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from the the-truth-is-what-we-say-it-is dept.
TechCrunch:
"China's web scrubbers have been busy banning a collection of terms and dropping the hammer on user accounts after the Xi Jinping, the country's premier, got the all-clear to become 'President For Life' after the Communist Party moved to amend the constitution to remove an article that limits Presidential terms to two five-year terms."
BBC:
"The comments remaining on the popular Sina Weibo microblog are mostly monosyllabic statements from users simply say they "like" or "approve" the amendments.
They are likely to be from China's "50 Cent Party" - a nickname coined for internet commentators who are paid small amounts to post messages supporting the government's position.
Some posts have attracted thousands of comments - but only a few are available to view. This is traditionally indicative of online censorship by government administrators. "
China Digital Times:
"Following state media's announcement, censorship authorities began work to limit online discussion. CDT Chinese editors found the following terms blocked from being posted on Weibo: [...]"
Sources:
China's web censors go into overdrive as President Xi Jinping consolidates power
China censorship after Xi Jinping presidency extension proposal
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Sulla on Tuesday February 27 2018, @08:57PM (11 children)
I have recently come across a lot of folks who seem to think that China is a poor repressed country that is just misunderstood and can do no wrong. In the US it seems pretty common to blame ourselves personally for the wrongdoings of our ancestors, it is not necessarily wrong because we are the same people we were then just with a different set of inputs. In the US's time as the sole superpower and during the period of the duality of the US/USSR some terrible things were done. Will the world when China is in control be worse than that when the US or Europe were in control? For South Korea and Japan and to some extent Vietnam/Philippines the US has been a great boon, our excess wealth and desire for cheap shit brought Japan and Korea up to the levels of being fully modernized. Vietnam, India, and others are experiencing the same effects to a lesser extent. China made the decision to not allow that to happen and to repress and keep their own people in poverty - this is frightful to me. If the party leadership sees their own people as nothing, how do they see the rest of the world?
China as a superpower is frightful, if we are the same people we were 150 years ago then they are the same people they were 150 years ago. Expect to see Taiwan reintegrated as US power falls, Vietnam and China will go to war over Vietnam's independence (Extremely high troop levels and weapons deal from Pres. Obama). There is that conflict between India/China over over the Maldives (https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2018/02/chinese-warships-enter-east-indian-ocean-amid-maldives-tensions/).
May you live in interesting times.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday February 27 2018, @09:10PM (4 children)
Maybe I haven't been browsing Tumblr enough because I haven't seen much of that jive talk. Who's saying it? Got a cite? Maybe an opinion column? Are they reaching back towards 19th century Western imperialism in China?
I'm sure some closely related (but not identical) sentiments are more like:
Nationalist Chinese person: The U.S. had its time at the top, now it's China's time.
Many people (in relation to climate talks): The West had its time to pollute and grow economically, now the rest of the world can have its chance.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday February 27 2018, @09:47PM (1 child)
Oh, it's more than that...China has, if you count the Xia period, a good 5,000 *years* of history. The US has been around for not even 1/20th of that. There is, I suspect, feeling among many Chinese that the world rightfully belongs to them as the oldest still-extant civilization and inventors of, for example, *gunpowder.*
And wasn't there some emperor in the 15th century AD who prohibited seagoing voyages not too long before Columbus and co. made their trips from Spain? Because if I'm remembering that right, that may very well be why we're not all speaking courtly Mandarin right now (and believe me I am trying my damndest to learn...). Such seemingly small things are the fulcrums on which history pivots. It's scary to think about...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 3, Informative) by Hartree on Tuesday February 27 2018, @11:29PM
I recall that it was at least partly a political battle between the eunuchs and the Confucian scholars. The emperor who had supported the voyages died, then the next emperor restricted the voyages for a short time His successor authorized a seventh one.
Then Admiral Zheng He's (a eunuch) seventh exploration fleet got destroyed by a storm off the coast of Africa and that helped tilt the balance from exploration (expensive) to internal civil works projects (also expensive).
The winning side tried to minimize the memory of Zheng He. He was born a muslim and became a eunuch which were both great ways to be unpopular with the Confucians. (Seeing a recurring pattern of how to handle the opposition? ;) )
This likely kept the Chinese from becoming a much broader empire. Whether they would have reached Europe is speculation.
(Score: 1) by Sulla on Tuesday February 27 2018, @10:48PM (1 child)
This is people I know in real life and not anyone that I know online. I will have to see if I can figure out what publications they read.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 27 2018, @11:28PM
I feel much better about it, now. Do you seriously imagine that they actually read?
(Score: 4, Informative) by Grishnakh on Tuesday February 27 2018, @10:33PM (5 children)
For South Korea and Japan and to some extent Vietnam/Philippines the US has been a great boon, our excess wealth and desire for cheap shit brought Japan and Korea up to the levels of being fully modernized.
Huh? Japan was just as modernized at the onset of WWII as the US was, and these days it makes the US look pretty backwards (take a ride on a Japanese train or subway and then try the same in the US). Losing a big war and then being occupied set them back a bit, but they weren't some backwards country before the war.
There is that conflict between India/China over over the Maldives
Don't worry, the Maldives will barely even exist in a few decades so it'll be moot.
(Score: 2) by looorg on Tuesday February 27 2018, @10:35PM
Don't be a downer. They'll be the next Atlantis!
(Score: 2) by Hartree on Wednesday February 28 2018, @04:55AM (2 children)
"the Maldives will barely even exist in a few decades"
It might just depend on how fast the Chinese can haul in sand. It's amazing how fast some islands in the South China Sea are growing. ;)
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Wednesday February 28 2018, @04:00PM (1 child)
Aha!! Maybe that's why they have an interest there! They're going to haul in more sand to shore up the islands, and then take a cut of the tourism profits!
Personally, I still think it'd be pretty cool to build a giant dam across the Strait of Gibraltar, and lower the water level in the Mediterranean. Imagine all the shipwrecks that would be found.
(Score: 2) by Hartree on Wednesday February 28 2018, @04:38PM
Hey, the Army Corps of Engineers diverted the water from Niagara falls in the late 60s, so I wouldn't bet against it. Especially if the Chinese are involved. They do big projects (Three Gorges, One Belt One Road, Tibet Railway for examples).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @07:33PM
Both Japan's modernization, and Japan's intervention in WW2 were both thanks to US attacks on their autonomy.
First during the Opening of Japan by forcing them to open trade with the US, then again during WW2 by cutting off the oil shipments they needed for their war effort against the surrounding Asian States and Russia. One could daresay the modernized Japan capable of its conflicts between the 1860s and WW2 were directly spurred by the US Opening, because prior to it their xenophobia and travel restrictions kept Japanese from travelling to America for education. Go read up on it, the big surge in American based education in Japan was directly a result of American intervention in Japan, leading up to Admiral Yamamoto's warning about coming into conflict with them during WW2... himself an American collegiate graduate.
American Foreign Policy has been responsible for a *LOT* more damage than most people are aware of, and almost as much comparatively as the rest of European expeditionary activities from the 1400s to 1900s.