Candelestine @ Candelestine @lemmy.world

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2 yr. ago

Oh come now, the decisions of a country are made by its leaders, not every single member of its political party. Otherwise that would be true democracy, and unbelievably cumbersome and impractical. Also, I'll remind you a fifth time, my default in the modern day is suspicion. I simply don't believe people automatically. This is independent of the things they say and how good they sound. Like, when I'm buying a product, I do not simply believe the user reviews. Instead I try to look for someone providing a little bit of actual evidence of their objectivity. That would earn a higher degree of trust, though still not total faith.

I would describe it as an influence or informational or perhaps espionage empire. You can have a military empire, where people do as you say or you kill them, yes? You can have an economic empire, where you use economic coercion instead of military. Or, in the modern day, you can control through another form of power--control in the information space. While propaganda is certainly nothing new, it has reached a degree of power we've never seen before. Or so I'm arguing, anyway.

I disagree, I think that muddles what "a hegemon" is. An idea, not being a conscious thing, cannot be a hegemon. Only a human or group of humans can be. There's nothing wrong with ideas competing because ideas alone cannot control. What one person realizes, another can too. While the idea can be influential, it cannot truly exert force. So, you could have an information empire, but having a hegemonic information empire is probably impossible without some kind of supernatural mind control. In this new way of looking at imperialism that I'm proposing, anyway. I acknowledge this is new, and traditionally empire was mainly economic and/or military.

Do Chinese citizens have any more insight on the inner workings of their leaders than outside observers? Or are they forced to simply trust them? And yes, I do not think 100% of everything that comes out of our State Dept is automatically a lie. Some things are true, some are false. The default of suspicion applies regardless.

Imperialism is empire-building. That's the root word imperial, of-an-empire. It's authority exerted over other people, foreign lands. Genghis Khan and Alexander the Great both worked on imperial projects, back when it was more commonplace. Hegemony is somewhat similar, though implies the empire is uncontested by other powers. The Mongols had a hegemonic empire. Napoleon, while being imperial, did not have a hegemonic empire, as the British and Russian empires contested and eventually defeated him.

So, I don't understand this difference between steps/products of imperialism, and just imperialism. Either you're empire-building, seeking authority over more and more peoples, or you're not.

China's system is opaque. Without allowing independent observation, aka transparency, there is just no point. I'm simply not willing to give them any extra faith. For the third time, suspicion is default. Suspicion exists until evidence to the contrary is provided. This is just a basic safety principle in the modern age and is healthier than faith-based alternatives. I know you didn't say that, incidentally, I was getting out ahead of a potential criticism before it appeared, saving us the time of having to discuss it. I was not accusing you of saying it, was I?

I think it's a very useful definition of imperialism, actually. It captures the new, informational-based methods of attack that have become so common in just the past couple decades. Economic and military (the original) imperialism are simply other methods. I am well aware that some communist thought tries to equate imperialism with global capitalism, making them identical. This is actually less useful imo.

You don't think exerting authority over foreign people is functionally a form of imperialism, in basic principle?

Anyone that tries to subject others to their control is practicing imperialism, in the modern form anyway. It used to mean something else. It's certainly not just the US, though we've done our fair share.

You can usually determine whether someone is trolling or not with some discussion. Just because someone says lgbt does not give them carte blanche to say whatever they want. If you really want to detect trolls, you need to remember some of them pretend to be lgbt just to cause more chaos.

It's not "both sides-ing" to assert that no position should be immune to criticism. No matter how underdog they are. Being an oppressed underdog should not give someone license to just do whatever the fuck they want like you're some fictional char like Batman or something.

Not if my suspicion applies to imperialists as well. It's not trolling if it helps keep you safe in an online world.

It's just healthy suspicion man. If you expect me to just apply some kind of universal trust to a country of human beings on Earth, you are sorely mistaken. People are people. No country on Earth is some holy union of people above being concerned about, that somehow does no wrong. That's just some weird, misplaced faith.

Again, I'm not forming an opinion yet. I apologize that this does not align with your very clearly pro-Chinese opinion. It is not China-Bad, it is China-is-a-country-and-countries-act-in-their-own-interests. These ideas are not harmful, they simply question your faith I suppose. I'm not trolling, I am dead serious in my position.

... you seriously asking me to provide evidence of any Chinese military research facilities? You understand how silly that sounds? Where do you think their hypersonic missiles came from, gifts from some UFO or something? I suspect the technology was researched through the scientific method.

Transparency is generally the key to securing trust. Otherwise yes, suspicion should be a default position. I don't fully trust my government, I'm certainly not going to trust someone else's.

From something I read yesterday he apparently talked about the UK helping them with targeting and intelligence with personnel on the ground. If I remember right.

It's not exactly surprising news, so to elaborate, I think the criticism towards him has been exaggerated. Likely for political purposes.

In other words no, just the words of the governmental body. My goalpost there has been pretty consistent. I'm not tossing any accusations whatsoever, despite apparently offending you. Just pointing out that national security concerns can be alleviated, there is a viable, diplomatic path forward for that. Since I am not an expert on the subject matter, I simply do not know if that has been attempted in earnest or not. I'm just being cautious before simply giving completely blanket trust to a country, I'm withholding my judgement and not yet forming an opinion.

No, not anything. Studies on, oh, let's say emperor penguins would be difficult to militarize. Or, atmospheric studies using ice cores. But many things, yes. Hand-waving them away and tossing casual insults about it is silly regardless.

The article cited signals intelligence. I'm not with the NSA or anything, so I'm pretty much just going off the article.

Do we have invitees accounts of that, or just the word of a governmental body?

National security is a legitimate concern, hand-waving it away as just "bs" is not a very practical attitude.

Racism is often subtle, so my accusation is not one I can back with sound evidence. It's a personal, subjective opinion. Nobody was ever blatant and outright. Much like how bullying among kids is often done with a degree of culpable deniability, where you never cross the line far enough, but make your opinions known in other, less confirmable ways.

No, I do not think the institution supported their viewpoints. I doubt they would have been fired though. For one, tenure prevents that. For two, diversity of opinion, even distasteful opinion, is permitted if one does not cross lines. Thought is not what gets policed, only behavior. Subtle behavior with culpable deniability is protected at the practical level, by simply being too difficult to enforce.

I don't know if they are or are not inviting foreigners. However, I do know that inviting them and allowing them full access to the station would put national security concerns to rest.

I was talking about American antarctic stations, not all American research sites. Though I'm now curious what the reasoning was for the ISS kick.

Speaking generally, using those two as very clear examples of a broader principle pertaining to all education and how it potentially intersects with ideology.

A great deal of modern study has been done on racism though, and how accurate it really is. The idea that racist attitudes are grounded in reality that gets suppressed is a standard conservative talking point. A quick google scholar search should reveal an avalanche of work dating back well over half a century that disproves this, though, much like with global warming.

No, afaik I did not have any outright crackpot instructors, though I definitely had some with racist attitudes on occasion.

Where does this association that all things bad and colonialism must always be one-in-the-same? If it's not colonialism, it must not be bad. If it's not bad, it must not be colonialism.

Regardless, the solution to the problem is fairly simple. The American stations, at least, are somewhat multinational, people from all over can go there. Perhaps they could invite foreigners to do work as well?

Debate should not be stifled. Outright bullshit should be.

For instance, if someone wanted to argue that carbon dioxide does not contribute to global warming based on the current evidence, they should be reprimanded for being a crackpot, and cherry picking in support of their ideology.

If they wanted to conduct a study on whether or not carbon dioxide contributes to global warming, that would be fine. If they make any "accidental" mistakes in their study, however, they should not be upset when that gets revealed when others examine their work.

Or, take a lot of standard racist attitudes. If someone wants to make various racist arguments based on the pseudoscience of the German Nazi Party, they should be reprimanded for being a crackpot. If they wanted to replicate any serious studies of the matter (many of which were done in the ensuing decades), done with the appropriate strictness and rigor, or even devise their own, that would be fine. Again, however, if they try to twist the results to match their own ideological preferences, they should not be surprised if that gets revealed when others examine their work.

Lastly, the author of the article talking about "truth" makes my skin crawl. That's a faith word. Truths belong in holy books. Education should be based on evidence. "Truth" should absolutely be banned in colleges, because truth is fundamentally unknowable. Unless you think Jesus should be the foundation of schooling or something. All we humans get is steadily improving understanding, always changing, always pursuing the truth, but never being arrogant enough to think we have actually fully arrived.

While yes, what he said was probably pretty dumb, what kind of escalatory ladder can Putin climb? He's already threatening to nuke everyone every other week. Doubt this, which he probably already knew, is going to be what makes him do it.

That's uh ... basically a playbook for implementing Orwell's 1984. About 40 years late I guess?

I can't quite put my finger on it, but there's something about this photoshop that makes it utterly amazing. Might be the hat.

I really hope this doesn't start an actual cult. People don't need much in the way of an excuse, you know.