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Comment by kenneth | Hacker News Reader

> Can you rely on South China Morning Post (scmp.com) to be unbiased as their current owner is Chinese Alibaba Group ? Apart from mild criticisms, I don't think Alibaba group can afford to publish against Chinese government.

Not sure why your comment was killed, because I think it's a valid question. But since it was, responding here.

Yes, they're owned by Alibaba. I happen to know some SCMP employees which gives me confidence that they're still editorially independent. They of course have a pretty pro-status-quo stance, and I don't recommend on relying on them entirely as your only source of information, but I don't believe China has any editorial influence.

(Also important to note Alibaba isn't necessarily in the CCP's best graces lately.)

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Am not following SCMP closely so better not comment on their editorial independence rashly... However, this may give you some additional perspective: https://www.hongkongfp.com/2018/11/13/i-will-no-longer-write...

Yeah Hong Kong Free Press may be the most independent source. You can support them here: https://www.hongkongfp.com/support-hkfp/

You literally just have to open their front page to find them calling military deployments in a stadium near Hong Kong "drills", citing anonymous sources that say "they are not of concern" and quoting liberally from anonymous online-posters on Chinese message boards (sic!) spouting hate.

They are literally drills: nobody is getting shot in Shenzhen.

Of course the drills are sabre-rattling, a show of force intended to send a message, and preparation for a future assault if necessary -- but they're still drills, not use of the military in anger.

Every "use of the military in anger" in history involves massing your forces at strategic borders. That is just War 101.

Also promises to the other party that “Don’t worry, this is all just a drill.”

Okay, but given that the army hasn't attacked anyone as of right now, what term would you consider appropriate to describe the "drills"?

There is a term for this: mobilization. It's a bit more dramatic, of course, in wars past, but the concept remains the same:

> Poland partly mobilized its troops on August 24, 1939, and fully mobilized on August 30, 1939, following the increased confrontations with Germany since March 1939. On September 1, 1939 Germany invaded Poland, which prompted both France and Britain to declare war on Germany.

> On 30 August, the Polish Navy sent its destroyer flotilla to Britain, executing the Peking Plan. On the same day, Marshal of Poland Edward Rydz-Śmigły announced the mobilization of Polish troops. However, he was pressured into revoking the order by the French, who apparently still hoped for a diplomatic settlement, failing to realize that the Germans were fully mobilized and concentrated at the Polish border.

I found it interesting that another username commented with the exact same message[0] in a related thread, slightly modified but with the exact same sentence structure and quotes.

> You only just have to open the SCMP front page to find them calling military deployments in a stadium near Hong Kong "drills", citing anonymous sources that say "they are not of concern" and quoting liberally from anonymous posters on Chinese message boards spouting hate.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20684694

Actually, my comment is earlier. I'm sure dang can confirm though we're totally separate people.

I don’t think it was killed, There are no upvotes or downvotes , It is just at bottom of the comment thread. That being said SCMP might still have some people who are editorially independent now. But I don’t think They would want to push their luck too far. Considering Alibaba group can face consequences of same in Mainland

The post was likely dead at the time the GP posted, and later some people vouched for the post to bring it back to life.

Can @dang confirm it , that it was dead due to downvotes or some bug. I do not see any downvotes or upvotes. You may be right but I Cannot confirm it.

Fyi, you can only ever see upvotes on your own posts.

Right, it was killed by a software filter and then users vouched for it. I've fixed the software filter and moved kenneth's reply to be a child of the comment it was replying to.

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