Successful Chinese Ballistic Missile Test

[K. A. Pital]

If they treat their citizens well, then it follows that if everybody were a citizen then everybody would be treated well.

I heard you erect a fence with Mexico so that poor Third Worlders most decidedly NOT become your citizens and not even live in the same nation as you, so that they won't even be able to get to the territory you inhabit. I don't hear America granting citizenship automatically to Iraqis, Vietnamese or Afghanis, despite it having bombed their nations. I don't hear America offering it's citizenship voluntarily to the world and all nations it has ever done grievous evil to. So bullshit, that is.

So no, it only follows that "if they treat their citizens well, other people can still be treated extremely BAD"

Not more, not less. There is no correlation between treating a subset of people good and being bad to other people. Nazi Germany was sure keen on "Aryans", after all.

[Ryan Thunder]

I heard you erect a fence with Mexico so that poor Third Worlders most decidedly NOT become your citizens and not even live in the same nation as you, so that they won't even be able to get to the territory you inhabit.

I'm not an American. Anyway, you'll notice that nobody born in Mexico to Mexican citizens is an American citizen. So they don't give a shit about them. Frankly, why should they, except out of the goodness of their hearts? Of course if Mexico and America were a part of the same country, well, it'd look really bad if this hypothetical Meximerica did nothing about its entire southern sector that's pretty much languishing.

I don't hear America granting citizenship automatically to Iraqis, Vietnamese or Afghanis, despite it having bombed their nations. I don't hear America offering it's citizenship voluntarily to the world and all nations it has ever done grievous evil to. So bullshit, that is.

So no, it only follows that "if they treat their citizens well, other people can still be treated extremely BAD"

Not more, not less. There is no correlation between treating a subset of people good and being bad to other people. Nazi Germany was sure keen on "Aryans", after all.

So, who do you advocate, then? Russia?

[Lusankya]

Suggesting that China do the same, both for the health of its own citizens and for the health of the world at large, isn't hypocritical, as long as it isn't taken to the absurd Green Fundamentalist angle of "industrialism is bad, everyone should be a subsistence farmer!" which would be bullshit.

Yeah. I think everyone (even Chinaphiles like myself) would like to see pollution here cut down, but at the moment, the answer to that is actually increased industrialisation, which, amongst other things, will stop the poor people in China from relying on coal for their winter heating and their cooking. That's one of the things that annoys me most about the "don't pollute, don't industrialise" angle. Northern China gets pretty damned cold in winter, and without either coal or some other kind of heating, people will freeze to death. I can only assume that people like Ryan just don't give a shit about that.

And, you may notice, it's not even all the Americans who are doing this... it's embarassing to have to share a foreign policy with some of these people.

Yeah. I did notice that it's not even all the Americans. That's why I specified Americawankers rather than Americans, especially since, IIRC, Ryan Thunder is Canadian. But he seems to be the political equivalent of one of those kids who hangs around with the school bully because he likes being next to strong. America has some quite intelligent people, but it also has some of the most amoral fuckwits in the world supporting it.

[Ryan Thunder]

So, I see that you were too busy scrambling for strawmen to villify me with to read that line about wanting everybody to be well fed, housed, and educated, with no qualifiers...

[Shroom Man 777]

And as I expected, you start asking lots of questions, and then interpret the individual answers in I give in the worst possible way you can in a desperate attempt to villify me. Well, fuck you too.

WHAT answers? You fail to answer any of my points. You don't even acknowledge the aforementioned American mistreatment of non-Americans, you pretend as if it is nothing, as if it's not a big deal and as if everything is fine and dandy. Your inability to acknowledge or to accept or to respond to any of these brought up points regarding America's shortcomings, beyond "oh at least its better than russchina lol" makes me think that you don't really give a damn about any of those things, and that you really don't care about people in the rest of the world but in your little favorite western countries.

So, again, why should anyone trust America as a leader of a global hegemony when, even today, it continues to mistreat the citizens of other nations? Yes, it treats its own people good, but it treats other non-Americans bad. We, people who are non-Americans, don't think this is good and we don't think this is agreeable. We don't agree to your concept of American hegemony. We are people from places that are not America, some of us are people from places that have been mistreated by America, and we have opinions and wants and needs that may not coincide with that of America's. In light of this, there are quite a few of us who would not like to see your fantasies of global hegemony come to light.

Yes, you could say that it's either "with us or against us" or your way "or the highway". But the fact is that we live in a big world with lots of people with lots of differences who may not get along, who may have different ideas on how to do things, who are not the same, and who might not appreciate many of the things America or the West might do. Some of the things that you think are "good" or are "right" might not be good or right for those people.

So far, none of your ideas and posts seem to suggest that you even care or give consideration to this.

And that's what has led me to think that way about you. What other way is to interpret your statements? You seem to disregard anything that does not coincide with your worldview, callously so. It seems like your idea, if it were actually put in place, would end up disregarding anything - even people - that do not coincide with the worldview either.

While we're at it, obviously, you would rather not benefit from the combined resources of the entire goddamn world trying to improve your country because you're just that much of an asshole.

Improve my country? How? By having American multinationals consort with authoritarian US-backed dictators like Ferdinand Marcos? That was a product of historic American intervention in the Philippines, which ended up in decades of martial law and lots of people killed, tortured or illegally detained. Are you going to conveniently ignore what happened? Pretend it doesn't happen? What assurances can you give us that this won't ever happen again, when you seem to be doing those same things today in the MidEast? Will we take your word for it just because you pwomised with your widdle pinky?

And is America your definition of "the entire goddamn world"?

I'd like very much to see the Philippines engage in friendly and peaceful relationships with "the entire goddamn world". But we can't forget the result of America's manipulation of the Philippines. America is not benevolent, and has and continues to engage in immoral acts internationally.

You should not be blind to that, you should not be ignorant of this, and you should not act as if it's nothing or pretend that everything is A-OK. That is a disservice to the people who HAVE experienced such mistreatment in the past and present and does nothing to bolster your credibility in their eyes.

That behavior is characteristic of the West, or at least America's, actions regarding the rest of the world and has not won them any favors. You have not shown yourselves fit for any of the "global hegemony" that's being prattled around here like cheap infomercial shit.

[Lusankya]

So, I see that you were too busy scrambling for strawmen to villify me with to read that line about wanting everybody to be well fed, housed, and educated, with no qualifiers...

Yet you don't want poor countries to industrialise without first getting money. In case you haven't understood what people have tried to tell you in the past and are telling you again now: that is impossible.

You just try explaining your position to the peasants I know who want their children to get a good education, but have only been able to let their children study after 4pm within the last 10 years, because before that the coal power station that gives them electricity didn't exist. You go tell them that they can't have their refrigerators or light bulbs because, whoops, it's not clean energy! You go and tell them that they can't have their 12 kuai/hour ($1.83US/hr) job - which pays more than twice what they'd get working in the fields - because it's better for everyone, apparently, if they continue to be soy farmers than if they gain skills that will actually give them the capability to create clean industries once their country has the capital for it.

Seriously. Fuck you. You have no idea about reality. Go drown in a toilet or something.

[Shroom Man 777]

Could you define "free world" for me, in positive terms rather than negative?

I'd like to say that the free world are prosperous and democratic and fairly liberal first world nations where the people have moderate to high standards of living, are fairly comfortable and happy, and are good places to live in compared to the Third World which I live in.

However, the "free world" is also a blanket label for the Americans and their allies, when they label themselves as "us" and when they label their enemies as "them". In the case of the Iraq war, and in the Cold War, this has led to the "free world" doing a lot of bad things historically. They continue to call themselves the "free world" but they're not exactly free of guilt, they're not exactly clean, and their hands are not exactly bloodless.

My definition of "free world" is... well... who calls themselves part of the "free world"? The guys who usually go on about that are the Americans and their allies. We've seen what they can do, and what they did.

[Shroom Man 777]

So, I see that you were too busy scrambling for strawmen to villify me with to read that line about wanting everybody to be well fed, housed, and educated, with no qualifiers...

But you seem to think that the only force of good on Earth who can do this is the West. We have shown that they are not a force of good, that they have often been a force of bad. That they DON'T want everyone fed, housed, and educated. Do you think the West gave a shit about people being fed, housed and educated when America was busy propping up regimes in the Philippines, South America and elsewhere?

Do you think the West gave a shit about people being fed, housed and educated when America was vetoing the UN Security Council's condemnation of the Iraqi gassing of Iranians?

I'm sorry, but your high opinion of the nobility of your nation and of America and the West just isn't something that the rest of us can share.

[ray245]

So, I see that you were too busy scrambling for strawmen to villify me with to read that line about wanting everybody to be well fed, housed, and educated, with no qualifiers...

Yet you don't want poor countries to industrialise without first getting money. In case you haven't understood what people have tried to tell you in the past and are telling you again now: that is impossible.

You just try explaining your position to the peasants I know who want their children to get a good education, but have only been able to let their children study after 4pm within the last 10 years, because before that the coal power station that gives them electricity didn't exist. You go tell them that they can't have their refrigerators or light bulbs because, whoops, it's not clean energy! You go and tell them that they can't have their 12 kuai/hour ($1.83US/hr) job - which pays more than twice what they'd get working in the fields - because it's better for everyone, apparently, if they continue to be soy farmers than if they gain skills that will actually give them the capability to create clean industries once their country has the capital for it.

Seriously. Fuck you. You have no idea about reality. Go drown in a toilet or something.

Even then, China is busy trying to seek new ways to develop green technology at a much faster rate than the US. Take for example, their attempts to build an eco-city. Good luck in trying to make such a project a reality in the US.

[LaCroix]

I said they should not be allowed to industrialize because before they could afford to implement clean technology they'd destroy us all with the sheer volume of pollution they'd produce.

You know that those evil Chinese factories are probably producing the plastic bags you are carrying your newest playstation game home in? And probably the cover for the disc, too...

edit: fuck.. forgot to refresh and missed the post between...

[AniThyng]

Well he did completely ignore the point that even ostensibly "clean" industries like electronics are hardly such, and also completely ignored the point that in order for everyone to live like a middle class citizen of the free world, somewhere out there there has to be a whole supply chain of factories and mines and oil wells.

You know, I don't actually dislike America or american corporations - obviously seeing as I am using an american designed computer and american software and work for a european MNC. But no one actually begrudges american investment. What they begrude is american geopolitical meddling.

[Simon_Jester]

Yeah. I think everyone (even Chinaphiles like myself) would like to see pollution here cut down, but at the moment, the answer to that is actually increased industrialisation, which, amongst other things, will stop the poor people in China from relying on coal for their winter heating and their cooking. That's one of the things that annoys me most about the "don't pollute, don't industrialise" angle. Northern China gets pretty damned cold in winter, and without either coal or some other kind of heating, people will freeze to death. I can only assume that people like Ryan just don't give a shit about that.

Or haven't thought it through, which amounts to the same thing.

Yeah. I did notice that it's not even all the Americans. That's why I specified Americawankers rather than Americans, especially since, IIRC, Ryan Thunder is Canadian.

That's just wrong. We do not deserve that level of fanatical apologism from noncitizens.

[AniThyng]

It did occur to me though that originally the point of contention was that China was an authoritarian state. Let's look at this from another angle: what if China were a liberal democracy? Does its geopolitical and economic interests change? I submit that it does not, even if you are indulging in Chinese Hegemon fantasies.

[Lusankya]

Pfft. If China was a liberal democracy, there would still be foot binding and women would be largely illiterate save for those in upper-class families. Oh, and there would be at least 100 million more peasants going around cutting down forests, eating pandas and shitting in the water supply.

Democracy is not what China has needed over the last century.

[Grif]

Pfft. If China was a liberal democracy, there would still be foot binding and women would be largely illiterate save for those in upper-class families. Oh, and there would be at least 100 million more peasants going around cutting down forests, eating pandas and shitting in the water supply.

Democracy is not what China has needed over the last century.

Can you clarify why? Seeing that China under authoritarian rule also did make a lot of mistake along the way. One that comes to mind is the Cultural Revolution.

[ray245]

Pfft. If China was a liberal democracy, there would still be foot binding and women would be largely illiterate save for those in upper-class families. Oh, and there would be at least 100 million more peasants going around cutting down forests, eating pandas and shitting in the water supply.

Democracy is not what China has needed over the last century.

Can you clarify why? Seeing that China under authoritarian rule also did make a lot of mistake along the way. One that comes to mind is the Cultural Revolution.

Because democracy don't work so well when your country is made up of illiterate/conservative idiots? Many people often believe that human rights and democracy are the same thing when it isn't true at all.

Perhaps when you actually starts to compare the damage done by the CCP verse the benefits the CCP has brought to China, you might have a proper case.

[Lusankya]

At the beginning of the 20th century, China had a largely peasant population. Reforms like women's education and the anti-food binding reforms were carried out largely in spite of popular opinion. Something like the one child policy would have been impossible to implement in China, especially given the strong influence of Confucianism and Daoism which strongly emphasise the importance of large families, and with large families, China would have much more difficulty breaking the cycle of poverty in the countryside. The increased population would also put an enormous pressure on the environment - especially water supplies which are already stretched, especially in the north. Korea Japan and Taiwan were able to get away from that, but they are much smaller countries, which made the job of industrialising a lot easier because it required an order or two of magnitude fewer resources, and Taiwan and Japan especially had the advantage of heavy American investment, which eased the burden significantly.

Now, things like the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolutions were mistakes, and China would have been a lot better off with a more effective dictator than Mao (possibly if Zhou Enlai was in charge - people still seriously love him), but a democracy would have been unable to properly implement the top-down reforms that have helped China the most in recent years.

For an example of what China would likely be like were it a democracy, take a look at India. That's pretty much what you'd get, except with less messed-up religious insanity.

EDIT: I will say that illiterate Chinese peasants are more sensible in many areas than barely-literate rural Westerners. At least they understand that education is important for improving their family situation, even if they don't have any themselves. But that doesn't mean that them having a say in the government is a good idea, because reforms like women's rights and population control, which China desperately needs would not gain their support in a democracy, even today.

[K. A. Pital]

So, who do you advocate, then? Russia?

I repeatedly said I "advocate" no one. I do not feel the need to be a hypocrite - what is bad if one nation does it, is bad if another does it too. End of story. Negative practices should be discouraged among all nations. Negative practices quite surely include meddling in foreign affairs of other nations.

For that reason I believe counterbalancing forces, if nothing else can practically help, should be encouraged.

In case there are better methods, like pan-national authorities (the UN), they should be used instead. But alas, the word of the UN means shit little. Therefore, the large powers should serve as counterbalances to each other's influence.

I have no problem with the US balancing China's reach. Or Russia's reach. Or anyone's reach for that matter. I'm not taking sides, and I'm certainly not subscribing to a position that one nation is entitled to rights that other nations do not have.

[Grif]

Now, things like the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolutions were mistakes, and China would have been a lot better off with a more effective dictator than Mao (possibly if Zhou Enlai was in charge - people still seriously love him), but a democracy would have been unable to properly implement the top-down reforms that have helped China the most in recent years.

I haven't considered that democracy works best when your population is relatively well-educated to begin with. Good point.

However, I think China, as of 2010, is already at the threshold where democratic governance is beginning to look like a better option compared to the old-style authoritarian rule. Literacy rate is already comparable with most First World countries. (Interestingly, my country, Malaysia (91.9%), had a lower literacy rate compared to China (93.3%) as of 2009) If anything, the CCP had remarkable success in educating the masses.

[AniThyng]

Now, things like the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolutions were mistakes, and China would have been a lot better off with a more effective dictator than Mao (possibly if Zhou Enlai was in charge - people still seriously love him), but a democracy would have been unable to properly implement the top-down reforms that have helped China the most in recent years.

I haven't considered that democracy works best when your population is relatively well-educated to begin with. Good point.

However, I think China, as of 2010, is already at the threshold where democratic governance is beginning to look like a better option compared to the old-style authoritarian rule. Literacy rate is already comparable with most First World countries. (Interestingly, my country, Malaysia (91.9%), had a lower literacy rate compared to China (93.3%) as of 2009) If anything, the CCP had remarkable success in educating the masses.

The problem with these sort of generally benevolent authoritarian governments is that they are never ready to give their population the benefit of the doubt - it's always some excuse about how the masses may be "confused" or misled. Certainly however gradual erosion of the authoritarian establishments power is much preferable to outright revolution or worse still, outside intervention. And yeah, some people overstay thier welcome (Mao, for example. Would be all well and good if he stepped down before the cultural revolution bullshit. No doubt you also know which esteemed countryman of ours would also do well to stfu )

[Simon_Jester]

Pfft. If China was a liberal democracy, there would still be foot binding and women would be largely illiterate save for those in upper-class families. Oh, and there would be at least 100 million more peasants going around cutting down forests, eating pandas and shitting in the water supply.

Democracy is not what China has needed over the last century.

This is not a disagreement disguised as a question, it is simply a question, because I would like to hear more about your opinion:

Europe and America had peasants going around cutting down forests, shitting in the water supply, and not teaching their women to read until quite recently. They didn't eat pandas, but I chalk that up to lack of opportunity. Why did democracy not fail miserably in those areas, if it would fail in China?

[Lusankya]

Democracy in those places was originally limited to the educated upper class: true universal suffrage wasn't really common until the 19th century, by which stage literacy was far more common. Women's liberation and women's suffrage, as a matter of fact were both brought about as a consequence of women's education, rather than a precursor to women's education, as was the case in China. Remember, women in the west fought for their liberation, but in China is was brought in by male reformists in the government, beginning with the Republic of China and continuing with the PRC.

Furthermore, at that stage overpopulation wasn't as big an issue as it is currently in China. Hugely unpopular measures like the one child policy weren't necessary back then, because infant mortality was still quite high, and the population wasn't as huge to begin with, so any increase in population from an improvement in living conditions would still be relatively small, and would not impact on the environment nearly as much. China has actually had to make much more extreme social, environmental and industrial changes that would be difficult, if not impossible, to implement with a democracy.

It's not that I don't think that a relatively stable democracy wouldn't have survived in China. But I think that if there were democracy, China would be in a much poorer state than it is now. Personally, I think that many of the things we take for granted today, particularly education of the masses, stem more from Enlightenment values than from democracy.

[K. A. Pital]

Europe and America had peasants going around cutting down forests, shitting in the water supply, and not teaching their women to read until quite recently.

Germany for one was nigh 100% literate at the dawn of the century. China, not so.

What is "quite recently"? European nations and the USA underwent industrialization in the XIX century. China is undergoing it for the last 60 years. A 100 year gap is not a small factor for such processes.

The question that must be asked is "why has democratic rule failed almost everywhere outside the First World", and especially why has democratic rule failed almost uniformly in the Third World. The answer might be a tautology, but it's nonetheless true - because it's (or was) the Third World, and comparing the "recent" (i.e. XX and XIX centuries) historical, social and economic conditions in the First World with nations like China is not going to yield any similarities.

[mr friendly guy]

You're a fucking liar. I said they should not be allowed to industrialize because before they could afford to implement clean technology they'd destroy us all with the sheer volume of pollution they'd produce. The climate is fragile enough as it is with the West being the bloody idiots we are. The last thing we want is 1.3 billion more people producing even more pollution than they would already.
.

And you gross over the point that its contradictory to say its unbelievable that the CCP is helping the average Chinese citizen and bitch about it when they do? Your reason for bitching about it when they do it a irrelevant to the main argument, but I see you choose to attack that because you perceive its easier to win. AM I RITE?

[UnderAGreySky]

The question that must be asked is "why has democratic rule failed almost everywhere outside the First World", and especially why has democratic rule failed almost uniformly in the Third World.

A genuine question, what do you mean by "failed"? Is this in terms of stability or economic/social progress?