niph

Genuinely curious. I keep thinking “it can’t get much worse without some kind of mass uprising” but the ability of the general population of Western states to just soak up suffering seems endless. Do you think we will actually see mass movements in the next decade or two? Or just slowly lurch into a void of ever-shittier liberalism?

By the West I mean like. Western Europe and the Anglosphere I guess.

The whole class was super suspect anyway because the discussion topic was “how would you debate morality with a religious fundamentalist terrorist” or something I don’t fully remember. And this guy is just like “yeah I’d say look, we have all these modern comforts like toasters and smartphones and stuff, we must be doing something right”. (This was in like 2009)

Anyway the ending of the story is that the dude became known in our class for being rejected by a girl and wanking into her dustbin like some kind of even more pathetic Louis CK. And later on for becoming a blood diamonds trader (serious). I don’t know if there was a moral to this tale but uh. Don’t be a chud I guess

I do a bunch of tournament coverage for a card game and I’ve been working years on these online events. I’m pretty good I think, and the goal has always been to get on the broadcast for the biggest pro tournament. The company that makes the game knows me because the online events are also part of the official tournament circuit so they’re happy to have me represent them… just not on the biggest stage I guess. And today I found out that some white guy streamer who has never done a real coverage show was given a role on the latest pro broadcast and I cannot handle it. I’ve worked SO hard.

The background to this was that a couple of years ago I publicly criticised the show (without even naming the casters) for misgendering my friend while she was playing the biggest tournament of her life. She was basically the only person in the event who wasn’t a cis man. It was so shitty for her and she desperately needed support. Anyway one of the casters yelled at me months later in a giant twitter DM saying how I shouldn’t have made him look bad if I wanted to work with him etc etc and now they are hiring more white guys with no experience over me and it suuucks

Happy New Year everyone!!!! I hope you all get to honour the true meaning of the Spring Festival by eating as much as you can and not doing any work. Also don’t let the capitalists short change you with their puny watered-down holidays, the celebrations should last 15 whole days. Thank you for making this the best place on the Anglo internet to be for Chinese diaspora socialists.

Was this deliberate??

Background: I’m Chinese by origin but grew up in the west. He’s English. He’s kind of a but in a lefty way and has been with me to China multiple times, we’ve been together for years. He has had misconceptions before but is always learning. He does go on Reddit still, mostly to talk about land value tax which is his big political obsession right now.

Anyway last night we were at dinner and talking about an idea for a project that’s like quora but with only expert/academic researchers as responders. Part of it would need a reputation rating for the researchers. We were then talking about the use cases/audience for the project and I said “this might be better suited to Asia” (because of how highly education is valued and the pressure on kids to study/achieve grades). And he immediately responded “because they’re used to social credit scores?” Like. Without missing a beat. Maybe I’m overthinking it but it really pissed me off that his first association when I mentioned Asia was… this.

We talked about it and he explained that the concept was already in his mind when he was thinking about the reputation system so it wasn’t just a reaction to Asia specifically. But he insisted that he knew social credit scores were a real thing. I think he did listen when I said these types of jokes were what made Reddit such a hostile environment to be in, though.

I’m not sure what I’m asking but I just wanted to get it off my chest. Does anyone maybe have resources on internet Sinophobia / explanation of where the social credit stuff came from I can share with him?

Thanks crew. Sorry that was so long x

I recently read this book researching a writing project and I think it should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in imperial or modern China.

It’s the autobiography of Puyi Aisin-Gioro, the last emperor of China. His life was insane. He was put on the throne aged 2 and abdicated 3 years later, but kept his title and was raised in the Forbidden City as essentially a prisoner - all so the corrupt palace officials could keep getting money from the government. He betrays the country and becomes a puppet emperor of “Manchukuo” under Japan’s colonial rule. After the war he is captured by the Soviets and then transferred to China when the Communist party won the civil war. Throughout his imprisonment, and to his great surprise, he is treated humanely and over a period of 10 years in prison manages to reform his entire outlook and become an upstanding citizen.

We talk a lot about deprogramming the cultists but I think there’s not been much discussion about how it can be done. The last few chapters of this book give a great illustration of reeducation that is compassionate and effective.

The book has received some criticism for being propaganda, and certainly the CCP took the view that his reformation would be an excellent demonstration of their progress and undoubtedly treated him well - but he wasn’t exempt from any of he duties and obligations in prison or anything like that. Anyway I haven’t seen any allegations of falsehood regarding his account.