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Comment by mensetmanusman | Hacker News Reader

China doesn't realize how much they are being held back by meaningless investments of time and expertise on this. They spend almost the same %GDP as the US does on the US military as on their internal suppression forces.

Maybe it's good for the world that they burn so much talent and wealth on adding inefficiency to their internal information exchange.

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It is not the goal of the CCP to advance China as it is to keep themselves in power.

I would disagree. The leading organization is much more aligned with the needs of the nation than the likes of Iran or Russia, which probably wouldn't mind bombing the shit out of their own city if it was necessary to stay in power.

For example they actually bow to American pressure and try to avoid sanctions or other trade problems. As of today their navy could be completely destroyed with like 30% of the US Navy, so any naval blockade is probably unbreakable for them. Iran's hunta would (and did) just say "whatever" and continued tanking the GDP.

Another example - the Chinese intelligence helps domestic industries, even those that are far from the defense business.

> which probably wouldn't mind bombing the shit out of their own city if it was necessary to stay in power

See the Tiananmen Square Massacre.

Bombing a city can result in tens to hundreds of thousands of casualties.

You have to have a sense of proportion on this, and an example that isn't 30 years old.

They fear bomb their own cities though (using drones!):

Shanghai Residents Told to 'Control Your Thirst for Freedom' Amid Lockdown

https://www.newsweek.com/shanghai-residents-told-control-you...

I didn't downvote you but if a government

- offers no way of replacing itself democratically

- extends own term indefinitely

- blocks free exchange of information

- censors specific speech that shows its failures or desire of people to replace it

- suppresses internal protests with murders and disappearings of people (1989 Tiananmen, 2019+ Hong Kong, blank paper movement, ...)

etc then it's super clear its primary goal is maintaining power.

Sure, it cannot maintain power without at least seeming to be "aligned with nation". But it takes second place to maintaining power.

There's probably more disagreement within the Chinese government than between the two dominant parties of each of the western powers.

Perhaps, but you wouldn't know it, and the results sure aren't felt domestically or internationally.

Everyone knows when people disappear or get "nicely escorted" from party meetings. /s

I am guessing the comment above somehow meant that more infighting within a gang of literal criminals who put themselves in power and clearly struggle to maintain it means the gang is somehow better than a democratic government? But I cannot see the logic

Yes of course. Because those disagreements are about how to stay power really, and something else for looks.

You have to keep the poeple happy enough, not even China could withstand the full force of their own people rising up against them.

So, on the surface, you appear aligned with growth and advancement and all that.

But under the surface, the system is about control, and only control.

PRC centralized narrative setting apparatus is more efficient than constant misinformation shitshow on western platforms. Not to mention the entire reason why PRC has domestic info ecosystem is because they were prescient in filtering external content. The system already paid for itself many times over.

>They spend almost the same %GDP as the US does on the US military as on their internal suppression forces.

It's almost as if PRC doesn't spend that much %GDP on military. The waste is PRC spending as much as US on domestic policing, which is not great considering how militarized US policing is. Meanwhile PRC simply doesn't spend that much on defense <2% vs US ~3.5%, if you include guestimates of shadow budgets, 3% vs 6%.

Get used to it; we will soon be a part of China's "community of common destiny".

I wouldn’t say that. But Western countries would absolutely replicate the surveillance and censorship if they could. And they do in some ways, but there are many structural things stopping them.

They let the private sector do it for them instead.

I wouldn't be so sure that it's a bad idea. Look how social media has damaged democracy around the world. US democracy is stuck in a bit of a death spiral - https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/04/how-stop-m.... I hate repression, but they've been at it for thousands of years and I'm no longer super confident we have something better (see citizens united, roe v wade, affirmative action). China's life expectancy just beat the US.

Free speech causing problems for the USA yet again?

I'd say the issue is "factionalism" as the US founding fathers identified it. Some group (elites, landlords, corporations, white people, etc) is looking out only for themselves at the expense of society in general. East Asian countries love enforcing their conformity and harmony.

The US doesn't have a minority rule death spiral because of social media, it has a minority rule cycle because the constitution literally entrenches minority rule via mechanisms like senatorial malapportionment, supermajorities, the electoral college and judicial review of policy (see citizens united, roe v wade, affirmative action) rather than merely procedure. It has experienced this before, sometimes devolving into outright civil war, without actually reaching death.

The technologies for resolving America's problems are well understood - majority decision making, parliamentarism, representation and participation of electoral minorities rather than inhibiting the work of the majority, a narrower scope of judicial review and/or a more flexible constitution. But as long as people say, as you do, "it isn't the thing that caused the problem that is the problem, it is some fancy gadget that is the problem", then you will be unable to solve the problems

> It has experienced this before, sometimes devolving into outright civil war, without actually reaching death.

That's not really enough to establish a pattern, though. People in China have furniture older than the United States.

> But as long as people say, as you do, "it isn't the thing that caused the problem that is the problem, it is some fancy gadget that is the problem", then you will be unable to solve the problems

This is victim blaming. US citizens get no say in governance:

"Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens"

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-poli...

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