freagle
@freagle@lemmygrad.ml
- Comment on Tusk: 500 million Europeans ask 300 million Americans to protect them from 140 million Russians 6 days ago:
The economics don’t work out. You are correct on the size of Russia’s military budget. But we need more perspective. The USA’s domestic police force, when aggregated, has a budget twice as large as Russia’s entire military including nukes. And that does not include the US spend on the FBI nor onn prisons.
There is nothing Europen can do to come close to the wealth transfer that is the USA military budget. More context is needed there too. Besides the fact the US military budget is larger than the next 10 largest military budgets combined, it’s important to note that the US military budget is almost dollar-for-dollar equivalent to the amount of bonds the US sells. This means that the MIC doesn’t actually make most of its money from foreign sales, it makes it from domestic sales and the money for those sales comes from foreign debt.
If Europe wants to hurt the USA, all it has to do is divest from the US bonds. But doing that would have massive implications for its strongly coupled economy. In short, EU essentially cannot break the military bond without breaking the economic bond. It’s trapped. It has to go through a period of austerity while it realigns its economy to be Eurasian instead of transatlantic. If it doesn’t do that, it will be forced into slower austerity by the USA as the US extracts wealth from Europe to shore ip the American financial system against the collapse caused by China’s unstoppable economics.
- Comment on China exploits Taiwanese commentators to fuel its propaganda, undermine the island country's stability 2 weeks ago:
Nope. Not doing it. You have demonstrated that you’re not here for a conversation. You’re just here to virtue signal, state your unexamined beliefs as universally accepted facts, and never ever ever engage in good faith. I won’t be dragged into a debate until you address the fact that you pivoted to avoid actual debate. Until then, I have no interest in arguing with you about any topic.
It’s pretty easy to look up China’s terrible early foreign policy. Nearly every Western communist who has done research into China has had to address it.
You think me saying that violence during the Tiananmen Square student protests is “speaking positively” about it? It was a terrible event, it just wasn’t what Western propagandists say it is. It wasn’t a massacre by the government, and it wasn’t the military opening fire on unarmed protestors. It wasn’t tanks crushing human bodies in the stretlet. It wasn’t any of those things. And it was still a bad event. People died, both protestors and security personnel. There was violence. The fact that you think me saying this is “positive” because I reject the propaganda about a massacre for which there is no evidence and against which there is ample evidence even from Western journalists - that’s exactly what I’m talking about when I talk about your beliefs not matching reality.
You’re still incapable of sticking to your original point which is that China is an exceptionally bad actor in taking quotes out of context to create a narrative. Until and unless you are capable of having that discussion, you cannot earn credibility by just continuing to pivot to new topics and demanding that I engage you in debate about historical facts. I won’t do it because you have shown yourself to be unwilling to argue in good faith.
- Comment on China exploits Taiwanese commentators to fuel its propaganda, undermine the island country's stability 2 weeks ago:
Typical brain-rotten liberal, continuing to protect your fragile psyche. You can’t deal with the fact that I just exposed your worm-like wriggling, so you have to pivot, yet again, by now accusing me of believing China is a perfect nation, engaging in whataboutism, and then assuming I’m a paid Chinese propagandist who is under the tyrannical rule of the evil commies.
So here’s some fun facts for you. I am a white cis het American man, born in the tri-state area to white cis het parents. I went to public school, just like most of us, and likely you. I consumed all of the propaganda, just like you did. I experienced all the same social pressures to conform and virtue signal. I was a boy scout, ffs. I learned how to treat an American flag with reverence and respect, something I still do today whenever I am tasked with managing a flag. My indoctrination is deep enough that when I see someone let a flag touch the floor I feel it in my body.
But what makes me different from you is that I allow new information to challenge my deeply held beliefs, and I am willing to wrestle with the consequences of doing that. I don’t just pivot every time someone confronts me with ideas that would challenge my beliefs. I study, I research, I write things out for myself, I debate with others who disagree with me to learn and not to win.
Yes I can talk about Tiananmen Square, about how tank man stood in front of a column of tanks, bringing them to halt. How the tank driver opened the hatch and had a chat with the man. How eventually that man came to understanding with the tank operator and with other protestors and he moved out of the way and the tanks continued on their journey. I can talk about how there were American journalists on the ground reporting on the student protests before, during, and after the supposed “massacre” and they all report that there was no massacre. I can talk about how the students literally killed multiple soldiers who didn’t fight back, how the students seized military rifles and turned their peaceful protest violent. Yeah, I can talk about it, because unlike you, I’ve done some research on it and I don’t assume that everyone who disagreed with the narrative I was raised on is some kind of evil agent.
I like how your examples of China’s bad actions are limited to Xinjiang and Tibet though. You don’t know anything of the actual really bad things China did in the first few decades after the victory of the communists. You don’t know the history of the things that you could actually use to show China has done some really fucked up things. And you don’t know these events because you don’t care about backing your beliefs up with reality. You’re content to just vibe.
Am I going to sit here and try to give you information about Xinjiang, Tibet, and Ukraine? No, of course not. Because it would be a waste of my time. You have demonstrated that you refuse to engage with literally anything that challenges your fragile psyche - you won’t even engage with your own fucking words when they’re presented back at you in a way that shows your complete disregard for truth, consistency, integrity, or honesty.
Stick to your guns. When you ask for information - ignore it. When you’re accused of pivoting, just pivot again. When you’re being accused of hypocrisy, just scream whataboutism. When you don’t know history, just rely on your vibes and accuse others of being special agents that are paid to fight with you. On the internet. For money.
Do you, boo.
- Comment on China exploits Taiwanese commentators to fuel its propaganda, undermine the island country's stability 2 weeks ago:
You are likely a CCP bot and I’m conversing with a computer.
You’re a meme at this point. But, allow me to show you just how ridiculous you sound by taking your words and stringing them together.
You said:
Probably the exploit is referring to taking what is said out of context and using very key clips to drive a narrative.
To which I replied:
That is, quite literally, the definition of the news media in every country for the last 200 years (minimum)
To which you replied:
To varying degrees, yes. The key is the extent which that is true.
Meaning that it’s not sufficient to note that all news media does this because there is quantity and severity to consider here. And you will go on to help us understand the quantity and severity in your next sentence:
china is an exceptionally bad actor here, and has been for a long time.
You began the comparative assessment by saying China is an “exceptionally bad actor”, meaning that amongst all bad actors, China is such a bad actor they can be considered an exception to the, presumably, standard amount of badness of other societies.
You then double down on your comparative assessment:
So don’t throw around “everyone has always doing this” to dilute the extent or make it seem less pronounced and “everyone does this to this degree”
Reiterating your position that China is an “exceptionally bad actor”. You then attempt to preempt any further discussion with the thought-terminating cliche:
you’re just engaging in basically whataboutism.
At this point, I called you out for orientalism and then immediately provided evidence against your position that China is exceptionally bad in this regard. But first, let’s remember the context here. Your claim is that China is an exceptionally bad actor, compared to the bulk of other nations, through:
referring to taking what is said out of context and using very key clips to drive a narrative.
And here is my evidence for how China could not possibly be a worse actor than the British or the Americans:
British news media was crucial in launching the opium wars against China. The Iraq war was absolutely 100% supported by news media in multiple Western countries doing the bidding of the war hawks. China can’t possibly be a worse actor in this space than the many many examples of Western news media launching actual wars that killed millions.
I think it’s pretty clear what I’m saying and what I’m arguing against. You say China is an exceptionally bad actor at driving narratives for political gain. I then compare China to the two largest producers of news media in the world, the UK and the USA, and show that those actors are so bad that they are complicit in launching wars and killing millions. What I left unsaid was that China has never used narrative control over news media to manufacture consent for wars that killed millions.
On this basis, I argue that China could not possibly be considered exceptional EXCEPT perhaps in the opposite way you meant it. China is exceptional in that it’s use of narrative control has led to far fewer deaths overall, has led to far fewer wars and military conflicts, and has led to far less human rights violations. No doubt you will key in on this last item and make something of it.
Instead of seeing my argument as actually attacking your position with evidence, you return to your thought-terminating cliche:
More on with your whataboutism. [sic]
I assume you meant to write, “Move on with” but honestly I don’t know.
You then pivot:
Again I wasn’t saying there isn’t a similar usage of propaganda in western media but also there at least has existed the right and existence of other media which dissents from the state propaganda.
Now your claim is no longer that China is an “exceptionally bad actor” in “taking what is said of context and using very key clips to drive a narrative” but rather that China does not allow media which dissents from the state propaganda while Western nations do.
This requires an entirely NEW set of evidence and arguments, which I will not provide you, because you deserve only to be shamed for your impetuousness. Don’t fucking claim that I am a bot when you can’t even keep track of your own fucking position, you milquetoast.
So let’s review:
(You) Probably the exploit is referring to taking what is said out of context and using very key clips to drive a narrative.
(Me) That is, quite literally, the definition of the news media in every country for the last 200 years (minimum)
(You) To varying degrees, yes. The key is the extent which that is true. china is an exceptionally bad actor here, and has been for a long time.
(Me) British news media was crucial in launching the opium wars against China. The Iraq war was absolutely 100% supported by news media in multiple Western countries doing the bidding of the war hawks. China can’t possibly be a worse actor in this space than the many many examples of Western news media launching actual wars that killed millions.
(You) I wasn’t saying there isn’t a similar usage of propaganda in western media but also there at least has existed the right and existence of other media which dissents from the state propaganda.
So you can fuck right off to wherever people accept this level of asinine “discourse” where you just bang out cliches and vibes and have the memory of a goddamned goldfish and where the only people who could possibly disagree with you and try to hold you accountable are bots, because I don’t want to fucking deal with your shit.
- Comment on China exploits Taiwanese commentators to fuel its propaganda, undermine the island country's stability 2 weeks ago:
You LITERALLY made a comparative statement saying that China was a worse actor and when I presented you with evidence undermining your COMPARATIVE claim you call it whataboutism. You are an unserious person protecting your psyche.
- Comment on China exploits Taiwanese commentators to fuel its propaganda, undermine the island country's stability 3 weeks ago:
What an orientalist claim. British news media was crucial in launching the opium wars against China. The Iraq war was absolutely 100% supported by news media in multiple Western countries doing the bidding of the war hawks. China can’t possibly be a worse actor in this space than the many many examples of Western news media launching actual wars that killed millions.
- Comment on China exploits Taiwanese commentators to fuel its propaganda, undermine the island country's stability 3 weeks ago:
That is, quite literally, the definition of the news media in every country for the last 200 years (minimum)
- Comment on New Chinese Hacking Campaign Targets Manufacturing Firms to Steal IP 3 weeks ago:
The amount of effort the West puts into stopping the free flow of useful information is ridiculous. It boggles my mind to think about how much money in total has been spent on research, development, lobbying, monitoring, deployment, enforcement, adjudicating, mediating, communicating, branding, marketing, selling, consulting, repairing, PR, auditing, planning, testing, debating, hiring, firing, managing, and everything else JUST for DRM technologies.
- Comment on China exploits Taiwanese commentators to fuel its propaganda, undermine the island country's stability 3 weeks ago:
Alternate headline: China shows people what Taiwaners say to support a particular position.
- Comment on 'No control': Sweden grapples with bomb violence wave 5 weeks ago:
Holy shit, how is this not on every fucking news channel?! 1 bombing every single fucking day of 2025?!
- Comment on USA| Trump’s FCC chair investigates NPR and PBS, urges Congress to defund them 5 weeks ago:
The number of people that are going to be unemployed in the next 90 days as a direct result of this administration’s decisions is truly astounding.
- Comment on USA | Trump tells Putin to end 'ridiculous war' in Ukraine or face new sanctions 5 weeks ago:
What more can the USA sanction at this point? They’ve already broke all norms and potentially international law by spending frozen assets.
- Comment on Elizabeth Warren wants to investigate whether VeriSign is ripping off customers and violating antitrust laws. 3 months ago:
Yes, verisign is ripping people off. Yes it’s violating antitrust. It’s definitely colluding.
- Comment on Signal gets new video call features, making it a viable alternative to Zoom, Meet and Teams 3 months ago:
Disagree. Consider that Pegasus’s vector was very often specially crafted SMS payloads.
- Comment on 6.8 magnitude earthquake shakes Cuba after hurricanes and blackouts 3 months ago:
Uhhh, Russia is fascist? They privatized all their industry, including their military industry, they scapegoat an internal enemy, and they believe in the ultimate supremacy of their own demographic?
- Comment on 6.8 magnitude earthquake shakes Cuba after hurricanes and blackouts 3 months ago:
Uhhhh, which communist entities is the US about to become buddy-buddy with?
- Comment on USA | Trump speaks with Putin and advises him not to escalate Ukraine war – report 3 months ago:
There is literally no need for compromat on Trump at this point. Between Stormy Daniels and Epstein and being convicted of felonies, the compramat can’t actually do anything. It’s unlikely that there IS any compramat. It’s much more likely that, as a NYC real estate mogul, Trump has extensive business dealings with the Russian mob and the top Russian billionaires.