What’s up with this straight up pro-china and pro-russia stuff on Lemmy lately?

It’s not even praising the people of China and Russia, but rather their gov directly.

Obviously the states have problems, and the EU to a lesser degree, but they at least have some human rights.

Is this some kind of organized disinformation campaign?

  • Azarova [they/them]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    81
    arrow-down
    7
    ·
    7 days ago

    Time for the weekly question as to why there are anti-imperialists on the anti-imperialist platform from a redditor who joined less than a month ago yes-honey-left

    • SomeLemmyUser@discuss.tchncs.de
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      8
      arrow-down
      14
      ·
      6 days ago

      I am so baffled since years that (mostly) americans think if you are against us (or its imperialism) u automatically need to be pro China and vice versa. I really can’t get why you guys always need to bootlick one or the other government. Why can’t you not fight for a better system, why do u always fight for a better oppressor?!

      Really grinds my gears.

      • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        21
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        6 days ago

        The PRC is the better system. It has a socialist market economy, one that works for the people, and doesn’t depend on imperialism. China isn’t an oppressor. Moreover, it is usually non-westerners that are pro-China, as they are the ones directly experiencing western imperialism and watching China focus on mutual development and cooperation.

        You have no reason to reduce the logic of why one would support the PRC down to simply being “anti-west,” if you ask anyone pro-China about why they are, we can give you nuanced and complete reasoning for doing so. By caricaturing the argument of those you disagree with, you quite literally strawman them.

        • SomeLemmyUser@discuss.tchncs.de
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          5
          arrow-down
          7
          ·
          edit-2
          6 days ago

          The PRC is the better system. […] Moreover, it is usually non-westerners that are pro-China,

          May I ask where your from?

          You have no reason to reduce the logic of why one would support the PRC down to simply being “anti-west,” if you ask anyone pro-China about why they are, we can give you nuanced and complete reasoning for doing so. By caricaturing the argument of those you disagree with, you quite literally strawman them.

          The comment I replied to litterally reduced their support of China to being anti-western opression and implies those are the same thing.

          Not a strawman at all

          • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            19
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            6 days ago

            I’ve stated elsewhere that I’m a USian, I live in the US Empire. That doesn’t take away from my points, though, polls on approval of the PRC are much higher in the global south than they are in the global north. I’m in the minority as a supporter of the PRC in the US, and it’s largely because I’m a Marxist-Leninist that I am.

            Further, no, being anti-imperialist does not mean that is the only reason to support the PRC. You strawmanned their point (correct the pronouns you used).

            • SomeLemmyUser@discuss.tchncs.de
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              5
              arrow-down
              12
              ·
              6 days ago

              Yeah have at it.

              That’s exactly my point. People see their own system is bad, they check that china/real existing socialism is regarded as the opposite to the system they consider bad - they have valid points but also pink-red glasses which makes them overlook problems.

              My point is, that we have 3 world powers, China, us and Russia, and ALL of them act in hegemonial fashion.

              Yes, us is currently the worst, but NONE of them fight for the working class, ALL of them fight to keep the ones rich, who are rich and the ones powerful, which are powerful in their respective system.

              If you consider yourself Marxist Leninist, may read a little more Marx and a little less Lenin. What China does is NOT what Marx sees as communist, it doesn’t even hold up to his imagination of socialism.

              • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                20
                arrow-down
                3
                ·
                edit-2
                6 days ago

                No, this is deeply unserious. What actually happens is people like me notice the problems surrounding us, read Marx, Engels, Lenin, and other Marxist writers, see what the PRC is managing to achieve thanks to its socialist system, and then learn to check media critically, looking at the sources, motivations, etc in order to actually see what’s going on. Then we keep reading theory and try to start organizing. Your characterization of leftists as simply supporting the opposite of what is going on is a mischaracterization, one you have not once provided proof for, yet is your entire argument.

                Secondly, only the US is the world hegemon. It is the world’s largest empire, and has full control of institutions like NATO and the IMF, which it wields in its favor to secure imperialism. Russia is not a hegemon, it has fallen far from its heights as the Soviet Union. The PRC isn’t a hegemon either, it is overtaking the US but it doesn’t depend on imperialism, millitary or financial domination.

                Russia is capitalist, correct, and the US is too, but they stand at odds due to the US being the world Empire and Russia being encircled by it. In the PRC, the working class is the one in charge!

                If you consider yourself Marxist Leninist, may read a little more Marx and a little less Lenin. What China does is NOT what Marx sees as communist, it doesn’t even hold up to his imagination of socialism.

                This is absolutely peak western chauvanism, undue superiority and self-confidence while knowing nothing about how much of Marx, Engels, and Lenin I’ve read. From Marx alone, not at all counting the dozens of other Marxists I have read:

                1. Capital: Volume 1

                2. Critique of the Gotha Programme

                3. Value, Price, and Profit

                4. Wage Labor and Capital

                5. Manifesto of the Communist Party

                6. Third Manuscript (1844)

                7. Critique of Hegel’s Dialectic and General Philosophy

                8. Marx to Ruge

                And I am about a third of the way through Capital: Volume 2. You have no idea what I have studied, and think you can just mouth off as though you know what I know better than I do. It’s peak western chauvanism. I’ve elaborated many times elsewhere on China’s system, but at its core, the proletariat is in power, and public property is the principle aspect of the economy. The large firms and key industries are publicly owned, and as the medium firms grow the state exerts more control and gradually sublimates them into the public sector. This gradual approach to sublimating property once the dictatorship of the proletariat has been established is right out of the communist manifesto. China is in the early developing stage of socialism, and is continuing to develop and socialize the economy.

                For further reading:

                1. Qiao Collective’s Introductory Socialism with Chinese Characteristics Study Guide

                2. Socialism with Chinese Characteristics ProleWiki page

                3. Socialist Market Economy ProleWiki Page

                4. People’s Republic of China ProleWiki Page

                5. My “Read Theory, Darn It!” Introductory Marxist-Leninist Reading Guide

                6. Has China Turned to Capitalism? Reflections on the Transition from Capitalism to Socialism by Domenico Losurdo

                7. China Has Billionaires by Roderic Day

                8. The Long Game and its Contradictions

                Do some reading if you want to use how much we’ve read as a cudgel.

                • Blisterexe@lemmy.zip
                  link
                  fedilink
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  arrow-down
                  2
                  ·
                  edit-2
                  6 days ago

                  ~I’m not who you were replying to before.~

                  I agree that the chinese mixed market model is better, and that the US sucks ass, but I have one question about your claims.

                  PRC, the working class is the one in charge!

                  can you explain to me how that can be true while the government is unelected and visibly does authoritarian stuff such as censorship, violent repression of various undesireables and supression of independent worker’s unions?

                  • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
                    link
                    fedilink
                    arrow-up
                    7
                    ·
                    6 days ago

                    First of all, the state is an extension of the class in power, it isn’t a class in and of itself. The class in power is the one in control of the large firms and key industries, in the PRC these are publicly owned. This can help make sense of the Chinese model of socialism.

                    With that in mind, the government is elected. It doesn’t have the same kind of competing party model of liberal democracy, but socialist democracy is focused on cohesion and cooperation. The government does censor speech, but that isn’t incompatible with working class power, the speech that is censored is largely capitalists trying to undermine the system (like Jack Ma). Further, independent worker unions in the context of socialism is dangerous, the government is already one run by the working class, so having a divided working class is more of a way for capitalists to drive a wedge between them and undermine the system.

                    I think if you read up more on SWCC things will make more sense.

              • davel@lemmy.ml
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                4
                ·
                5 days ago

                If you consider yourself Marxist Leninist, may read a little more Marx and a little less Lenin. What China does is NOT what Marx sees as communist, it doesn’t even hold up to his imagination of socialism.

                It does hold up to Marx’s imagination of a “lower phase” of socialism, heading in the direction of higher phases and then ultimately communism. This has been a continuous understand of the necessarily long process among Marxists, because we aren’t utopians imagining a fantastical overnight transformation: https://files.catbox.moe/6n2qll.avif

      • Diva (she/her)@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        19
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        6 days ago

        Your comment reminded me of this Rosa quote:

        “The German government‑socialists may shout that the rule of the Bolsheviks is a caricature of the dictatorship of the proletariat. If it was or is, then only for the reason that it is a product of the conduct of the German proletariat, conduct which was a caricature of socialist class struggle.”

        I live in the US, I don’t see the reason to demonize its enemies on the other side of the planet when my class enemies are right here running the US government and its associated political parties.

        • SomeLemmyUser@discuss.tchncs.de
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          13
          ·
          6 days ago

          I don’t see reason to demonize people at all not Americans not Chinese.

          We should be in solidarity with everyone from the working class, no matter his or her place of birth.

          Fighting for the working class always means fighting against oppressors.

          In the historical period we live in us is the worst of them, but that doesn’t make other ones good.

          Freedom of minorities, press, and assembly are under atack nearly everywhere, in the us in the EU, in China and in Russia - but those are tools the working class needs to build a better system.

          Bravo, you checked that the us government system has major flaws, may critically look at there enemies, for they are not even close to the ideals they pretend following.

          Demonizing doesn’t help, but idolizing also doesn’t.

          May try to fight for the people, not for the powerfull.

          There is no system existing on this planet at the moment which will do that for you. Simping for one or the other oppressor doesn’t cut it, even if some are better then others, you need to fight for the people, not the powerful.

          • Diva (she/her)@lemmy.ml
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            14
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            6 days ago

            The way to fight for the people isn’t by going along with 100% of US propaganda about its state enemies.

            Do you think that I should be taking a German fundamentalist ‘on a mission from god’ against china and communism as an authority on the oppression there when he doesn’t even speak the language and routinely fabricates evidence?

          • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            12
            arrow-down
            3
            ·
            6 days ago

            The working class of the PRC is the class in power! This is chauvanism, why on Earth do you get to say that the working class needs to overthrow the socialist system they support? This is a deeply western viewpoint you have, the Chinese working class already overthrew their oppressors last century.

              • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                10
                ·
                edit-2
                6 days ago

                What’s your point, exactly? Is this just an unrelated jab at the DPRK? Are you saying people can only support their governments if they are brainwashed? Brainwashing doesn’t even exist, it was a concept invented by the west to explain why citizens of socialist countries support their system, which they failed to replicate with MKUltra:

                The term “brainwashing” was first used in English by Edward Hunter in 1950 to describe how the Chinese government appeared to make people cooperate with them during the Korean War.

                In 1979, John D. Marks wrote in his book The Search for the Manchurian Candidate that until the MKUltra program was effectively terminated in 1963, the agency’s researchers had found no reliable way to brainwash another person, as all experiments at some stage always ended in either amnesia or catatonia, making any operational use impossible.

                Ultimately, polling in support of the PRC is extremely consistent, even when taken from western orgs.

                According to the most recent report (2024), people in China have overwhelmingly positive views of their political system. 92% of people say that democracy is important to them, 79% say that their country is democratic, 91% say that the government serves the interests of most people (rather than a small group), and 85% say all people have equal rights before the law. Furthermore, China outperforms the US and most European countries on these indicators – in fact, it has some of the strongest results in the world. The figure below compares China’s results to those from the US, France and Britain. These results may help explain the high levels of satisfaction with government reported by the Ash Center.

                You don’t appear to have any point supported by data, just failed Cold War conspiracy theories.

                • CybranM@feddit.nuBanned from community
                  link
                  fedilink
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  arrow-down
                  10
                  ·
                  6 days ago

                  Haha, where did you get brainwashing from? I would trust polling from the notorious big-brother state of China about as much as from Russia or NK, that is to say, not much at all.

                  • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
                    link
                    fedilink
                    arrow-up
                    8
                    arrow-down
                    1
                    ·
                    6 days ago

                    Because this is western polling in China, for one, and for two, the west is also made up of “big brother states.”