China should take down the great firewall, let millions of Chinese swarm the western internet and show them what real freedom of speech is like : comradeship

[–] kredditacc@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Vietnam has no such firewall, as such, our people are accustomed to fighting Internet reactionaries. There are 2 types of reactionaries:

The loud, in-your-face ones. They will openly express their hate towards our government, the Chinese government, and Communism. They will openly spread misinformation (either deliberately or because because they believe in it) to smear their ideological opponents. The Vietnamese people laugh at their face. We do not respect them and we do not heed them. As a result, they are mere annoyances, not that dangerous (ideologically speaking).
The subtle West-loving liberals/"arachists"/"leftists"/whatever-you-call. This type do not openly oppose government policies. Instead, they will hide behind the mask of politeness and subtly mix facts and lies in order to twist our understanding. They walk the thin line between truth and misinformation, legality and illegality. The Vietnamese people generally don't guard against this type, because they aren't obvious enough to notice. This type requires actual actions from our establishment (such as police investigations) to counter.

Also, type 1 usually loves Trump and type 2 usually stands with Biden.

Anyway, white reactionaries aren't really interested in our online space. There are a few times the Vietnamese netizens and American netizens interact is when an English YouTube channel made videos about Vietnam (the topics are usually either the Vietnamese economic miracle or the Vietnam War). Fights usually happen between American rightwingers and Vietnamese in the comments, the results is usually the American comment being ratio'd. And that was Vietnam whose population is but a small fraction of China.

As for China, instead of suddenly open the gate for YouTube, Facebook, and the likes to flock in, I think it is safer for them to expand their already existing social media (Bilibili, Weibo, etc) to the English language. To be more precise: They should add foreign languages to the platform the Chinese themselves use (like how YouTube and Facebook do), not creating an "English fork" to separate Chinese from the rest of the world (which is what they already did).

[–] darkernations@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

It is difficult to "brainwash" people against their perceived material interests. People are "apolitical" because they benefit from the status quo. There are plenty of Chinese liberals within the mainland who are allowed to benefit from the current system as they interact with it in a way that is overall beneficial to the dictatorship of the proleteriat but if there are narratives that they feel will benefit them further which they can act on that causes malevolence, then they will potentially be a greater cost to the system than a benefit; a burden the country could do without.

Western propaganda works because of perceived material benefits of going along with it and the costs of going against it exceed the benefits in a capitalist world; not because it injects ideas into human beings scifi/horror-movie-style like a poltergiest taking over them against their will.

[–] LeGrognardOfLove@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I don't think censorship is the way. I feel it's a fear driven approach and paternalistic.

It's easy to see with your own eyes the decay of western society, because the supposed material gain is rooted in elitism and barely hidden exploitation.

The only way to convert the liberals is to show them what is really going on in the material world of western society. Keeping it censored will allow liberalism to fester and grow unchecked in china as these people will have their ideas reinforced by not being in contact with what liberalism really cause.

[–] darkernations@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

"Marketplace of ideas" means the idea with dominant capital will be dominant; it is not the "merit" of the argument that wins a person over. In a dictatorship of the proleteriat by seizing the means of production the socialist enterprise controls the capital and therefore "wins" the argument for the proleteriat. The perception whether an idea is good or not is always affected by bias; the point is for whom the bias should be in favor of.

That does not mean there is no objective reality or concrete solutions to real-world problems. Science is the method of figuring this out and marxism is a science. The problem is where and when people choose science in the day to day world. There are classes of people with sufficient privilege that perceive not to be affected by this ignorance, and therefore ignore the science when it suits them.

It is not a question of whether "censorship" is good or not; de facto censorship will always exist with every community and society - the question who gets to decide which censorship, what gets censored and which media it should take form in.

If one imagines a space with no formal censorship that does not mean it does not take place; a lack of a formal structure and hierarchy just means an informal one takes place instead, and in a capitalist world this means capital will dictate what those will end up being.

In early stages of socialism by definition it will have capital mechanisms such as markets; this is not maintained in a "neutral" environment, it will inevitably come with the culture of liberalism.

We should aim to have a scientific approach and understand of how things works and try to step away from the liberal frameworks we are brought up in which often conceptualises problems it does not really want to solve in absractions, rather than ground them in the concrete of the real.

My argument isn't for or against censorship; it is just a tool and to understand how and whether we use this tool we should understand the science of how ideas "win" people over.

One can think of a socialist country as where the standards enforced on an educator is enforced on every aspect of society and this includes what gets amplified and de-amplified for the progression of society. No individual has the correct answer, our collective knowledge and trials of how to apply this scientifically in a continually shifting landscape is the way forward.

[–] LeGrognardOfLove@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

The only thing you said I think is wrong is that de facto censorship always exist.

Censorship is created by a social entity hidding or faking data. Any advanced mind can take these incomplete or faked conclusions and from there find out that the data has been messed with.

Any "trust me bro" arguments can be rejected from the get go. Any information without it's reproduction steps has no meaning, only an agenda.

People are pretty bright animals on the individual level, but where they fail is that they are social animals which will take cue from other social animals and social entitiesml.

What you see as de facto censorship is only a natural consequence of this mechanism.

But this can be countered with proper education of both the social animals and the social entities.

Fatalism is not needed here because we know that we can build social constructs that can change both how the social animal and the social entity comport themselves.

All in all , a censorship attempt, for a social animal that reject social cues from it's peers, is at best an attack on it's agency and intelligence, as worst a proof that the social entity has a hidden agenda and whishes a bad outcome to the censored.

And this attempt will by itself, because the social animal has an advanced mind, create an interest in what the other entity is trying to hide.

We can see this in action with antivaxxer, flat-earthers and so on, in which de facto censorship does not exist.

These examples are not the best, because they also get influenced by bad messaging -a sort of propaganda created by bad actors be it animal or entities - but they examplify the mechanism I am talking about.

Sorry, my English is quite poor this morning as I am very tired from bullshit events in my life.

So if im not very clear, I'm sorry again.

[–] darkernations@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Every community has censorship to filter out its perception of noise or topics they feel are dangerous/ destablising/ upsets decorum/creates havoc with internal structures etc etc. We do it here for example with bad-faith liberal slop. It could be de facto or de jure.

In capitalist society it would be those that fit with their narratives and perspectives. For example, we live in a world of (crumbling) Western Hegemony so there will be self-censorship on the genocide or pro-Russian perspectives of the Ukraine war; from schools to newspapers to entertainment media - there does not need to be someone at the top pulling the strings, the associated communities (formal and informal) will do that themselves.

Education will not in itself lead to "enlightenment". One of the first organisations to discover climate change were oil companies but their class perspective did not take them down the path of environmentalism.

We have to a degree accept the fact the people intelligently seek narratives that they feel benefit their perceived material perspectives - including us - and it behooves us as MLs to understand this and allows us to better understand which class our audience is and focus our energies where it is productive.

Anti-vaxxers and flat-earthers could look up the same information we do but choose not to believe them. It comes from a level of privilege where they feel the consequences of their ignorance does not affect them. They create spaces for themselves to talk about the issues that are important to them and filter out the "noise" in those spaces.

In the wider community the above two groups fester as they are not a threat to capital. In a spcialist society such nonsense is stomped out for the greater good.

There are for example stories where "traditional" communities with overbearing patriarchal structures who were forced at gunpoint for their women to be literate and educated. There is a "generational trauma" but the outcome of good is exponential as a result for all the following generations. (This is not a specific example of socialist history, this was actually Kemalist Turkey. Socialists usually use more tactful approaches)

We have to understand freedom not from an idealistic conception but a scientific understanding of social sciences, and it ia from that true freedom is acheived.

The west has at its disposal significant access to vast volumes of knowledge through the internet but people voluntarily choose wilful ignorance for their perceived material benefits.

The above is not a nihilistic perspective, it is encouraging to know there is a scientific approach to liberation of the world despite what it seems like an unsurmountable obstacle of bad-faith ignorance. It just means we have to direct our energies towards the revolutionary classes.

(English was not initially my first language either; hope life at your end gives you a break!)

[–] LeGrognardOfLove@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Oh, what you are describing is called an echo chamber. It's mostly an opt in mechanism?

I wouldn't call that censorship at all! But I get your point.

[–] darkernations@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Maybe but includes more scalable societies including whole nations and alliance of nations, and censorship could be de facto or de jure.

The choice to opt in and out depends on the class perspective in bourgoisie society; the more subjugated one is the less of a choice that will feel. If one can imagine a censorship in favour of the dictatorship of the bourgoisie then why not in one favor for the dictatorship of the proleteriat?

If a formal censorship is not declared it does not mean an informal does not exist, one which is dictated by class relations within that society (this is itself one of the criticisms against anarchist ideas of post-capitalism ie not based on science but on utopia/idealism of the assumption of lack of formal hierarchies would free mankind's innate nature for freedom or some such Bakunin nonsense. Our nature is in a relationship with nature outside us, each constantly changing the other - ie it is dialectical. )

[–] LeGrognardOfLove@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

You say that informal censorship is always dictated by class relations ?

That's an interesting take.

I always saw echo chambers (what you call informal censorship) as inability to cope with a cognitive dissonance. It's a way to emotionally protect one self from others beliefs.

In more than a way, a semi closed environment like lemmygrad is that, I think.

I don't see it as censorship but more like a way to have constructive conversations about some subjects.

That's an interesting take none the less!

[–] darkernations@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 1 month ago

The perspectives espoused are relatively new for me; previously how free speech and "propaganda" was understood was influenced by Chomsky's Manufacuring Consent and Parenti's (better written) Inventing Reality. The latter is still a good book but the understanding of how this stuff works has evolved.

We have to sometimes take a step back in order to not overestimate an individual's agency/power over society's class relations (which is really damn hard for us Westerners - not matter the color - because of how much indvidualism is ingrained in our cultures); it is partly why class betrayal is a big thing. Learning dialectics (still learning, to be honest) and this article made a big impact:

https://redsails.org/masses-elites-and-rebels/

Thanks for engaging and hope you have a good one.

[–] pcalau12i@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I don't really agree. US propaganda is absurdly effective and for some reason no other country has been capable of replicating it. I think the problem is socialist countries tend to be too honest. Their propaganda against western countries is often to just tell it like it is. A lot of people in the USSR doubted it and genuinely believed the USA was a utopia and the Soviet propaganda was just all lies, and so that's why many supported Yeltsin. You see the same with China today, if you ask Chinese opinion on the USA you will be surprised that most don't see the USA a dystopia but as a utopia. Many Chinese people have frequently told me they thought in the USA people only work four days a week and health care is free.

US propaganda is much more effective because they just make absurdly extreme lies, claiming that socialist countries are all literally hell on earth. The reason this is so effective because most reasonable people who recognize their state is probably going to lie to them for their own benefit are also afraid of becoming dogmatic in the opposite direction, and so they falsely assume that "the truth must be somewhere in the middle." In other words, if the state says a country like the former USSR was literally hell on earth where everyone starved, the "reasonable" person isn't just going to assume that the USSR wasn't literally hell on earth, because they have a cognitive bias that makes them not want to come across as too dogmatic in the opposite direction, so they will instead conclude that he USSR was slightly hell on earth.

You see this tactic used all the time in liberal media. They always exaggerate things to the most ridiculous degree, like in the DPRK they publicly execute you with artillery for having the wrong haircut or feed you to dogs. This propaganda is so effective because even people who recognize this propaganda is indeed propaganda will still buy into it somewhat, and so the lie still works on them. An obvious example is the "100 million dead" claim which we all know is just a completely fabricated number, but even more "reasonable" people who recognize it is fabricated just assumes the number is less but still in the tens of millions, so they still have bought into the propagandistic framing that it even makes sense to blame socialism/communism for these kinds of deaths at all. They already buy into a framework which is biased against socialism/communism because they'll never apply this same kind of arbitrary body count analysis to capitalism, and so they're already successfully propagandized by assuming their is some truth to it even if they admit the 100 million number is exaggerated propaganda.

This tactic was first introduced by Adolf Hitler when had talked about what he called the "Big Lie" in Mein Kampf, explaining it as a propaganda tool the Nazis would use where they would make lies so extraordinarily exaggerated that most people assume there must be at least some truth to them, even if they don't buy into it completely. But if you buy into it at all, you have already fallen for the lie, and so you are already successfully propagandized.

Western countries really have their propaganda down to a science and no one can compete. Chinese people do not have some sort of magical mental barrier that can block out all western propaganda, they are human beings just like all of us and are susceptible to the same kind of propaganda, and I fear it would have far more negative impact than positive to let a flood of western propaganda into China. I mean, this was already kind of attempted at a small scale in Hong Kong and we saw how that turned out.

[–] cimbazarov@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

American online right wing propaganda is way too strong, to a point where its just a self-sustaining plague on the internet. The way it turns apolitical people into right wing nut jobs is quite scary. I would bet most people in China are apolitical and that would be ripe picking for the propaganda.

[–] MasterDeeLuke@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Yeah so many get suckered in by people like Joe Rogan/Jordan Peterson/Asmengold/Tim Pool etc. All of them of have this certain playbook of intentionally hiding their power level and slowly nudging apolitical people towards the dark side.

[–] queermunist@lemmy.ml 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I don't think that's actually what happened.

I think people like Joe Rogan et al are, themselves, slowly nudged towards the far right by their sponsors and endorsements and partnerships and guest appearances etc etc. Those idiots didn't play some kind of long con to trick normal people into becoming rightists, they themselves changed and dragged their audiences with them. They don't have a playbook, they're being played.

[–] MasterDeeLuke@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 1 month ago

Both are probably true tbh. It's clear those people were artificially propped up and put into the spotlight by sponsors behind the scenes. On the other hand, all of them made/make numerous efforts to downplay themselves as "neutral" when they were already clearly entrenched onto the right and clearly knew what they were doing to at least some extent. They may be idiots but I don't think a simple act of manipulation like that necessarily requires being a genius.

Comradeship // Freechat