README.adoc

= China Dictatorship 中国独裁统治
:china-dictatorship-media-base: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship-media/master
:cirosantilli-media-base: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cirosantilli/media/master
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https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship[GitHub Pages] | https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship[GitHub project] | https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship/archive/gh-pages.zip[HTML download]

Chinese "Communist" <<dictatorship,"Dictatorship">> "facts". 中国《共产主义》<<dictatorship,《独裁统治》>>的《事实》。<<faq,FAQ>>, <<news,news compilation>> and <<restaurants,restaurant>> and <<music,music>> recommendations. <<faq,常见问答集>>，<<news,新闻集>>和<<restaurants,饭店>>和<<music,音乐>>建议。<<xi-abolishes-term-limits-2018-03,Heil Xi 卐>>. <<xi-abolishes-term-limits-2018-03,习万岁>>。

This README is too large and so https://github.com/isaacs/github/issues/1610[GitHub cuts it up] on https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship[github.com]. You can view it fully at https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship[] or by downloading it locally as shown at: <<mirrors>>.

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Xi_Jinping_The_Governance_of_China_photo.jpg[height=600]

toc::[]

[[about]]
== About 关于

This repo has the following goals:

* allow copy pasting links to answers to questions/comments that have been posted a million times before by <<wumao>>, mostly under: <<faq>>. This was the original goal.
* serve as a censorship bomb to block <<github>> in China: <<keyword-attack>> to destroy the <<gfw>> and <<dictator-needs-gfw,therefore the CCP>>. Or more realistically get added to the <<github-gov-takedowns>> hall of fame.
* be a fun and sometimes silly source of Chinese mostly anti-CCP culture like a better https://en.uncyclopedia.co/wiki/China[Unencyclopedia] / https://web.archive.org/web/20191209021646/http://encyclopediadramatica.rs/China[Encyclopedia Dramatica] without the stupid stereotype jokes. Just quickly browse the pictures with Ctrl + F "Figure" and have fun.
* serve as a place where people can post interesting related stuff in the issues: https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship/issues see also: <<shitpost>>
* highlight positive about China's culture outside of its shitty government, such as <<the-best-chinese-supermarket-food-products,food>> and <<music>>. This has two goals:
** teach foreigners (maybe even Chinese people on certain points) about amazing Chinese things that they can consume
** show wumaos that <<ciro-santilli>> is not as clueless about China as they think

== Copypasta

Here's an image/sentence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copypasta[copypasta]/summary of key events for the <<keyword-attack>>.

Another advantage of this is that since it comes first in the repo, it ensures that key elements show up on github.com despite file size cutups: https://github.com/isaacs/github/issues/1610[].

Each summary section contains a link to the main section, which contains sources and description of each image.

**六四事件 Tiananmen square protests 1989**

https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship#tiananmen

Music!

* https://youtu.be/-JTWXqUPQ7I[Joan Baez - China]
* https://youtu.be/6OOlXJs4I8k[Philip Morgan - Blood is on the square]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Tiananmen_students_sitting.jpg[height=400]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Tank_Man.jpg[height=400]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Tianmen_crushed_dead.jpg[height=600]

**法轮功 Falun Gong 1999 70M believer religion banned**

https://cirosantilli.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship#falun-gong

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Falun_Gong_Ghuangzhou.jpg[height=600]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Falun_Gong_lady_silenced.jpg[height=600]

**新疆改造中心 Xinjiang re-education camps 2018**

https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship#xinjiang

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Xinjiang_prisoners_sitting_identified.jpeg[height=400]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Xinjiang_prisoners_march.jpg[height=400]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Uyghur_sale_website.jpg[height=500]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Xinjiang_camp_in_camp.jpg[height=600]

**小熊维尼 Winnie the Pooh 2018**

https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship#winnie-the-pooh

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Xi_Pooh_Obama.webp[height=400]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Xi_Abe_Pooh.webp[height=400]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Xi_Jinping_heart.jpeg[height=400]

**郝海东 Hao Haidong Chinese soccer superstar turns against the CCP 2020**

https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship#hao-haidong

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Hao_Haidong_kick.jpg[height=500]

**冠状病毒审查 Censorship of the 2019 Corona Virus**

https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship#corona

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Li_Wenliang_covid.jpg[height=400]

**基督迫害 Christian persecution 2018**

https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship#christianity

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Church_demolition.jpg[height=400]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Last_Supper_Mao.jpg[height=400]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Pope_CCP_deal.jpeg[height=400]

**LGBT权利 The suppression of homosexuality**

https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship#gay-rights

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Tianmen_lesbian_kiss.jpg[height=500]

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Addicted_bed.jpg[height=400]

**996.ICU**

https://cirosantilli.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship#nine-nine-six-icu

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/996ICU.png[height=400]

**Gay Putin**

https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship#gay-putin

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Gay_Putin.jpg[height=400]

**Vajiralongkorn Hamtaro**

https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship#thai-king-hamtaro

image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Side_by_side_comparison_between_Thai_king_Vajiralongkorn_and_Hamtaro.jpg[height=400]

[[mirrors]]
== Mirrors of this page 这个网页的镜像

You can download the webpage locally from GitHub at: https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship/archive/gh-pages.zip

Media such as images are not stored in this repository, but rather at https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship-media to keep the lightweight clone. The locally downloaded HTML will then read images from that repository. But we've learnt after creating that repository that the subdomain that serves the images is censored: <<github-censored-subdomains>>, so they might still be broken.

You can also clone locally with Git:

....
git clone https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship
cd china-dictatorship
git checkout gh-pages
xdg-open README.html
....

or build it yourself:

....
bundle install
make
xdg-open README.html
....

You can also build with local images:

....
git clone https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship
git clone https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship-media
cd china-dictatorship
make MEDIA=../china-dictatorship-media
....

Given <<github-censored-subdomains>>, this might be the only way to view the images from China.

The cool thing about Git is that we can maintain several mirrors on multiple websites very easily:

* https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship Canonical source and rendered output. If ever <<github-gov-takedowns>> we do this: <<strategy-if-this-repo-gets-added-to-github-gov-takedowns>>
* https://gitlab.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship Maybe some day https://gitlab.cn/ ? :-)
* https://bitbucket.org/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship
* https://gitee.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship on <<gitee>>, blocked after 12 hours: <<gitee-censorship>>

GitHub Pages: https://cirosantilli.com/china-dictatorship trade-offs with https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship[]:

* pros
** cut up to 512KB of source, and therefor unacceptable as the only source: https://github.com/isaacs/github/issues/1610[]
** https://help.github.com/en/github/authenticating-to-github/about-anonymized-image-urls[GitHub's camo] keeps hiccuping and not showing images
** and YouTube videos show inline there
* cons
** domain will eventually get blocked in China. <<greatfire>> https://zh.greatfire.org/https/cirosantilli.com shows that in 2020-01-19 the domain was unblocked, but on the next text at 2020-05-23 it was "contractictory".
** Camo bypasses the need for VPN, since most images are served from <<wayback-machine>> which is <<censorship,blocked in China>>.

It is really interesting to see how many people star the GitHub repository, and then a few minutes later they think about how they might get put in jail, and then unstar it. Talk about <<chilling-effect>>!

GitHub Pages was first enabled in 2020-03-22 at https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship/commit/0b362a83fb5dd55f67b9d351551d0c18e7f3229a[].

The perfect solution might be to download all images and upload them to https://github.com/cirosantilli/media since GitHub content does not go through Camo, we have to see if such images don't fail to load as often.

We also have a NPM Node.js package https://www.npmjs.com/package/china-dictatorship[]. After https://askubuntu.com/questions/594656/how-to-install-the-latest-versions-of-nodejs-and-npm/971612#971612[installing NPM], you can be use it as:

....
npm i -g china-dictatorship
china-dictatorship > README.html
....

This would force China to also block/curate package managers to block this repo. The package is already available in this Chinese Taobao mirror: https://registry.npm.taobao.org/china-dictatorship (https://web.archive.org/web/20200406081433/http://registry.npm.taobao.org/china-dictatorship[archive]).

We also managed to upload a Python PyPi package at: https://pypi.org/project/china-dictatorship/ Is as:

....
python3 -m pip install --user --upgrade china-dictatorship
china-dictatorship.py > README.html
....

We later found on Google by chance that libraries.io picked it up and rendered the README.adoc nicely as well: https://libraries.io/pypi/china-dictatorship (https://web.archive.org/web/20200318043050/https://libraries.io/pypi/china-dictatorship[archive]). This is why packaging is a good idea.

A programmatic inferface is also exposed on those packages, making it easy to quickly add a `--china` option to your project, e.g. from Python:

....
import china_dictatorship

print(china_dictatorship.get_data())
....

This outputs the rendered HTML, which end users should the pipe into a file:

....
./your-program --china > README.html
xdg-open README.html
....

Here's a concrete example: https://github.com/cirosantilli/linux-kernel-module-cheat/commit/082166a360c56990662c715196229016d8806ab3

TODO: create an Ubuntu PPA and Ruby gem as well.

Update all mirrors in one go with: link:push-mirrors[]:

....
./push-mirrors
....

In particular, that script calls link:push-gh-pages[]:

....
./push-gh-pages
....

which is more lightweight and pushes just to GH Pages, so we are going to be using that more often to avoid overloading package managers too much.

There is no need to update package versions or add git tags, all of that gets done automatically by the script!

[[faq]]
== FAQ 常见问答集

[[why-keyword-attack]]
=== Why attack websites with censored keywords? 用审查词攻击网站有什么用呢？

<<keyword-attack, The attack>>.

To <<effective,destroy the firewall>>.

This would then end <<censorship>>.

And then <<dictator-needs-gfw,Ciro believes>> that this would also <<why-end-dictatorship,end the dictatorship>>.

The keyword attacks increase the cost of censorship.

If commies censor things, they will get worse IT technology, and thus become <<richer,less rich>> and militarily powerful.

Since all they care about, like any other politicians, is power, the only way to make them stop censorship is to make the cost of censorship higher than not censoring.

Without the threat that China will be less technologically, and therefore militarily advanced, there is no incentive for the CCP to destroy the firewall.

The goal is to put them in a position where they have to choose between either:

* having military power
* remaining a <<dictatorship,dictatorship>>

but not both, since having both means that they will <<war,start WW3 and destroy humanity>>.

Closely related/identical ideas are <<cute-cat-theory-of-digital-activism>> and <<collateral-freedom>>.

Related attack: <<photobombing-like-attacks>>.
[[harm-programmers]]
==== Does Ciro Santilli want to harm the Chinese programmers? 三西猴想要伤害中国程序员吗？

No.

This is not revenge of any kind.

He knows he is harming you in the short term, and he doesn't like that.

But he believes that this harm is a necessary means to reach his real goal, which is to destroy the firewall, and the dictatorship.

Don't you think it is worth a try? Destroying the firewall, would <<why-end-dictatorship,enormously benefit>> not only Chinese programmers, but every single other Chinese person too.

Once the firewall is destroyed, which <<dictator-needs-gfw,may destroy the dictatorship>>, he want China to develop the best science and technology in the world, and <<would-ciro-santilli-like-to-live-in-china>>.

And by the way, with his https://github.com/cirosantilli[extensive contributions to open source software], Ciro is already helping China, and all underdeveloped countries, to become stronger. His hope is that if poor countries become richer and better educated, that they will be less likely to be influenced by the CCP's money, and therefore are more likely to be allies of democracy.

See also: <<disturbs>>.

[[harm-people]]
===== Does Ciro Santilli want to make the Chinese people people look bad?

No, the opposite.

Ciro only wants their <<dictatorship,dictatorial government>> to look bad to destroy it, and help China become <<does-ciro-santilli-hate-china,the most awesome country on Earth>>.

Even the Chinese that are against their own Government <<what-should-pro-democracy-chinese-living-in-china-do-about-the-dictatorship,cannot do much about it openly>>, so it is not their fault.

And even those <<i-like-my-dictatorship,who supported their dictatorship>> must be respected, whoever <<stupid,stupid>> and <<brainwashed-by-usa,brainwashed>> you might think they are, <<democracy-is-a-religion,since it is impossible to prove who is right or wrong in politics>>.

See also: <<about>>.

[[stupid]]
==== Does Ciro Santilli think that the Chinese are stupid or brainwashed? 三西猴觉得中国人是啥子或被洗脑吗？

Obviously not, if you even thought about this, it is likely because of: <<evil-west>>.

Don't you see that this is just pure and simple politics? And likely ineffective one at that: <<effective>>.

* everyone is brainwashed by their environment: <<brainwashed-by-usa,brainwashed>>
* it is impossible to prove who is right or wrong in politics: <<democracy-is-a-religion>>
* not even the CCP is evil: <<ccp-evil>>

[[keyword-attack]]
==== What is a screen name keyword attack?

Adding censored words to your username: https://stackoverflow.com/users/895245

This only works on websites that show usernames everywhere.

This then leads to your username appearing on thousands of pages, depending on how much you contribute to the website.

It is also possible to do it with images, although this is less effective in taking down websites since images are harder for the firewall to track automatically. But:

* they are more memorable than words
* they also work on websites like GitHub where your real name does not show on most pages, only slug

so maybe the most effective approach is to use both keywords and images to get the best of both worlds ;-)

.<<chrysanthemium-xi-jinping>> has been used by Ciro Santilli as a profile picture censored image attack
image::{cirosantilli-media-base}/Chrysanthemum_Xi_Jinping_with_black_red_liusi_added_by_Ciro_Santilli.jpg[height=400]

This type of attack is essentially an <<embargo>>.

See also: <<photobombing-like-attacks>>.

[[cute-cat-theory-of-digital-activism]]
==== Cute cat theory of digital activism (可愛貓理論)

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cute_cat_theory_of_digital_activism
* https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/可愛貓理論

Someone told <<ciro-santilli>> a while after he had started doing his <<keyword-attack>> on <<stack-overflow>>, he didn't know about it before, but it is basically what he was doing.

You can never invent anything new anymore nowadays!

This is especially relevant to <<github>>! And GitHub's mascot is also a cat ;-) Some mentions of this:

* 2020-09-09 https://www.wired.com/story/china-github-free-speech-covid-information/
* 2020-09-09 https://www.xataka.com/servicios/github-inesperado-ultimo-reducto-libertad-expresion-gran-firewall-que-pone-jaque-intereses-china

Related:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_activism

===== Collateral Freedom

<<greatfire>> people called a <<cute-cat-theory-of-digital-activism>>-related project of theirs "Collateral Freedom" (a reference to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collateral_damage[collateral damage]), in which they seem to be trying to forward censored websites somehow through AWS to force the Chinese Government to block the entire AWS in China:

____
Collateral Freedom ties access to information to the Chinese economy. If [authorities] truly want to block access to this information, then they must give up certain access to economic freedoms.
____

2015 coverage: https://techcrunch.com/2015/03/30/greatfire/

There's an useless Wiki page for that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collateral_freedom

https://www.theregister.com/2019/05/10/amazon_backtracks_on_s3/ clarifies that on Amazon S3 the question is about:

* `https://s3.amazonaws.com/<bucket_name>/<object_key_name>`
* `https://<bucket_name>.s3.amazonaws.com/<object_key_name>`

the second of which can be easily blocked by domain, but the first can't, and how amazon was planning on killing the first option.


[[meant-to-be-used]]
=== Politics should not be posted in technical websites such as GitHub or Stack Overflow 不应该在技术网站例如Stack Overflow和GitHub讨论政治

Is the Chinese government using the Internet the way it was meant to be used, by investing billions in <<censorship>>?

What about <<nine-nine-six-icu>>? Did you also complain about it, or did you just star it like 250k of your fellow programmers?

Any act of protest will use things in ways that it was not meant to be used.

For example, the street is not meant to showcase protest banners, it is meant to be a passageway for cars.

As engineers, we have a moral responsibility towards society. We should not blindly follow orders of those in power if it violates our principles, e.g. build weapons or censorship mechanisms. And we should freely express our principles and violation concerns.

Making a statement where no one will ever see it, like a personal website, is <<effective,sure to have no effect>>.

Much of the best art and technology is about using something in a way that it wasn't meant to be used.

Finally, the political powers of each website decide what is allowed or not on their website, and what is not allowed gets blocked. So far, Stack Overflow and GitHub's Terms of Service have said to go ahead:

* <<stack-overflow>>
* <<github>>

<<programthink>> has, of course, a beautiful reply to this at https://github.com/programthink/zhao/tree/e8eea46424549c11792dfe61cf9e7698bdbd7240#致反对此项目的墙内程序员[]:

[[programthink-meant-to-be-used]]
____
致“反对此项目的墙内程序员”

本项目上线第二天，就收获 363 个 star 兼 88 个 fork，甚至还挤进 GitHub 的“当日 Trending”——俺很荣幸，也很高兴有这么多人给俺捧场。

但是在本项目的 issue 列表中也看到好几个反对此项目的程序员（应该都来自墙内），他们担心这个项目导致 GitHub 被 GFW 封杀。

这几年来，类似的言论俺已经看了不少。就好比强盗拿刀杀人，围观者不但没有谴责强盗，反而去谴责卖刀的店家——这就是传说中的“link:https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/斯德哥爾摩症候群[斯德哥尔摩综合症]”。

有兴趣的同学，可以看俺之前的博文——《link:https://program-think.blogspot.com/2012/06/stockholm-syndrome.html[天朝民众的心理分析：斯德哥尔摩综合症]》
____

Translation:

____
In reply to: "Programmers behind the <<gfw,GFW>> who are against this project"

The second day after the project went online, it got 363 stars and 88 forks, and even squeezed into GitHub's "Trending repositories of the Day". I am honored and I am so happy that so many people gave me their support.

However, in the issue list of this project, I also saw several programmers who opposed this project (likely all from within the GFW), and they worried that this project would cause GitHub to be blocked by GFW.

Over the past few years, I have read a lot of similar comments. A good comparison would be if a robber were killing someone with a knife, and the onlookers not only did not condemn the robber, but instead condemned the shop that sold the knife. This is the legendary "link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome[Stockholm syndrome]".

Interested people can read my previous blog post: https://program-think.blogspot.com/2012/06/stockholm-syndrome.html["Psychological Analysis of the People of the Heavenly Dynasty: Stockholm Syndrome"].
____

Infinite duplicate pool:

* https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship/issues?q=label%3Ameant-to-be-used+
* https://github.com/caffeine-overload/bandinchina/issues/89

==== Is Ciro Santilli making programming contributions with the main intent of promoting his political agenda?

No, that is just a side effect.

For example, if that were the case, he would definitely target more widely used technologies, in particular Web and JavaScript, instead of obscure things like C and assembly in which I have spent tons of my time.

Also, <<effective,any attempt to influence a billin people is unlikely to have any effect>>. Much more likely to have any effect, would be for <<ciro-santilli>> to become rich and powerful first, and the best way to do that is to invest in whatever he thinks is most useful.

Actually, it can even be argued that Ciro's somewhat irrational, since he would be much more likely to become rich and powerful by bowing down to the CCP and trying to get their money instead.

On the other hand, becoming rich and powerful is also highly unlikely, so maybe it's justa matter of taking a low-risk low-reward path?

Ciro has have very little free time, and he will never do something for political reasons, only things that interest me technically.

Finally, do you really think he'd be able to do such awesome projects if he had primarily political considerations in mind? XD

===== Is Ciro Santilli making trivial edits on questions just to spam your name further?

No.

I just think that the website is great, and want to push it to perfection, in particular with better Google keyword hits, and uniform grammatically correct titles.

If you think that any of my edits were harmful, please ping me and open a meta thread to discuss specific edits, and I will comply with consensus.

[[why-end-dictatorship]]
=== Why would China be better without its Dictatorship?

Because it would make China, and the world:

* <<richer,richer>>
* less likely to get into <<war,WW3>>
* <<intolerance,safer for its own citizens>>

[[richer]]
==== Why would democracy and freedom of speech make China richer? 言论自由让中国比较富有

There is infinite debate about this out there, some examples:

* https://www.becker-posner-blog.com/2011/05/can-poor-countries-afford-democracy-becker.html (https://web.archive.org/web/20180923192824/https://www.becker-posner-blog.com/2011/05/can-poor-countries-afford-democracy-becker.html[archive])
* https://www.quora.com/Is-democracy-or-authoritarianism-better-for-developing-countries

For:

* dictatorships are more likely to start <<war>> or other <<policies,crazy policies>> like the <<great-leap-forward,Great Leap Forward>>, which completely destroy the economy in one go
* society becomes richer when people know that they can do their startups, get rich, and stay in the country without fear of being persecuted unfairly and losing everything instead of migrating to Canada, see also: <<rule-of-law>>
* it is much harder to fix problems if you can't talk about the. Any criticism of the government, even if constructive, <<censorship,is taken as menace to power, and more likely to be shut down>>, which makes the government and just becomes less efficient since there is less feedback.
+
This greatly increase the probability of dealing poorly with such problems, see e.g. all the global problems listed at: <<not-chinese>>.
* governments are monopolies, and the more powerful they are, the worst it is for competition an efficiency in general. E.g.: the startup with better government ties wins, instead of the most efficient one.
* people in dictatorships tend to <<real-username-law,hide their true identities online>> and in life in general. It is best not to stand out, because if you make any mistake, you are really fucked. As a result, for example, if you do something awesome like a creating an open source project, but do it anonymously, you won't get as much fame. And therefore everyone does less of such awesome things on average.

Against:

* presidents only care about the 4-8 year horizon, while dictators can make longer term decisions to maintain power forever, their power being limited only by "the people are happy enough to not start a revolution"
* dictatorships can make changes faster without the same amount of discussion that happens in democracies, where power is more spread out.
+
Killing a million people will make us richer? No problem, let's do it.
+
That is great when they make good decisions, but it sucks when they make <<war,bad ones>> more likely.

<<ciro-santilli>> really likes https://web.archive.org/web/20180923192824/https://www.becker-posner-blog.com/2011/05/can-poor-countries-afford-democracy-becker.html[Posners'] way of putting it:

[[dictatorship-variability]]
____
While average rate of growth do not appear to differ much between democracies and authoritarian regimes, the variability in performance does differ more among authoritarian governments. China has had remarkable growth since the 1980s, but the prolonged devastation and hardship produced by China's "<<great-leap-forward>>" (when millions of farmers starved to death) and its Cultural Revolution would unlikely have occurred in a democratic country like say India. Nor is it likely that say Cuba and many African nations would have suffered so long with such terrible economic policies if they had reasonably democratic institutions.
____

Maybe China was poor because of Mao's crazy communist regime. Similar regimes also made <<russia>> poor. And yes, before that exploitation by the West may have been a factor.

Definitely, the current regime is better than Mao's, but just imagine how rich China could be if it had more freedom and justice.

Imperial China lost the race for the Industrial Revolution. Will another dictatorship be able to stay on top of the next technological revolution?

.XKCD 937 "TornadoGuard" comes to mind in relationship to the <<dictatorship-variability,variable performance of dictatorships>>. https://xkcd.com/937/[Source].
image:https://web.archive.org/web/20200825230502im_/https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tornadoguard.png[height=600]

==== Censorship makes countries poorer

<<dictatorship,Dictatorships>> need <<censorship>> to survive, and they must control all information to make themselves always look good: <<dictator-needs-gfw>>.

As a result, knowledge of problems flows more slowly, and therefore they also take longer to solve.

Maybe this hurts the argument, but Hillary agrees: :-)

____
But countries that restrict free access to information or violate the basic rights of internet users risk walling themselves off from the progress of the next century
____

.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccGzOJHE1rw&t=2110 "Secretary Clinton Speaks on Internet Freedom", U.S. Department of State, 2010-01-22
video::ccGzOJHE1rw[youtube,height=400,width=600,start=2110]

Also mentioned at: link:https://youtube.com/watch?v=d3dE_LDz_9E?t=1681[Google versus China - VPRO documentary - 2011]

This is also the basis of a <<keyword-attack>>.

This is also well illustrated in the link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_(miniseries)[HBO 2019 miniseries "Chernobyl"], which suggests that part of the reason why Chernobyl happened is because of the Soviet Union's obsession to save face.

.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocBVLMHK6c8 Chernobyl supercut scene where the reactor explodes, and a chief engineer "Comrade Dyatlov" accepts the 3.6 Roentgen measurement as "Not great, not terrible" and forwards it to his superiors who take actions based on that, even though the radiation measurement apparatus only goes up to 3.6 Roentgen. Needless to say, the actual radiation was much, much higher: when a proper measurement is made, the value is 15000 Roentgen! The URSS only admitted Chernobyl three days after when Swedish nuclear plant radiation detector alarms started going off. Notably, in order to keep it secret, they for example did not cancel the https://time.com/4313139/post-chernobyl-parade/[International Workers' Day parade in Kharkov, Ukraine which happened five days after the disaster].
video::ocBVLMHK6c8[youtube,height=400,width=600]

.Photo of a CDV-717 radioactivity meter that maxes out at 3.6 Roentgen like the one that would have been used in Chernobyl. https://www.reddit.com/r/ChernobylTV/comments/bnio6n/36_roentgen_on_a_cdv717/[Source].
image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/3_6_Roentgen.jpg[height=400]

This suggestion is even more explicit in the fictional https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_Z[World War Z] 2006 novel by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Brooks[Max Brooks] about a <<corona,virus>> outbreak in China. It was later adapted into the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_Z_(film)[World War Z (2013)] movie by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paramount_Pictures[Paramount]:

* https://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/jun/04/brad-pitt-china-world-war-z[]: Paramount cowards tried to kowtow and remove references to China from the movie, but it failed
* https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/china-barred-my-dystopian-novel-about-how-its-system-enables-epidemics/2020/02/27/cc0446f0-58e5-11ea-9000-f3cffee23036_story.html[]: no Chinese publisher dared publish the book unless China references were removed, which the author declined, and so the book was not published in China

Or https://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/21/death-statistic/[if you prefer]:

____
The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic.
____

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amartya_Sen[Amartya Sen] is another famous proponent of similar arguments in the area of hungers: https://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/211/44284.html[] (https://web.archive.org/web/20170722090616/https://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/211/44284.html[archive])

____
In democratic countries, even very poor ones, the survival of the ruling government would be threatened by famine, since elections are not easy to win after famines; nor is it easy to withstand criticism of opposition parties and newspapers. That is why famine does not occur in democratic countries. Unfortunately, there are a great many countries in the world which do not yet have democratic systems.
____

although like any other political argument, https://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/01/arts/does-democracy-avert-famine.html[some disagree].

Virus outbreaks and other natural disasters also illustrate this well: <<corona>>.

[[corona]]
===== Censorship of the 2019 Corona Virus 2019冠状病毒病早期迹象审查

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coronavirus_disease_2019
* https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019冠状病毒病

The Chinese Government censored the initial outbreak in January and did not inform Wuhan on January 8, which likely made the situation much worse than what it could have been.

Good timelines so without a fucking paywall:

* https://www.axios.com/timeline-the-early-days-of-chinas-coronavirus-outbreak-and-cover-up-ee65211a-afb6-4641-97b8-353718a5faab.html "Timeline: The early days of China's coronavirus outbreak and cover-up"
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_2019–20_coronavirus_pandemic_in_November_2019_–_January_2020

Timeline:

* 2019-12-27 several genomics companies had sequenced the coronavirus and noticed the similarity to Sars. According to GeneBank, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/MT019529[] the sample was collected on and 23-Dec-2019 and published on 04-FEB-2020
* 2020-01-03 findings were sent to the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Center_for_Disease_Control_and_Prevention[Centre for Disease Control] (CDC, https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/中国疾病预防控制中心[中国疾病预防控制中心]) in Beijing, but then the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Health_Commission[Chinese National Health Commission] (https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/中华人民共和国国家卫生健康委员会[中华人民共和国国家卫生健康委员会]), China's top medical authority, issued orders to not talk about it and destroy samples
* 2020-01-08 CDC team went to Wuhan to see the situation, was not informed that contagiousness of the disease had been confirmed
* 2020-01-20 the findings were made public, in an interview with Zhong Nanshan. He later said in an interview that the local government should be blamed:
+
video::LK1Pz8FmryM[youtube,height=400,width=600,start=132]
* 2020-01-23 Wuhan begins lockdown
* 2020-01-24 to 30 Chinese New Year

News coverage:

* 2020-05-12: https://www.newsweek.com/exclusive-cia-believes-china-tried-stop-who-alarm-pandemic-1503565 CIA people said China stopped the WHO from sounding the alarm from January 24 to January 30, while at the same time stockpiling protection materials
* <<caixin>> article about how early Coronavirus signs were censored:
** https://china.caixin.com/2020-03-10/101526309.html (https://web.archive.org/web/20200317111527/http://china.caixin.com/2020-03-10/101526309.html[archive]) "李文亮所在医院为何医护人员伤亡惨重？" (Why did Li Wenliang's [李文亮] hospital suffer heavy casualties?)
** https://www.caixinglobal.com/2020-02-29/in-depth-how-early-signs-of-a-sars-like-virus-were-spotted-spread-and-throttled-101521745.html (paywall) "In Depth: How Early Signs of a SARS-Like Virus Were Spotted, Spread, and Throttled"
** https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/chinese-scientists-destroyed-proof-of-virus-in-december-rz055qjnj "Chinese scientists destroyed proof of virus in December". Paywall skip: https://archive.md/xOKiu Terrible copy paste of some Caixin article with no sources/precise names.
* https://www.businessinsider.com/china-information-crackdown-on-wuhan-coronavirus-2020-1 "China spent the crucial first days of the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak arresting people who posted about it online and threatening journalists" (https://web.archive.org/web/20200124113400/https://www.businessinsider.com/china-information-crackdown-on-wuhan-coronavirus-2020-1?r=US&IR=T[archive])
* https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/g5xykx/you-can-now-go-to-jail-in-china-for-criticizing-beijings-coronavirus-response "You Can Now Go to Jail in China for Criticizing Beijing's Coronavirus Response"
* https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qjdn4d/doctors-in-wuhan-are-still-dying-and-beijing-is-still-trying-to-silence-them Ai Fen's (艾芬) report of how the situation was mishandling was censored
* 2020-04-13 https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/12/asia/china-coronavirus-research-restrictions-intl-hnk/index.html "Beijing tightens grip over coronavirus research, amid US-China row on virus origin". The Government can now veto papers from being published on the subject of the origin of COVID-19.

Some believe that the Chinese government grossly under-reported death counts. Official figures were about only 3300 deaths, in the insanely densely populated Wuhan area, while Italy had reached 10000 deaths:

* 2020-04-19 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nr280LWjJT0&t=2198 Trump says on a White House briefing he does not believe China's case count
* 2020-04-01 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-01/china-concealed-extent-of-virus-outbreak-u-s-intelligence-says CIA speaks
* 2020-03-29 https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8165717/Locals-Wuhan-believe-42-000-people-died-coronavirus.html Reports of funerary urns sold

Maybe China is saying the truth this time. Maybe the rapid Dictatorship response worked. But maybe the most important lesson to take out of this is: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/27/china-loses-trust-internationally-over-coronavirus-handling[no one trusts a Dictatorship], after an infinitely long history of lies and no freedom of the press.

<<li-hongzhi>> of course doubts those number :-) <<falun-gongs-view-of-epidemics>>.

On the other hand, one may argue that the "city closure" measures were stronger/faster than in democracies.

Doctor Li Wenliang (李文亮) reported the virus, but was told by authorities to stay quiet, and later died from the virus, becoming somewhat of a martyr:

* https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51409801
* https://chinadigitaltimes.net/chinese/2020/02/【网络民议】你能做到吗？-你听明白了吗？/

The following excerpt from his forced confession trended:

____
你能做到吗？ +
你听明白了吗？
____

Translation:

____
Can you manage? +
Do you understand?
____

.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assemblage_(art)[Assemblage] of a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Respirator[respirator mask] with a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gag_(BDSM)[BDSM gag ball] attached to it, suggesting that citizen reports of COVID-19 in China have been censored. https://twitter.com/FakeNewsOfChina/status/1221396086033530880[Source].
image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Covid_gag_mask.jpg[height=600]

.Selfie of Li Wenliang on his hospital bed before he died. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51409801[Source].
image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Li_Wenliang_covid.jpg[height=400]

.Corona Xi mural of <<xi-jinping>> morphed into a Coronavirus by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lushsux[Lushux]. Fuller composition view: https://twitter.com/lushsux/status/1243830638966235136[]. Reddit called it https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/fqku03/winnie_the_flu/[Winnie the Flu] in a reference to <<winnie-the-pooh>>. https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/fqku03/winnie_the_flu/[Source].
image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Covid_Xi.jpg[height=500]

====== nCovMemory

Popular GitHub repo documenting personal experiences and media reports:

* https://github.com/2019ncovmemory/nCovMemory "新冠肺炎记忆：报道、非虚构与个人叙述" 2020 New coronavirus pneumonia memories: reports, non-fictional and personal accounts.
* https://github.com/memoryhonest/nCovMemory-en translation project

Other interesting GitHub repositories: <<github-repositories-with-censored-information>>.

====== People arrested for reporting on the 2019 Corona Virus

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chen_Qiushi[Chen Qiushi] (https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/陈秋实_(律师)[陈秋实])
** Twitter: https://twitter.com/chenqiushi404
** YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCv361SF6FKznoGPKEFG9Yhw
** https://edition.cnn.com/2020/02/09/asia/wuhan-citizen-journalist-intl-hnk/index.html "Chen Qiushi spoke out about the Wuhan virus. Now his family and friends fear he's been silenced"
** 2020-04-18 https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/epgek4/he-traveled-to-wuhan-to-report-on-coronavirus-and-hasnt-been-heard-from-since "He Traveled to Wuhan to Report on Coronavirus – and Hasn't Been Heard From Since"
** https://youtube.com/watch?v=Iwpr55PZEJ8 "Lawyer Chen Qiushi documenting coronavirus epicentre disappears" by <<scmp>>
+
video::Iwpr55PZEJ8[youtube,height=400,width=600]
* Fang Bin (方斌)
** Twitter: https://twitter.com/GuqZJRTOvbqbGub
** YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRItarzSwqakT-EZkSvuy3A
*** The last YouTube video simply says:
+
____
全民反抗 +
https://zh.m.wiktionary.org/zh-hans/还政于民[还政于民] +
方斌书
____
+
which translates as:
+
____
All the people, revolt. +
Return the country (politics) to its people. +
Written (calligraphed) by Fang Bin.
____
+
video::_7VIG2qp0j4[youtube,height=400,width=600]
** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUvBNpkxrJo "Fang Bin is second Chinese citizen journalist to vanish while reporting from coronavirus epicentre" by <<scmp>>
+
video::sUvBNpkxrJo[youtube,height=400,width=600]
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Zehua[Li Zehua] (https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/李泽华_(记者)[李澤華])
** YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJHUpBCNKrZwBhxfcIrP8Aw
** Twitter https://twitter.com/kcrissli
** 2020-02-28 https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qjdejp/a-chinese-citizen-journalist-covering-coronavirus-just-live-streamed-his-own-arrest
* 2020-04-25: Chen Mei, Cai Wei and his girlfriend, who contributed to <<terminus2049>>
* 2020-04-14: Zhang Zhan (张展)
** https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsNKkvZGMURFmYkfhYa2HOQ
** https://www.scmp.com/video/coronavirus/3084983/coronavirus-chinese-citizen-journalist-detained-after-live-streaming

TODO maybe not arrested but relevant:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fang_Fang[Fang Fang] (https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/方方_(作家)[方方]) published in 2020 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wuhan_Diary[Wuhan Diary] (https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/方方日記[方方日記], 方方日记)
+
Possible free Chinese version: https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=ZGF5YWJvb2suY29tfHd3d3xneDo3ZGUzZWZjZDgyZDkxNjc0 (http://web.archive.org/web/20200720084342/https://doc-10-bk-apps-viewer.googleusercontent.com/viewer/secure/pdf/3nb9bdfcv3e2h2k1cmql0ee9cvc5lole/0cr4s4veutmm50d7alffk68perm7us3s/1595234550000/lantern/%2A/ACFrOgDGbspvoNIJBVI1N2-EwaZHJPCTgPKmJeFaWgposQKpu5Eu0aqwA_CIZfLkobNVy1-xKcxKzw2CMAyxH4aUPjcHsp2w1JB2fwoX1g_39gVGh38SxfK-UrQyhy_3n19wbWhWErj_a41hMVR4?print=true[archive])

[[war]]
==== Why would democracy and freedom of speech make China less likely to start a war?

This has been discussed to death:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_peace_theory
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perpetual_Peace:_A_Philosophical_Sketch

Some arguments include:

* the people who will actually fight and die on the front can't vote against it
* dictators have huge power, so if they put it in their heads that they want to start a war, it is much harder for sensible people to stop them
* dictators need <<evil-west,to keep the people in fear all the time to keep their power>>, and a war is a great way to achieve that

Of course China won't say that they are starting a war when they do.

They will of course start with territories which they claim as theirs, to add to <<separatism,other recent additions which were not theirs>> until the recent past, even though their inhabitants desperately want to leave China:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_China–India_skirmishes | https://www.asiasentinel.com/p/beijing-said-to-fund-separatist-india "Beijing Said to Fund Separatist India Movement"

Which reminds us of... <<nazi>>:

* 1939 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleiwitz_incident[Gleiwitz incident], a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_flag[false flag attack]
* 1938 Annexation of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudetenland[Sudetenland] from Czechoslovakia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_World_War_II explains:
+
____
A decisive proximate event was the 1938 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_Agreement[Munich Conference], which formally approved Germany's annexation of the Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia. Hitler promised it was his last territorial claim, but in early 1939 he became even more aggressive, and European governments finally realized that appeasement was not guaranteeing peace."
____
* 1935-1938 https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Causes_of_World_War_II&oldid=968409781#Expansionism_and_militarism comments:
+
____
In Italy, Benito Mussolini sought to create a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Empire[New Roman Empire], based around the Mediterranean. It invaded Ethiopia as early as 1935, Albania in early 1938, and later Greece. That provoked angry words and an oil embargo from the League of Nations, which failed.
____
* 1931 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_invasion_of_Manchuria[1931 Japanese invasion of Manchuria], with one false flag event preceding it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mukden_Incident[Mikden Incident].

When China <<evil-west,calls the USA Imperialist>> (帝国主义), there is of course some truth to it, but it is also very ironic, because as https://youtu.be/GiVs05yq9-o?t=74[Lindybeige mentions], China is obviously the largest empire on Earth! Despite its <<xinjiang,uniformization>> efforts, China is highly diverse since it is obviously made up of a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_groups_in_China[large stitched up carpet of nations that were conquered by a single empire]. E.g. <<xinjiang>> translates literally as "The New Frontier"!

===== The United States has recently started several wars and killed millions!

Not even democracies can fully protect people from other countries, because they don't vote. Yes, congratulations, <<western-democracies-are-not-perfect>>.

But if the USA were a <<dictatorship,dictatorship like China>> it would kill way more, because it would censor every report against the war internally to its own people, and the wars would just go on like in <<nineteen-eighty-four-war-is-peace>>.

How many times do we have to bring <<nazi,Hitler>> up? 70-85 million deaths in one go: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties

The only reason China has not started wars is because it is a poor country, and it would lose them. If it were rich, it would have started more wars and killed 100 times more people.

Finally, some wars are good.

If a country is oppressed by a dictatorship, and most of its people want to be free, it might be right to help them be free.

If a country sponsors terrorism, it might be a good idea to take out their Government.

This has to be analyzed on a case-by-case basis, and maybe a verdict will never be reached. But at least in a democracy the people can decide based on varied information. In a dictatorship, whatever the dictator decides happens.

Also, most of those small wars that he USA started end up being https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_war[proxy wars] between the USA and <<russia>>/China, with the USA pushing for democracy, and Russia/China pushing for more dictatorships.

[[uneducated-masses]]
==== The Chinese masses are still uneducated, and not fit for free speech and democracy 中国大众愚昧，不能好好选领导

When will they be ready? Who decides? What if they think that they are <<tiananmen,ready now>>?

In George Bernard Shaw's "Maxims for Revolutionists" words:

____
Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for <<corruption,appointment by the corrupt few>>.
____

Many democracy supporters jokingly recognize democracy's shortcomings.

A https://winstonchurchill.org/publications/finest-hour/finest-hour-141/red-herrings-famous-quotes-churchill-never-said/[fake Churchill quote]:

____
The best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter.
____

Art Spander:

____
The great thing about democracy is that it gives every voter a chance to do something stupid.
____

Laurence J Peter:

____

Democracy is a process by which the people are free to choose the man who will get the blame.
____

===== The Chinese masses are not interested in politics and therefore not ready to vote

But how would they be interested in politics or be able to discuss it, if it is <<dissidents,impossible to have a different view without going to jail>>?

What about the <<tiananmen,1 million people in Tiananmen>> and the 70 million <<falun-gong>> followers? Did they not care?

[[overlook-human-rights-for-profit]]
==== As long as China is developing economically, it is fine to violate the human rights of a few million people

This argument can be made, but it is a risky way to live: <<intolerance>> and borderline <<nazi>>.

Do the <<violence,ends always justify the means>>?

What is the point of having all that wealth, when you risk <<rule-of-law,being put into jail for unfair reasons>>?

<<ciro-santilli>> argues that China would be even richer if it weren't for the CCP: <<richer>>, and that the CCP only violates people's human rights as a tool to stay in power: <<ccp-evil>>.

.<<rebel-pepper>> cartoon about a pig who does not care about politics because it cannot be eaten. 民主又不能当饭吃 https://twitter.com/remonwangxt/status/1131398147253710850[Source].
image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Pig_politics_Chinese.jpg[height=600]

.Translation by Ciro Santilli of the Rebel Pepper cartoon about the pig who does not care about politics because it cannot be eaten.
image::{cirosantilli-media-base}/Rebel_pepper_pig_can%27t_eat_democracy_cartoon_translated_to_English_by_Ciro_Santilli.jpg[height=600]

.https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/shut-up-and-take-my-money[Shut up and take my freedom] meme by <<ciro-santilli>>.
image::{cirosantilli-media-base}/Shut_up_and_take_my_freedom.jpg[height=400]

[[corruption]]
==== Democracies have less corruption than dictatorships

One of the key points of <<xi-jinping,Xi Jinping's>> governments has been to quench corruption. And use that as an excuse to get rid of rivals while at it.

However, there is one much better solution to that: democracy and freedom of speech.

The reason is obvious: with censorship, <<chinese-politicians-really-care-about-the-chinese-citizens,corrupt politicians>> can <<internal-censorship,censor>> anything bad that they did, and so it becomes much harder to destroy corruption.

In George Bernard Shaw's "Maxims for Revolutionists" words:

____
Democracy substitutes election <<uneducated-masses,by the incompetent many>> for appointment by the corrupt few.
____

Well known corruption cases:

* 2020 Ren Zhiqiang
** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ren_Zhiqiang
** https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/任志强
** https://edition.cnn.com/2020/09/22/asia/china-ren-zhiqiang-xi-jinping-intl-hnk/index.html "Chinese tycoon who criticized Xi Jinping's handling of <<corona,coronavirus>> jailed for 18 years"
* 2012 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ling_Jihua[Ling Jihua] (https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/令计划[令计划]): son died in Ferrari crash with two women on the car, which put the spotlight on him
* 2012 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bo_Xilai[Bo Xilai] (https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/薄熙来[薄熙来]): trigerred by the murder of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Heywood[Neil Heywood], of which Bo's wife was accused

Related events:

* <<panama-papers>>

===== Operation Fox Hunt

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Fox_Hunt

Trying to prevent corruption is fine, but violating the laws of other countries in doing so, or the <<rule-of-law>> of their family is not.

Publicized by China itself: <<china-daily>> http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2015-11/05/content_22375920.htm

* 2020-10-28 "Eight Individuals Charged With Conspiring to Act as Illegal Agents of the People’s Republic of China" https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/eight-individuals-charged-conspiring-act-illegal-agents-people-s-republic-china

[[liu-changming]]
====== The detention of Liu Changming's (刘昌明) family (2018)

China imposed an exit ban on the ex-official's family, who are also USA citizens:

* officer Liu Changming (刘昌明)
* wife Sandra Han
* children Victor Liu (born July 1999 in the USA) and Cynthia Liu (27 in 2019, born in China, but also American citizen)

China says that the children and wife do have valid Chinese documents, so maybe those idiots did not give up their Chinese citizenship and went to China. Why, why, why would you do that? Don't they know anything about China?

Cynthia claimed her father has left home a long time ago and that they are not in contact with their father.

Liu is a so called https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naked_official[naked official] (https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/裸官[裸官]), who let his family go live outside of China to prevent such problems with the CCP.

The wiki page also explains that in 2014 rules were added to prevent promotion of officials whose spouses live abroad.

This reminds Ciro of a Mafia movie, maybe Godfather II, where the bad guy says he "likes doing business with a man that has a family, because he has more collateral".

Coverage:

* 2018-11 https://www.businessinsider.com/liu-changming-china-holds-officials-family-hostage-to-force-return-2018-11

.2019-05-09 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2hBtXdaYsQ Cynthia Liu, daughter of Liu Changming (刘昌明) pleas freedom on YouTube. Commented upload by CBS, TODO can't find original video on YouTube, maybe they sent straight to CBS?
video::t2hBtXdaYsQ[youtube,height=400,width=600]

[[effective]]
=== Will the keyword attacks really help to destroy the firewall?

It is both unlikely, and hard to be sure.

Just like it is unlikely that the activity of on individual can have a big influence in any group of 1 billion people.

Every action is statistical: I just push the balance a little bit towards freedom.

This FAQ and any talk is useless. You and I are wasting our time here.

The possibility of blocking Stack Overflow and GitHub is 1000x more useful than any talk, but it is still useless.

However, potentially blocking those websites takes <<better-to-do,0 of my time>>, I just leave the content there, so it is worth my time.

To have an idea, in 2015 there are about:

* 20M developers in the world
* 2M in China : https://www.quora.com/Approximately-how-many-programmers-are-there-in-the-world https://www.techrepublic.com/blog/european-technology/there-are-185-million-software-developers-in-the-world-but-which-country-has-the-most/
* 5M Stack Overflow users https://data.stackexchange.com/stackoverflow/query/227868/select-count-from-users
* TODO I wonder what percentage of GDP those programmers control. I'll bet any programmer on Stack Overflow is at least 5x more powerful than the average Chinese.

And if we never start somewhere, nothing will ever happen.

Furthermore, even if the <<gfw,GFW>> falls, it is not clear that this will imply the end of the dictatorship: <<effective>>.

Even if it is not, it does not matter, since <<ciro-santilli>> spends so little time doing it: <<better-to-do>> and has fun in doing it.

.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Cards_(American_TV_series)[House of Cards] S01E02 "Nobody can hear you. Nobody cares about you. Nothing will come of this." GIF. https://houseoflessons.tumblr.com/post/43967209684/on-protesters-nobody-can-hear-you-nobody-cares[Source].
image::{china-dictatorship-media-base}/Nobody_can_hear_you.gif[height=400]

[[embargo]]
==== Embargoes make dictatorships stronger (禁运使独裁更强大)

The <<keyword-attack,keyword attack>> is basically an embargo.

There is already a lot of literature about this, especially in the cases of Cuba and North Korea. It is basically a libertarian vs conservative/Cato vs Heritage thing in the US:

* https://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/no-embargo-harms-cubans-gives-castro-excuse-policy-failures-regime
* https://www.heritage.org/trade/report/why-the-cuban-trade-embargo-should-be-maintained
* https://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_big_idea/2006/08/thanks_for_the_sanctions.html

The key dilemma is:

* if we keep contact with the Dictatorship, maybe its people will see that democracy is better and start a liberating revolution
* if we keep giving technology to the Dictatorship and it does not become a democracy, we are making a Dictatorship more technologically advanced, and therefore <<war,dangerous>>

Some interesting aspects of the keyword attack embargo:

* it is immediately self-enforcing: we don't need politicians to decide and enforce the complex "if you do this, we punish you like that" question.
+
By political and technological information is together, and this immediately puts the dictatorship in a bad spot, without us having to decide anything.
* by affecting programmers in particular through Stack Overflow and GitHub, we make them more likely to develop better <<censorship-circumvention,Firewall climbing>> tools themselves

One point in favor of the embargo is that China has opened up since the '80s '90s, but did freedom improve at all? Under <<xi-jinping>>, it may be argued that it did not, and maybe that we should just stop feeding them technology and accept that they won't become free.

Trump's link:https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jun/02/trump-banning-huawei-beginning-of-biggest-trade-war-ever-united-states[2019 China trade war], and in particular the <<huawei>> ban, is an event that has brought this question to the spotlight once again.

===== Keyword attacks could be used by certain CCP political groups to justify blocking off the entire external Internet, and make the dictatorship even more pervasive

It is a risk, but it would make China drastically <<richer,less powerful>>, so at least they wouldn't be able to start or sustain <<war,WW3>>. So I don't think it will go that way.

[[so-block-cost]]
==== Stack Overflow and GitHub could be blocked at no cost by the Chinese government

Hitting the block button has, of course, no cost.

The cost of blocking Stack Overflow lies of course in the loss of information, and slower technological development, see also: <<why-keyword-attack>>

Remember that it is not possible for the Chinese government to block only certain pages of HTTPS websites due to encryption: either the entire IP/domain name is blocked, or nothing.

The 2019 <<nine-nine-six-icu>> event however brought to my attention that Chinese (usually WebKit-based) browsers are already censoring HTTPS websites selectively of course, see e.g.: https://github.com/996browser/996.BROWSER/tree/77f28a36a862e3cc4d238dc47c19872156096bc4

But Ciro doubt developers use those browsers, right? The only way would be for China to forbid foreign browsers entirely.

BTW, <<ensi>> brings a whole new dimension to HTTPS by encrypting the domain name as well!

===== Is Stack Overflow blocked in China?

There was no clear evidence of that as of April 2020: https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/267715/is-stack-overflow-accessible-in-china/288497#288497

It worth noting however that as mentioned at <<is-stack-overflow-blocked-in-china>> that websites can become non-functional if CDNs they rely on are taken down, instead of the website being taken down itself.

For example, Stack Overflow relied on Google for some of its JavaScript and on Imgur for images, both of which are blocked in China.

[[disturbs]]
==== Keyword attack profiles disturb me

But isn't it better to be annoyed than having <<war,war>>, <<richer,being poor>> or <<xinjiang,put into jail unfairly>>?

If the truth is too much for you to bear, worry not, you can use either:

* Greasyfork browser extensions
** https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/32236-stackoverflow净化器 "StackOverflow净化器" (Stack Overflow cleanup)
*** GitHub user with the same username: https://github.com/EternalPhane
*** https://web.archive.org/web/20181211094818/https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/32236-stackoverflow%E5%87%80%E5%8C%96%E5%99%A8
*** https://web.archive.org/web/20181211094917/https://greasyfork.org/en/forum/discussion/47981
** 2020-07-09 https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/406756-ciro-santilli "Ciro Santilli"
*** https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/406756-ciro-santilli/discussions/53697
*** Some possible authors (of course, with that name, there must be 10 thousand Chinese people at least):
**** https://english.meta.stackexchange.com/users/156741/li-xiaodong
**** https://github.com/DoyleLi from Intel
* a custom ad terminator expression shown at: https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship/issues/87 `stackoverflow.com##a[href="/users/895245/ciro-santilli-%e6%96%b0%e7%96%86%e6%94%b9%e9%80%a0%e4%b8%ad%e5%bf%83%e6%b3%95%e8%bd%ae%e5%8a%9f%e5%85%ad%e5%9b%9b%e4%ba%8b%e4%bb%b6"]`

Another good option is to use the trusty <<cac-report-website>>.

Installing any of those immediately give you <<social-credit-system,10 Sesame Points>>, <<xi-abolishes-term-limits-2018-03,习万岁>>.

See also: <<harm-programmers>>.

.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwCyQINNXwE "What is more obscene: sex or war?" scene from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_People_vs._Larry_Flynt[The People vs. Larry Flynt (1996)]. Ciro just can't stop thinking about that scene when someone tells him that <<disturbs,his profile disturbs them>>. What is more obscene? <<xi-jinping-memes>> or human rights violations?
video::SRPiE59e8NU[youtube,height=400,width=600]

[[not-chinese]]
=== Non-Chinese people should not interfere in Chinese politics (外国人不应该干预中国政治)

* For better or worse, China and other countries happen to be located in the same planet.
+
If China's <<richer,economy>> is bad, the economy gets worse in other countries.
+
If China's <<howey-ou,environment is bad>>, the environment gets worse in other countries.
+
If China <<war,starts a war>>, other countries will have to fight it.