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Comment by vtange | Hacker News Reader

And the worst part about having to move out of country to find out things that were censored/hidden? You'll be inclined to believe foreign nations have a negative bias towards China.

At least, that's China's (and Russia's) narrative.

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Or extreme emotional devastation that lead to extreme hatred towards the CCP government. Finding out you've been lied to your entire life WILL shock you to the core.

Funny enough for me, neither happened. I left when I was in my early teens but having spent enough time being indoctrinated. I didn't chalk every western report on the CCP to be based on hatred, nor did I develop extreme distaste for the CCP.

I still think Western reporting likes to sprinkle in a few words to demonstrate their distaste for communism and authoritarianism (even when unnecessarily) whenever possible. But above all I think I just learned to be skeptical -- a useful trait for this current election cycle ;)

To be fair I think for the people that are much older who have spent their life dedicated to the proletariat struggle, the truth may be a lot harder to swallow. On the other hand, the older folks aren't blind either. Most will have some idea that there are devious things happening behind the curtain -- but Chinese as a culture has always promoted collective harmony over individuality. So most simply accept the way things are.

Isn't that exactly the case in some instances? Every country and, by extension, news channel has its own agenda to push.

Yes, but in places where say news organizations are tightly controlled by the state, it is much easier to push a nationalistic, "my-country-can-do-no-wrong" agenda than in places where multiple parties push for agendas that help point out flaws that need to be mended in a country.

One thing doesn't prove or disprove the other really.

To be fair, USA hardly ever reports positive articles about China. We didn't report on their moon landing until a year after it happened and many people don't even know it happened at all.

Same goes with their space station. The only coverage went to their previous one that is leaving orbit into earth.

I know that this is a small sample size and only related to their space program as well as my personal observations, but its really hard (for me at least) to say that the USA media does not have a negative bias towards China

For the past couple months the media has pointed out China's successes in tech in Shenzhen, how they have a much better stance on climate change than Trump, and how they have the most prudent position (that doesn't involve all-out war) on North Korea. That's pretty positive if you ask me.

Maybe it's a bit of her bias seeping in a bit, but I can certainly agree it's getting better

Yes, it is getting better. But even then I can't help but feel like it's said in this "See, even the Chinese do better than trump" manner. Just like 10 years ago the only good news about China was about how well their economy is doing, but not without some "they took our jobs" vibe.

I don't understand that it was voted down. I think it is a fair argument.

I agree the reporting has been getting better.

Nonsense. The 2013 Chinese moon probe landing was literally reported in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and CNN. What more do you want?

I guess for something that eventful to be more common knowledge. You can find articles from 2016, 2017 even "announcing" the images, but as far as the general public cares, USA was the only country on the moon.

Again, this is my personal bias and I live in the Mid-west so it may be different elsewhere

Various countries have been sending unmanned probes to the moon since 1959. It's not eventful just because China managed to repeat what the Soviet Union and USA did decades ago. It's great that the Chinese accomplished it and they should be proud of their efforts, but so what.

You can't force ordinary people to care about every single space exploration mission. It doesn't impact their lives.

Maybe it is just that sending a robot to the moon doesn't count as "having been on the moon", else the EU, US and USSR would "have been on the Mars" already.

The Soviets landed unmanned craft on the moon too[1], not to downplay China's success. I would imagine most people tend to think of the Apollo landings and nothing else, since getting people there and back in one piece is fairly significant.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_landing#Unmanned_landings

I'm in the UK and it was reported in the media here, but even so the main news sources I used with the best info were American.

this sub-thread is basically the raison d'etre for n-gate.

http://n-gate.com/

>To be fair, USA hardly ever reports positive articles about China.

That's not true at all. For decades the mainstream media has been reporting about how China has been industrializing at a remarkable pace, and how the life of the average person there is vastly more free than it was under Mao.

But it also reports on the negatives like net censorship and widespread corruption. On the whole, I think the US mainstream media gives a much more balanced picture China than does China's own media.

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