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Comment by refurb | Hacker News Reader

By antagonize you mean “asking China not to secretly steal our intellectual property”?

This smells of hypocracy.

Our companies sets up production in China to take advantage of loose labour laws and abuse workers, but cry foul when they get hit by loose IP laws.

Also the US stole textile technology from the British Empire to launch it's own industrial revolution.

Also your regular reminder that intellectuall properly is legal fiction that some cultures do not recognise, or see differently.

Extending this logic, if the US said some state should stop trafficking in slaves you’d say “this smells of hypocracy! the US had slaves 160 years ago, so shouldn’t be expecting other states to not buy and sell slaves”.

See how stupid that argument sounds?

Go ask random people on the street 'do you think slavery is morally right'.

Then go out on the street and ask 'do you think it's morally wrong that India does not respect our medical patents so that they can produce cheap generic treatments from cancer accesible to their people'

You will find that the number of people that believe these two situations are morally comparable is roughly ~0%

>"See how stupid that argument sounds"

Your argument sounds even more stupid. You are comparing something commonly recognized as a crime to some artificial concept forced down the throat of a country that was being exploited and was frankly in their right to use whatever means to get out of that subservient state. The west is patented everything by now. Expecting the rest of the world to serve that system and be poor forever is disgusting.

You realize hypocrisy doesn't require something is a "crime" right?

Can you tell me whose hypocrisy you are referring to.

The earlier reply to my comment that China should stop stealing intellectual property was "This smells of hypocracy.".

Hmmm, this argument would hold more weight if offshoring for cheap labor was not eerily like modern slavery. This is exactly what happens now - the West has laws, and corporations go abroad to ignore them and absolve responsibility, while lobbying for and supporting the lack of human rights.

> See how stupid...

You compared "intellectual property" to slavery. Try again.

There's anarchy between states - the US is spying on Chinese industries, just as China is spying on US industries, it's how the world is.

That said, this man isn't a spy - the fact that the government couldn't rig a jury in Tennessee makes very clear that he is innocent.

Did you reply to the wrong comment?

No. You wished China would stop spying on the US. That's just not in the cards.

That profile lists it as a “50 cent Army member”. The profile is not really a good faith interactor.

Isn't that just tongue-in-cheek? Considering how easily accusations of astroturfing and shilling are thrown around when it comes to this topic.

Sure it certainly could be. Whether the account is shilling or shit posting doesn’t really matter though. Either one isn’t a good faith interaction.

Good thing then Germany ain't antagonizing the US [0] or this whole topic would look very hypocritical [1].

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON#Examples_of_industrial...

[1] https://apnews.com/article/b40414d22f2248428ce11ff36b88dc53

brain drain was a thing before the term "steal IP" was invented.

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