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Comment by erokar | Hacker News Reader

Somehow it's comforting to see how laughably bad China is at propaganda.

What isn't a laughing matter is how we excuse all our favorite tech companies to continue manufacturing there.

For a long time we excused China in the hope that integration of our economies would lift China towards Democracy and respect for human rights. We/It failed. For all the things I disagree with Trump about, the trade war is not. I hope the tariffs are increased over time so that the supply chain begins to exclude China. There are other countries that will do it for almost as cheap, and do not abuse the U.S.'s good will so thoroughly.

IMO, the hope that trade and economics would bring democracy to China was delusional from the start. It's the same sort of flag-waving idiocy that assumed toppling Saddam would turn Iraq into the Middle Eastern equivalent of post-war Japan. The US has basically permanently nerfed its own global hegemony barely 2 decades after defeating its only major adversary (the Soviet Union), all because of the idealistic aspirations of flag-waving ideologues that triumphed over pragmatic realists and cynics.

You are probably right, but I think that there was an idea that empowering (by money) a broad swath of Chines citizens would naturally lead to increases in their political power, hence a nation that would lean toward democratic tendencies.

Nobody cares. The international community generally shrugs when something is done orderly and internally.

China has too much money and business opportunities to be thrown away.

Lots of people care, they just can't do anything when every choice in the shops for countless things are manufactured there, and few web stores even list country of origin.

They probably knew exactly what they were doing. The truth being mostly already out there, they probably wanted to show something like "look, it's not that bad, we are not killing them". Some sort of damage control I guess.

To you. The truth stops being a tangible concept when it’s suffocated by a cloud of swirling lies.

I think this is the likely explanation, assuming the Chinese propagandists are competent. They need to put disinformation out there to cause people to doubt.

The other explanation is that it's a ham-handed attempt by propagandists that are operating outside their element (i.e. they are used to operating in an environment where they literally dictate the narrative to the media (whose surname is "party" and all that)).

> The truth stops being a tangible concept when it’s suffocated by a cloud of swirling lies.

American news media came to mind when I read this

Simply because you are not the target demographic.

Read Frank Dikotters 'Tragedy of Liberation' and you might have second thoughts. There is a sizable historical precedent--with measured success--for these kinds of indoctrination tactics in China.

I think you should consider how well it has worked with the target audience (i.e. not the West).

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