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Watching the CCP Press
A Chinese factory in Zambia was set on fire. The following quotes are from the Global Times, the CCP news outlet.
The three Chinese nationals from East China’s Jiangsu Province were murdered by three local Zambians who then set fire to the warehouse of a Chinese clothing company on Sunday, outraging the Chinese community in the African country, local sources revealed to the Global Times.
According to a preliminary investigation by Zambian police, the suspects, two men and one woman, entered the warehouse and killed the victims before committing robbery, and then set a fire to destroy evidence.
Then the article wanders into the territory of victimhood.
Some Chinese living in the country expressed concern over their own safety. Some locals have misunderstood epidemic measures adopted by some Chinese companies, they said. . . Local Zambians have misunderstood why Chinese companies are prohibiting their employees from going outdoors during the epidemic: allegedly one of the reasons for the murders.
The Chinese are acting responsibly, and those irrational locals just don’t understand. But why would they not accept the wisdom of the Chinese position?
Some reports by Western and local media and politicians have stigmatized China and are affecting Africans’ ideas of China and Chinese people, Chinese nationals working in Zambia told the Global Times.
False Western reports have generated a bad impression of Chinese, Wang Xin, deputy head of the Overseas Chinese Association in Zambia, told the Global Times on Monday. Those who thought the novel coronavirus originated in China were staying away from Chinese and this had induced conflict between Chinese and local Zambians, Wang said.
False Western reports led to people thinking the virus originated in China.
Huh.
The rest of the article lets the reader draw the unavoidable conclusions:
Some Chinese living in Zambia also claimed that Lusaka Mayor Miles Sampa has been playing a role in provoking conflicts between Chinese and local Zambians with his allegedly frequent comments against Chinese.
During an inspection of a cement factory with a closed-off management system amid the epidemic, Sampa accused the Chinese management of being “slavery reloaded” and posted the comment “Black Zambians did not originate Coronavirus. It originated in China,” he said on his Facebook page. He also publicly used derogatory words such as “Chinaman.”
Get it? The truly lamentable virus is racism, spread by the lies of the Western press.
This is what they put in their English-facing pages; imagine what we don’t see.
Makes me get almost nostalgic for the USSR – they lied just as much, but they didn’t whine like the CCP. Such delicate sensibilities , so easily bruised. Of course, it’s for domestic consumption: those Western devils are Stigmatizing China, which is inseparable from the CCP, and this baseless slander is a coordinated attempt to sully the shining truth of Xi.
If I could make an observation, it might be this: Xi, and by extension, his political apparatus is really bad at reading the room. This was actually an opportunity to bind the world’s economies tighter to China if they’d behaved differently. Lies, delays, defective medical equipment, and utter BS deflecting responsibility may play well domestically, but when you have your forearm on the windpipe of the domestic audience, what’s the point? The world expected the CCP to act like a grown-up who shared the values of the international system they desire to join, and the CCP says nah, bro, we’re going to deflect all criticism and screw Hong Kong and threaten Taiwan and India also you should buy our stuff, because screw you.
They may have thought this would work in the West because they had penetrated the academic institutions, corrupted the elites in government with investments, depended on the reflexive anti-Americanism of the chattering class, and could count on Paul Krugman to write another piece about their nice train stations. Maybe they’re right. But if the virus had come from Italy or Japan or the UK or Canada, the response would have been different.
We know that, right? In our gut? Those countries would have behaved completely differently. The media might be hating on the UK because it’s Tory now, but otherwise, the NYT and WaPo would be doing stories about how Canada’s acceptance of blame is laudable and stands in stark contrast to Trump’s failings, and here’s Gov. Cuomo to tell you how Trump should have done this or that.
The only time China pops up in the COVID stories these days is to tell you they tested eleventy billion people in Wuhan and no one had the virus, so everything’s awesome, and meanwhile in Virginia people are going to the beach like suicidal lemmings.
Perhaps Xi gambled that contrition would be seen as weakness – the anti-Western narrative would prove more profitable, and the West would fracture along its brittle lines and seek to channel its anger inward. Can’t say it won’t work. He has lots of help. You can always hire people to hate their own culture, but the most dependable allies are the ones who’ll do it for free.
Published in General
Individually and at the corporate level, this is straightforward enough. You quickly learn who is and is not a good actor, and you act accordingly.
99% of things we buy from China do not involve a breach of trust. When we try to build in China, breach of trust, sooner or later, becomes a near-certainty.
So we keep things arms-length, and do not extend trust. That is doable.
Laowhy’s and Serpentanza’s Youtube channels are excellent. Both are westerners (one American, one South African) with long periods in China and married to Chinese doctors (M.D. doctors).
In the right circumstances, of course.
I do not trade with Iran or North Korea, despite interest on their end. Partially this is practical – I do not wish to break the law. But if it was legal, and the business was very much in my favor… I probably would.
Trade requires two to tango. Both sides have to believe they are benefiting. But just because one side is evil does not mean it is always and necessarily wrong to trade with them.
Here is a reductio ad absurdum: Posit that you could sell North Korea food in return for their nuclear arsenal. Wouldn’t you do that?
I know Jews who gave goods to the Nazis in exchange for lives, and I would probably have done the same thing.
I buy things from China every day. Why not?
There are exceptions: I won’t buy a phone or computer from China, for security reasons. Nor will I buy a car or safety system, for quality reasons.
You cannot do business with evil. They kill people to harvest their organs.
Asian culture is as racist as they come. The Chinese people embrace racism, sexism, and many other non western ideas. They are our enemy.
They always have been and always will be.
Whine? No, I’d say he fights. It’s one of the reasons why he was elected.
Can you not make anything about Trump, Gary.
[redacted for rudeness]
Riddle me this. Who was the only U.S. President to actually begin measures to radically change our relationship with China since 1988?
Of course you can, and sometimes must, if only to save your own life or the lives of those you love.
I stumbled on them years ago. I second this, their shows are terrific, as is their joint channel ADVChina.
JamesL,
This post is very important as it reveals a very crucial phenomenon that should affect your whole outlook. Communism is the new colonialism-imperialism. While the Chinese hide behind claims of the terrible effects of Western colonialism, many of which are untrue or exaggerations, you miss the fact that Bolshevik Marxism intends to take over where the Europeans left off. The Marxists are the exploiters. The Chinese Marxists are using cheap African labor virtually as slaves. The hatred of the Chinese in Africa is genuine hatred and has nothing to do with a few tweets on the internet.
Wake up and smell the Marxist overlords.
Regards,
Jim
It’s bad to make China live up to its agreements. It might, as the headline of this WJS article “[Deepen] Worry of More Conflict.”
“For more than a decade.” Who was President then?
So we gave China a competetive advantage over responsible companies from the US and elsewhere. But the money was good for the right people.
Breaking news:
That is likely to have implications on economic relations and could lead to sanctions.
What’s your point? How is that the same as getting cheaper goods from China?
There are persistent reports from China of prisoners being killed to order to procure organs for a specific recipient. Is this what you mean?
This.
You’re right. I left that part out, since it’s another can of worms. Here’s an interesting reddit post on the Weibo reactions.
The problem with this strategy is that we would be inadvertently further enriching the CCP.
The only way for a peaceful resolution of this problem is to starve the CCP of money. Unfortunately, since the CCP is part owner of all Chinese companies, it’s impossible to do business with China’s companies without also doing business with the CCP.
This is the same way the Arab countries became such a threat to western countries. The oil money didn’t go to the Arab middle and lower classes. Because of how the ownership of the oil rigs and refineries evolved, it simply went to the very wealthy who controlled all of the economic growth in the Arab countries.
Insisting on democracy isn’t the answer either since the wealthy upper classes in these corrupt countries control the election processes. They have one goal, and it isn’t justice or fairness. It’s winning at all costs. They keep their upper hand.
I still don’t like the idea of anyone being murdered because of their race, color, or creed; or any other reason. I try to separate Communist China from the millions of Chinese, many in the U.S. of A. We need to fight the ideology and save the people.
Were that it were only so easy. I have no doubt most Chinese believe their own government because that is their only source of news. The Chinese have papers published all over the world including here in the United States. Internally, the Chinese can point to their own papers and say, see, even the US newspaper is echoing what our propaganda is saying. And most believe it. Most Chinese view the demonstrators in Hong Kong as traitors. That is what they are always have referred to until now. Now they are referred to as terrorists.
The only good thing about this is Chinese building methods are crap and the buildings won’t last long.
Most African countries are also single-party states and the parties have close relations with the CCP. Or they have until now.
#42 Ontheleftcoast
FYI
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/dannyalexanderjapansoftwarebiz_china-stock-gsx-techedu-plunges-as-short-activity-6668242316798640129-vE3X
OP @jameslileks
FYI per your observations about Xi and the CCP being unable to read a/the room: As I elaborate here, in theory the regime ought to be conducting at least a Modified Limited Hangout; however, they aren’t doing so not because they lack the skill (to say nothing of sympathetic/pliant media access), but rather because the core CCP culpability facts are just so inherently radioactive that attempts to obscure them on the contrary just serve to highlight the disturbing green radioactive glow around the edges of the obscuring objects (Party cadres and diversionary arguments) that the Party tries to deploy.
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/dannyalexanderjapansoftwarebiz_the-ccp-has-been-completely-incapable-of-activity-6666451166269972480-1Clo
Here’s an example of the Party face-planting on a Modified Limited Hangout attempted several days ago:
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/dannyalexanderjapansoftwarebiz_wuhan-lab-admits-to-having-three-live-strains-activity-6670430261487955968-tZGs
Shortly after the above, the Party makes another attempt at a Modified Limited Hangout: This time, the Party’s mouthpiece is someone with supposed international credibility, and per what I discussed in my initial LinkedIn post (first URL above), about what a passable Modified Limited Hangout might assert, she does try to invoke the image of the WIV/Wuhan Institute for Virology team as selfless guardians of humanity simply seeking to advance the boundaries of shared global knowledge about deadly bat coronaviruses posing heretofore unseen risks to us all — but then she goes and goofs it up by saying that the WIV doesn’t have the droids, er, the coronavirus strains the Free World is looking for.
https://nypost.com/2020/05/25/chinese-researcher-warns-coronavirus-is-just-tip-of-iceberg/?utm_campaign=iphone_nyp&utm_source=mail_app
I am convinced the CCP wants Hong Kong because it is beautiful and it is rich. They talk ideology, but they’re really about money and fancy places to visit, vacation, and live. They have screwed up the Mainland, and the Communists wouldn’t know how to build something beautiful if their lives depended on it. It’s ironic that they will inevitably destroy the disputed territories the CCP covets most: Singapore, Hong Kong, Nepal, and Taiwan (Formosa). Perhaps that is the Good Lord’s way of not letting such evil people get what they want.
It’s the same reason Pakistan and India fight over Kashmir. It’s beautiful and rich, and the politicians want it.
Watching the US press and other institutions is good practice for China watching.
Like this:
Accurate. The headline corresponds well to the graph.
Well, sort of. When you click on the graph, this is what you see:
I love the way the media has been all over this for years.
A lady I know says that the many of the Mainlanders know their government is corrupt and lying to them while also oppressing them, but they’re terrified to say anything for fear of spying.
Wow. Too funny and true.
Since China began its move into Africa I’ve felt sorry for the locals and thought that China would end up making the Belgians look like Mother Teresa.
That has been tried, and North Korea soon repudiated the agreement and resumed nuclear weapons development.
I would trade with none of the people. Indeed, I would have aruged for turning on the USSR when we had the chance, and pushing them into oblivion.
I am not one of those who are soft, and unable to make the hard choice now, for the right future.