In the USA, if it it was a student who had commended the Intifada, the situation would be the same, except the university president would have written an email condemning him as an anti-semite and praising the Hillel students harassing him, and he may have been charged with one of the hosts of laws in the US outlawing the boycotting of Israel.
President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
171–180 of 1001 posts
Re: President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
#172Earlier quoted context omitted.
One of the best ways for those of us in the democratic West to combat this is to not tolerate when our own governments promote false narratives. This displays the virtues of our imperfect system better than anything else, imo. Don't tolerate lies, hypocrisy, or sophistry from our leaders even if they are nominally on 'our side'.
I mean I think that is a very simplistic, limited and isolated point of view to address a population, but also very optimistic about the democratic West population capability to logically read situations. I see tennis players in China being incarcerated for speaking out, I saw recently a video of a guy trying to report about Uyghurs concentration camp, and if I was worried as Americans right now about China (not even…
Well, because despite those failures, things can always be worse. This game is not zero-sum.
Re: President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
#173Earlier quoted context omitted.
“Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.” ~ George Orwell, 1984
Whenever you think that you’re on the outside looking in, seeing the world for what it is while others seem blind, you should reconsider your perspective. The Chinese people is not some herd of sheep without mental faculties. I wince when I see quotes like these spoken about a people of literal billions.
So, should the outside observers who noticed the mass hysteria, death and destruction in Russia, Germany, Cambodia, Myanmar, Romania, Turkey and myriad other examples during the 20th century just have realized that they needed to "reconsider their perspective"? It's entirely possible, and in fact, highly probable, that entire mass groups of people can be manipulated into collective insanity quite easily. That doesn't make them sheep, it makes them Human, and it's up to us to be aware of this aspect of our collective psychology and point it out where visible.
Re: President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
#174Meanwhile, GDPR has deprived me of the right to read this article
Re: President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
#175Earlier quoted context omitted.
We have the same problem in the US. Certain "Freedom loving" sects applaud military intervention, increased police presence, spying on citizens, and the death of any protester, peaceful or otherwise.
That seems like a very, very, broad brush.
It's the same type of problem, but much more limited in extent.
Every country has it to some degree, authoritarian regimes typically go crazy with nationalism since it's the most powerful tool they have to force their victims on the side of the aggressors against the evil foreigners.
Re: President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
#176The brainwashing must be strong for students thousands of miles away from China in the middle of nowhere Indiana for them to feel the need to snitch on dissenters. Or, more likely, they were threatened before they left China that they would be watched while abroad.
They ARE being watched abroad, if I'm not mistaken. They keep using WeChat to communicate with family/friends so...
The network effect is even worse when consider a lot of the alternative are banned in china. This makes it difficult basically impossible for Chinese abroad to communicate with their friends and family back in mainland using some alternative service.
Re: President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
#177Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is a completely backwards way of looking at it. If you don't have the budget, create a static website and throw it behind github pages or s3 or whatever. An entire university with a school of computer science cannot figure out some standard way of doing this ?
This is an independent website, not part of the official University budget. You can’t just round up some CS students and have them produce a website compliant with international law for free. This involves legal teams, contracted developers, and constrained budgets that are already stretched thin on operating in their core business. It’s not reasonable to demand they invest tens of thousands of dollars (or demand equ…
How are they producing a website compliant with local laws then ? What if they inadvertently end up violating DMCA ? What happens then ? The answer to that is one can be reasonably sure that they aren't doing anything stupid or malicious. It's the same with GDPR. Don't use trackers, cookies, adware etc., none of which are necessary for a college newspaper. This is a simple technical problem.
Re: President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
#178The scale of some Chinese people's commitment to support of their government's chosen narrative against facts is quite impressive / scary. Zealots make great cannon fodder, and the more cannon fodder the higher the chance of winning. It bodes poorly for Hong Kong, Taiwan, and any other country with a coastline along the South China Sea.
One of the best ways for those of us in the democratic West to combat this is to not tolerate when our own governments promote false narratives. This displays the virtues of our imperfect system better than anything else, imo. Don't tolerate lies, hypocrisy, or sophistry from our leaders even if they are nominally on 'our side'.
China as a strong lobby in DC [0]. And, while admitting you're wrong should show strength and courage, for some reason, probably due to media pressure among other things, the political discourse in the US doesn't allow people to admit they were wrong and course correct or just come to a new position when new information is found. Remember the huge campaign calling John Kerry a "flip-flopper" [1]? I suspect the lobbyist money is more of the driving factor here though. If you can somehow eliminate that, our elected leaders wouldn't have the motivation for lies, hypocrisy, or sophistry in the first place.
0 - https://www.thedailybeast.com/meet-the-us-officials-who-now-...
Re: President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
#179The scale of some Chinese people's commitment to support of their government's chosen narrative against facts is quite impressive / scary. Zealots make great cannon fodder, and the more cannon fodder the higher the chance of winning. It bodes poorly for Hong Kong, Taiwan, and any other country with a coastline along the South China Sea.
One of the best ways for those of us in the democratic West to combat this is to not tolerate when our own governments promote false narratives. This displays the virtues of our imperfect system better than anything else, imo. Don't tolerate lies, hypocrisy, or sophistry from our leaders even if they are nominally on 'our side'.
I am less worried about our democratic governments then I am about private entities, especially in sports and entertainment bending over to various totalitarian governments for a handful of bucks. Because that is making it easier for our governments to do the same, simply because people are used to it.
Re: President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
#180Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Chinese people will surely not write about the Americans like this. 1984 is banned there.
That's apparently wrong, and your comment thus a wonderful example of what toxik meant.
Apparently nowadays you can buy a physical book but not talk about it online. Guess my conclusion still stands.