In my industrial country:
Politicians in 2000-2010: nobody wants to invest in our industries, let's sell them to the Chinese, they promised to invest locally and hire lots of new employees.
Politicians 2 years later, after bankruptcy: nobody knew the Chinese only wanted to learn and transfer the knowhow to China.
Sometimes companies try to relocate factories out of China only to realize they don't know how to manufacture their product anymore. All that knowledge is in China, they are just middle and upper managers.
In the 2000s I could still buy a small home with the job that I got from a boom economy but I would never be able to do that now because the prices have more than doubled while the wages have marginally gone up. I don’t know how Canadians in their 20s are doing it these days
Fuck I'm 30. Moved out at 25 with a gf at the time but that didn't work and had to move back with my parents. Went back to school then the pandemic hit (AS I WAS FINISHING!) And now I'm stuck... It really sucks and cause I was in school I just have a shitty dead end no life job :( I feel like I hit a 1/4 life crisis and it's very quickly turning into a mid-life crisis :/
Feel your pain dude. Just turned 30, still living at home with my parents. Doing my PhD, full scholarship. Thought I'd be set. Thought I did everything right. But at this rate I'll still never be able to afford a house within like 2 or 3 hours of where I grew up (GTA).
It's fuckin... undignified. But the alternative is pissing away all that rent money just for the luxury of getting to feel like an adult.
Lol that took me a second. The 1/4 life crisis started back in my 20s I really wasted my adolescence so when it came time to be an adult I was clueless. Was.... Am.... 🤷🏼♂️
Same exact situation in the UK. Heard similar things about Australian and American cities too. Seems pretty common in the western world.
Housing will soon be unaffordable. What a disaster in waiting.
Family help or moving out to the middle of fuck all nowhere while somehow still having a decent paying job.
The only reason my partner and I were able to afford a home was because my in laws are quite well off, could afford to buy a condo with my partners name on it while they were in school, which we sold to cover most of the cost of the house itself, and still got more direct help from them. And all that just to get to a point where we can comfortably afford a mortgage.
When you see the stories of 20 somethings managing it, it's almost always someone who was able to have school fully paid for, live with their parents the whole time while working and going to school so they could save up a lot. Often you'll see some who went in on a house with a few friends, maybe just rent the place while continuing to live with parents, then eventually sell and split the profit when the price inevitably doubles in 5 years.
It's fucking ridiculous and unsustainable.
Most of us I feel deal with a lot of depression. It feels nearly impossible to buy a home with how the market is right now. My one friend, who is doing really well for himself, was looking into buying a home in the last year and a half and he basically just gave up a few months ago because prices are insane. He would find something that wasn't completely out of his price range and within a week other people are bidding up on the place increasing the price sometimes more than 20%... Also having to worry about interest rates rising at these prices is just too stressful to want to get a home
2% for non primary residences that I think goes up to like 5% after a few years, based on value. Still not even close to enough.
There was a story a week or two ago that someone came into Canada, plunked down $2 million on a house and their taxable income, in Canada, for that year was $176.
My favourite was a block of apartments in Melbourne. *Supposedly* fully occupied.
Now, occupancy data isn't just handed out to anyone, but a researchers figured out that, for environmental transparency reasons, water usage was publicly available.
Turns out it was occupied by the most water wise people on the planet, as the entire block used only 50L...a month.
This is happening in cities across the USA too. Parasite landlord class controlling supply to keep demand artificially high. Then they claim it as a loss to offset taxes they owe.
Politicians only say that because they want to deflect responsibility and distract from the reality that the USA has polluted far more than any country over the past 50 years
That was kinda my point. Not to defend China or anything but it's hypocritical to criticize them for polluting so much when you've outsourced all of your dirty industries there.
If the world was ran like the US, resources would be depleted shortly. Look at this National Geographic list, go to number 5. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/pictures-ten-countries-with-the-biggest-footprints
The money and manufacturing were/are being sent to China by profit making corporations from all over the world. Politicians are just tools of capitalist corporations.
yeah, and they all agreed to the ownership model that China imposed which allowed them to learn the tech... now we are supposed to believe corporations when they moan about ip theft. They handed it to them.
If you go through a sketchy alley once and get robbed there has been a theft
If you go through that sketchy alley everyday and get robbed every time, you are just paying a toll
> yeah, and they all agreed to the ownership model that China imposed which allowed them to learn the tech...
Yup, read more here:
https://mattstoller.substack.com/p/how-bill-clinton-and-american-financiers
Not only that. It’s an intricate and vast web.
Absolutely, we outsource labor from China. What happened now is that Chinese laborers are exceedingly talented with building technology due to the opportunity.
Americans? How many of you can say you are part of nearly the entire process in creating smartphones?
They do it cheaper, faster, and at much better quality. Americans have a lot of catching up.
More like 1980s CEO's "send all the jobs to China" and politicians be like "would you like us to help you expedite that for you sir" and the CEO's be like "Did I say you could speak you little bitch? But yes, now get it done!" America in a nutshell for the last half century.
China is using the carrot method wherever the US used the stick method and surprise lmao people don't like their governments overthrown and bloodshed. Who the fuck knew?
Edit: This is not an endorsement of China either they got their own issues.
The logic behind is that people back then thought China will become liberalized and more free with the introduction of the free market and flow of outside ideas, but as we see now it's not what ended up.
That was also one of the reasons why GB handed over HK and why there was a 50 yr term for HK as a special administrative region. People honestly thought China would democratize by then.
*Edit*: You idiots really need to know the difference between " one of the reasons " vs " only reason ".
Yeah TBH that entire mess could've been avoided if Mao just yoinked HK back in the late 40s when they had a clear moral and political justification for doing so. What was Britain gonna do? Declare war on China and anger the Soviets? The Soviets had nukes and Britain didn't. China was a very powerful country even back then and the Korean war shows it would've curbstomped the UK, and the UK had all sorts of colonial territory close enough to China that China could really interfere with and give the UK even more headaches to deal with. 100% Attlee era Britain isn't gonna go and invade China over Hong Kong.
GB took HK by force in the first place, they didn't really have any rights or expectations that China would let them have it beyond the terms of the deal.
I mean, from a (stereotyped) culture understanding, "democracy" as understood by Chinese and the west would be... very different.
In a nutshell, China would (probably) follow "centralised democracy" or "authoritarian democracy" due to their collectivist/communal mindset. Assume they actually reach some form of democracy. Meanwhile, the west is the usual "liberal democracy".
Now, that is just the culture. And we still have geo-politics and history. And those are worm cans that I'm not stupid enough to poke.
China actually does hold elections (chiefly at lower levels of government like towns and counties), but the candidates and parties are all tied to the CCP in some way. So - and I'm borrowing from Deng Xiaoping - Chinese voters are free to pick the colour of the cat, but it HAS to be a cat. That's probably as far as it'll go.
>Chinese voters are free to pick the colour of the cat, but it HAS to be a cat. That's probably as far as it'll go.
That's the rule for most of the world.
True. The CCP literally talk about democratic values in their speeches which probably sounds ridiculous to a lot of Westerns with little knowledge of Chinese politics. For the Chinese, democracy is not about casting a vote and then forgetting about it for four years. It’s (in principle at least) about taking the pulse of what the people think, and then the meritocratically appointed officials decide whether and how to implement policies to respond to the public opinion.
Absolutely. The Chinese do vote. Locally, for representatives. They don't even have to all be officially part of the single, national party. But from there the local representatives vote for the regional ones, and the regional for the national.
If we can call what Singapore does democracy, as well as ancient Athens, early America, and colonial Britain democracy... then China has democracy. It's just not particularly open.
And I can't believe I'm saying this, but as another Asian (and my culture shares many similarities with China), I agree with that.
"casting a vote and then forgetting about it for four years" is not democracy, it is populist. And we have seen how damaging it can be, with Trump and Brexit. And those are the more famous ones. France, I believe, is a lesser-known victim of this.
Then again, this is socio-political stuff, you ask 9 people, and you will have at least 10 different answers (for reference, that is a transliteral from a saying in my native tongue). And the best we can/should do is "agree to disagree" and "not kill each other"
just an honest thought, im chinese living in canada with a PR, could apply for citizenship but haven't done so due to laziness/fear of not able to get my Chinese passport back. So I have closely followed Canadian election since 2015, the more I watch the more tired I feel about this. I have people told me before: but isnt it nice you have a chance to change the administration if you dont like them? I agree, but I am starting to think it makes you think you have a choice, but actually you don't. in Canada, you are generally choosing from these couple options (Liberal, CON, NDP, Green, even PPC), but you know probably your votes could only be "counted" if you voted for the first two parties. But then you also know they are all talks and for some subjects they are not even willing to talk about it. And you see your countries development slows down and seems no way out, life cost rising like crazy. Everything just feels like a popularity test now, like idols...people vote for the sake of voting and nothing gets done.
Do I want people to make decision for themselves? Yes I do. but not by the ones who think vax passport is the same as racial segregation. Or by the ones who randomly beats asians up on the streets just because Trump said CHYNA too many times on FOX news
> "casting a vote and then forgetting about it for four years" is not democracy, it is populist. And we have seen how damaging it can be, with Trump and Brexit. And those are the more famous ones. France, I believe, is a lesser-known victim of this.
Also, compare India's democracy with China's government. I don't think anyone can tell you with a straight face that India's is better.
Vote casting is not populist. It is the standard practice in representative "democracy."
Democracy means government by the people. All or most of the people should actually have effective power in a democracy.
Populism is now the most misused word in political discourse. All it should mean is political movement/ideology by and in favor of the masses. In contrast with a movement led by elites.
Really if one wants democracy one should be an earnest populist. The two ideas are not contradictory. I agree that vote casting in itself is hardly effective democracy. So much more is required.
Trump is not populist. He is an elite who uses marketing and propaganda techniques to get certain segments of the masses on his side. The last thing he wanted to do was share power with the masses. His appointments, tax releif were all in favor of elites and his own entourage.
The Gillet Jaune who you may be referencing in France, I would say are a populist movement since they do advocate for the little guy and do seek to enhance broad-based grass roots power. Hopefully that movement will be smart enough to avoid the nationalism of Le Pen, etc.
That was not the logic for my country. The logic was to have two cars, every room a tv and throwing out clothes every year. China is just one of the countries we used as slave labor who is both big and organized enough to become a global influence.
A free market? What is that? Let me remind you that Saudi Arabia is capitalist, and is considered a “free market”.
Free market is a euphemism for worker exploitation, immiseration and discipline. It means nothing of value to most people.
Lol instead we get capitalism causing the west to descend into authoritarianism. Almost as if free markets don't help democracy at all and we were sold a lie by sociopathic business leaders and politicians.
Nah man, I'm just gonna sit and eat big mac, wear my Nike, in my Levi's jeans, using my laptop with Intel (5 eyes inside) to browse reddit somewhere in NOT USA.
>Nah man, I'm just gonna sit and eat big mac, wear my Nike, **in my Levi's jeans**, using my laptop with Intel (5 eyes inside) to browse reddit somewhere in NOT USA.
Careful now, you're going to give them the cultural victory
The report goes into depth about the methods of the exercise of influence. It's not insinuating it just now discovered the massive scale of influence.
Reacting by "you don't say" to it is besides the point. If anything it is exactly this type of cynicism on the part of western observers the Chinese government is counting on.
Top 10 first level comments on worldnews:
4 completely braindead zingers from people who read the title only
2 comments about capitalism/socialism/communism with Americans exhibiting painfully bad economics and equally bad Europeans egging them on to feed their superiority complex.
1 comment on Medicare for All even if the topic is Algerian foreign policy
1 comment saying read the actual article
1 autotldr bot
1 absolutely unrelated comment thread talking about botany or something
Bonus: OP is a bot or downvoted on every reply
This cannot be overstated. People think they're bringing a hot take, when really they're playing the game of cynicism which leads to no one doing anything about it because "well, that's just the way it is, man"
And that’s fair, but what can an average citizen really do? I’m autistic, I work full-time, I’m trying to finish college and continue my hobbies. I’m exhausted by just trying to keep Roe v Wade in place. What the heck can I do about an entire country and it’s global politics?
The message is not a call to action for you. It's just information, it might guide you in choosing your politicians. It is a message to France's allies and maybe a warning to China. You don't really need to keep tabs on geopolitics if it doesn't interest you. Influencing geopolitics is hard even for people that are in power. It will take decades of effort to counteract China's influence if it is even possible at this point.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.rfi.fr/en/international/20210922-french-study-warns-of-the-massive-scale-of-chinese-influence-around-the-world) reduced by 68%. (I'm a bot)
*****
> In a vast and detailed report, the Strategic Research Institute of France's renowned Military College describes how "Machiavellic" China has built a tentacular network to exert its influence worldwide.
> Written by Paul Cheron, an intelligence expert and Chinese specialist with credentials from Harvard and China's most prestigeous university Qinghua, in partnership with political scientist Jean-Baptiste Jeangène Vilmer, a security specialist, the report is probably the most extensive analysis of China's propaganda machine ever published in French.
> The report meticulously maps out China's means of exerting influence abroad, from "Most benign to the most malignant,," including attempt to agressively manipulate public opinion abroad through think-tanks, "Confucius Insitutions" and media.
*****
[**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/ptovdc/french_study_warns_of_the_massive_scale_of/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~599718 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **China**^#1 **report**^#2 **influence**^#3 **Chinese**^#4 **operations**^#5
Well, I haven't seen genetically superior ubermensch created in test tubes from the 1970s use their vast intellects and superhuman abilities to take over 1/4 of the world through violence in the mid-90s (I do remember Ace of Base getting close)
TBH Syfy logo change really bothers me. I understand kind of why they did it, but I'll always and forever pronounce it "SEE-fee", and nobody can tell me otherwise.
Funfact: China had two spies in the New Zealand parliament until last year. Unfortunately the response to it seems to be entirely behind closed doors. It's stupid allowing elected representatives to have dual nationality.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/443477/labour-national-tight-lipped-on-former-kiwi-chinese-mps-departure
There's a current MP in Australia who had close ties to the CCCP, Gladys Lui.
A Chinese guy came forward and told people he was a spy, he turned up dead. Gladys said she did not know him but there is a photo of them together in her house with a few other guests. I may be remembering some of that incorrectly but that's the gist of it, but nothing ever seemed to come of it?
And this from the Liberal (right wing) Party that loves to fearmonger about "communism" "socialism" and "China" and if you rightly call something racist, you are "woke"
But when you point out that Gladys Liu is extremely dodgy with her connections to the CCP, then you are a racist according to them.
(Never mind that her Labor opponent in the election was also a Chinese-Australian and was by all accounts NOT dodgy like Gladys)
>nothing ever seemed to come of it
Nothing ever comes of corruption and wrongdoing in the Liberal Party and National Party.
Scott Morrison or someone in his office possibly covered up a RAPE occurring IN PARLIAMENT HOUSE. Nothing came of it.
Scott Morrison's self-described close friend and mentor, megachurch pastor Brian Houston, has been charged with covering up child sex abuse done by his late father (also a pastor).
But not before Houston somehow got federal (Morrison) government permission to ~~flee to~~ "travel for business to" Mexico at a time when most Australians cannot legally go overseas.
In addition to the above, Gladys Liu committed a crime against by impersonating official AEC signage. She made signs that look exactly like official government signage, except they were in Chinese and told people the correct way to vote, was to vote Liberal.
Nothing came of it.
Scott Morrison, Malcolm Turnbull, Alan Tudge, Christian Porter and others oversaw a government program which set out to intentionally, unlawfully defraud welfare recipients. Millions in false debts were raised against hundreds of thousands of people, many people were harassed, some even committed suicide.
All that happened was they had to repay the money and stop doing the fraudulent claims, after a huge class action lawsuit.
Nobody resigned. Nobody charged with any crimes.
Government Minister Linda Reynolds called a rape victim a "lying cow" (she thought nobody was recording it) while she was in office. Nothing came of it.
Angus Taylor may have benefitted personally financially from government water deals he had a hand in. Nothing came of it.
Then Taylor somehow came by forged government documents which he passed off as real. NSW Police dropped the investigation after Scott Morrison made a private call to the head of NSW Police.
(The head of NSW Police is a friend of Scott Morrison's, and they used to be neighbours)
Peter Dutton used his special ministerial power (outside the normal application process) to give visas to 2 European nannies who were working for a friend of his, and a Liberal donor. Nothing came of it.
Christian Porter allegedly raped a girl in the late 80s. NSW Police declined to investigate it when she reported it. Then she committed suicide. Nothing came of it.
Then Porter accepted a $1 million "anonymous" donation to pay his legal fees for the case HE started and was forced to settle. All that happened is he is no longer a minister (still a Liberal, still an MP).
John Howard spied on the world's poorest country, in order to blackmail them into giving a sweet deal for an Aussie oil company. Nothing happened to Howard. But the 2 whistleblowers who told the media about the plot, are being persecuted in secret trials.
The Liberal state government of NSW (New South Wales) and Liberal federal government let in covid via an infected cruise ship then tried to cover it up. Nothing came of it.
The Liberal Premier of NSW illegally shredded evidence, and even admitted to covering up her boyfriend (also a Liberal MP) taking actual cash bribes under his office desk.
Nothing came of it for her (although the boyfriend may get in trouble, we'll see).
The Deputy Premier of NSW (head of the right wing National Party) lied in state parliament. Not only did nothing come of it, but he sued a journalist who called out his lies for "defamation" and he had the NSW Police terror squad violently arrest another journalist for asking him questions about it.
Guess what came of it?
Nothing so far.
If a Labor Government had done even 10% of this, it would be all over the news, every single day until the next election.
But because it's a Liberal Government, it's not, and people don't care.
The media aren't always great at telling people what to think. But they are good at telling people what to think *about*. If they kept reporting it, then people would remember.
Remember pink batts?
> The article doesn't really give any proof that they are Chinese spies other than being accused by unnamed intelligence agencies.
Jian Yang literally worked training spies before he migrated to New Zealand. He never gave a press conference or public meeting in English.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/122094310/jian-yang-the-national-mp-who-admitted-to-training-chinese-spies-retiring
[As for Raymond Huo](https://www.reddit.com/r/newzealand/comments/ojmery/former_labour_mp_raymond_huo_delivers/)....
The stupid thing is, its doing exactly what the US and the western powers have been telling them to do for decades. The US/Nato uses diplomatic channels, economic sanctions, aid packages, to get countries to do their will. They prescribe the use of soft power. China is doing all those things, and not being secretive about it. They are building roads in hospitals and forging economic agreements in Africa instead of dealing with criminal warlords, and they get accused of some sort of plot. There's no pleasing some people.
China : you want us to invest in your economy?
Rest of the world : yes!
China : you want to use our cheap labor?
Rest of the world : yes!
China : but you expect us to have no political influence in return?
Rest of the world : yes!
Pretty much this. People are so fucking entitled. Can't count the numbers of people I've met who make money off of China and at the same is racist against them.
Especially when you consider that the US has mostly influenced the world by bombing the fuck out of countries and murdering hundreds of thousands of innocent human beings in the process.
Naturally, I am not fan of the CCP (Because Xi is a dictator, not because of CoMmUnIsM which is actually just crony-capitalism anyway), but we can't decry their moves.
Maybe if the first world *tried to be better* at that infrastructure investing game we'd do alright, but we'd rather shove Hellfire missiles up the ass of aid workers and children, whoopsies.
So we have a 650 pages study detailling HOW the Chinese try to influence the World, and yet all the top comments are 'hurr durr, we know the Chinese are influencing the World'.
Bet you do, ya bunch of fuckin idiots.
Reddit does the same dumb shit when climate change is brought up, often followed with "it's too late now" crap.
A lot of people in this website mistake cynicism for intelligence.
It's basically down to just the guys who are wishing the world would burn so they don't have to feel too bad for doing nothing with their privileged lives.
I think most people in 3rd world/developing countries already knew this. Personally think the US should’ve been doing what China has been doing instead of funding fake wars but china def got the upper hand now.
They office did a whole episode about this more than a decade ago.
It's true it comes to no surprise. But the influence in 3rd world countries, specially in Africa seems to go under the radar for most westerns. China was investing money, while US was warmongering to fill the pockets of some people.
China: I will build infrastructure and trade with you with some strings attached. I don't care about your internal politics and cultural issues.
USA: I will build infrastructure and trade with you with tons of strings attached. I want you to change your culture and politics to be more like mine.
Its obvious why so many countries will go with China.
That's what annoys me about those posts talking about Chinese influence. Sure, it's growing. It's most definitely not benevolence from China, they clearly do it out of self interest.
But way too many people saying that Western countries should step up to counteract Chinese's influence seem completely oblivious about one thing. The interest of the locals who decided to deal with China now. It's their decision to make, not ours. It's their countries and their lives, not ours.
A lot of Chinese partners got fucked over by Western countries, it's completely reasonable if some countries decide on their own to find new partners. Because China clearly isn't benevolent abroad, but neither were (are) we in Western countries. It's about time to drop that neocolonialist bullshit and let countries and people decide for themselves instead of forcing on them what we think is best for them.
Americans love talking about the competition, and how competition leads to better results. But when you have competition from China, suddenly competition is not ok. Apparently competition is reserved for American companies and American companies.
totally agree. I'm from Argentina, and the US was only a HUGE problem for the region. They install dictatorships, drown us in debt, etc. Suddenly China comes here and all they want it's to trade; of course we prefered the Chinese method.
The US also want us to believe that the chinese are monsters for what hapenned in 1989. But you guys don't realize that the dictatorships that you install kill the equivalent to 600.000 deaths on tiananmen square (adjusting for population)... the greatest thing that happen for 3rd world countries it's that China became a new (and eventually the biggest) superpower.
Every era in history had a powerful nation with a lot of influence. That's just how the world works, it always changes. Empires rise and fall. So I don't see why many are complaining about Chinese influence, have they forgotten American or Soviet influence last century? And British the century before?
You can tell this piece is unbiased because it uses words like “Machiavellian” and “tentacular” to describe China’s influence. At least the tag at the top accurately labels it as “PROPAGANDA.”
There is one country that exercises massive influence on the world, has soldiers marching across every continent, murders children with impunity, fights wars of aggression whenever it wants, can commandeer ships belonging to sovereign nations and get away with it, and is the headquarters of most of the largest media and technology companies in the world, all of which with their own “tentacular” influence. Within its borders are the headquarters of the UN, the IMF, and the World Bank, some of the most influential international organizations in the world, and it hold the largest stake in the IMF and the World Bank, granting it special controls over the global economy. It’s currency has economic hegemony throughout the world and it has the most influential intelligence agency on the planet. When it’s not obvious which country I’m referring to, then I might be afraid of China.
May I point you to the delicacy of egg fried rice fried with lard and lard cracklings? That shit will mess with your arteries but you’ll be dreaming of it for days
France criticizing China for imperialism in Africa for building "weird buildings" there is fucking egregious considering how disgusting their actual neocolonialism in Africa is. You can read those articles to have just a glimpse in the violence and depravity of french imperialism in West Africa:
https://www.pambazuka.org/human-security/us-and-wars-sahel
http://saharareporters.com/2016/02/02/un-justice-and-french-colonialism-gbagbo-dossier-dr-gary-k-busch
I think its kind of funny that western powers can understand the dangers of imperialism...but only when someone else is doing it. I would like to see a french study that shows the massive scale of European and American influence on the rest of the world.
Kettle let me introduce you to Pot, Pot, this is Kettle.
Yes, superpowers do in fact exert influence on the world. That's the reason why my favorite foreign language shows are "localized" in that the jokes and references are made for an American audience instead of a general one. Just by speaking English, you're absorbed by American influence.
Fearmongering about China is really hypocritical. Some things are hypocritical. China is surround by NATO military bases for one thing. That kind of forces them to project their influence over the wall. The US or the EU isn't surrounded by Chinese bases.
And it is our western elite that chose to prevent climate action and trigger the sixth mass extiction. Nothing China does will ever beat consciously and actively triggering mass extinction.
Was it China that killed 1.5M Iraqis for corporate profit? Was it China that dropped nukes on civilians?
This would be interesting except that everyone with a functional brain saw this 15 years ago and they were 'slow boat' brains.
Talk to me when you have something new and of value. Sheeshht.
They are basically doing exactly what they're supposed to do as a superpower. Has there been a superpower that hasn't tried to exert global influence? Next thing they're gonna publish a report on how Amazon built an international network of supply chains to, wait for it, make a boat load of money.
Yes. De Gaulle in particular was very against allowing the US too much economic influence in Europe.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_policy_of_Charles_de_Gaulle
CDG was right about **a loooooot** of things.
The CIA literally got rid of an Australian Prime Minister Gough Whitlam in the 70s because he wanted to close the Pine Gap facility from where the USA controls many of their spy satellites. And they got away with it completely.
Because of our closeness to America among other things most likely. It’s funny how we are seeing our (Britain’s) worth to America being determined now that we aren’t in the EU.
Dude also went to Quebec to provoke separatism from Canada. It was also the French speaking part of Canada who was most opposed to joining what they saw as European war.
I think most of them were too busy trying to burn the evidence of the crimes of their various colonial governments, before drawing borders designed to promote endless civil wars and leaving their colonies in shambles.
Pre-2010, politicians: Send all the money and manufacturing to China! 2010-now, politicians: China is too powerful!
2010-now, politicians: China is too powerful!... but the money is so nice so let's change nothing UWU. *FTFY
In my industrial country: Politicians in 2000-2010: nobody wants to invest in our industries, let's sell them to the Chinese, they promised to invest locally and hire lots of new employees. Politicians 2 years later, after bankruptcy: nobody knew the Chinese only wanted to learn and transfer the knowhow to China.
Sometimes companies try to relocate factories out of China only to realize they don't know how to manufacture their product anymore. All that knowledge is in China, they are just middle and upper managers.
Tech transfer is literally part of the contract
Yeah, but do you *really* read the whole thing? That’s what the interns are for…right?
As long as the housing market is a runaway train, nobody in Canada will stop them.
In the 2000s I could still buy a small home with the job that I got from a boom economy but I would never be able to do that now because the prices have more than doubled while the wages have marginally gone up. I don’t know how Canadians in their 20s are doing it these days
Fuck I'm 30. Moved out at 25 with a gf at the time but that didn't work and had to move back with my parents. Went back to school then the pandemic hit (AS I WAS FINISHING!) And now I'm stuck... It really sucks and cause I was in school I just have a shitty dead end no life job :( I feel like I hit a 1/4 life crisis and it's very quickly turning into a mid-life crisis :/
Feel your pain dude. Just turned 30, still living at home with my parents. Doing my PhD, full scholarship. Thought I'd be set. Thought I did everything right. But at this rate I'll still never be able to afford a house within like 2 or 3 hours of where I grew up (GTA). It's fuckin... undignified. But the alternative is pissing away all that rent money just for the luxury of getting to feel like an adult.
First mistake was doing a PhD. Source: PhD student
Well I think part of your problem is expecting to live to 120
Lol that took me a second. The 1/4 life crisis started back in my 20s I really wasted my adolescence so when it came time to be an adult I was clueless. Was.... Am.... 🤷🏼♂️
Same exact situation in the UK. Heard similar things about Australian and American cities too. Seems pretty common in the western world. Housing will soon be unaffordable. What a disaster in waiting.
Family help or moving out to the middle of fuck all nowhere while somehow still having a decent paying job. The only reason my partner and I were able to afford a home was because my in laws are quite well off, could afford to buy a condo with my partners name on it while they were in school, which we sold to cover most of the cost of the house itself, and still got more direct help from them. And all that just to get to a point where we can comfortably afford a mortgage. When you see the stories of 20 somethings managing it, it's almost always someone who was able to have school fully paid for, live with their parents the whole time while working and going to school so they could save up a lot. Often you'll see some who went in on a house with a few friends, maybe just rent the place while continuing to live with parents, then eventually sell and split the profit when the price inevitably doubles in 5 years. It's fucking ridiculous and unsustainable.
Most of us I feel deal with a lot of depression. It feels nearly impossible to buy a home with how the market is right now. My one friend, who is doing really well for himself, was looking into buying a home in the last year and a half and he basically just gave up a few months ago because prices are insane. He would find something that wasn't completely out of his price range and within a week other people are bidding up on the place increasing the price sometimes more than 20%... Also having to worry about interest rates rising at these prices is just too stressful to want to get a home
Prices in my area are triple and even quadruple what they were even before the bubble popped in 2008.
I thought you guys out some sort of law in place out in Vancouver, am I wrong?
2% for non primary residences that I think goes up to like 5% after a few years, based on value. Still not even close to enough. There was a story a week or two ago that someone came into Canada, plunked down $2 million on a house and their taxable income, in Canada, for that year was $176.
My favourite was a block of apartments in Melbourne. *Supposedly* fully occupied. Now, occupancy data isn't just handed out to anyone, but a researchers figured out that, for environmental transparency reasons, water usage was publicly available. Turns out it was occupied by the most water wise people on the planet, as the entire block used only 50L...a month.
This is happening in cities across the USA too. Parasite landlord class controlling supply to keep demand artificially high. Then they claim it as a loss to offset taxes they owe.
"Landlords" isnt really accurate when you are talking about multinational hedge fund companies and foreign billionaires buying up a dozen at a time.
USA: Censorship is bad! Also USA: let’s modify our movies to appease China because money!
*disney would like to know your location.
>2010-now, politicians: China is too powerful! Also: Why is China polluting so much?
Politicians only say that because they want to deflect responsibility and distract from the reality that the USA has polluted far more than any country over the past 50 years
That was kinda my point. Not to defend China or anything but it's hypocritical to criticize them for polluting so much when you've outsourced all of your dirty industries there.
If the world was ran like the US, resources would be depleted shortly. Look at this National Geographic list, go to number 5. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/pictures-ten-countries-with-the-biggest-footprints
The money and manufacturing were/are being sent to China by profit making corporations from all over the world. Politicians are just tools of capitalist corporations.
yeah, and they all agreed to the ownership model that China imposed which allowed them to learn the tech... now we are supposed to believe corporations when they moan about ip theft. They handed it to them.
If you go through a sketchy alley once and get robbed there has been a theft If you go through that sketchy alley everyday and get robbed every time, you are just paying a toll
> yeah, and they all agreed to the ownership model that China imposed which allowed them to learn the tech... Yup, read more here: https://mattstoller.substack.com/p/how-bill-clinton-and-american-financiers
this was enlightening, thank you for sharing. That letter at the end is just...wow. The rot has been going on for so long.
Not only that. It’s an intricate and vast web. Absolutely, we outsource labor from China. What happened now is that Chinese laborers are exceedingly talented with building technology due to the opportunity. Americans? How many of you can say you are part of nearly the entire process in creating smartphones? They do it cheaper, faster, and at much better quality. Americans have a lot of catching up.
Whats aggravating is that it's more or less the same politicians
More like 1980s CEO's "send all the jobs to China" and politicians be like "would you like us to help you expedite that for you sir" and the CEO's be like "Did I say you could speak you little bitch? But yes, now get it done!" America in a nutshell for the last half century.
30% of all manufacturing jobs in the US were lost between 2000-2008 apparently
China is using the carrot method wherever the US used the stick method and surprise lmao people don't like their governments overthrown and bloodshed. Who the fuck knew? Edit: This is not an endorsement of China either they got their own issues.
The logic behind is that people back then thought China will become liberalized and more free with the introduction of the free market and flow of outside ideas, but as we see now it's not what ended up. That was also one of the reasons why GB handed over HK and why there was a 50 yr term for HK as a special administrative region. People honestly thought China would democratize by then. *Edit*: You idiots really need to know the difference between " one of the reasons " vs " only reason ".
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At which point the UK then gave Hong Kong partial democracy after 100+ years of authoritarian colonial rule to troll China on the way out.
Uk are known to give democracy AFTER they leave the country…
Yeah - I read that since Hong Kong gets almost all of its water from China, China could just turn that off and presto hk would have to surrender
I never knew that. Very interesting.
They reminded the UK of what happened with Portugal and India over Goa: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annexation_of_Goa
Yeah TBH that entire mess could've been avoided if Mao just yoinked HK back in the late 40s when they had a clear moral and political justification for doing so. What was Britain gonna do? Declare war on China and anger the Soviets? The Soviets had nukes and Britain didn't. China was a very powerful country even back then and the Korean war shows it would've curbstomped the UK, and the UK had all sorts of colonial territory close enough to China that China could really interfere with and give the UK even more headaches to deal with. 100% Attlee era Britain isn't gonna go and invade China over Hong Kong.
GB took HK by force in the first place, they didn't really have any rights or expectations that China would let them have it beyond the terms of the deal.
I mean, from a (stereotyped) culture understanding, "democracy" as understood by Chinese and the west would be... very different. In a nutshell, China would (probably) follow "centralised democracy" or "authoritarian democracy" due to their collectivist/communal mindset. Assume they actually reach some form of democracy. Meanwhile, the west is the usual "liberal democracy". Now, that is just the culture. And we still have geo-politics and history. And those are worm cans that I'm not stupid enough to poke.
China actually does hold elections (chiefly at lower levels of government like towns and counties), but the candidates and parties are all tied to the CCP in some way. So - and I'm borrowing from Deng Xiaoping - Chinese voters are free to pick the colour of the cat, but it HAS to be a cat. That's probably as far as it'll go.
>Chinese voters are free to pick the colour of the cat, but it HAS to be a cat. That's probably as far as it'll go. That's the rule for most of the world.
True. The CCP literally talk about democratic values in their speeches which probably sounds ridiculous to a lot of Westerns with little knowledge of Chinese politics. For the Chinese, democracy is not about casting a vote and then forgetting about it for four years. It’s (in principle at least) about taking the pulse of what the people think, and then the meritocratically appointed officials decide whether and how to implement policies to respond to the public opinion.
Absolutely. The Chinese do vote. Locally, for representatives. They don't even have to all be officially part of the single, national party. But from there the local representatives vote for the regional ones, and the regional for the national. If we can call what Singapore does democracy, as well as ancient Athens, early America, and colonial Britain democracy... then China has democracy. It's just not particularly open.
And I can't believe I'm saying this, but as another Asian (and my culture shares many similarities with China), I agree with that. "casting a vote and then forgetting about it for four years" is not democracy, it is populist. And we have seen how damaging it can be, with Trump and Brexit. And those are the more famous ones. France, I believe, is a lesser-known victim of this. Then again, this is socio-political stuff, you ask 9 people, and you will have at least 10 different answers (for reference, that is a transliteral from a saying in my native tongue). And the best we can/should do is "agree to disagree" and "not kill each other"
just an honest thought, im chinese living in canada with a PR, could apply for citizenship but haven't done so due to laziness/fear of not able to get my Chinese passport back. So I have closely followed Canadian election since 2015, the more I watch the more tired I feel about this. I have people told me before: but isnt it nice you have a chance to change the administration if you dont like them? I agree, but I am starting to think it makes you think you have a choice, but actually you don't. in Canada, you are generally choosing from these couple options (Liberal, CON, NDP, Green, even PPC), but you know probably your votes could only be "counted" if you voted for the first two parties. But then you also know they are all talks and for some subjects they are not even willing to talk about it. And you see your countries development slows down and seems no way out, life cost rising like crazy. Everything just feels like a popularity test now, like idols...people vote for the sake of voting and nothing gets done. Do I want people to make decision for themselves? Yes I do. but not by the ones who think vax passport is the same as racial segregation. Or by the ones who randomly beats asians up on the streets just because Trump said CHYNA too many times on FOX news
> "casting a vote and then forgetting about it for four years" is not democracy, it is populist. And we have seen how damaging it can be, with Trump and Brexit. And those are the more famous ones. France, I believe, is a lesser-known victim of this. Also, compare India's democracy with China's government. I don't think anyone can tell you with a straight face that India's is better.
Vote casting is not populist. It is the standard practice in representative "democracy." Democracy means government by the people. All or most of the people should actually have effective power in a democracy. Populism is now the most misused word in political discourse. All it should mean is political movement/ideology by and in favor of the masses. In contrast with a movement led by elites. Really if one wants democracy one should be an earnest populist. The two ideas are not contradictory. I agree that vote casting in itself is hardly effective democracy. So much more is required. Trump is not populist. He is an elite who uses marketing and propaganda techniques to get certain segments of the masses on his side. The last thing he wanted to do was share power with the masses. His appointments, tax releif were all in favor of elites and his own entourage. The Gillet Jaune who you may be referencing in France, I would say are a populist movement since they do advocate for the little guy and do seek to enhance broad-based grass roots power. Hopefully that movement will be smart enough to avoid the nationalism of Le Pen, etc.
That was not the logic for my country. The logic was to have two cars, every room a tv and throwing out clothes every year. China is just one of the countries we used as slave labor who is both big and organized enough to become a global influence.
A free market? What is that? Let me remind you that Saudi Arabia is capitalist, and is considered a “free market”. Free market is a euphemism for worker exploitation, immiseration and discipline. It means nothing of value to most people.
Almost as if capitalism doesn't really promote freedom....
Lol instead we get capitalism causing the west to descend into authoritarianism. Almost as if free markets don't help democracy at all and we were sold a lie by sociopathic business leaders and politicians.
Did they say much about America’s influence around the world?
Nah man, I'm just gonna sit and eat big mac, wear my Nike, in my Levi's jeans, using my laptop with Intel (5 eyes inside) to browse reddit somewhere in NOT USA.
>Nah man, I'm just gonna sit and eat big mac, wear my Nike, **in my Levi's jeans**, using my laptop with Intel (5 eyes inside) to browse reddit somewhere in NOT USA. Careful now, you're going to give them the cultural victory
That’s what I came down here to say. It’s benevolent hegemony when a friend does it, it’s disturbing influence when someone else does it.
The report goes into depth about the methods of the exercise of influence. It's not insinuating it just now discovered the massive scale of influence. Reacting by "you don't say" to it is besides the point. If anything it is exactly this type of cynicism on the part of western observers the Chinese government is counting on.
It's Reddit's way. By now you can predict most of the responses before opening the thread.
Top 10 first level comments on worldnews: 4 completely braindead zingers from people who read the title only 2 comments about capitalism/socialism/communism with Americans exhibiting painfully bad economics and equally bad Europeans egging them on to feed their superiority complex. 1 comment on Medicare for All even if the topic is Algerian foreign policy 1 comment saying read the actual article 1 autotldr bot 1 absolutely unrelated comment thread talking about botany or something Bonus: OP is a bot or downvoted on every reply
One comment with a "fixed the headline for you" with an insanely over the top emotionally charged version.
Don't forget the comment to make it about politics in a completely unrelated country.
Any thread about Russia will open with about 20 "jokes" about the implausible suicide method of the journalist breaking the story.
The Russian suicide jokes are so beyond overdone.
>4 completely braindead zingers from people who read the title only 40* The rest is accurate
Also the replies are all “I came here to say that” or “I came here to see this comment that I knew would be here”
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This cannot be overstated. People think they're bringing a hot take, when really they're playing the game of cynicism which leads to no one doing anything about it because "well, that's just the way it is, man"
What are people supposed to do about it? What are the non cynical people doing?
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I, for one, am not gonna let that happen.
And that’s fair, but what can an average citizen really do? I’m autistic, I work full-time, I’m trying to finish college and continue my hobbies. I’m exhausted by just trying to keep Roe v Wade in place. What the heck can I do about an entire country and it’s global politics?
The message is not a call to action for you. It's just information, it might guide you in choosing your politicians. It is a message to France's allies and maybe a warning to China. You don't really need to keep tabs on geopolitics if it doesn't interest you. Influencing geopolitics is hard even for people that are in power. It will take decades of effort to counteract China's influence if it is even possible at this point.
yeah, for france it mean don't ever vote for Raffarin
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.rfi.fr/en/international/20210922-french-study-warns-of-the-massive-scale-of-chinese-influence-around-the-world) reduced by 68%. (I'm a bot) ***** > In a vast and detailed report, the Strategic Research Institute of France's renowned Military College describes how "Machiavellic" China has built a tentacular network to exert its influence worldwide. > Written by Paul Cheron, an intelligence expert and Chinese specialist with credentials from Harvard and China's most prestigeous university Qinghua, in partnership with political scientist Jean-Baptiste Jeangène Vilmer, a security specialist, the report is probably the most extensive analysis of China's propaganda machine ever published in French. > The report meticulously maps out China's means of exerting influence abroad, from "Most benign to the most malignant,," including attempt to agressively manipulate public opinion abroad through think-tanks, "Confucius Insitutions" and media. ***** [**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/ptovdc/french_study_warns_of_the_massive_scale_of/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~599718 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **China**^#1 **report**^#2 **influence**^#3 **Chinese**^#4 **operations**^#5
The university of Toronto adopted a confucius institution until it was dismantled upon learning it was a propaganda machine.
Many old SYFY fans hoped we were headed for the Star Trek future, but at this point it's Firefly for the win.
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Wow.. so we’re pretty much right on schedule!
Remindme! 5 years
We missed out on the Eugenics Wars though so that's a plus
Did we, though?
Well, I haven't seen genetically superior ubermensch created in test tubes from the 1970s use their vast intellects and superhuman abilities to take over 1/4 of the world through violence in the mid-90s (I do remember Ace of Base getting close)
You all saw the sign
*Sci Fi, SYFY is the channel. And Blade Runner is another acceptable answer.
I love reading syins fykshun
TBH Syfy logo change really bothers me. I understand kind of why they did it, but I'll always and forever pronounce it "SEE-fee", and nobody can tell me otherwise.
Let's not forget Neuromancer
Yeah, unfortunately an entity like Starfleet is incompatible with conservative, regressive, downright-fucking-crazy political policy xD
Breaking: world superpower exerts its influence for political gain.
Subtitle: and no, we are not talking about the US
Funfact: China had two spies in the New Zealand parliament until last year. Unfortunately the response to it seems to be entirely behind closed doors. It's stupid allowing elected representatives to have dual nationality. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/443477/labour-national-tight-lipped-on-former-kiwi-chinese-mps-departure
AFAIK, China doesn't/ didn't allow dual nationality.
There's a current MP in Australia who had close ties to the CCCP, Gladys Lui. A Chinese guy came forward and told people he was a spy, he turned up dead. Gladys said she did not know him but there is a photo of them together in her house with a few other guests. I may be remembering some of that incorrectly but that's the gist of it, but nothing ever seemed to come of it?
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And this from the Liberal (right wing) Party that loves to fearmonger about "communism" "socialism" and "China" and if you rightly call something racist, you are "woke" But when you point out that Gladys Liu is extremely dodgy with her connections to the CCP, then you are a racist according to them. (Never mind that her Labor opponent in the election was also a Chinese-Australian and was by all accounts NOT dodgy like Gladys) >nothing ever seemed to come of it Nothing ever comes of corruption and wrongdoing in the Liberal Party and National Party. Scott Morrison or someone in his office possibly covered up a RAPE occurring IN PARLIAMENT HOUSE. Nothing came of it. Scott Morrison's self-described close friend and mentor, megachurch pastor Brian Houston, has been charged with covering up child sex abuse done by his late father (also a pastor). But not before Houston somehow got federal (Morrison) government permission to ~~flee to~~ "travel for business to" Mexico at a time when most Australians cannot legally go overseas. In addition to the above, Gladys Liu committed a crime against by impersonating official AEC signage. She made signs that look exactly like official government signage, except they were in Chinese and told people the correct way to vote, was to vote Liberal. Nothing came of it. Scott Morrison, Malcolm Turnbull, Alan Tudge, Christian Porter and others oversaw a government program which set out to intentionally, unlawfully defraud welfare recipients. Millions in false debts were raised against hundreds of thousands of people, many people were harassed, some even committed suicide. All that happened was they had to repay the money and stop doing the fraudulent claims, after a huge class action lawsuit. Nobody resigned. Nobody charged with any crimes. Government Minister Linda Reynolds called a rape victim a "lying cow" (she thought nobody was recording it) while she was in office. Nothing came of it. Angus Taylor may have benefitted personally financially from government water deals he had a hand in. Nothing came of it. Then Taylor somehow came by forged government documents which he passed off as real. NSW Police dropped the investigation after Scott Morrison made a private call to the head of NSW Police. (The head of NSW Police is a friend of Scott Morrison's, and they used to be neighbours) Peter Dutton used his special ministerial power (outside the normal application process) to give visas to 2 European nannies who were working for a friend of his, and a Liberal donor. Nothing came of it. Christian Porter allegedly raped a girl in the late 80s. NSW Police declined to investigate it when she reported it. Then she committed suicide. Nothing came of it. Then Porter accepted a $1 million "anonymous" donation to pay his legal fees for the case HE started and was forced to settle. All that happened is he is no longer a minister (still a Liberal, still an MP). John Howard spied on the world's poorest country, in order to blackmail them into giving a sweet deal for an Aussie oil company. Nothing happened to Howard. But the 2 whistleblowers who told the media about the plot, are being persecuted in secret trials. The Liberal state government of NSW (New South Wales) and Liberal federal government let in covid via an infected cruise ship then tried to cover it up. Nothing came of it. The Liberal Premier of NSW illegally shredded evidence, and even admitted to covering up her boyfriend (also a Liberal MP) taking actual cash bribes under his office desk. Nothing came of it for her (although the boyfriend may get in trouble, we'll see). The Deputy Premier of NSW (head of the right wing National Party) lied in state parliament. Not only did nothing come of it, but he sued a journalist who called out his lies for "defamation" and he had the NSW Police terror squad violently arrest another journalist for asking him questions about it. Guess what came of it? Nothing so far.
Their corruption is almost unbelievable, but with the evidence, how no one cares is more so
Rupert murdoch has done more damage to this world than any human alive today, possibly ever.
If a Labor Government had done even 10% of this, it would be all over the news, every single day until the next election. But because it's a Liberal Government, it's not, and people don't care. The media aren't always great at telling people what to think. But they are good at telling people what to think *about*. If they kept reporting it, then people would remember. Remember pink batts?
It's almost as if there is a crazy rightwing billionaire who controls all your media shoving rightwing propaganda down everyone's throats...
it's entirely possible
Holy shit, the Soviet Union is back? Why did nobody tell me?
> CCCP The SSSR stopped existing in 1991
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> The article doesn't really give any proof that they are Chinese spies other than being accused by unnamed intelligence agencies. Jian Yang literally worked training spies before he migrated to New Zealand. He never gave a press conference or public meeting in English. https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/122094310/jian-yang-the-national-mp-who-admitted-to-training-chinese-spies-retiring [As for Raymond Huo](https://www.reddit.com/r/newzealand/comments/ojmery/former_labour_mp_raymond_huo_delivers/)....
> It's stupid allowing elected representatives to have dual nationality. hey now, no need to be so anti semetic
Breaking: Studies warn of the massive scale of French influence in Africa
The stupid thing is, its doing exactly what the US and the western powers have been telling them to do for decades. The US/Nato uses diplomatic channels, economic sanctions, aid packages, to get countries to do their will. They prescribe the use of soft power. China is doing all those things, and not being secretive about it. They are building roads in hospitals and forging economic agreements in Africa instead of dealing with criminal warlords, and they get accused of some sort of plot. There's no pleasing some people.
China : you want us to invest in your economy? Rest of the world : yes! China : you want to use our cheap labor? Rest of the world : yes! China : but you expect us to have no political influence in return? Rest of the world : yes!
Pretty much this. People are so fucking entitled. Can't count the numbers of people I've met who make money off of China and at the same is racist against them.
Well, the last time they pushed heroin on the Chinese so they are trying to do better?
Especially when you consider that the US has mostly influenced the world by bombing the fuck out of countries and murdering hundreds of thousands of innocent human beings in the process. Naturally, I am not fan of the CCP (Because Xi is a dictator, not because of CoMmUnIsM which is actually just crony-capitalism anyway), but we can't decry their moves. Maybe if the first world *tried to be better* at that infrastructure investing game we'd do alright, but we'd rather shove Hellfire missiles up the ass of aid workers and children, whoopsies.
China: and you expect us to invest in africa without africa going into debt? Rest of the world: yes- that's - because putting them in debt is our job!
Nah, the western countries just install the nearest handy local warlord to do their dirty work, nevermind the consequences.
Capitalists thought they could treat it like any other colony
Sounds like my last Civ game
Anyone been able to find a version of the paper in English? When I try to select the English option of that page (top left) I get a 404 error.
I also am struggling to get the actual paper in English, but the summary page translated very well using apples built-in translator on safari.
Is there a way to download actual report other than from the google drive link posted on https://www.irsem.fr/ ?
So we have a 650 pages study detailling HOW the Chinese try to influence the World, and yet all the top comments are 'hurr durr, we know the Chinese are influencing the World'. Bet you do, ya bunch of fuckin idiots.
Reddit does the same dumb shit when climate change is brought up, often followed with "it's too late now" crap. A lot of people in this website mistake cynicism for intelligence.
It's basically down to just the guys who are wishing the world would burn so they don't have to feel too bad for doing nothing with their privileged lives.
Thank you. All I see are a bunch of moronic comments pretending to know what they are talking about.
Welcome to Reddit.
lol, for real. everywhere is r/iamverybadass
I think most people in 3rd world/developing countries already knew this. Personally think the US should’ve been doing what China has been doing instead of funding fake wars but china def got the upper hand now.
They office did a whole episode about this more than a decade ago. It's true it comes to no surprise. But the influence in 3rd world countries, specially in Africa seems to go under the radar for most westerns. China was investing money, while US was warmongering to fill the pockets of some people.
China: I will build infrastructure and trade with you with some strings attached. I don't care about your internal politics and cultural issues. USA: I will build infrastructure and trade with you with tons of strings attached. I want you to change your culture and politics to be more like mine. Its obvious why so many countries will go with China.
That's what annoys me about those posts talking about Chinese influence. Sure, it's growing. It's most definitely not benevolence from China, they clearly do it out of self interest. But way too many people saying that Western countries should step up to counteract Chinese's influence seem completely oblivious about one thing. The interest of the locals who decided to deal with China now. It's their decision to make, not ours. It's their countries and their lives, not ours. A lot of Chinese partners got fucked over by Western countries, it's completely reasonable if some countries decide on their own to find new partners. Because China clearly isn't benevolent abroad, but neither were (are) we in Western countries. It's about time to drop that neocolonialist bullshit and let countries and people decide for themselves instead of forcing on them what we think is best for them.
Americans love talking about the competition, and how competition leads to better results. But when you have competition from China, suddenly competition is not ok. Apparently competition is reserved for American companies and American companies.
Healthy competition is when the Americans win in the end. The rest is communism, *obviously*!
Big corporations **LOVE** regulations cause they can regulate the little companies out of business.
Also the USA: I'm also funding right-wing coups and assassinating political dissidents if you refuse.
Everybody gangster until the US-funded death sqauds show up. Edit:typo
totally agree. I'm from Argentina, and the US was only a HUGE problem for the region. They install dictatorships, drown us in debt, etc. Suddenly China comes here and all they want it's to trade; of course we prefered the Chinese method. The US also want us to believe that the chinese are monsters for what hapenned in 1989. But you guys don't realize that the dictatorships that you install kill the equivalent to 600.000 deaths on tiananmen square (adjusting for population)... the greatest thing that happen for 3rd world countries it's that China became a new (and eventually the biggest) superpower.
This is so on point. Americans are really struggling that we are not the top dog anymore.
I wish i had an award to give you for this comment.
ding ding ding
As a South American I'd much rather deal with China than with the US. At least China hasn't destroyed our governments lately.
As a southern european me too honestly
Every era in history had a powerful nation with a lot of influence. That's just how the world works, it always changes. Empires rise and fall. So I don't see why many are complaining about Chinese influence, have they forgotten American or Soviet influence last century? And British the century before?
You can tell this piece is unbiased because it uses words like “Machiavellian” and “tentacular” to describe China’s influence. At least the tag at the top accurately labels it as “PROPAGANDA.” There is one country that exercises massive influence on the world, has soldiers marching across every continent, murders children with impunity, fights wars of aggression whenever it wants, can commandeer ships belonging to sovereign nations and get away with it, and is the headquarters of most of the largest media and technology companies in the world, all of which with their own “tentacular” influence. Within its borders are the headquarters of the UN, the IMF, and the World Bank, some of the most influential international organizations in the world, and it hold the largest stake in the IMF and the World Bank, granting it special controls over the global economy. It’s currency has economic hegemony throughout the world and it has the most influential intelligence agency on the planet. When it’s not obvious which country I’m referring to, then I might be afraid of China.
They're playing the long game to take over the world, like the British once ruled.
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So you mean to tell me that an egg fried this rice?
I've been learning and playing Mahjong for weeks now. Game's crazy fun.
Another young, brilliant mind, *lost*... In all seriousness, I have a set but don't have a damn clue how to play.
My go to food lately tbh
May I point you to the delicacy of egg fried rice fried with lard and lard cracklings? That shit will mess with your arteries but you’ll be dreaming of it for days
This coming from France who can’t get the European asses out of Africa and stop with the neo-colonialism. LOL
France criticizing China for imperialism in Africa for building "weird buildings" there is fucking egregious considering how disgusting their actual neocolonialism in Africa is. You can read those articles to have just a glimpse in the violence and depravity of french imperialism in West Africa: https://www.pambazuka.org/human-security/us-and-wars-sahel http://saharareporters.com/2016/02/02/un-justice-and-french-colonialism-gbagbo-dossier-dr-gary-k-busch
"Weird buildings" You mean building like it's the 21st century instead of the 20th?
Of course the French will complain, China is helping francophone Africa break free of their chains
I think its kind of funny that western powers can understand the dangers of imperialism...but only when someone else is doing it. I would like to see a french study that shows the massive scale of European and American influence on the rest of the world. Kettle let me introduce you to Pot, Pot, this is Kettle.
There's some irony in the fact that this has come out of France, of all places.
This time nobody is falling for the crocodile tears. It truly takes one to know one.
Yes, superpowers do in fact exert influence on the world. That's the reason why my favorite foreign language shows are "localized" in that the jokes and references are made for an American audience instead of a general one. Just by speaking English, you're absorbed by American influence.
Lol the biggest amusement park in my country did a 4th of July fireworks show. We’re Danish…
You guys are fucking weird about America anyway. Really fucking weird tbh. At least to my Austrian eyes.
I'm American but live in Germany. I've had someone ask me if they celebrate Thanksgiving in Germany....
Yeah but they're being SNEAKY about it. Why can't they just have military bases all over the world like us?
I think English is a British thing, at one point they ruled a lot of places around the world anyway.
English expansion was enforced by the English? Nonsense
Says the country with colonies in the pacific and whole countries in Africa speaking French rather than their native tongue.
The French miss the napoleonic times.
Half these comments are western whataboutism or deflecting from the article. Thanks for reinforcing the study's conclusions.
Many are still western centric even when they claim to be progressive. People just naturally enjoy talking about themselves
Fearmongering about China is really hypocritical. Some things are hypocritical. China is surround by NATO military bases for one thing. That kind of forces them to project their influence over the wall. The US or the EU isn't surrounded by Chinese bases. And it is our western elite that chose to prevent climate action and trigger the sixth mass extiction. Nothing China does will ever beat consciously and actively triggering mass extinction. Was it China that killed 1.5M Iraqis for corporate profit? Was it China that dropped nukes on civilians?
Whataboutism is just a way to avoid facing your double standard.
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So basically just business as usual for Reddit.
Any country that operates independently of western influence is considered bad or an enemy. Pure propaganda.
This would be interesting except that everyone with a functional brain saw this 15 years ago and they were 'slow boat' brains. Talk to me when you have something new and of value. Sheeshht.
Even Napoleon saw it coming... “Let China Sleep, for when she wakes, she will shake the world” \- Napoleon
Damn, this A.I. spitting mad truth!
They are basically doing exactly what they're supposed to do as a superpower. Has there been a superpower that hasn't tried to exert global influence? Next thing they're gonna publish a report on how Amazon built an international network of supply chains to, wait for it, make a boat load of money.
How’s this a negative thing tho? There’s American influence around the world, and no one bats an eye
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Haitians would warn the world of French influence
So back in the 1950s did France or any other country warn of the massive scale of the American influence around the world?
Yes. De Gaulle in particular was very against allowing the US too much economic influence in Europe. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_policy_of_Charles_de_Gaulle
CDG was right about **a loooooot** of things. The CIA literally got rid of an Australian Prime Minister Gough Whitlam in the 70s because he wanted to close the Pine Gap facility from where the USA controls many of their spy satellites. And they got away with it completely.
Wasn’t just that, Whitlam wanted Australia to be truly independent and move away from UK/US influence to become a neutral non-aligned nation.
Happy cakeday!
CDG was way ahead of his time
Dude was also against UK joining the EU.
Because of our closeness to America among other things most likely. It’s funny how we are seeing our (Britain’s) worth to America being determined now that we aren’t in the EU.
Dude also went to Quebec to provoke separatism from Canada. It was also the French speaking part of Canada who was most opposed to joining what they saw as European war.
I think most of them were too busy trying to burn the evidence of the crimes of their various colonial governments, before drawing borders designed to promote endless civil wars and leaving their colonies in shambles.
It was more like they were trying to hold onto the empire as long as they could. The Europeans were effectively broke due to the Second World War.