261–270 of 560 posts
A friend of mine is leaving HK today - he lives there, so this is not a casual trip abroad. He said the level of fear is making it impossible to live there as a single person. The shops and restaurants are closed. Even his own employer shut its doors indefinitely - and they’re just a video production company. The virus won’t be what ruins China. It’s the panic itself.
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I lived under the USSR, American and European propaganda machine, they are all the same. You get tired of them as you get to my age. I'm pretty sure that rayiner's comment exists mirrored on a random Chinese forum. Someone being offended by a comparison of China and US (implying China is better). We're all the same.
No they aren't the same. The Americans and the Europeans didn't have a gulag. The Chinese are "reeducating" millions of people right now. I hope when I get to your age I don't magically forget that slavery and concentration camps are bad.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/inside-roman...
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/15/cia-torture-...
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This kind of analysis I'm seeing everywhere is so misguided. The reason the local government didn't report on the situation accurately and even punished some journalists for speaking about it is a flaw of how their country is run and how their command structure incentives are poorly set up. This isn't a new problem and it's why we have converged to a different system in most of the West. The government coming in late…
While I'm not saying you're wrong, I think it's worth pointing out that the reason the 1918 flupandemic was called the "Spanish flu" for many years, was that Spain was the first nation to admit that there was a problem. They weren't the first, or even second or third nation to get it, just the first to admit it. So the problem of not admitting the seriousness of the situation, is not a new one. Which is not to say th…
"x is not a new problem" - is not an argument - it's a whataboutism. Every single problem has existed before.
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China is a place where you can be locked to a chair and interrogated by police for social media comments critical of the state. Don't try to tell me it isn't a government ruled through fear. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6uy12RpqQc
That’s like saying Americans are in fear of being water boarded by the authorities. Chinese people in China are not afraid of the cops. If you see how Chinese people interact with cops, I bet you would be surprised. I regularly see people yelling and screaming at them, and the Chinese cops will still try to diffuse the situation.
Perhaps they're not afraid of the cops on a daily basis, but they are afraid of the CCP.
>That’s like saying Americans are in fear of being water boarded by the authorities.
Guess where you can shit talk about the head of state and not end up in a re-education camp?
Gorbachev used to say that Chernobyl was where the USSR really started to crumble. The disaster made clear how morally bankrupt and technically incompetent the system really was, wiping out any remaining goodwill or trust. Similarly, Katrina was where the semi-fascist US consensus under GW Bush went to pieces. I suspect China will experience a similar moment at some point. This might well be it.
History doesn’t simply repeat itself, it rhymes.
I wish western world central banks were as competent. In a situation of sudden supply constraints, prices are supposed to adjust up. This is basic supply and demand. Western world central banks tend to pressure prices down during economic shocks by withholding liquidity. This puts private markets in a gridlock and causes untold amount of damage to people's careers.
"I wish western world central banks were as competent." Well... "Western world central banks tend to pressure prices down during economic shocks by withholding liquidity." Well, we have seen gigantic quantitative easing in the US and the EU and also in China. Inflation - I assume that is what you mean by "pressure prices down" - keeps elusive. Japan has tried for decades to create inflation. The only thing that the c…
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How stable is the power that Xi has consolidated? How would the party and the public respond if there were leaks about his private life and behavior? I wonder what his skeletons in the closet are... I've also wondered how receptive the Chinese people would be to a series of documentaries or dramas that point out the inequality and unfairness in their system. A film that highlights how the government treats humans and…
> How stable is the power that Xi has consolidated? Very stable. Basically nothing besides something coming from withing the party itself can shake him, and he took down all of those threats to him from within the party. Not even Mao ever managed to cleanse all of his detractors from the party up until his death. Saying this, you should not be confusing that "people are throwing looks into his back," and quiet whispe…
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No, literally a face mask, so that people know that you aren't going to give them the virus. I don't know if it's mandatory to wear a face mask. But it doesn't seem like it would be too different from what always happens in Chinese New Year in Beijing. All the shopkeepers aren't from Beijing originally, so they close shop for two weeks and go back to their hometown. There's pretty much no restaurants open, except may…
> All the shopkeepers aren't from Beijing originally, so they close shop for two weeks and go back to their hometown. Sounds like an opportunity for someone to open some bagel shops.
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No they aren't the same. The Americans and the Europeans didn't have a gulag. The Chinese are "reeducating" millions of people right now. I hope when I get to your age I don't magically forget that slavery and concentration camps are bad.
No, that's wrong, the Americans forced us to host your gulags in our countries, besides torture they were also doing human experimentation. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/inside-roman... https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/15/cia-torture-...
Your attempt to equate these things is frankly shocking.
All I can think is: Good luck to any short sellers who decide to fight that . It will be interesting to watch -- from a safe distance.