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China's state media buys Meta ads pushing Russia's line on war

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Re: China's state media buys Meta ads pushing Russia's line on war

#41
post #2

Should these ads fail in fact checks? Does Meta do fact check, similar with Mr Trump campaigns, on its ads?

Unfortunately, a big chunk of propaganda (to use the word very broadly - not just wartime propaganda) relies on information that is either true, subjective, or non-verifiable, and the dishonesty comes in the form of the context in which it is presented, cherry-picking, lies of omission, implications, assumptions, and optimizing for emotion rather than plain information delivery.

Yes, the most powerful propaganda uses truth and logical fallacy to influence. Any time Putin is challenged about killing his political opponents, he responds with whataboutisms about protests and police killings in the US. All true, but entirely irrelevant.

Re: China's state media buys Meta ads pushing Russia's line on war

#42

> Many of the ads, which are mostly clips of CGTN newscasts, sprinkle in pro-Russia, anti-NATO talking points and downplay Russia's actions in launching an unprovoked invasion of its neighbor. So what exactly did they say?

I don’t know about the ads, but here are their state media reports:

They peddle Russia’s claim that US has bioweapons in Ukraine: https://www.newsweek.com/china-peddles-russias-claim-that-us...

And here’s CGTN’s article on “biolabs” in Ukraine, citing Russia media outlets and officials: https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202203/1254330.shtml

Edit: As pointed out by a commenter, the above article is from GlobalTimes, not CGTN. The actual CGTN article: https://news.cgtn.com/news/2022-03-07/Russia-reveals-evidenc...

Re: China's state media buys Meta ads pushing Russia's line on war

#44

I don’t know why China is so keen on helping Russia. Is this some kind of godfather deal and they want some massive ROI from Russia once things settle down a bit? Or is this some long-term strategy “against the West”?

All of those things but also, supporting Russia's invasion of Ukraine is internally consistent with their views on Taiwan. They cannot denounce Russian aggression on Ukraine but still openly claim Taiwan.

I think China is satisfied enough with the notion that Taiwan is already part of China and there is no need to invade.

Re: China's state media buys Meta ads pushing Russia's line on war

#45

I don’t know why China is so keen on helping Russia. Is this some kind of godfather deal and they want some massive ROI from Russia once things settle down a bit? Or is this some long-term strategy “against the West”?

All of those things but also, supporting Russia's invasion of Ukraine is internally consistent with their views on Taiwan. They cannot denounce Russian aggression on Ukraine but still openly claim Taiwan.

China has never recognized Taiwan as a sovereign nation. Russia and China are among the parties to the Budapest Memorandum, a 1994 treaty recognizing Ukraine as a sovereign nation.

Re: China's state media buys Meta ads pushing Russia's line on war

#46

> Many of the ads, which are mostly clips of CGTN newscasts, sprinkle in pro-Russia, anti-NATO talking points and downplay Russia's actions in launching an unprovoked invasion of its neighbor. So what exactly did they say?

I don’t know about the ads, but here are their state media reports: They peddle Russia’s claim that US has bioweapons in Ukraine: https://www.newsweek.com/china-peddles-russias-claim-that-us... And here’s CGTN’s article on “biolabs” in Ukraine, citing Russia media outlets and officials: https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202203/1254330.shtml Edit: As pointed out by a commenter, the above article is from GlobalTimes, not…

They are probably building up a strategy of blaming COVID-19 on fabricated US/Ukraine bioweapons research (accidental release).

Re: China's state media buys Meta ads pushing Russia's line on war

#47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's not to understand? Russia is doing the pre-production research of how China will need to protect their economy when they put their military in Taiwan.

> What's not to understand? Russia is doing the pre-production research of how China will need to protect their economy when they put their military in Taiwan. China will not get sanctioned like Russia has. The world's dependence on Chinese manufacturing is like Europe's dependence on Russian gas, times ten. Or, more precisely, it will get sanctioned like Russia has, but like the Russian sanctions, they will include…

We wouldn't need to sanction them like Russia, they are much closer to a debt crisis and need growth to maintain it.

Re: China's state media buys Meta ads pushing Russia's line on war

#48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's not to understand? Russia is doing the pre-production research of how China will need to protect their economy when they put their military in Taiwan.

> What's not to understand? Russia is doing the pre-production research of how China will need to protect their economy when they put their military in Taiwan. China will not get sanctioned like Russia has. The world's dependence on Chinese manufacturing is like Europe's dependence on Russian gas, times ten. Or, more precisely, it will get sanctioned like Russia has, but like the Russian sanctions, they will include…

I think it would take less sanctions to send Chinese to the streets, so China would be more likely to try not to get sanctioned. We see locally they vent fury over economic issues quite often despite much more locked down media and a generally better looking economy than Russia. People in China are fine with the government as long as the economy is good, not sure how they would react to the government getting sanctioned to a degree that makes their lives worse

Re: China's state media buys Meta ads pushing Russia's line on war

#49

I don’t know why China is so keen on helping Russia. Is this some kind of godfather deal and they want some massive ROI from Russia once things settle down a bit? Or is this some long-term strategy “against the West”?

All of those things but also, supporting Russia's invasion of Ukraine is internally consistent with their views on Taiwan. They cannot denounce Russian aggression on Ukraine but still openly claim Taiwan.

It's actually the opposite: supporting Russia's invasion is in direct conflict with China's long-standing official line that sovereignty must be the primary principle in international relations.

From China's point of view, Taiwan is purely a question of Chinese sovereignty. They've never recognized the Taipei government and they try to sanction countries that do recognize Taiwan. The idea is that this "recognition limbo" leaves Taiwan under Chinese sovereignty by default.

Yet China has formally recognized Ukraine and its original post-Soviet borders. It's hard for them to now make the argument that Ukrainian sovereignty is meaningless but other countries must not interfere with Chinese sovereignty.

Re: China's state media buys Meta ads pushing Russia's line on war

#50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What's not to understand? Russia is doing the pre-production research of how China will need to protect their economy when they put their military in Taiwan. China will not get sanctioned like Russia has. The world's dependence on Chinese manufacturing is like Europe's dependence on Russian gas, times ten. Or, more precisely, it will get sanctioned like Russia has, but like the Russian sanctions, they will include…

It’s infuriating that the west allows itself to remain dependent on a dictatorship.

We stopped letting them manufacture anything of strategic military or government significance. We are mostly dependent on them for basic household goods and consumer electronics. Those things could be cut back significantly without destroying our own economy. Keep in mind that China can't feed itself without the world. That is a much more dangerous dependence.
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