this post was submitted on 27 Apr 2024
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I do wonder if this is america being anti communist as history has shown before. Not to say China is actually communist but the economic system is hybrid socialist/capitalist and China is catching up or surpassing america so with this said what's to say america starts using this tactic against more of chinas Chinese owned exports?
Beyond that america has meta which has done much the same as tiktok, targeting youth, furthering mental health issue, spying, anti trust and coverups yet they get a slap on the wrists.
Anti communist? With everything else we buy from China, this is the tipping point to be anti-communist? How about all the US social media platforms that China won’t let in? Is that “anti-capitalist?”
Um yeah this is cold war type shit. It's not a "tipping point", just part of that broader context.
socialism has always been anti capitalism. socialism is based on principles like international revolution and a highly configured economic structures whereas capitalism is extraction of capital which western countries have been doing in china as much as china will allow but this isn't what i am arguing.
something to keep in mind is that we don't buy tiktok, similarly to meta and alphabet (google).
brief easy to read history of cold war activity.
Cuba and North Korea (the forgotten war) are both good to look in to. i hope the history can bring context to my previous statement as geopolitics is never as it seems.
While I appreciate the additional info, that really doesn’t add to the conversation about what the tipping point is for the parent comment.
i was not talking about a tipping point, i was focused on the geopolitics in my original comment.
would you argue America to be pro communist?
maybe but i'll be honest, i dont know what you mean by this, the fight against communism has been a steady state of proxy wars, embargoes, surveillance and propaganda campaigns, so i would definitely say banning tiktok sits within embargo and propaganda.
yea socialism is apposed/untrusting of capitalist products, usually seen as exploitive by the communist this is due in part to the never ending revolution.
100%
I didn’t argue that we are pro-communist.
The point of my observation was that the premise of the TikTok sale is “anti-communist” and that it’s being brought up at all against the background of all the existing, deep economic ties between the US and China. IOW the US putting its foot down on TikTok is anti-communist, but accepting everything else gets a pass?
Funny that you point out the mistrust of (in this context of social media) western products as being exploitative when the Chinese exploitation of data and use of algorithms to manipulate what we see on TikTok is exactly one of the reasons the US wants the sale.
you make a good point that Tiktok is doing some shady stuff but meta were court covertly collecting data from Snapchat through unknowing users devices.
Facebook whistleblowers testimony where she speaks of fb knowing the harm the platform does, and knows that fb targets minors even though Facebook has a minimum age 13.
should Facebook be banned or at least forced to sell? this is why the fiasco is coming across as anti-communist, an extension of cold war hostilities.
Tiktok offers no financial incentive to America unlike Chinese exports, apple are not about to pay a reasonable amount to create an iPhone in America, china is in a pretty good position with its fabrication and engineering, consumer products or even solar panels are far superior to what America can make on a similar budget.
this is because you view things through a capitalist scope, i am guilty of this too. Facebook as linked in the above article does the same.
They are not the same. One manipulates and exploits its own country’s citizens for profit, the other exploits and manipulates both its own and citizens of other countries for profit and government data collection.
While TikTok doesn’t offer financial incentive to any US corporation, it certainly offers incentives to the users of the platform.
Let’s not move the goalposts/butwhatabout to talking about minors using social media or Chinese manufacturing, that’s too much to get into and keep it focused on the communist/capitalist debate and why TikTok is being treated as it is.
Facebook isn't shy from governments surveillance either.
this debate wont be answered in till documents either leak or become old enough to be declassified like what happened with some of the cold war documentation otherwise we're arguing points of conjecture.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/03/tiktok-bill-foreign-influence/677806/
It's less about communism and more about authoritarianism. Even historically, communism was (IMO) just the trigger word associated with a slide into authoritarianism ... which is what seemingly happened in countries that had a communist uprising to overthrow the government and broader "owning class."
China seemed like they were on course to be a friendly communist country at one point, but they've slid back into authoritarianism under Xi.
I fully expect more hostility towards Chinese exports. Part of the reason for that is going to be that China is happy to use government money to subsidize certain industries to help gain dominance (Sherrod Brown - D Ohio) was recently speaking out about the risk Chinese subsidized EVs pose to the US auto industry domestically and internationally.
communism is not innately authoritarian same with libertarianism and capitalism instead its bad actors that make it so and once bad actors get involved then communism is not meeting its definition. china is a weird one where its communist in name alone with its hybrid economic system and repressive regime which goes against core principles of socialism/communism. i think the death of the USSR which had lead the revolution, as well as the many western embargoes on socialist countries have soured relations.
if your interested in podcasts id like to recommend you listen to blowback as it follows US hostilities against socialism/communism. i believe its on several platforms
A part of me genuinely would like to see communism work.
Another part of my looks at the past century and sees the same pattern of well meaning revolution to communism, that results in a corrupt government that owns and controls everything.
I don't think the Russian people that got the ball rolling for the USSR were stupid or evil, but I also don't think it worked out like they wanted.... and I think that's true of every other case of communism that's been tried in practice.
Part of the problem is without ownership, you don't own the situation. Which house is taken better care of, the one that's rented or the one that's owned?
Another social mind game, are you better off getting into an accident with 1 person around to call for help or 20? It's been shown that when people can put off responsibility/assume someone else is going to "own" the situation, they do.
I think capitalism with regulation to keep money out of politics, mixed with more social programs (particularly socializing the insurance industry) makes the most sense.
personally, communism in a capitalistic world is very hard.
Cuba wanted to break away from American capitalists and gangsters using Cuba to store money and exploit the Cubans for sugar plantations then the US sets embargoes, Cuba maintains its independence and manages to get its literacy level up to 1953—56% 1970—88% 1986—nearly 100% implemented free social health care with newly built hospitals and students had to work in small towns and villages for part of they're doctorate. but American meddling was constant with the Cuban missile crises which laughable America clutched they're purls whilst having setup nukes on the USSR's doorstep as if that wasn't threatening.
Cuba has sadly remained under the sanctions and is struggling to stay afloat.
its important to view economics outside of our place of living, while western life is so so although homelessness is forever on the rise but outside of these countries life is different and the people are very much exploited by capitalism whether through ford or amazon, this is why we live the way we do.
I agree with your last paragraph in particular, I think if we ever want to have a hope of capitalism, communism, or socialism it starts with teaching people "the cheapest option isn't the best."
I am fortunate to have a well paying job. I do not buy cheap third world or authoritarian made products unless I absolutely have to. I go out of my way to find products made in democracies that have stronger labor and environmental laws. A recent example, I could've gotten cheap placemats for my table or a cheap table off of Amazon or at a department store.
Instead, I paid local Amish carpenters to build me a table and bought placemats from a company in Indiana. I also encourage anyone and everyone who has the means to do the same. Try and look at the product beyond "what it does" and "what it costs you." If nobody was willing to buy an iPhone made with slave labor, the gears at Apple would turn very very quickly.
Edit: And yes, it's awful how we've treated our neighbors to the south.
i am glad you can take something from that, sadly while your doing your part in society it still leave others to be exploited and a few smart consumers wont stop this. capitalism is by design repressive, while it exploits me and you some what the people in Afghanistan, China, South America to name a few beer the true brunt of it. suicide nets around Chinese factories, opium doubling in Afghanistan since us meddling as well as political in stability and South America is treated like a stopping ground for the rich where they'll own holiday homes hotel pricing locals out or run plantations.
i campaign with the socialist party, help with protests and union action, eventually i hope for international reforms.
if you'd be interested in hearing more about socialism id be more than happy to talk.
It may be simplistic, but the short version of what you seem to be saying at the beginning is: "every '-ism' is inherently neutral until people get involved."
Which is why I believe no system that is conceived by humans will ever be not exploited.
This is very true, a knife isn't inherently evil.
Though some systems are more susceptible to manipulation, dictatorships, free market capitalism and feudalism are some of the worst culprit's.
Sadly whilst we occupy the word in clusters of people we must have a system of governess
Agree. Thinking about it, the romantic in me wants to believe that the best system was probably the small indigenous tribal units. Collective social goals, group welfare, close-knit often matriarch families, conservation mindset...
A bit hard to pull off in the 21st century world though. :/
Sounds like primitive communism, its dreamy but wouldn't take much for a few tribes to consolidate power leading to a form of feudalism and class issue between different tribes.
This is something democratic socialism tries to address
I was going to include the social democracies of northern/central Europe as another better path, but it was really late and I was tired,and now I lost my train of thought. The Nordic countries, the Netherlands... while no system is perfect and every country has its challenges, these seem to exceed most on the measures that should matter.
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/rankings/well-developed-public-education-system
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/rankings/quality-of-life
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/rankings/social-purpose
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/rankings/agility
It's America being "anti criticise Israel "