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= China Dictatorship 中国独裁统治
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Chinese "Communist" Dictatorship "facts". 中国《共产主义》独裁统治的《事实》

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== FAQ

[[why-keyword-attack]]
=== Why are you attacking websites with censored keywords?

<<keyword-attack, The attack>>.

To <<effective,destroy the firewall>>.

This would then end censorship.

And then <<dictator-needs-gfw,I believe>> 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 less rich and militarily powerful.

Maybe this hurts my argument, but Hillary agrees: https://youtu.be/d3dE_LDz_9E?t=1681 :-)

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>>

[[harm-programmers]]
==== Do you want to harm the Chinese programmers?

No.

This is not a revenge of any kind.

I know I am harming you on the short term, and I don't like myself for it.

But I believe that this harm is a necessary means to reach my 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>>, I want China to develop the best science and technology in the world, and <<would-you-like-to-live-in-china>>.

And by the way, by contributing to open source, I am already helping China, and all underdeveloped countries become stronger.

[[why-end-dictatorship]]
=== Why do you want to end the dictatorship?

Because I think that this would make China, and the world:

* <<richer,richer>>
* less likely to get into <<war,WW3>>

[[richer]]
==== Why would democracy and freedom of speech make China richer?

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

* http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/2011/05/can-poor-countries-afford-democracy-becker.html
* https://www.quora.com/Is-democracy-or-authoritarianism-better-for-developing-countries

For:

* dictatorships are more likely to start <<war>> or other crazy policies like the 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.
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Any criticism of the government, even if constructive, 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.
* 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.

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.
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Killing a million people will make us richer? No problem, let's do it.
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That is great when they make good decisions, but it sucks when they make <<war,bad ones>> more likely.

I really like Posners' way of putting it:

____
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?

[[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 <<fear-of-west,to keep the people in fear all the time to keep their power>>, and a war is a great way to achieve that

[[fear-of-west]]
==== The commies exaggerate the thread of the West to keep in power

This is a common strategy, but the West is not as evil as they say:

____
Once upon a time, there was a farmer with a farm.

One day, the animals in the farm started feeling a bit trapped, and started bumping against the fence to get out.

The farmer, however, was smart, and told the animals:

_____
Careful! There is a wolf outside! If you go out, you will be eaten by the wolf!
_____

The animals, were not that smart, and listened to the farmer, they were afraid!

From time to time, one of the animals would disappear (and without their knowledge, reappear on the farmer's dinner table).

But the farmer kept giving the animals delicious food without them doing any effort, so they decided to believe the farmer's explanation that that animal had escaped and been eaten by the wolf.

Maybe, there was actually a wolf outside. But if they had escaped, only some of the animals would have been eaten by that wolf.

But by staying in the farm, all the animals were, sooner or later, eaten one by one.
____

TODO source.

===== Censorship is necessary to protect China from harmful USA propaganda

I don't think this is below them, but:

* without censorship, you would be much richer and stronger, and more able to defend yourselves
* why does China also censor its own people in addition to foreign propaganda?
* maybe this fear is greatly emphasised by the Chinese government beyond truth just to help them keep control of the country by fear and maintain their own power. Can the Americans really have that much influence in your country?
* maybe the regions that want to split from China feel like China is not giving them anything back, and they are themselves looking for allies outside of China to help them split. With democracy, people are more likely to get what they want, and there will be split parties and votes.
* the same argument can be used to justify any action, no matter how bad. E.g.: we must put all who criticize the government in jail, or else they will make China less united and weaker against the USA!

==== The Chinese masses are still uneducated, and not fit for free speech and democracy

When will they be ready? Who decides? What if they think that they are ready now?

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

==== Embargoes make the dictatorship stronger

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

There is already a lot of literature about this, specially 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
* http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_big_idea/2006/08/thanks_for_the_sanctions.html

Some ideas:

* This embargo is a bit different than other in the following sense:
* Programmers are more likely to develop better Firewall climbing tools if SO is blocked
* If we don't take any action to show our dissatisfaction, the dictatorship never ends.
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The commies exist like any other organization for a sole purpose: maintain their own power.
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If nothing is done to show dissatisfaction, they will never give up on that power.
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There are two extremes of action (both which _I don't_ support):
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* everyone become a willing mindless slave of the leader: perfect stability
* everyone take up arms and do terrorism: perfect instability
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But between those two extremes, what is the right measure? I think that saying nothing is too close to stability.
+
I do see that one alternative scenario is that if we do nothing, maybe there will be more and more contact with Western countries, and the Chinese will see for themselves that we are not that bad, and eventually request democracy.
* Even if programmers get very powerful, it is not very likely that they will succeed to undo the dictatorship, they simply don't have enough power.
+
I'd rather have a less strong dictatorship, than one with good programmers.

===== 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