Derek Currie recently alerted the good (or not so good, depending on your perspective) readers of Attack the System of a blog post of his on China. I new I had to share when he linked to a video of Chinese propaganda. Not generic “Mao was great, don’t spend so much time on the internet, nothing happened at Tiananmen Square, eat your vegetables” variety, but about Tibet and made by a little kid. Public opinion in the U.S is pretty one-sided in favor of Tibetan independence, with everyone else not caring. New York cops do sometimes beat up pro-Tibetan demonstrators, but they’re viewpoint neutral deliverers of beatdowns. Chris Hitchens is one of the few people to talk smack about the Dalai Lama, but he’s hard to take seriously for a number of reasons. If you read the mainstream media you’re already exposed to plenty of anti-China sentiment, how about sampling something completely different? Or not all that different, as Derek suggests.
January 25, 2010
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January 31, 2010 at 6:37 pm
Aw, the hard core Chinese nationalist propaganda just had to be backed with a music written by a Greek for the movie about conquest of the New World by a Western power. O.K.
February 2, 2010 at 3:32 pm
I actually hadn’t even watched that video. My description referred to a different one. Don’t know how I missed it.
February 14, 2010 at 5:49 pm
Ever read the Trimondis?
http://www.iivs.de/~iivs01311/EN/links.htm
Currie’s piece is interesting, but “Bravo Google”? How is collusion with “our” spooks (lately hubbubed re: NSA but in itself nothing new) any better, or do you find one pile of shit to smell worse in this case? Off-topic, but just thought I’d ask. Don’t be evil & cheers, T!
February 18, 2010 at 5:34 pm
No, I hadn’t read that. An interesting contrast for the usual western reverence for Buddhism, particularly among normally anti-religious types who don’t know much about it, like Sam Harris.
March 2, 2010 at 8:23 pm
Thanks for the referral teageegeepea!
Explaining my ‘Bravo Google’ line: I’m a critic of Google. They attract criticism with their biznizz manifesto of ‘Don’t Be Evil’. But when they actually live up to their manifesto, I like to applaud. Add to that the fact that after years of collusion between US companies and the rather nasty Red Chinese government against China’s own citizens, it is refreshing to see the mask ripped off and this entanglement not only questioned but torn away by what I hope is the first of many companies. It certainly opened the deluge of extremely belated criticism by the US federal government. China has been cracking US government computers since 1998! Finally they’re standing up to Red China. I don’t like Hilary Clinton much, but ‘Bravo!’ to her as well for stating quite clearly that freedom of speech and freedom from censorship is required as an American brand. Do business with the USA and be open to all freedom.
Of course that’s idealism and there will be a re-entrenchment of Red Chinese abuse of the world at large. It’s all basic human behavior patterns. And of course the USA is infamous for its abuse of other countries as well as many of its own citizens.
In any case, in an attempt to be sane amidst the current propaganda era, it is important to gather different POVs. I got a nice one today as a blog comment on the article. I tossed back a long but hopefully useful reply to open up some further thought patterns. :-Derek