR winning the WW2? Or about the Guantanamo Bay?

I believe Enemy at the Gates was a major blockbuster.

Re: China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization

#73

Post by lelandfe » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:22 PM UTC

adventured wrote: post #34

fouric wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can think of the WHO, John Cena's Twitter apology, Blizzard, the NBA, and Apple, but what else is there?

Hollywood - the movie industry more broadly - is also mostly gone now. They're all cowards, terrified of doing or saying anything critical of China (for exactly the same reason the NBA is, fear of losing the China market). They should be at the forefront of being critical of an illiberal superpower, given their supposed ideological leanings as an industry. Instead they're hiding in the back of the room, they'll be th…

I don’t think this should surprise anyone. Hollywood has no ideological anything beyond “make more money,” and for some franchises China is not just a market - it’s the market.

The Transformers series especially wound up being money printing machines in China.

Even overlooking the pressure China doubtlessly applies to Hollywood, the execs greenlighting scripts would have to start hating money to approve anything that jeopardizes revenue from Chinese theaters.

Re: China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization

#74

Post by pessimizer » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:22 PM UTC

rsj_hn wrote: post #52

FooBarWidget wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back in the 70s, the KMT definitely supported the One China Principle. They were still firmly dreaming about retaking the mainland. Back then the mainland and Taiwan even regularly fired shells at each other, not to actually attack, but as a statement by both sides to foreigners that the China-Taiwan issue is an internal China matter (namely a civil war), and not one of Taiwan being an independent state.

We have North and South Korea when the communist revolution succeeded in the north but not the South. In the U.S., West Virginia split off from Virginia when most of Virginia joined the confederacy but a part didn't. Civil Wars, partial rebellions, partial revolutions, are one the mechanisms of state formation.

We have North and South Korea because of a US invasion, the massacre of tens of thousands of people in the South with any sort of left/social-liberal sympathies, and a fully fascist government propped up by the US that lasted until the 80s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilminism

It's nothing to respect. The US is something to respect, because it's got a lot more economic and military power than poor backwards NK. Through the US, South Korea became a country. That's the mechanism of state formation.

China doesn't bow to the US, so it's an entirely different dynamic. I say entirely different but the creation of Taiwan was a forceful takeover of an inhabited island by a retreating army who ruled with an iron fist. It was under martial law for 40 years. The nicest thing I hear people say about Taiwan is that it's 1) not China, and 2) not that oppressive anymore.

The idea that China would suddenly respect that is weird. Plenty of people in Taiwan support unification.

It also isn't like people who also wish to deal with China don't deal with Taiwan as if it were a country, they just don't call it one. It's like when they tried to call gay marriage "civil unions" in order to maintain the letter of homophobic policies while abandoning the substance.

Re: China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization

#75

Post by Supermancho » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:23 PM UTC

aww_dang wrote: post #32

Supermancho wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think you would do well to distinguish between the CCP and China the nation. Why is that? Granted, the people of China individually work within the gaps of totalitarian control. Ok. The country of (historic and modern) China is whatever the CCP leadership dictates.

Individuals are not the collective. Not only is it inaccurate as a generalization, but it personifies the collective. A nation state is an abstract concept. Politicians and leaders act. Individuals may agree or disagree. Abstractions have no agency. This is most apparent for me in the false narrative of, "China lifted a billion people out of poverty". Unpack that one. This advancement is relative to a largely agraria…

> Individuals are not the collective. Not only is it inaccurate as a generalization, but it personifies the collective. A nation state is an abstract concept.

A nation state (which is a political organization) is the way that populations interact on the political stage. A nation state presents representatives which uniformly have a manner of control over the population and the forces (eg economic and/or social and/or military) that population can wield. So this "abstract concept" is not relevant in any way to the discussion. China is whatever the CCP says it is, because they can do all the things a nation state might want to do (imprison, slaughter, wage war, nationalize industry, etc).

> This is most apparent for me in the false narrative of, "China lifted a billion people out of poverty".

It's a misrepresentation of history by omission, but it's not false by any stretch. I don't think it's impressive given the historical context, but all sorts of governments use information without context as slogans. I'm not surprised the slogan is so limited. It lifted multiple billions out of poverty by putting them in the ground.

> China, the nation advanced economically. Business people worked together to develop an economy. These individuals are the real heroes, not the state.

They aren't China. They operate there at the CCPs whims. I am confident these individuals operate there because the CCP allows it and doesn't want what they have (yet).

> Going back to the propaganda narrative, how much better off would the people of China be if they were not under the yoke of the CCP?

We are talking about the China of today. Telling someone to make a distinction because you want to discuss about China's future or even alternate past is a derail. GL with whatever.

Re: China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization

#76

Post by baybal2 » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:25 PM UTC

chunghuaming wrote: post #59

perihelions wrote: post #38

Of course Wikimedia won't take any action to appease this totalitarian nonsense. But, most for-profit companies do exactly that. When was the last time any Hollywood movie or mainstream entertainment mentioned Taiwanese conflict? When do you last remember seeing "Free Tibet"? Or any Tibet? Chinese film censors can apply billions of dollars of pressure, simply to change a single word. Who can withstand that? Wikimedia…

Watching James Bond this weekend made me sad. No mention of China at all, as the cause of many geopolitical crisis around the world, as well as the source of atrocious acts against muslims (go check out cnn's china whistlerblower interview recently that detailed the hanging of uighurs and raping of them). If you want a super evil villain, look no further than Xi Jing ping and the CCP, who has threatened literally mos…

The West really, really wants to shut its eyes on China very tight. We need to deny the West this comfort.

That's a paradoxal reaction. It's like somebody being raped tries to cover her face to not to see her rapist.

Not seeing a rapist doesn't change the ground reality of you still being raped. The correct action is not to use hands to cover your face, but to punch back the assailant.

Re: China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization

#77

Post by pessimizer » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:26 PM UTC

Ericson2314 wrote: post #54

azernik wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The KMT absolutely did not want to give up its title of "Republic of China". It had been only 30 years since the civil war. KMT leadership was still people who had personally fled the mainland in middle age. The president at the time, Jiang Jingguo, was on the young end (he was the son and heir of Jiang Jieshi) - and even he had only arrived in Taiwan at age 39. None of those people had strong local ties, either pers…

> From the US perspective, why would they go out of their way to call Taiwan its own country when neither government, on either side of the Strait, was interested in that? :) I feel like this the same sort of thinking as tech debt. Names? Who cares! Everyone knows what the situation is on the ground. In my view, norms have to be actively upheld, even especially if you are on "Team 'rule of law'". If the thing is a st…

> In my view, norms have to be actively upheld, even especially if you are on "Team 'rule of law'".

What norm or law makes Taiwan a state other than that it claims itself to be? If you're team "rule of law" I think you have to insist that the KMT still run China.

Re: China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization

#78

Post by pessimizer » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:28 PM UTC

matheusmoreira wrote: post #51

tuberelay wrote: post #4

China corrupts any global organization it touches.

Yup. Supposedly free american companies are forced to bow down to authoritarian chinese government demands because they can't afford to lose that market. The wonders of globalization. Imagine what China is gonna do to Apple now that on-device wrongthink scanning is a thing.

> on-device wrongthink scanning is a thing.

Yes, it's horrifying how the authoritarian Chinese government forced this.

Re: China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization

#79

Post by perihelions » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:31 PM UTC

satao wrote: post #67

perihelions wrote: post #38

Of course Wikimedia won't take any action to appease this totalitarian nonsense. But, most for-profit companies do exactly that. When was the last time any Hollywood movie or mainstream entertainment mentioned Taiwanese conflict? When do you last remember seeing "Free Tibet"? Or any Tibet? Chinese film censors can apply billions of dollars of pressure, simply to change a single word. Who can withstand that? Wikimedia…

It's even crazier because when you are not american you realize that Hollywood is also the biggest soft propaganda agency for the USA. When have you seen a movie about the USSR winning the WW2? Or about the Guantanamo Bay?

The US didn't use soft power to censor Soviet cinema within the USSR. It's an absurd power.

Re: China blocks Wikimedia from entering World Intellectual Property Organization

#80

Post by ben_w » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:32 PM UTC

tuberelay wrote: post #4

China corrupts any global organization it touches.

Global organisations are to nations what words are to individual humans, both in capability and purpose: they get used, not corrupted, by government action.

Actual corruption can still happen by individuals within organisations, but that (continuing the metaphor) is like coughing or stammering while you talk, and isn’t desired even by the user.