You should see my posts in some of the US threads.
I should add to this that when I allow myself to criticise the action of a government, itâs never against the country itself, or against the people. I practice tâai chi regularly since more than twenty years. That alone should tell you the respect I have for China in a cultural sense.
But it doesnât change my stance on a political level: Chinaâs current government isnât trustworthy, and my opinion is that democratic states shouldnât place their fate in the hands of totalitarian states, and allow them to grow in influence. That is a dangerous game.
I could say the exact same of the way how Saudi Arabia and the other Arabic Gulf states have been allowed to grow in influence. Totally wrong for me.
Yeah have to agree there with the territorial disputes, there must be something in or near the Spratly islands for China to build something out of nothing, what money itâs resources of some kind?
Not sure about Taiwan, wasnât there a bunch of countries/islands which Japan had to hand back to China after WW2? In any case, it was ticking along nicely as a SAR of China until recently, when the US decided to get involved with itâs anti China sentiment and started to stir things up, as per HK.
Australia didnât do themselves any favour with the Covid call out did they, surely they should have thought about any ramifications before being USâs mouthpiece. Which goes with your point about dependency on trade, not sure when the Aussies will pick up whatâs been hit already. Having said that, pretty sure Iron Ore is still a major export to China.
North Korea is a funny one, for a supposedly secret state, it seems like the US knows something about everything thatâs going on there, making it up maybe?
Also, why would the Kim family want to rule over a population and starve them, why wouldnât they want to rule over a country thatâs prosperous? Itâs bizarre.
What are the other border disputes? I only know of the obvious and reported on ones, didnât realise there were so many. How many of them stem from Chinaâs old seafaring days and possibly claiming everything in sight?
Iâve yet to check out the US thread, Iâm sure my tuppence wonât be welcome there either haha
I guess itâs like all governments really, does anyone have faith in that theyâre doing the right thing for the people democracy or not.
The Gulf states get away with it because of money and resources, Amnesty international have always been on about them about human rights etc. but everyone turns a blind eye, because they bring something to the table right?
It depends. As far as Iâm concerned, I trust my government to generally preserve the best interests of our population, within a democratic frame. Of course, there can be the odd case of individual corruption, and sometimes also shady behaviour from our government. And many economic or social choices are far from perfect. But as a whole, I trust our elected representatives to not only respect our democratic frame of mind, but to want it preserved themselves.
Then again, we are a small country, and arenât involved in trying to dominate half of the world instead of co-operating with others⌠maybe thatâs the problem with certain countriesâŚ
Wow this reads like a massive conspiracy theoristâs post.
Sounds like you know nothing about HK and are just reflexively defending China. Taiwan is not, and has never been an âSAR of Chinaâ. Nor would all the unrest in HK have happened if China had not decided to renege on its agreement, and try to force through the extradition law.
Essentially claiming everything they (or some nation that an ancient dynasty once conquered millenia ago) once came into contact with is theirs.
The history of China is fascinating, and its people are actually far more multicultural than the government would have you believe (e.g. no such thing as âChinese cuisineâ as a monolith), but the government is despicable, disgusting, and a threat to humanity.
Australia didnât do itself any favours by legitimately questioning the origin of covid?
This is the culture of secrecy that is so dangerous. The virus came from China and has caused havoc all over the world, but no one is allowed to ask where it came from and how did it spread? This is important information that we all need to prevent a recurrence of this disaster, but all we get from the PRC is silence and threats.
Ah I canât believe I missed that part of the post.
I frankly donât care about the origin of the virus beyond learning how to prevent incidents like that from happening in the future. The most unlikely scenario seems like a deliberate state-sponsored release, so itâs either a lab accident, sabotage, or the original hypothesis of a zoonotic origin.
If it was the former two, the only thing to be done is to discuss how to improve lab protocols and security in future. If I recall correctly, the only lab in the area that would be dealing with such viruses was in fact a US-China joint effort (prior to Trump pulling funding) into coronaviruses and how to mitigate their effects, or even prevent them from infecting humans. A noble effort, so I canât see whatâs so embarrassing about it, apart from the complete undermining of the Chinese Communist Party and its attempts to project power and confidence.
Itâs not just the questioning the origin of covid, but the teaching of democracy and individual thoght that China opposes.
Look intot he number of times China has critisised Australian Universities for âspreading liesâ when in fact they are merely teaching what is accepted to be true, but the CCP donât like it as they donât come out smelling of roses ie Tienemann Square
Itâs mainly about oil and gas. Although the news will be about fishing, itâs all about getting rights to untapped resources (Billions of barrels).
The disputes in the South China Sea are a mess (not all down to China). However I liken the building of Islands is a maritime equivalent to Israel-Palestine strategy with settlements, in the establishment of outposts solidifies their claims.
I only have a passing knowledge of the disputes but this map illustrates the challenge. China claims most of the South China sea
This has caused disputes with Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam, over the hundreds of islands in the area.
There have also been issues with Japan with claims associated with different islands.
On land, China has a dispute with India over (big conflict last year), expansions into Napal, and Bhutan.
As ever these things are never black and white. Some claims are legitimate, some far more dubious, others just wrong. However, its clear China is pushing outwards, using its weight, being less than tactile with its international relations. Those in the region are treading a fine line between ensuring positive relations/trade with most powerful country in region (soon to be world) and risk and threat of that same nation.
I know fuck all about China to be completely honest.
But since we got brown marmorated stink bugs and then Corona from them itâs starting to get a bit personal.
I said pretty much the same thing the other day on here. Itâs a lot harder to support them when their claim is rightful rule over the mainland. Basic independence is a much easier idea to get behind.
The interesting thing is that what I know of Taiwanese people they donât even care about the ROC name. At least none of the current generation do. My girlfriend is from Taiwan and when we spoke about this the other day she shrugged and said she doesnât think she has ever even said the phrase ROC regarding where she is from.
I fucking hate those things. thereâs a 100ft maple on the property next to mine and they sit on the underside of the leaves. I find one of them every week trying to get into my house. Drives me nuts.
Lots of pieces in the last month or so about how the US focus on terrorism in the post-9/11 period allowed China to rise with our attention paid elsewhere. I think it is the pervasiveness of the thinking that results in these articles that is a greater explanation - the US has an inflated sense of what it can achieve on the world scale.
The US has been the dominant power in the world since 1945 and is now losing itâs pre-eminence. A new world order is emerging and it will take some getting used to for all parties involved. Just from a cultural perspective, it will be interesting to see what happens if Hollywood ceases to be the centre of the movie industry.
