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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]]
== FAQ 常见问答集

[[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.
+
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.
+
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.

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.
+
The commies exist like any other organization for a sole purpose: maintain their own power.
+
If nothing is done to show dissatisfaction, they will never give up on that power.
+
There are two extremes of action (both which _I don't_ support):
+
* everyone become a willing mindless slave of the leader: perfect stability
* everyone take up arms and do terrorism: perfect instability
+
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

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.

==== What you are doing will never have any effect

That is true with high probability, just like any other individual which tries to influence 1B 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 times 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 http://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 http://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.

==== Stack Overflow 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.

[[dictator-needs-gfw]]
=== Would ending the great firewall truly end the dictatorship?

Not 100% sure.

In Russia for example, the Internet is relatively free, but the government controls most professional media, which is what most people end up seeing, by suing dissidents media out of business.

But on the other hand Russia is already much freer than China.

Although I don't like them, I can't deny one thing: the commies are smart, and when they do something (e.g. censorship), it tends to keep them in power.

=== This is your personal problem, we have nothing to do with it, stop punishing us for it

We have to fight for justice for our fellows, or else when injustice happens to us, no one will fight for use either.

Every form of protest incurs some damage. E.g., if we manifest on the street, it generates a traffic jam.

I don't like it, but I think it is worth it.

How can you be that certain that your children won't have dissident ideas and be punished unfairly for them?

Intolerance is a risky way to live.

If you just work to make money and have a good life, without any plans to improve the government, you are just making the economy of the dictatorship stronger, then when they start a <<war,war>> or kill yet another minority, blood will also be on your hands.

[[stability]]
=== If anyone disagrees with the government they must be punished to keep the stability of the country

Destroying diversity is the best way to reach a point where everyone can agree to start a new big war and destroy everything.

The CCP thrives on the excessive fear it instigate into its own people.

How can society improve, if we are never allowed to try new things out?

Change does not require violence. Violence happens because the government punishes any dissidence, even if pacific, to retain its own power.

In democracies, radical policy changes happen without dropping a single drop of blood. People vote, and policies change, end of story.

=== You are using Stack Overflow in a way that it was not meant to be used, so what you are doing is in principle wrong

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 responsability 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>>.

Finally, it is up to the Stack Overflow community to decide what is right or wrong, and so far the consensus is go ahead:

* http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/298950/are-political-profiles-that-could-possibly-affect-the-participations-of-other-us
* http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/267368/are-political-avatars-and-profiles-ok
* http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/299882/can-a-username-be-considered-spam
* http://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/286082/does-the-be-nice-policy-require-se-users-to-be-nice-to-people-who-are-not-se-u/286090#286090, see public figure comments

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

==== Are you making programming contributions with the main intent of promoting your political agenda?

No, that is just a side effect.

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

Also, as I've said elsewhere, my actions are very unlikely to have any actions. Much more likely to have any action, would be for me to become rich and powerful first, and the best way to do that is to invest in whatever I think is most useful.

Actually, it can even be argued that I'm somewhat irrational, since I would much more likely 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 I'm just taking a low risk low reward path?

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

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

===== Are you making trivial edits on questions just to spam your name further?

No.

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

==== Your profile disturbs me

I know, 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 >:-), have a look at this cool browser extension to clean up Stack Overflow: https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/32236-stackoverflow净化器

=== You are not Chinese, you can't interfere in Chinese politics

. We live in the same world.
+
If China's <<richer,economy>> is bad, my economy is worse.
+
If China's environment is bad, my environment is worse.
+
If China <<war,starts a war>>, I might have to fight it.
. If I lived under a dictatorship, I would welcome foreign intervention.
+
Even if you don't, I know several Chinese who do.
. You have been brainwashed by the commies who say that all foreigners are bad :-)
+
The commies do this because most foreign countries are telling the Chinese to get rid of the dictatorship.
+
Most foreigners actually want what is best for China.
. You can't do anything about it.
+
I don't like this argument, but in the end, this is what all politics comes down to: power.
+
I recognize that in that sense, I may be similar to the CCP and any other political party.

[[not-chinese]]
==== You are not Chinese, you have been brainwashed by the USA know nothing about China

Everyone is "brainwashed" by their environment.

I don't doubt that you know more about China than me.

But if you are Chinese, also consider that you have been brainwashed by the commies, so likely much more than me since you live in a dictatorship.

So, instead of saying that, why don't you just actually prove your point by teaching me something interesting about China that I don't know about? I love learning new things.

But please, link to reference material instead of just saying it, it will be much more convincing.

===== Can I contact you in Chinese?

If you don't know English well enough, that's fine though, go for Chinese.

But if you do, use English.

I am not going to learn Chinese because of your message.

It is more productive for you to write in English, so that the rest of the West can also learn something new.

Especially since it seems that most Chinese already know what you are talking about.

See also: <<what-is-your-chinese-level>>

[[preconceived]]
===== You have a preconceived opinion about China that cannot be changed

I try to justify here why I think China would be better with democracy, but I know that ultimately all of this is useless.

Our opinions are all determined genetically and by bring-up, and there is nothing I can do to change yours, or you change mine.

From that point of view, all of this is just a cold blooded political game, in which I try to force the CCP to take down the Firewall: <<why-keyword-attack>>.

Unfortunately I'm still still human and do get annoyed or sad sometimes, but never mad, even if your opinion is contrary to mine, and therefore wrong :-)

I also have doubts about certain things I do as expressed throughout this FAQ.

Also, I have never said that that anyone else is wrong.

In the end, I just end up thinking about new replies to things people say to me, and add them to this FAQ so that future replies will be faster to copy paste.

==== Have you ever lived in China?

No, only visited once.

And I don't think it is a good idea for me to do that now :-)

But I know that if you don't mind contributing to making <<war,WW3>> deadlier and shut up and obey the CCP, China is already a fine place to live as much as any other developing country.

===== Would you like to live in China?

If the dictatorship ends, I would like to <<do-you-hate-china,migrate to China>> if given a decent job to help you develop and become awesomer.

==== What is your Chinese level?

Oral enough for daily things, but not understand a natural casual dinner conversation.

If it matters, with some patience, I can make myself understood though.

I read with link:http://www.perapera.org/[Perapera], write with a mixture of link:https://www.pleco.com/[Pleco], Google translate and Googling to see if Chinese actually say the sentences that way.

I haven't tried to learn characters, too much effort, but I learnt the most common ones without trying.

I really wish I could learn more, but I have other more important endeavours at the moment :-(

[[bias]]
=== This repository is completely biased against the Chinese Government!

I prefer the term focused :-)

That being said, I take the agenda of information sources very seriously.

E.g. I try to clearly classify Communist Party, Falun Gong, and Western government linked sources.

Any evidence of positive political progress will also be added to this repo, e.g. people openly discussing politics online, human rights activists doing political stuff and not being put into jail, etc.

Party promises do not count, only reports of activities by individuals.

See also:

* <<preconceived>>
* <<flg-bias>>

=== China is fine as it is, stop making it worse

Welcome to the wonderful world of democracy, a world where people can have different political opinions than you :-)

See also:

* <<why-end-dictatorship>>
* <<preconceived>>

==== I like my Dictatorship

I can understand that.

It must feel good to have absolute truth in the <<democracy-is-a-religion,Cult of Xi>>, and let the black police <<against-censorship-and-flg,get rid of weirdos for you>>.

A scene from the awesome mini-series link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seventeen_Moments_of_Spring[Seventeen Moments of Script (1973)] comes to mind.

In link:https://youtu.be/YsXhgzX56cA?t=2086[Episode 7, 34:46], the main character, Stierlitz, who is an undercover Soviet spy in Germany during WW2, travels on a train with a link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_Hitlerum[Nazi officer].

The war is almost over, and the desolate officer, tells Stierlitz:

____
I told my children: I hate democracy!

No democracy in our Reich!

Any democracy in our country is doomed to end up with one thing: the dictatorship of small shopkeepers.

The more freedom we have, the more we want to be controlled by the SS again.

And then we want our secret police back, and concentration death camps again, and the universal fear everywhere!

Only then can we feel ourselves calm and secure.

No need to prove your point of view in defending the fate of the home land.

No responsibility.

Just raise your hand in the honor of him, who will take care of everything for you.

Just shout "Hail Hitler" and everything becomes understandable.

No more worries.
____

I find it amusing that a Soviet movie criticizes dictatorships.

=== Irrelevant personal questions

==== Why did you start the keyword attack?

The last straw was when in March 2015 my girlfriend's mother was arbitrarily kept 15 days in jail for doing Falun Gong. I posted this at:

* https://twitter.com/cirosantilli/status/579270450984984576
* https://www.facebook.com/cirosantilli/posts/952661734753174

I then continued because I hate political censorship.

I am against violence. <<do-you-hate-china,I love China>>.

===== Jail post

====== Jail post en

My girlfriend's mother, a 63 year old lady, was kept 15 days inside a Chinese "correctional facility" because she does Falun Gong.

She had to stay all the time in a small room with a bed and a toilet, under video surveillance, being fed three meager meals a day.

I see Falun Gong http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falun_Gong as just another moderate religion which causes no harm to its believers. The only reason that it is unofficially outlawed in China is because the communists fear it as a political competitor.

There was no trial and no explanation. She was going to take a train to visit her sister. But she didn't know that there was an important political event happening in the capital: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12th_National_People's_Congress So the police at the station, who already knew she did Falun Gong, took her away.

When she came back home, the house had been searched and was all messed up. Her religious books and computer were missing.

I'm glad she was not physically harmed. I find it fascinating how even well educated Chinese support a government which simply does not represent some of its people. How will you feel when something like that happens to your own family, and there is nothing you can do about it?

====== Jail post zh

(Translation by my wife)

我女朋友的母亲，一位63岁的女士被监禁在一个中国的“劳教所”，只因为她炼法轮功。

她被迫待在一个小屋子里面，只有一张床和一个排泄的地方，一直处在监视器下，每天两个窝头一碗只有几个白菜叶的汤。

我看过法轮功http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falun_Gong 只是一个和平的信仰，对相信它的人没有任何坏处。它在中国被非官方的定为违法（其实没有一项明确法律禁止），唯一的原因就是工产党害怕它是一个政治竞争对手。

没有审讯没有任何解释。她正准备坐火车去看她的姐姐。但是她并不知道那个时候有重要的政治会议正在首都进行：http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12th_National_People's_Congress
所以那些知道她炼法轮功的铁路警察把她带走了。

当她回到家中时，房子被搜查过了，四处一切混乱。她的信仰书籍和电脑都没有了。

我很庆幸的是她身体并没有受到伤害。我觉得很意思的是一些受过良好教育的中国人怎么能够迫害一部分它的人民的政府呢？如果这样的事情发生在你的家庭，而你什么都不能做，你会怎么想？

====== Jail post pt

A mãe da minha namorada ficou 15 dias num "centro de correção" chines porque ela faz Falun Gong.

Ela ficou o tempo todo num quarto pequeno com uma cama e banheiro, sobe videovigilância, recebendo 3 refeições pequenas por dia.

Para mim, o Falun Gong http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falun_Gong é apenas mais uma religião moderada que não causa nenhum problema para seus crentes. A única razão pela qual ele é proibido na China é porque os comunistas tem medo dele como competidor politico.

Não houve julgamento nem explicação. Ela ia pegar um trem para ver sua irmã, mas ela não sabia que teria um evento político importante na capital: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12th_National_People's_Congress Então a polícia da estação, que já sabia que ela faz Falun Gong pegou ela.

Quando ela voltou pra casa, a casa tinha sido procurada pela polícia e estava uma bagunça. Os livros religiosos e seu computador foram confiscados.

Eu fico feliz apenas que ela não sofreu abuso físico. Eu acho fascinante como mesmo muitos chineses educados apoiam ainda um governo que não representa parte do povo. Como você vai se sentir quando algo do tipo acontecerá com a sua família, e você não pode fazer nada sobre isso?

===== Further details about my mother-in-law's persecution

March 2015: 15 days in jail for no reason: https://www.facebook.com/cirosantilli/posts/952661734753174

June 2017: 3 cops came to her house. She was there. They asked if she still did Falun Gong. She said yes. They took photos of her Falun Gong books / posters. They were polite.

October 2017: 7 - 8 cops came to her house _at 11PM_. They knocked the door strongly and made noise, and questioned neighbours of her whereabouts. Luckily she was not there.

==== Are you a radical?

I don't consider myself a radical because of: <<preconceived>>

I never get mad. Only a slightly sad or annoyed sometimes.

But maybe no radical ever considers himself radical? Hmmm...

link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efHCdKb5UWc[The Dark Knight - Some Men Just Want To Watch The World Burn]. I worry sometimes.

==== Do you think Chinese politician X evil?

The term evil does not make sense to me.

The best definition I can reach is a psychopath with zero empathy for anyone: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy although I think that can be better characterized as a disease or extreme personality trait.

I believe that the huge majority of those politicians are just regular dudes with a knack for politics but brought up in a fucked up political situation.

Just like you, me and other politicians in any country.

==== Do you think the Chinese government is evil?

No, just <<richer,inefficient>> and <<war,dangerous>>.

To me, it's just another non-democratic empire like the Qing Dynasty. 共产朝 as I call them. But alas, I'm not the inventor of the expression: http://web.archive.org/web/20161025220242/http://tieba.baidu.com/p/752094668

==== Are you a SJW?

SJW: there is a seed of SJW in me.

One major difference between me and the stereotypical SJW is that I never engage in lengthy discussions.

I limit myself to listening as much as I can to learn new arguments.

So the rationale of my actions is _not_ to convince anyone, but rather:

* increase the monetary cost of censorship by binding politics to tech
* group up like minded people who don't like censorship

See also: <<preconceived>>

==== Do you hate China?

On the contrary. China has my favorite food, language, history, culture and nature in the world. And because of that: <<would-you-like-to-live-in-china>>.

As link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bjarne_Stroustrup[Bjarne] said:

____
There are only two kinds of programming languages: those people always bitch about and those nobody uses
____

I only focus here on negative things to provide content that will activate the Great Firewall.

===== Why do you love China so much?

I don't believe in reincarnation, but sometimes I'm tempted to.

Interesting how different people get <<do-you-hate-china,different impressions>>!

[[famous]]
==== Are you doing this just to become famous?

No, I am a selfless human being, only concerned with the greater well being of humankind.

===== Are you doing this because it makes you feel important?

See: <<famous>>.

==== Would you be doing this if you were in China?

Not with my real name attached to it.

==== Do you believe in or practice Falun Gong?

No, I'm agnostic: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnosticism

Here are some things that I don't like about Falun Gong for example: <<things-i-personally-dislike-about-flg>>.

See also: <<flg-is-fake>>.

===== How much do you know about Falun Gong's claims?

I haven't read their <<flg-canon,canon>> myself, no patience, but I have constant contact with believers and so have an idea of its content.

[[flg-canon]]
===== What are the canonical Falun Gong texts?

It appears that Falun Gong cannon is present at: http://falundafa.org/

It contains <<flg-lhz,LHZ>>'s approved texts / speech transcriptions, which are sacred.

The only sacred version is Chinese which is a sacred language, and of which there is only one perfect revision.

I think <<flg-lhz,LHZ>> claims the specifically chose to reincarnate in China this time.

The English translation is made by followers, and gets new revisions to reduce translation imperfection.

However, the Chinese language seems to be fundamentally sacred, and there might never be an sacred English version approved by LZH.

This is a reasonable command to download the English cannon for grepping:

....
wget -r -l inf --no-remove-listing --no-clobber --no-parent -w 2 https://en.falundafa.org/falun-dafa-books.html
....

TODO: need to find a way to wrap lines, otherwise grep might fail on sentences.

Nothing else is canonical. LHZ seems to have said that there are enlightened followers, but has not specified who, so we can't derive canon from anyone else.

Notably, <<flg-organized,FLG media>> such as http://www.minghui.org/ is believer led and thus not canonical.

==== There are bad things happening all over the world, why don't you fight for those causes as well / instead?

We have to choose the one we think is the worst, and focus on it.

What is worse is a subjective choice. For me:

* I love China and my Chinese wife
* I hate dictatorships, and China is the largest one

My <<keyword-attack,SO username>> and protest time are not infinite.

See also:

* <<russia>
* <<western-democracies-are-not-perfect>

=== Is your campaign funded or otherwise supported by some organization?

Nope.

But then, a shady supporting organization might require that I don't disclose their support, so maybe the best answer is that you will never know for sure.

Of course, a hidden support would represent a reputation hit for both such organization and for me, which makes it less likely that I would have accepted or had such an offer.

Also consider my motivation. If your mother in law were put into jail unfairly for 15 days, for following the same religion that your wife follows, and if you had a social media presence, wouldn't you be tempted to do the same?

What about you, are you funded by the CCP?

See also: https://github.com/cirosantilli/china-dictatorship/blob/48a95bf57a16b85619a6ae68702d18c9a5078797/FAQ.md#flg-has-been-funded-by-the-us-government-at-least-once-therefore-it-is-evil

==== Does your employer support this?

My employer has nothing to do with this.

He doesn't approve or disapprove of the Chinese government or of my private actions.

The only thing that my employer _does_ believe in is that employees can have their own political opinions, and that this should not affect hiring decisions.

Obviously, this action limits my ability to lead high profile deals with China.

Also I'm quite curious if this would limit my ability to go to China for business, but I haven't applied for a visa since I've started this. It likely wouldn't be a good idea for me to go to China :-)

But my employer believes that inclusion and non-discrimination is more valuable.

I will always do my best to not let my personal opinions affect my professional decisions, as that would be unfair to my employer.

[[better-to-do]]
==== Don't you have anything better to do?

In 1989, a beautiful thing called the World Wide Web was invented.

The Internet gives everyone the magic power of writing something, and having million people read it for free!

This is how much time I spend on this to give you an idea:

* every week or two, someone sends me a message, I reply with "read the FAQ", and usually update 
* I follow https://www.reddit.com/r/China amongst many other programming subs, and all major bad news show up there. See also: <<anti-commie-info>>
* when something bad enough comes up, I go to https://chinadigitaltimes.net/china/sensitive-words-series/ and update <<keyword-attack,my keyword attack>>. I've only been updating it on Stack Overflow these days, since GitHub does not show my profile name prominently.

Then I just contribute to programming websites exactly as I would if I weren't making this campaign.

=== Were you influenced by the Cute cat theory of digital activism?

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

Nope, someone told me about it after a while, but it is basically what I'm doing.

You can never invent anything new anymore nowadays.

=== People in China have already considered democracy, and rejected it

OK, shall we put that to an anonymous vote just to make sure?

Dear sir or madam: do you want more control over your government? y/n

=== Are for a violent revolution to overthrow the CCP?

No, I'm against physical violence.

And furthermore it would never work, since the CCP controls the army.

I propose instead a revolution of ideas, and efficient link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonviolent_resistance[nonviolent resistance].

Where efficient means: if you are a dissident, use privacy technology, and weight well the benefit vs risks of your actions.

You are often more useful to the cause outside of jail than inside.

[[dictatorship]]
=== Why do you say China is a dictatorship?

True, I'm using the word in an extended / jokingly sense.

Maybe authoritarian is a more precise term.

In particular, dictatorships are harder to sustain than authoritarianism, since it generally implies even less freedom.

Dictatorship is becoming link:https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/07/world/asia/china-xi-jinping-party-term-limit.html[more and more precise under Xi] however.

[[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 with images, although this is less effective in taking down websites since images are harder to track automatically.

This type of attack is essentially an embargo.

==== Do Stack Overflow policies allow for keyword attacks?

The current consensus is yes:

* https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/286082/does-the-be-nice-policy-require-se-users-to-be-nice-to-people-who-are-not-se-u
* https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/267368/are-political-avatars-and-profiles-ok
* https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/299882/can-a-username-be-considered-spam
* https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/299882/can-a-username-be-considered-spam
* https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/349131/users-political-display-name-triggering-government-action-against-users-who-vie

The Chinese law doesn't I'm afraid :-( https://advox.globalvoices.org/2015/04/16/new-internet-rules-in-china-target-usernames-avatars-as-subversive-tools/

[[anti-commie-info]]
==== What are the best sources of anti-commie news?

https://www.reddit.com/r/China

Catches all the important news

A large part of the posts is controversion material.

Has some noise of course as well, but less than other media I find.

Highly worth your feed.

Reddit was banned in China in August 2018: https://www.reddit.com/r/China/comments/965k4c/reddit_banned_in_china/

Tecent will invest 150 million on Reddit in 2019: https://gizmodo.com/reddit-banned-in-china-is-reportedly-set-to-land-150-1832375439 See also: <<biased-media>>.

==== Where can I find good words for a keyword attack?

* https://chinadigitaltimes.net/china/directives-from-the-ministry-of-truth/?view=all updated weekly with the newest news. TODO credibility, methodology. Chinese version of list: https://chinadigitaltimes.net/chinese/category/%E6%9C%89%E5%85%B3%E9%83%A8%E9%97%A8/%E7%9C%9F%E7%90%86%E9%83%A8%E6%8C%87%E4%BB%A4/?view=all
** A wiki of subversive claims by the same source: https://chinadigitaltimes.net/space/Main_Page, the "Grass-mud horse index" (cao3n2ma3 草泥马), with a censored term of the week section.
** Fun 2015 ebook: https://github.com/cirosantilli/decoding-chinese-internet-pdf-download
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_blacklisted_keywords_in_China> <https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E4%B8%AD%E8%8F%AF%E4%BA%BA%E6%B0%91%E5%85%B1%E5%92%8C%E5%9C%8B%E5%AF%A9%E6%9F%A5%E8%BE%AD%E5%BD%99%E5%88%97%E8%A1%A8
* https://github.com/jasonqng/chinese-keywords
* link:complete-gfw-rulebook-for-wikipedia-v3.0.pdf[]
* https://qz.com/698990/261-ways-to-refer-to-the-tiananmen-square-massacre-in-china/ 261 ways to refer to the Tiananmen Square Massacre in China

[[keyword-choice]]
==== How do you choose keyword for the keyword attack?

* recent cases receive a large prime over raw death toll, because older cases can always be attributed to other people.
+
E.g., I've heard there is even some opening towards acknowledging the Great Famine, thus 烏坎事件 (and others from my previous profile names)
* words must refer to a precise event, and must be clearly summarizable in very few chars, for increased impact, and profile name length limitations.
+
E.g. "High corruption rates, high pollution", although very serious, feel too generic.
* events that relate directly to freedom of speech receive a prime, since they can only happen in China and very few other countries.
+
E.g.: Falun Gong, Tiananmen.
+
Non e.g.: corruption and pollution. Those are hard to quantify, and there is always an immediate reply: china GDP per capita is low, same happens in India, Brazil, etc.
+
Freedom of speech however, is immediately verifiable (e.g. "my Weibo was taken down"), and undeniably caused by the current central government.
* the more people affected, and the more deeply they have been affected, the more important obviously

In the end, it is all about prioritization, and how much profile name real estate is available.

I am currently trying to maintain in my Stack Overflow Location a ranking of events in a single string, so that it can be easily copy pasted around.

If you think that this list can be improved, please open an issue explaining how and why.

==== Are there other openly dissident users on Stack overflow?

* "GNUSupporter 8964民主女神 地下教會"
** https://math.stackexchange.com/users/290189/gnusupporter-8964%E6%B0%91%E4%B8%BB%E5%A5%B3%E7%A5%9E-%E5%9C%B0%E4%B8%8B%E6%95%99%E6%9C%83
** https://web.archive.org/web/20180924203410/https://math.stackexchange.com/users/290189/gnusupporter-8964%E6%B0%91%E4%B8%BB%E5%A5%B3%E7%A5%9E-%E5%9C%B0%E4%B8%8B%E6%95%99%E6%9C%83
** Keyword attack inspired by me
* Yu Hao
** http://stackoverflow.com/users/1009479/yu-hao
** http://archive.is/76FCb
** "GFW (Great Firewall of China) is one of the most notorious inventions in the history of Internet. Anyone working for it should be ashamed."
** Scott 混合理论
+
https://stackoverflow.com/users/1230329/scott-%E6%B7%B7%E5%90%88%E7%90%86%E8%AE%BA
+
Same message as Yu Hao, I wonder if it is an external thing or direct copy of Yu, but no Google hits besides them.
* Terry Wang
** http://stackoverflow.com/users/1801697/terry-wang
** http://archive.is/V0aSK
** Lego recreation of Tankman on profile picture.

Users who had GFW references but removed it:

* http://stackoverflow.com/users/4594532/gnimuc-key
** http://web.archive.org/web/20170331144256/https://stackoverflow.com/users/4594532/gnimuc
* http://stackoverflow.com/users/651907/jclin
** http://web.archive.org/web/20160516065151/https://stackoverflow.com/users/651907/jclin

Users who mentioned me in their profiles at some point:

* https://web.archive.org/web/20170602054631/https://stackoverflow.com/users/815408/%E8%AF%B7%E5%B0%81%E6%8E%89ciro-santilli-%E4%B8%AD%E5%9B%BD%E5%85%B1%E4%BA%A7%E5%85%9A%E4%B8%87%E5%B2%81

Query to find them: http://data.stackexchange.com/stackoverflow/query/312863/mentioned-ciro-santilli-on-aboutme-or-displayname

[[separatism]]
=== What do you think about separatism?

If a large number of people in a given region want to leave an country strongly or have greater autonomy, I believe that they should be allowed to do so.

Rationale:

* if they don't feel they are getting a good deal out of your country, it is unfair to keep them in
* keeping them in the country forcibly implies large scale violation of human rights: mass incarceration and removing freedom of speech.
+
Which in turn implies terrorist backslash.
+
All of which are against my principles.

What makes me the most mad is the censorship. If you are going to put people in jail, write a clear law about it, and let international reporters come to see the situation.

But why do you do something and then hide it? Maybe because you are not doing the right thing?

[[taiwan]]
==== What do you think about Taiwan?

I don't consider Taiwan separatism.

Taiwan is a country split due to civil war, long ago.

The fact that most countries in the world does officially recognize Taiwan as a country is a joke, considering that the only thing keeping it afloat is the West's military threat.

The West must not let China advance and take more territories. The more they take, the more they will want.

The West must protect China's neighbouring countries with military support and assurance.

The West must recognize Taiwan for what it is: a separate country, under threat of invasion, and in need of support.

If China's claim to Taiwan is valid, then Taiwan also has an equally valid claim on China.

If China's claim to Taiwan is valid, then so will it's claim to any other country.

If Taiwan is a part of China, why doesn't China put the Chinese flag on all major Taiwanese government buildings?

Oh, I forgot, it is because they have absolutely no control over Taiwan. Just like the have absolutely no control over any other country.

China, if you want to claim that Taiwan is a part of you, just invade them already. Or just stop this joke.

Someone once told me:

____
Taiwan should not be considered a country by China, because then it would not join back to China when China becomes a democracy, and would be used by the USA to do evil things like they did in the Middle East
____

Reply: China claiming that Taiwan is a part of them only drives Taiwan closer to the West! Who wants to be part of a dictatorship unless you have been brainwashed by one?

Some interesting links:

* link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-China_policy[] every country has private relations with Taiwan through some trade organizations, they just don't call them embassies
* link:http://travel.stackexchange.com/questions/62447/how-can-a-citizen-of-mainland-china-visit-taiwan/62466#comment178495_62466[] hi, I want a _not VISA_ to Taiwan. Thanks.

[[xinjiang]]
==== Xinjiang 新疆

In 2017 - 2018, details of internment camps are emerging.

It is still hard to get hard evidence, much like every other mass human rights violation, here go the best ones:

* 2018-05 generic report https://jamestown.org/program/evidence-for-chinas-political-re-education-campaign-in-xinjiang/
* 2018-05 mapping interment camps with satelite imaging:
** https://www.albawaba.com/news/mapping-china%E2%80%99s-internment-camps-its-ethnic-minorities-1136100
** https://medium.com/@shawnwzhang/list-of-re-education-camps-in-xinjiang-%E6%96%B0%E7%96%86%E5%86%8D%E6%95%99%E8%82%B2%E9%9B%86%E4%B8%AD%E8%90%A5%E5%88%97%E8%A1%A8-99720372419c List of Re-education Camps in Xinjiang 新疆再教育集中营列表 Shawn Zhang https://www.reddit.com/r/China/comments/8mbhad/satellite_imagery_of_xinjiang_reeducation_camps/
* 2018-05 Omir Bekali’s account of Xinjiang education camps:
** https://apnews.com/6e151296fb194f85ba69a8babd972e4b
** https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/former-inmates-of-chinas-muslim-re-education-camps-tell-of-brainwashing-torture/2018/05/16/32b330e8-5850-11e8-8b92-45fdd7aaef3c_story.html?utm_term=.df8ea170b18f
** http://uk.businessinsider.com/what-is-life-like-in-xinjiang-reeducation-camps-china-2018-5

[[russia]]
=== What do you think about Russia?

I've always been curious to how Russia can be both oppressive and a democracy, unlike China which doesn't even try to pretend. This is what I gather:

* the government controls all major media. If any media says bad things against them, the government finds pretexts to create lawsuits or increase taxes against such companies. Therefore all people end up thinking that the government is good.
* just like China, they emphasise the threat of the foreign countries, especially the US, as a justification for having an oppressive power.
* the government puts pressure on any significant opposition candidate. One technique is to find some reason to put them in jail for 2 months, which by Russian law forbids them from participating in further elections. Only candidates that don't really stand a chance are left as a fake opposition.
* small time social media is fine, but if you reach some prominence, you start taking the same risks as politicians, although you are more likely to face more brutal illegal gangster violence threats as you are less visible

While I'm at it, some interesting news:

* 2018-04 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-43752337 Russia to block Telegram app over encryption
* 2017 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-40635267 Russia Jehovah's Witnesses banned after they lose appeal
* 2016 https://news.vice.com/en_us/article/kzgkv3/russians-now-need-a-passport-to-watch-pornhub
* http://www.scmp.com/news/world/russia-central-asia/article/2085395/its-now-illegal-russia-share-image-putin-possibly-gay
* 1995 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladislav_Listyev

=== Western democracies are not perfect

That is definitely true.

Nothing is perfect in this world.

I just think that they are way better than dictatorships.

As link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority[Churchill] once brilliantly link:https://richardlangworth.com/worst-form-of-government[put it]:

____
Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.
____

However, this is all obviously subjective, and believing that dictatorship is a better form of government is also a valid belief.

See also:

* <<richer>>
* <<preconceived>>
* <<bias>>

==== Snowden

The level of unknown surveillance that Snowden uncovered is a bad thing about the US.

However, it is obvious that the level of surveillance in any dictatorship will be infinitely higher, since the Government has much more power.

Snowden's prosecution was inevitable. Countries need secret services. Secret services need laws that prevent leaking classified information that was produced by government officials.

I have never and will never criticize China or any other country for spying or prosecuting spies.

The problem with dictatorships, is that they make _every_ information that makes them look bad a "state secret". Including any information that hundreds of thousands of people have witnessed, or economic performance metrics.

If Snowden were Chinese, the Chinese government would ban talking about him or anything he uncovered. A <<keyword-attack,keyword attack>> with "Snowden" in the West has no effect.

Ultimately, I think camera surveillance is somewhat inevitable, because people will always want to fight crime and terrorism and surveillance technology keeps getting cheaper and cheaper.

I am however strictly against the ban of cryptography.

I also believe that a good solution to balance out government power is the second amendment. I'd rather have more school shootings and less full blown dictatorship led genocides / mass human rights violations.

==== Fake news

When a government controls all information to make it look good, and no one can challenge it, you cannot trust _any_ of the news produced by that country, as anything could be fake.

It is much better to have some fake news, but also few sources which are likely telling the truth.

=== Falun Gong