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Information operations directed at Hong Kong

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Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#391

Post by Arn_Thor »

luckylion wrote: post #349
Arn_Thor wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO the CCP gets its legitimacy to govern from its performance in some key areas: economic development and stability/security. That plays to the party's strengths, so the state-controlled media has actively promoted the view that these factors are the most important. Note how issues like the environment and health care were very much put on the back burner until public awareness and criticism reached a critical thres…

> the state-controlled media has actively promoted the view that these factors are the most important Or those are the most important factors and that's why they are optimizing for them first. Carville's slogan for Bill Clinton was "It's the economy, stupid", and it's plausible at least. What good does a healthy environment if you don't have food to eat? What good does economic progress if you don't have security? Th…

> I don't see a reason why the Chinese wouldn't follow on that route

That was the hope and belief behind Nixon's trip to China, and the inclusion of China into the WTO. But with Xi taking power, arguably the most totalitarian leader in China since Mao, there is no sign that civil liberties are anywhere on the horizon.

> But that's only because the basic needs are generally taken care of.

History does not agree with you, I think. People were fighting for democracy as a response to totalitarian systems which did not provide them with the resources and security they wanted—even before the age of plenty brought about by industrialization. And when the west was democratized, a lot of those countries were ravaged by two world wars, and far behind where China is today.

And when it all got underway, were not the ideals of the enlightenment in large part a counter to monarchies and feudalism which failed to provide what the people needed? If one sets aside the notion that without freedom, a plentiful existence loses its meaning (which is another, philosophical argument), I think the fight for representation in government is precisely a fight to achieve one's economic and social goals.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#392

Post by jokoon »

Are you saying that the CIA is not trying to help the protests?

I'm not trying to say that the CIA is involved, but I would be surprised to learn that the US is not trying to get involved to amplify the noise the protests are making.

With Trump and his trade war, don't you think he would not ask the CIA to try to damage the reputation of chinese government by using protests?

I don't like the PRC and their method, but I'm just curious to ask what the US is doing.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#393

Post by kr4 »

tmux314 wrote: post #42

Good on Twitter and Facebook. On top of blocking thousands of websites (which includes Facebook, Google, Twitter) China's government employs thousands of government employees just to purge even the most mild criticism of the CCP on Weibo [1]. They also employ tens of thousands to export their propaganda overseas, using sock puppet accounts to push their worldview[2]. And their worldview is fiercely anti-democratic. T…

China's all-weather partner, Pakistan, has been doing similar information warfare against India regarding Kashmir after abrogation of article 370 on Aug5.

"We have found that just after the annulment of Article 370, more than 1,500 bots (fake profiles) from Pakistan surfaced on social media and started trending anti-India narrative. In these tweets, they are also urging United Nations to intervene," said Tarun Vig, co-founder of Innefu Labs, a cybersecurity firm. He added on August 5 alone, more than 1,000 Twitter accounts were created from Pakistan which was discussing India and Kashmir. Bot profiles were sharing the same tweets over and over again.

0: https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/newsindia/pakistan-bots-wage-...

Some fake videos: https://www.altnews.in/pak-minister-shares-edited-clip-to-fa... https://www.indiatoday.in/fact-check/story/kashmir-massacre-... https://www.republicworld.com/india-news/general-news/isi-ba...

Some twitter action: https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/check-our-transpar...

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#394

Post by xster »

dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #379
powerapple wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mostly only comment on China related articles, with a pro-China view. Sometimes I find it necessary to comment because it is rare to see pro-China comment here. I am definitely not state-sponsored, I might be brainwashed in your opinion, but definitely not getting paid for those comments, and those comments are from the bottom of my heart :) I don't really like to read political posts on Hacker News, I am mostly in…

I have a question from you. How, as a pro-China person, do you view the Dalai Lama? Because I see a certain inconsistency that nobody can explain to me: the DL insists he doesn't care about the complete autonomy or independence [0] of Tibet, just faving a bit more freedom so that people can practice their religion and cultivate their culture. This, in my opinion, is a moderate view, and in no way a threat to the inte…

I'm just a guy, so it's just one perspective. I'm also not that well read so I'm likely to be mistaken so I apologize ahead of time given the sensitivity of the topic.

First, as much as I think the internet is a great knowledge spreader, it's not an amazing medium for mutual understanding. Me not paying the cost of time and money to get to a cafe to talk with you and the extreme ease of lobbing self-satisfying, snarky sound bites and closing the tab makes it really hard to talk about politics. It's really shaped by the accumulation of everything you experienced and everything you read as a person so not starting from the beginning is a disservice to communication. But alas, we can't.

FWIW, I align more with Buddhism than any other spiritual thought system. I'm sympathetic to his journey and think he and his followers are thrown into, and nominally became figureheads in a bigger clash that he can't control nor (I think) care very much about.

I don't think he himself, for instance, championed or was very fond of the CIA operation to take 2,000 Tibetans to be armed and trained in Colorado and then paradropped back into China for guerrilla warfare [1] (he was also just 20 back then). While I do think theocracy and political control [2] shouldn't mix, I don't think their social structure is anyone's business and I think he would be right to fight for self-determination. So it is unfortunate that he's stuck between having no means of opposing China vs taking US backing [3], which forces China's hands further (when China just very much finished fighting a hot war with the US).

If the world were in a vacuum, I very much believe in self-determination of all groups as Woodrow Wilson would define it. Anyone should be able to split off and do as they'd like. But as optimistic as he was going into the war, Wilson himself ultimately didn't persevere through the old world colonial powers to demonstrate that he believed it himself enough to even back a member of the victor side for self-determination [4]. Given the historical context (and the contemporary US overthrow of Albania 1949 [5], Iran 1953 [6], Guatemala 1954 [7], Greece [8], Indonesia 1958 [9], all of which decidedly did not end up with any 'self-determination' [10]), I wouldn't see China concluding that giving up Tibet in 1960 would somehow translate into Tibetan 'self-determination' rather than colonization [11].

That isn't to say though that China should be accepted for descending into absolute savage levels in the following decades of destruction. I absolutely do wish that the residents at Dharamshala could return to China if they choose so. But unfortunately I don't think the world of geopolitics is sterile enough to let it be a simple 2-party bilateral discussion.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_Tibetan_program

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2009/feb/10/tibet-...

[3] https://www.nytimes.com/1998/10/02/world/world-news-briefs-d...

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shandong_Problem

[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albanian_Subversion

[6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27état

[7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27état

[8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Civil_War

[9] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_activities_in_Indonesia

[10] https://truthout.org/articles/us-provides-military-assistanc...

[11] https://www.jstor.org/stable/24572145?seq=1#page_scan_tab_co...

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#395

Post by meerita »

laughinghan wrote: post #193
meerita wrote: post #47

> Covert, manipulative behaviors have no place on our service While I celebrate this from them to kill manipulation, this sentence can be applied to their own bias towards conservative people who get banned and progressive don't, even saying worse things or using the service on massive organization to take down accounts. If both parties do harm, they should be take down. But both Twitter and Facebook do enormous effo…

> their own bias towards conservative people who get banned and progressive don't Interesting, what leads you to believe this is the case? I've heard of this happening; I've also heard of the exact opposite happening, e.g. this post which cites examples of specific people and pieces of content that were banned as well as the specific dates and times and durations of the bans: https://medium.com/@thedididelgado/mark-z…

There's plenty evidence, from internal emails calling "nazis" to some conservatives to presentations, hidden camera to a high level manager, etc. PrageU, some conservative voices are banned, and there are specific guidelines designed by them to ban them and shadow ban them. It is not news that Twitter, Facebook and Google shadowbans or directly demonetize or ban conservative voices.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#396

Post by stef25 »

wannaduo wrote: post #370
xster wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Semi-tangential, but many Chinese tech companies just have a perma-VPN company wide and use GSuite and Google search by default. And Hacker News is a tech-leading forum (though it's not that big of a thing in China AFAIK).

Actually，I work for one of the most well known Chinese Internet companies. Our company’s VPN is blocked by HN

The VPN blocks HN, not the other way round

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#397

Post by luckylion »

Arn_Thor wrote: post #391
luckylion wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the state-controlled media has actively promoted the view that these factors are the most important Or those are the most important factors and that's why they are optimizing for them first. Carville's slogan for Bill Clinton was "It's the economy, stupid", and it's plausible at least. What good does a healthy environment if you don't have food to eat? What good does economic progress if you don't have security? Th…

> I don't see a reason why the Chinese wouldn't follow on that route That was the hope and belief behind Nixon's trip to China, and the inclusion of China into the WTO. But with Xi taking power, arguably the most totalitarian leader in China since Mao, there is no sign that civil liberties are anywhere on the horizon. > But that's only because the basic needs are generally taken care of. History does not agree with y…

> there is no sign that civil liberties are anywhere on the horizon

The main question is probably what time frame that horizon is. It's hard to predict the future, very, very few people in 1985 (or even in '88) believed the SU would collapse, and yet it did a short time later. "The Chinese are destroying their environment" was a meme, now they are somewhere at the top regarding new sustainable energy installed, and they are fighting pollution (Beijing is in the situation Los Angeles was a few decades ago).

> People were fighting for democracy as a response to totalitarian systems which did not provide them with the resources and security they wanted

That's what I'm trying to say. People want stuff, and a mostly capitalist, mostly democratic society is good at providing stuff for a large majority of the population. If it wasn't, people would care very little for democracy. Throw us into a hard and long recession and offer a (to the majority of the population) plausible way out via authoritarian measures and, so I believe, you'll be surprised how quickly they'll agree to abandon democracy. Democracy is to most (or to all? a different argument is mostly made by the affluent, and they never need to choose) a means to an end, not an end in itself. The CCP is currently still ranking very favorably compared to "before CCP" with regards to providing stuff. If that changes, or people believe that democracy could provide significantly more with few trade-offs, I expect the general sentiment to change. (Pro tip: want to fuel desire for democracies around the world? Make sure all/most citizens in Western democracies massively profit continuously from the democratic system, not just a minority at the top)

Given that civil liberties often follow wealth (it's easy to be generous when you're rich), I don't see why that wouldn't happen in China. They're not at a Western level of wealth yet, and for a significant part of the population, poverty is still the primary concern, not civil liberties. When that has changed, so will demands of the population (though it's unlikely they will too closely follow Western values, given their culture is very different in many regards).

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#398

Post by solipsism »

echevil wrote: post #323
dang wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I can tell, that is only a small minority of the commenters with such views. Far more are people in Western countries who have personal, familial, educational, or work ties to China, or who had experiences in China that gave them a different perspective. In a way, though, we're talking about the same thing, because most of this follows from human loyalties—to family, tribe, country, etc.—that all of us have…

Just to share some perspective as a native Chinese living in US for anyone interested: - Most of immigrants from China after 2000 holds pro-China views, and there's strong tendency to become more pro-China after living in US for some time, after having full exposure to US media and getting to know how things really work in US. - It's probably common to see HN accounts that comment mostly on China related issues. I do…

When people question if an account is genuine just because they have pro-China voice, it's just confirming how hypocritical western "freedom of press" is, and pushing us towards more pro-China

Firstly, do you mean "freedom of speech"? Few people here are the press.

Secondly, can you elaborate on this view? I don't doubt that the situation is as you describe, but if true this shows a misunderstanding of the freedom of speech. It's not hypocritical(in general) to criticize speech one doesn't support, or to accuse the speaker of having ulterior motives, while supporting the freedom of speech. Freedom of speech doesn't give anyone the right to speak without being criticized.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#399

Post by solipsism »

powerapple wrote: post #378
kmonsen wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think what is missing in most the the China and HN discussions is that HN is not blocked by the great firewall, so it is much easier for regular people living in China to participate. They will naturally have more pro-China views. Just like residents of every country will have more positive views of that country. And when that country is criticized they will be even more defensive and reflectively pro what is criti…

In general actually people who have access to western medias are educated enough to think differently, not to take the media's view wholly. I am sure many of them would just defend China out of pride (apply to people living in China), for others, mostly oversea Chinese, they have seen the world and concludes that is the right view to hold, and they don't have to follow western media's (CNN, BBC) view on things. I per…

I'd like to see an honest explanation of the kind of bias you're talking about, on the part of Western media. I'm open to its existence, but I also know it's an easy accusation to lob without evidence.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#400

Post by solipsism »

xster wrote: post #347
yorwba wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> HN is not blocked by the great firewall Your information is 16 days out of date: https://en.greatfire.org/news.ycombinator.com There's now a partial block where it can be accessed from some locations and not from others. That's not necessarily going to prevent "pro-China" views from appearing. People who circumvent the Great Firewall e.g. to follow celebrities on Instagram may not like the censorship, but could be…

Semi-tangential, but many Chinese tech companies just have a perma-VPN company wide and use GSuite and Google search by default. And Hacker News is a tech-leading forum (though it's not that big of a thing in China AFAIK).

Always been curious -- why is this allowed by the Chinese government? If people feel comfortable using such a VPN, they must have some reasonable belief that the Chinese government doesn't care that much about it, right?
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