Comment by PavlovsCat | Hacker News Reader

Comment by PavlovsCat | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

> Why would I care what "they" say if I have first hand knowledge about whether it's major or not?

"Major" and "major in contrast" are two very different things.

Why would I care about your assessment of a situation when I see how you play fast and loose here?

> The government actually publicly addressed that a while ago and I've seen it in news. It's very different from what the western media claims of course, and it's a complicated issue like the fake news.

It's too complicated to explain, so I take your word for it?

> Also, it's mostly western media that cares the most about these topics, not the "individual self media".

Any intelligent human with a backbone cares about people murdered en masse, over decades, or put into concentration camps that grow like mushroom in mere months, including people you cannot tie the shoelaces of. You don't measure the importance of this by how many people care about it (how convenient for you to claim by the way, since anyone who disagrees, might have to fear for their life), you find out the importance of a person by their stance on this, among other things.

edit: I didn't mean to have a go at you. I'm kinda sorry for that, but I also have to weigh between not offending you, and not spitting on the people who get murdered, and which you downplay. Can't make everyone happy, and that's not really my fault either.

I'll just note that so far you aren't really speaking for yourself, but refer to Chinese media, without even stating their explanation, and bring up "Western media". Our media don't speak for us just like your media can't speak for you. Yes, Western media also sweeps Western atrocities under the rug (though not uniformly), and that's very deplorable. That just means we're not really better, maybe even worse when it comes to wars of aggression -- but that makes none of it okay, it's not a contest.

Well, thank you for the detailed explanations, and I think I owe you some more explanation.

I'm not sure how different are "Major" and "major in contrast". Sorry about my English, it's not my first language. It is my opinion that fake news and such are an important problem and it's prevailing in Chinese social media. I do believe freedom in press is great but freedom with no regulation would be very dangerous. I don't remember how many times I need to tell my parents "don't listen to that, that's completely fake" "seaweeds on the market are not made of plastic bags", "it's fine to eat persimmon",...

> It's too complicated to explain, so I take your word for it? It's just something I don't feel like arguing, because why would you trust me instead of those news reports you've been reading all the time.

> Any intelligent human with a backbone cares about people murdered en masse, over decades...

I'd feel terrible about those people, of course, but ONLY IF THOSE CLAIMS ARE TRUE. I don't really buy their claims because the reporters themselves are very unlikely to have investigated the situations in person, and the stories are most likely coming from sources that either are anti-Chinese government themselves or seeking personal gains (like getting refugee visa in US). And the stories don't really make sense.

The official claim from Chinese government is: those are re-education centers trying to train muslim extremists so that they have enough skills to get a job and live a normal life instead of becoming terrorists.

While I won't simply just believe the Chinese government's claim as it is, but it is much more plausible and much more likely to be truth adjacent. If you know more about China, you'll know there are actually quite many muslims living in peace in China, and you can easily find muslim restaurants in most cities. Why would Chinese government even care about put muslims in Xinjiang into concentration camps? What would they gain from that? The background is that there had been more terrorist activities in the past few years in that region, and it's becoming more unsafe, especially for Han ethnic group to live there. That's what the government is most worried about. Re-educations are just a way of making extremists less extreme.

> I'll just note that so far you aren't really speaking for yourself, but refer to Chinese media, without even stating their explanation, and bring up "Western media"

I do bring up "Western media" a lot because I am so frustrated with them bull-shitting about China and that they successfully influenced people's opinions with tons of single sided stories and disinformation. I had friends asking me about whether I have need to worry about social credit score, and what can I say? "It's at most a proposal yet and it's far from being established" "How can there be so many creepy rules before it's established?" "You can't just believe whatever NPR says because you think it's neutral. Their sources could lie"

Your English is very, very good. And thank you for not being offended by me snapping at you.

> It is my opinion that fake news and such are an important problem and it's prevailing in Chinese social media. I do believe freedom in press is great but freedom with no regulation would be very dangerous.

I agree with that, but of course, it then depends on what the regulations are.

> I'd feel terrible about those people, of course, but ONLY IF THOSE CLAIMS ARE TRUE.

Fair enough. Even if we may disagree about what is or isn't happening, I'd rather we agree on that and not the rest, than the other way around.

> Why would Chinese government even care about put muslims in Xinjiang into concentration camps? What would they gain from that?

To practice things that can be extended to the wider population maybe?

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/china-s-xinjiang-p...

What would anyone gain from making all that up?

> Re-educations are just a way of making extremists less extreme.

How come people just disappear and nobody knows what happens to them?

Okay, so you don't think that's what's happening, but can you say how many people have been re-educated? How long does it take on average, how many are currently detained, how many have been released? Have there been any injuries or deaths? Are these questions even raised, much less answered? You don't owe me an answer to any of that, but that's why I think what I think.

> I do bring up "Western media" a lot because I am so frustrated with them bull-shitting about China and that they successfully influenced people's opinions with tons of single sided stories and disinformation.

I don't like what many major media are doing in general, so I don't really disagree. But saying it's all biased and therefore made up, could also be used against anything the Chinese or any other government says.

It turned into an interesting discussion actually, thank you!

> To practice things that can be extended to the wider population maybe?

I didn't read the full article you referenced, but from what I know it is true that surveillance has tighten up in Xinjiang. Why do you think that happened? Why does Chinese government needs to "control" Uighurs, and not other minorities that are living peacefully in other regions of China.

I don't know what exactly is happening out there, but naturally you'd need more security when the there's danger to public safety. I wouldn't say there's no wrong-doing of the government, but bottom line is, I don't really doubt the primary goal is just anti-terrorism and make that region safe.

> How come people just disappear and nobody knows what happens to them?

Well I don't know how could people just disappear in Xinjiang.

But it reminds me that, recently a friend of mine asked me "How could a person just disappear? How scary is that" after she read this article.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/13/world/asia/china-fan-bing...

Apparently it sounds like the Chinese government "made" her disappear. Well, I only found it funny and I told her "It's fine, she just disappeared from media. Her agent probably knows her whereabout but won't tell the media as she's being investigated and there's no official result." Fan Bingbing reappeared just a few days later when the investigation ended, as most of us expected, and she made an official announcement about her tax evasion. Throughout the entire time I didn't feel anything scary at all, but that's not the impression if you only read the NYTimes report.

> But saying it's all biased and therefore made up

I wouldn't say they all made up facts, but simply selecting the truth to report and finding a way to report it that supports their existing belief can also make a huge impact on people's perception.

I also don't believe most professional news reporters would just make up facts. (The "Self-individual media" in China is way too different, plenty of them do make up facts;) So, a much more likely scenario in my mind, is that they interviewed unreliable sources. To depict that in a more extreme but easy to understand way, just imaging if reports interviewed a terrorist in middle east, and ask them about America. Plenty of people left China in the past century (very small in percentage but still a big number because of the large population base) because either they really hate Chinese government or they're trying to get refugee visa. They also have much closer relations with western media. But anyway, it's just my guess.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com