from the gunboats,-always-associated-with-diplomacy dept.
Hong Kong Airport Paralysed for a Second Day by Protesters:
The US is claiming its naval ships have been denied entry to Hong Kong, as Donald Trump suggests troops are “moving towards the border”.
A US Commander has confirmed China has blocked the Pacific Fleet’s naval ships from entering ports in Hong Kong.
Two US naval ships due to visit Hong Kong have been denied scheduled access to the city’s ports by China, the US Pacific Fleet confirmed today.
A US Navy spokesman today said two vessels had been blocked from entering the port, hours after President Donald Trump said China was moving its troops towards the border.
The president’s claims were made without specific evidence, according to The Australian
Commander Nate Christensen, the deputy spokesman for the United States Pacific Fleet, confirmed this morning the two US ships, USS Green Bay and USS Lake Erie, had been barred from entering the port. The first vessel, an amphibious dock landing ship, was due to stop in Hong Kong on Saturday, and the second was due in the city next month.
The last time the US Navy visited Hong Kong was in April.
Our Intelligence has informed us that the Chinese Government is moving troops to the Border with Hong Kong. Everyone should be calm and safe!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 13, 2019
[...]Hong Kong’s 10-week political crisis, in which millions of people have taken to the streets calling for a halt to sliding freedoms, was already the biggest challenge to Chinese rule of the semi-autonomous city since its 1997 handover from Britain.
But two days of protests at the airport have again raised the stakes for the financial hub.
Beijing is sending increasingly ominous signals that the unrest must end, with state-run media showing videos of security forces gathering across the border.
[...]All check-ins were cancelled on Tuesday afternoon after thousands of protesters wearing their signature black T-shirts made barricades using luggage trolleys to prevent passengers from passing through security gates.
[...]Demonstrators say they are fighting the erosion of the “one country, two systems” arrangement that enshrined some autonomy for Hong Kong since China took it back from Britain in 1997.
While Hong Kong is a sovereign part of China, the former colony has significant differences to the mainland, including separate legal and political systems, distinct currency, national sporting teams and a greater tolerance for freedom of expression.
Hong Kong also retains many of its pre-colonial features, including driving on the same side of the road as Britain and Australia but not China, the retention of many British place names and statues of British monarchs and dignitaries.
Those two different systems are supposed to remain in place for at least 50 years.
However, Beijing has sought to erode these freedoms in recent years through changes to the law, attempts to not allow pro-independence politicians to take their seats in the region’s parliament and even the disappearance of booksellers critical of the Communist Party leadership.
See also: Navy Times, Business Insider, CNN.
Related Stories
YouTube Disables 210 Channels That Spread Disinformation About Hong Kong Protests
YouTube said on Thursday that its site was used to spread disinformation about the mass protests in Hong Kong, days after Twitter and Facebook cracked down on thousands of China-backed accounts that compared the demonstrators to terrorists and accused them of being at the whim of foreign interests.
In a blog post, YouTube said it had disabled 210 channels this week that had uploaded videos about the protests in Hong Kong. The channels had worked in a coordinated fashion to spread disinformation, the company said. YouTube, which is owned by Google, did not specify when the channels were taken down.
Shane Huntley, a software engineer on Google's threat analysis team, said the channels that were removed were "consistent with recent observations and actions related to China announced by Facebook and Twitter."
Facebook and Twitter said on Monday that they had removed thousands of accounts that originated in China and that acted together to amplify messages and images portraying Hong Kong's protesters as violent and extreme. It was the first time that the social media companies had removed accounts linked to disinformation in China. At the time, Twitter said it had "reliable evidence to support that this is a coordinated state-backed operation."
Also at The Guardian and Reuters.
See also: The People's War Is Coming in Hong Kong
Hong Kong: British consulate employee Simon Cheng detained in China
China's arrest of a Hong Kong man puts spotlight on a controversial shared rail station
Previously: Extradition Law Amendments Protested in Hong Kong
One Million People Protest a Proposed Extradition Law in Hong Kong; Gov't Acquiesces, for Now
How Hong Kong's Protestors Are Hindering (and Hijacking) the Tools of Surveillance
China Warns Hong Kong Protesters Against "Playing With Fire"
China Says Sino-British Joint Declaration On Hong Kong No Longer Binding
Hong Kong Airport Paralysed for a Second Day by Protesters; US Naval Ships Blocked
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:34PM
No extraction for western puppets by US ships? Good. They'll get some re-education thereafter.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:34PM (52 children)
Beijing has helpfully armed the Chinese troops with clue bats, to help the protestors understand that they are part of China.
WTF did everyone THINK was going to happen, when the treaties and agreements were signed? They really thought that Hong Kong would rule itself into perpetuity? With every iota of control that the West surrendered, the day of full reunification drew closer. The day has all but arrived. The smart people aren't going to draw attention to themselves, or piss off The Party. No one is coming back to rescue them.
(Score: 5, Touché) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:38PM (6 children)
See, this is where the Great Firewall works against China's interests. If folks in Hong Kong had known that China would fucking kill you and imprison your entire family for protesting, they might not be causing quite such a ruckus.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by http on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:35PM (1 child)
That would probably have given people a greater incentive for protesting.
I mearn, really, how would you, TMB, react if you realized your government might disappear your family (I'm assuming here that you have one) for openly disagreeing with some of their more heinous practices?
I browse at -1 when I have mod points. It's unsettling.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday August 16 2019, @02:22AM
False comparison. I'm an American, so from a nation of people with an outright fetish for telling their government to fuck off. And I'm above average in that trait even among Americans. China has a massive history of doing what the fuck you're told.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by boltronics on Friday August 16 2019, @03:10AM (3 children)
I replied to this earlier, but it seems my comment was deleted when SN has to be restored from backups.
Hong Kong is not behind the Great Firewall.
It's GNU/Linux dammit!
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday August 16 2019, @10:39AM
Huh, what keeps the iMongols from raiding then?
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 16 2019, @04:26PM (1 child)
I believe he was implying that because mainland Chinese can't post about the things their government is doing to them and are effectively censored, the Hong Kongers might not be as aware of what happens when people resist.
(Score: 2) by boltronics on Saturday August 17 2019, @03:32AM
They would know all too well - certainly more than westerners would. It's quite common for people in Hong Kong to go to China, for business, shopping, etc.
My wife is from Hong Kong. I mentioned what was mentioned here, and she says westerners on the Internet have no idea.
It's GNU/Linux dammit!
(Score: 4, Interesting) by epitaxial on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:42PM (23 children)
In accordance with the "One country, two systems" principle agreed between the United Kingdom and the People's Republic of China, the socialist system of the People's Republic of China would not be practised in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR), and Hong Kong's previous capitalist system and its way of life would remain unchanged for a period of 50 years. This would have left Hong Kong unchanged until 2047.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:55PM (12 children)
Why doesn't Hong Kong just accept the great loving arms of a socialist government? Socialism is great, everyone gets all the free shit they need.
(Score: 3, Funny) by VLM on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:14PM (11 children)
That's what people don't understand due to propaganda. Its not 1950 anymore and the USA is the far left screwed up country now, and Russia and China are conservative right wing countries.
What do you do with a treaty designed around China being more progressive socialist than western civilization, then the US veers hard left to be more left wing than China/Russia were in the last century?
For a concrete social issue example, "whos the real leftist" when gay marriage is legal in the USA but not in China?
Affirmative action in the USA means public hatred of historically successful groups; that's virtually unheard of in China.
In China everyone makes fun of the Baizuo. Thats not allowed in the USA, we barely tolerate comedians making jokes about our Baizuo.
Its the same thing with the Russians. They used to support subversion in the USA during the commie era, that money supply is cut off so our subversive orgs (media, mostly) hate Russia now. And in the usual projection of the opposite, now that the Russians are no longer interfering with our politics, they are accused of exactly that.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:45PM
Wishing your government could have a crackdown just like China has. You must be masturbating furiously over this.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by meustrus on Wednesday August 14 2019, @03:06PM (6 children)
There's a lot to unpack here, and the best way is probably line by line. Here we go.
It's worth mentioning that no matter where you stand on social justice issues like gay marriage, they are almost completely orthogonal to economic issues. Communism vs Capitalism does not imply any particular code of sexual morality. Democrats in the US right now care more about social justice issues, and unfortunately they are being used to distract from economic issues while inequality rises. But hey, men can wear pink now and keep their hair long, not to mention all the other more serious expressions of personal identity, and that freedom of expression is worth more than affording rent to a surprising number of people.
Of course they make fun of the Baizuo. It means white foreigner as much as anything else. The concept doesn't make sense here. Probably the closest analogue is making fun of the French nanny state, which we absolutely do. Well, used to do before the French turned right.
Affirmative action only means public hatred insomuch as economics is a zero-sum game. The goal isn't to hurt white people, even though you can make the argument that it does. Anyway, I guess you like how the Chinese treat the Tibetans and other conquered ethnic groups? You must not have listened to the stories from your grandparents of the times when German, Irish, Italian, Scottish, Welsh, and even poor English people were considered racially inferior to the true God-given owners of the Virginia colonies and their legacy?
Your assertion that "the Russians are no longer interfering with our politics" flies in the face of the evidence. Just because Trump hasn't been indicted for conspiracy doesn't mean the Russians weren't interfering anyway.
In fact, the one thing Russians are most proven to do is go around spouting stupid contradictory nonsense to get a rise out of people. Their goal is to distract us from coming together to make things better by focusing all our attention on the things we can never agree on. Things like gay marriage, affirmative action, and how to respond to threats to our democracy.
Which raises the question: are you, VLM, a Russian troll? Or are you just a troll? Does it matter?
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:07PM (5 children)
You forgot "racist" but at this point it might be redundant pointing it out.
(Score: 2) by meustrus on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:59PM (4 children)
If we simply dismiss VLM as a racist, we will all lose the opportunity to deconstruct his motivations. This goes for anybody you disagree with. Racism is a valid opinion. Rather than recoil from it in horror, we must be prepared to attack it on its own merits.
Which I won't do here, because I didn't pick up anything particularly racist about his post here.
Now I'm left to wonder if AC is another Russian troll. AC might even be VLM trying to start the VLM-bashing party, because that would get us to form sides and stop talking to each other.
At least on Soylent, the Anonymous Cowards tend to actually post according to their namesake instead of making meat puppets.
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:47PM (3 children)
No, it isn't. It's pointless, irrational hatred given entirely unjustified additional life by according it the underserved stance of "valid opinion."
It has no merits. But yes, it should be attacked. Specifically because it is invalid opinion, and further, invalid opinion that has done great harm and can reasonably be expected to continue doing so.
--
Want about to a race conditions? hear joke
(Score: 2) by meustrus on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:13PM (2 children)
Racism, as an ideology of preferring people of your own race over others, can be valid when everybody is a racist. You see this in prisons, where sometimes the only way to be safe is to fall in with the gang that matches your skin color because everyone else is going to attack you anyway.
It intersects easily with xenophobia, which can be valid when you have some relationship with everyone in your community.
Neither of these ideologies are valid in modern society...most of the time. But it's important to recognize when they are effective, because if, say, African Americans formed an explicitly anti-white organization - let's call it the Black Panthers - that would make anti-black organizations suddenly valid to most whites. Society easily devolves into conditions that make racism rational for a majority of people.
The legacy of American racism involves wealthy plantation owners creating a distinction between poor blacks, who could be enslaved, and poor whites, who could not. This was a rational ideology for the plantation owners, because it kept the masses from revolting. It was rational for the poor whites, because they got special treatment. It was rational for slaves, then, to hate white people, because they were all complicit in the racist system.
The system was evil! Regardless, it persisted for centuries. We still hear its echoes today. The moral argument of the abolitionists did not end slavery. Industrialization did.
What I'm saying is: Don't be like the abolitionists. Don't try to convince people to join you because of your moral superiority. Be like the industrialists. Create a better system. Break the old system by targeting what made it useful. Make racism obsolete, and help the racists migrate to a better ideology.
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Wednesday August 14 2019, @09:46PM (1 child)
That's not what racism is at all.
Racism consists entirely of the (bullshit) concept that people — so far, that means humans — of (whatever) race(s) are inherently inferior to your own race, or to some other race.
We're not talking about "I prefer nordic blondes", we're talking about "I assert that black / white / asian / ainu / etc. people are inherently lesser human beings", gutter philosophies based upon no facts whatsoever other than the nature of oppressive cliquing mechanisms, the only function of which is to isolate and disadvantage others.
There's a thing as trying way too hard to be even-handed, and that's exactly what you're on about here.
There may be good reason to object to a particular set of social (or non-social) behaviors. There's no reason whatsoever to assign them as an inherent characteristic of any particular race. That stuff is tribal / clique-based. For instance, I'm not nasty because I'm white, I'm nasty because I grew up fighting the cliques in Spanish Harlem. Not because they were hispanic — but because they, meaning everyone in the clique regardless of racial heritage — were assholes to me.
--
I despise spelling errors. You mix up two
letters, and your whole sentence is urined.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 15 2019, @05:09PM
The problem I see here is that commenters don't know what words like socialism, right, left, racism, and a whole host of other politically and socially charged words mean. They should all have to take remedial 8th-12th grade English.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @03:06PM
I don't think left vs right is a useful framework at all. Why do you think the media tries to get you to think in those terms.
Instead it is a cabal of corrupt insiders along with their millions of cronies and dependents (the army of government bureaucrat's and corporate middle managers) vs the rest of us.
Eg, it will supposedly come out soon that the FBI was not only trying to blackmail Trump, but also Clinton (and all the other candidates):
https://soylentnews.org/submit.pl?op=viewsub&subid=35594¬e=&title=Overstock.com+CEO+Comments+on+Deep+State%2C+Withholds+Further+Comment [soylentnews.org]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCKuwCRKP6c [youtube.com]
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:26PM (1 child)
the USA is the far left screwed up country now
Truly hilarious! Screwed up? sure... Far left?? Who puts those crazy ideas in your head?
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:30PM
VLM's post does a good job of demonstrating how warped and useless the notions of left and right are. Because it's true that western commentators criticize Russia on PC grounds and keep trying to connect them to Repubs, Trump, or the alt-right. Meanwhile, Russia has national health insurance and a still active Communist party...
(Score: 4, Interesting) by zocalo on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:14PM (8 children)
China has seen their chance to expedite the timescale to the inevitable considerably and (from their PoV, quite understandably) taken it, and you can bet the UK's response is going to be "Please, Sir, can I have some more?" because asking NATO for help under Article 5 isn't an option here, and there's no way Boris is going to go and beg the EU for some additional support in the form of sanctions.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:24PM
Note that ALL ships leak. New, old, properly maintained, or negligently abused, they all leak. The only questions are, how fast do they leak? And, how fast can the water be bailed? When leakage exceeds the ability to pump water back out, THEN you have a problem.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:29PM (1 child)
Don't blame it on brexit. The HK agreement was always basically an admission by the UK government that they can't defend the province.
(Score: 2) by zocalo on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:30PM
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
(Score: 4, Insightful) by janrinok on Wednesday August 14 2019, @03:05PM (4 children)
Is your only solution to problems the use of military might? No wonder the world views those with the biggest armed forces as bullies rather than benefactors.
If the World stopped buying Chinese goods it would have more effect than sailing a few warships around Hong Kong. If diplomats started asking China which of their own bilateral agreements China was going to tear up next it would make more of an impression upon the Chinese government.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by jmorris on Wednesday August 14 2019, @03:58PM
The world is governed by the existence and use of military force, and little else. When all parties are in agreement as to who has the most ability to project military force into an area there is peace. When there is a difference of opinion there will be war to settle the question. The weak will submit to the strong. There is no other way. Transparency is peace. All this other nonsense is just an attempt by the strong to improve their PR. But as they grow weak reality is reasserting itself.
As for HK, don't care. They should be waving around British flags, they are a former British territory and the Treaty was with them. This is NOT our fight. And the media frenzy over it is more revealing for the things they don't say. Notice how similar protests against an oppressive government have been occurring every weekend in France all year, but have been under a media embargo outside of the country? France is a European country, a friend and ally of America going back to the American Revolution itself. Crickets. Hong Kong is getting heavy rotation in media coverage. Ponder this. Who benefits?
The smart people in HK got out while they still had British travel papers, the less smart got out over the next twenty years while the getting was still almost as good. Stupid is supposed to hurt, those remaining can enjoy being Chinese Communists now. I'll worry about the encroaching Communism here in America.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:03PM
> If the World stopped buying Chinese goods ...
These sorts of economic games were used quite extensively in 17th and 18th century Europe, with little effect. In the end, military power has always been the final arbiter of real politik.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:05PM (1 child)
At the end of the day, when it comes to international relations force is the only thing that matters. It has always been that way, and it will always be that way. You can levy sanctions against a country, but if the country you're levying sanctions on can beat the crap out of you then they will and then your sanctions don't count for squat.
Let's say that you're the only country that supplies oil to the other five countries around you. You decide you don't like country #3 and stop giving them oil. Then they walk over and beat the crap out of you, and hey presto your economic sanctions against country #3 didn't accomplish a whole lot except to get you killed. The economic sanctions can only work if you have a bigger, better army than country #3 and can keep them from beating the crap out of you instead.
So then you're not literally beating the crap out of others, but using sanctions and other means remains bullying and you're still a bully. The essence of bullying is doing something to others that they don't like and can't stop. The means is really irrelevant.
To put that in international relations terms, soft power only matters if you have the hard power to back it up. In other words, it's all about force.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:49PM
sh1111111t, i just majored in politics in like 20 seconds ^_^
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:14PM
Yes. And, do you have any idea how many women have believed that they wouldn't get pregnant, because "I'll only put the tip in", and/or "I'll pull out in time".
Listen closely, and you'll hear "pray that I don't alter it any further". Not that the prayers will do any good - the top dogs in Beijing just like to hear the fervent prayers.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:12PM (4 children)
Your ignorance is showing: see https://soylentnews.org/politics/comments.pl?noupdate=1&sid=33087&page=1&cid=879761#commentwrap [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:15PM (3 children)
"for fifty years" means "until I have the power to do as I wish".
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:55PM (2 children)
How many people will trust Chinese agreements in the future? What about when it comes to solving the current US/China trade war. What will the US expect from any agreements?
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:08PM
Exactly the same number as trusted them before. Zero. Same for most treaties by most countries throughout time. They are a piece of paper representing only an understanding of the situation at the time they were signed. So long as the situation remains mostly stable treaties are obeyed. But when the situation greatly changes and one side will greatly benefit, a reason is always found to ignore the treaty. This is reality. And all your bleating about morality, the U.N., etc. is just demonstration of ignorance of how the world actually works.
When the Hong Kong Treaty was signed there were two powers signing it, one strong yet fading, the other weak but growing. Time has rendered the submissive posture China assumed in the treaty unnecessary so it has been discarded. England is in no position to enforce its treaty and everybody knows that. The people in Hong Kong certainly appear to understand, which is why they are appealing to the U.S. But we didn't sign that Treaty, we never had the benefit of possessing Hong Hong, we have to tie to it. It is not our problem. There is only downside to our CIA's current meddling there.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:13PM
How many people should trust any treaty the US government has ever signed? If we count they number of treaties it has used like toilet paper against those it has honored, the answer should be "none." Just ask the Indians.
How treaties work in practice is how well one party can make the other party suffer for a breach. The best treaties, those that are best honored and last longest, are between parties whose real power is more or less equivalent. If that changes, let's say one suffers internal dissent that weakens it considerably, you better believe the stronger party will take advantage by openly violating it or by re-negotiating it on much less favorable terms.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:13PM (1 child)
The smart people fled the past year.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:20PM
The smart people ran to the US and Canada 20 years ago, gained citizenship, and returned to HK with those nifty new passports so they could bail the moment things inevitably went sour the way they are now.
What we're watching now is an object lesson in killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. Beijing and the mainland Chinese thought hooray we're gonna pick up this wealthy international financial center called Hong Kong and we can milk the hell out of it and get free money out of it. But that only works if they leave it alone. But socialists can never leave things alone, because they're all smarter than everybody else and know better than anyone else how things should be done, so they meddle and meddle and meddle until they have turned a vibrant center of wealth and innovation into a smoldering crater of poverty, despair, and naked brutality.
But, then, there's a lot of that going around these days. Venezuela did it. Heck, Disney did it with Star Wars. One's a country and the other is an entertainment franchise, but the core dynamic remains the same.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:42PM (11 children)
Ahh, the authoritarians show up. Trump supports China so you better support them too, right? Gotta own them libs, its more important than having any any integrity whatsoever.
You and your traitor in chief are showing your true color.
It is yellow.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:51PM (10 children)
It's China, right? Not the US, right? What business is it of yours how China runs China? Weren't you one of those bitching because Russia interfered in our own internal affairs? WTF?
(Score: 2) by meustrus on Wednesday August 14 2019, @03:12PM (9 children)
Time used to be that Americans wanted to see Democracy and Capitalism spread throughout the globe. We saw our system as superior and wanted to share it with everyone.
What happened? Did we decide that those people didn't want our help? Ha! Did we decide that we don't care about anyone else? Maybe. Did we decide that The Government knows best? I really don't see how that's possible, but it makes the most sense of conducting in a trade war with China while also commending them for cracking down on one of our historical trading partners.
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
(Score: 3, Touché) by mhajicek on Wednesday August 14 2019, @03:43PM
That's only pretext. We topple democratically elected governments all the time.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:15PM
We realized it was long past time to worry about that crap and worry about fighting Communism here.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:26PM (5 children)
Marxism happened, actually. Not formal Marxism, but college professors and educators steeped in Marxism who have spent a long time indoctrinating the youth across the Western world. First, they taught everyone that the Western tradition is evil. Then once they got enough people to acquiesce to that they curved it further into post-modern de-construction of everything. Now we're in end-stage semiotic meltdown where they've even got many people questioning how many genders there are.
Everything else that the Western tradition has produced, math, science, art, democracy, all that gets jettisoned as those turns of the self-destructive spiral tighten.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:57PM (2 children)
Education happened, actually. Not formal Education, but college professors and educators steeped in Education who have spent a long time teaching the youth across the Western world. First, they taught everyone that the evils that Western nations committed in the name of expansion and hegemonic empire. Then once they got enough people to acquiesce that the West aren't the heroes they portrayed themselves as they curved it further into post-modern re-construction of everything (after Modernist deconstruction, as anyone who has studied the subject knows came first). Now we're in next-stage semiotic rebuilding where we've even got many people recognizing that "different" doesn't mean "bad and must kill it!" Which is pretty emasculating to people who've only ever learned how to use guns instead of words.
Everything else that the Western tradition has produced, math, science, art, democracy, all that gets jettisoned by the rednecks as people with the brains to learn actually do so
FTFY.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:16PM (1 child)
^ reality
It makes a lot of older people uncomfortable since they were steeped in Heroic Patriotism (TM) from an early age. I have yet to see a single post on this site advocating for the government owning private business or any other aspect of communism.
We already have coops, and we already have socialized education / police / infrastructure all over the US. We just want the rightwing authoritarians to stop defunding these programs and we want healthcare to be socialized since medicine should not be profit motivated.
The facts are in but the rightwing nutters just REFUSE to accept facts. Feelz over realz, just more gaslighting projection.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:26PM
It is just hilarious to read this knowing reality. The negative interest rates, etc are on their way. People are getting so rich off you easily misled people, and this is going to accelerate to unbelievable levels as soon as you get what you want.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:02PM
huh? maybe "marxism" doesnt mean what i think it means. it doesn't mean "the knowledge and philosophy by a dude called marx"?
anyways, i totally fought thru "das Kapital" (well it's ongoing, toilet literature, 2 pages per dump, 78% done), straight from the horses mouth.
it's massive and long winded. more is better(tm).
anyways, it does open eyes about alot of things. marxism is like kapitalism, two sides of a coin. one is informing the rich, the other the poor.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @08:29PM
You are that worried about some people at a university or people demonstrating free speech that you feel threatened by them?
No wonder incels like you grab guns and start shooting random people.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:50PM
Isolationism was a thing throughout the early 20th century. Then we won and became the world's policeman. An unenviable position.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:21PM
"The smart people aren't going to draw attention to themselves, or piss off The Party."
Nice to have suspicions verified.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:04PM
No, just for the following 50 years, like that agreement people signed said.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:53PM (2 children)
I guess these guys are just headed for the pub eh? https://twitter.com/sszyz1758/status/1160307728767758341 [twitter.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 15 2019, @05:42PM (1 child)
Wow! That's some data you have there. I mean, there must have been thirty vehicles in that clip you showed! Somewhere between a company and a battalion! Wow! That proved... absolutely nothing, as a United States National Guard unit going to training can field a convoy of that size. (Of course, we don't generally stop all traffic for them).
That 'troops are heading somewhere' is important, but lacking some key information. How many troops? Of what type? More to the point is that the President didn't provide evidence. You know, the kind that a nation-state can develop.
I don't doubt that Trump was told by someone familiar with the intelligence (maybe he attended his daily brief for once or maybe another adviser told him) that there are indeed troop movements in the direction of Hong Kong. And sure, troop movements of signficant size. But at this point the United States has been wrong or outright lied so many times about intelligence (WMD, anyone? and that's just the tip of the we-need-to-crack-iphones iceberg) that unless evidence is presented then it is just talk. And that's before we consider that these words come from the Liar in Chief, who should never be believed about anything by anyone without absolute proof.
And then to end it with a smarmy, "be calm and safe!" message, instead of, "stand up for yourselves and become free" or, "Hong Kong's independence is important enough that the United States will stand up for it," or even a, "we will continue to honor the Hong Kong Policy Act," truly shows where this President's priorities lie. Er, lay. Or rather that the Twit in Chief doesn't have a clue what to really say when it comes to international diplomacy which is why his administration should forceably take his iPhone away from him.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 16 2019, @04:59PM
The article said that, but then later said this:
"Beijing is sending increasingly ominous signals that the unrest must end, with state-run media showing videos of security forces gathering across the border."
So did they show videos of security forces gathering across the border, or is there no proof?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 15 2019, @05:28PM (1 child)
MSM rule #1: Anything Donald Trump says must have aspersions cast on. The audience must not think Donald Trump can have rational thought.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 15 2019, @05:43PM
Yeah. Because he can't, by all available evidence.