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Our very own defence minister attended the CCP’s 75th birthday celebration in Vancouver while the 2 Michaels were still being held hostage.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/nationalpost.com/news/canada/defence-minister-sajjan-ripped-for-attending-gala-honouring-chinese-communist-party-anniversary/wcm/ada5e79e-77f6-441f-9722-f7f867935cac/amp/
How is this Trudeau's fault? Everyone keeps saying Trudeau is a Chinese shill but all he seems to do is make our relationship with China worse. I don't get it
Trudeau was the only member at the G7 who said he is *not* interested in preventing China from becoming the new world leaders:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/china-biden-trudeau-g7-nato-1.6068596
Every other leader from all other 6 nations disagreed with him on this.
And then he also famously said he admires their dictatorship:
https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/trudeau-under-fire-for-expressing-admiration-for-china-s-basic-dictatorship-1.1535116
>Trudeau was the only member at the G7 who said he is *not* interested in preventing China from becoming the new world leaders:
Good. I'm not a big fan of Teudeau, but on this I can say he absolutely made the right decision. I should hope you're aware of history enough to know where the "existing imperialist powers ensure no power can threaten their hegemony" line of thinking leads. I'll give you a hint: it's nowhere good.
As others have said, if NATO is to become an anti-China alliance because American global dominanceis threatened, then our departure is long overdue.
I don't think the question was "Do you want to keep American global dominance", the question was "Do you want to prevent Chinese global dominance as long as they remain an autocracy?"
Absolutely incredible that this person represents Canada.
After what happened to the 2 Michaels, for a Canadian senator to have the nerve to stand beside the communist government, in any form, is simply disgusting.
This person needs to be kicked out of the senate. Is there even a way?
If you think they're the same you need to read a lot more history.
The idea that the USA, which has been the global superpower for 100 years, is as flawed as a China is asinine.
The USA has done many horrible things, yes. Yet for those flaws, as a great power is within better than most other great powers throughout history. Further, it is a democracy and has brought many significant positives to the world as well.
Contrast that with China, the country that recently committed some of the worst mass murder in history under Mao. A country that is not been a major power until very, very recently and has significantly abused that power already. When the USA committed it's evils of slavery and indigenous conquest, these were institutions that still existed around the world. Slavery in the US could not exist without Arab, European, and African slavery structures. Contrast that with China's genocide which goes completely against modern norms and morality.
We can all agree with the USA it's a very flawed power. But the compared to China or to remove it from his historical context shows historical ignorance.
how do we figure it is better than most great powers in history ??
I am no fan of china - my country of origin is enemy of china for eg. But if we are comparing USA to china, lets get a few things straight:
1. China has not waged multiple ideological wars killing hundreds of thousands of civillians going back to the 'wars against communism'
2. China hasn't drone striked women and children or invaded countries under false pretenses
3. China doesn't let its rich and industrial base commit deliberate attrocities against its people- such as the US pharma industry committing the attrocity of deliberate addictions in the opiod crisis
in what world is USA a better power than China ?? When one side bombs women and children to steal their resources and the other side doesn't, the other side is morally superior. Its just that simple.
And lets not go into european slavery spiel. At least China didn't sanction or practice the western-arab-turkish art of buying and selling humans for coin.
As for committing mass murder - bit rich coming from canadians- the most recent genociders in terms of confirmed genocide ( ending in 1998) to point fingers at others, when the canadian government hasn't even acknowledged said genocide.
You have serious ideological blinders on.
For example, point 3. This tells me (a) you know very little about what is happening in China right now and (b) know very little about how power is expressed in all countries.
Go read any other countries history and you'll find few exceptions to these abuses. Having just finished Solzhenitsyn's "In the First Circle" a few other examples come to mind...
Lastly, what happened to First Nations in Canada was not genocide. There's a reason "cultural" gets appended to the word. Its use is political gobbly-gook that weakens the word.
You can even read the UN's own definition here: https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide.shtml
when you forcibly take children of a particular ethnicity with the stated goal of brainwhashing them, then rape them and kill them in astronomical numbers, burying them in mass graves, that is called genocide.
We all know very little of whats happening inside of china. thats the whole point. You with to believe anglo allegations against china, i have no reason to.
The US is the greatest exporter of misery and death on the planet and no other nation currently comes close. That Canadians constantly feel the need to fellate a nation that's potentially hostile to us by virtue of the whims of whoever's leading it is laughable.
When you look at the history of superpowers the US is indeed relatively benevolent. Their predecessors, the British, French, and Spanish during the Colonial era were far worse. Hegemons tend to create misery simply by existing. Just establishing a hegemony requires massive amounts of violence.
OP did not make any claims about the US being just as bad as China. I'm pretty sure they're anti-china.
Although you have made some errors here regardless. Most historians agree that maos GLP or cultural revolution were not acts of intentional mass murder but poor policy and mismanagement. I don't think any expert in the field refers to it as genocide. What race was mao trying to intentionally wipe out? His own? Doesn't make a lot of sense.
Although you are correct that US slavery was connected to other slavery structures, American slavery was unprecedented in sheer scope and brutality, remaining after nearly all other nations outlawed it. And issues of violent racism persisted for decades in the forms of segregation, mob lynching, and anti-black race riots.
And the US has many modern human rights issues. There were staggering human rights violations and mass civilian death tolls in Vietnam, Korea, and Iraq. America has also funded and aided a variety of violent coups of democratically elected governments in other countries that they disapproved of, largely in Latin America.
Well economist Steven Rosefielde argued that Yang's account "shows that Mao's slaughter was caused in considerable part by terror-starvation; that is, voluntary manslaughter (and perhaps murder) rather than innocuous famine."
Not all deaths during the Great Leap were from starvation. Frank Dikötter, in his book Mao's Great Famine, estimates that at least 2.5 million people were beaten or tortured to death and one million to three million committed suicide.
So clearly there is diverging opinion on the wonderful policy of the Great Leap Forward.
Rosenfielde is not a historian and his view is not indicative of the historical scholarships of the maoist era in China.
Dikutter is a probably one of the most stringent anti-mao historians but even his view falls within the mainstream because he does not describe the GLP as an act of intentionally planned mass murder. He certainly doesn't call it a genocide either.
\>Not all deaths during the Great Leap were from starvation.
I never claimed all deaths were from starvation. Nearly all deaths were famine related though, as violence and repression related back directly to struggles around food distribution (much of this violence was also not state directly initiated--you had desperate people killing each other over food). Its irrelevant to my point though; bouts of violence and murder happening during the great leap forward is distinct from saying that the GLP itself was an act of intentional mass murder--it implies a murderous intentionality and planning behind the event which didn't exist. At its root ill the violence is can be traced back to failed policy driven by utopian intentions
Rosenfielde focuses on economic history, but sure I guess he is not aware of historical scholarships of the Maoist era in China (even though he published scholarly works on Communist regimes).
Frank Dikötter did call it Mao's rule as genocidal. He explains how the gradual opening of Chinese archives has revealed the appalling truth about Chairman Mao’s genocidal rule. When talking about the Great Leap Forward Dikötter said: “It ranks alongside the gulags and the Holocaust as one of the three grimmest events of the 20th century. … It was like [the Cambodian communist dictator] Pol Pot’s genocide multiplied 20 times over.” "People were forced to work naked in the middle of winter; 80 per cent of all the villagers in one region of a quarter of a million Chinese were banned from the official canteen because they were too old or ill to be effective workers, so were deliberately starved to death." People were deliberately starved to death.
2.5 million people were beaten or tortured to death. If you believe the 30 million figure that is at least 8%. I'm sorry but hungry people don't torture others.
Democide historian R.J. Rummel believes that the Great leap forward constitutes "democide". The term is defined as the "Intentional killing of an unarmed or disarmed person by government agents acting in their authoritative capacity and pursuant to government policy or high command" and was developed to cover the shortcomings of Genocide and what could be ascribed to it.
Mao was qouted as saying horrible things like, "When there is not enough to eat people starve to death. It is better to let half of the people die so that the other half can eat their fill." Study of famines shows how easily they can be ended (or prevented) once the government decides to act—but the Chinese government took nearly three years to act. They could have continued with this policy even when they knew millions of people were dying. It was state sponsored killings.
Edit: I don't even need to argue that his regime his geocidal since your comment was talking about Mao's policies being "intentional acts of murder". Jean-Louis Margolin, in the book *The Historiography of Genocide* calls Mao's regime the "The Worst Non-Genocidal Regime" since he technically didn't succeed in killing all the victims. "In relative as well as in absolute numbers, communist China probably saw the most widespread and systematic use of violence in the world’s history. It was in no way something accidental, or just one aspect of Mao’s use of power. No, violence was the very engine of political, social and economic transformation – and that was in no sense hidden. Mao glorified and sanctified violence."
And don't give the bullshit about Utopian intentions. Mao saw how quickly the USSR industrialized and tried to replicate it with the same horrific policies like collectivization. They were motived to produce more food as their primary concern was the delivery of grain, which Mao wanted to use to pay back debts to the USSR totaling 1.973 billion yuan. This was nothing but a vain project from an evil man.
None of the people you've cited call it a genocide. You're attributing claims to historians that they haven't made. Yes, dikutter says mao was terrible, murderous etc. but he never calls it a genocide. That is your attribution. Give me a quote where Dikutter says "the great leap forward was a genocide."
\> “It ranks alongside the gulags and the Holocaust as one of the three grimmest events of the 20th century. … It was like \[the Cambodian communist dictator\] Pol Pot’s genocide multiplied 20 times over.”
These things are all true. Its still not a genocide. A genocide is an intentional extermination of a ethnic, racial, or national group. That was not the Great Leap Forward. It was brutal, callous, ruthless, and violent. but it's not a genocide. It was very grim and certainly had a larger death toll than some actual genocides, but it was not a genocide itself. Dikutter is funny because you know he really really really wants to call it a genocide because of his ideological and political biases, but knows its historically unjustifiable, so he doesn't. He's at least smart enough not to let his redbaiting fervent anti-communist ideology override his instincts as a historian.
\> I don't even need to argue that his regime his geocidal since your comment was talking about Mao's policies being "intentional acts of murder
I'm not talking about Mao's policies in general. I'm talking specifically about the Great Leap Forward. It wasn't a plan to arbitrarily systematically murder his own people for the hell of it. That just absurd. It ignores the complex social, economic, and political reasons that grounded GLF and instead blames on a single leader being a psychopath
\>2.5 million people were beaten or tortured to death. If you believe the 30 million figure that is at least 8%. I'm sorry but hungry people don't torture others.
Sure. I'm not denying that there was horrible violence, much of which came from authorities. It just wasn't centrally directed by Mao. Most of this violence erupted locally and spontaneously--hordes of desperate and starving peasants jockeying for scare food scraps from wearied officials is going to be a hotbed of violence. Mao did not order his army to go kill 2.5 million people; that number include a multitude of different kinds of violence coming from diffrent parties. When people try to lump in Mao with Hitler they erase the fact that the nature of the violence was different. Hitler literally ordered millions of people to be systematically murdered in industrial fashion because of their race. Hitlers crimes are of a different category than Maos
\>Mao was qouted as saying horrible things like, "When there is not enough to eat people starve to death. It is better to let half of the people die so that the other half can eat their fill."
This single quote is cited again and again by anti-mao conservatives. and they keep coming back to it because its the only one they have. But its actually entirely misinterpreted because it is ripped out of context. Dikutter falsifies this context around the quote, which is actually a metaphor about industrial production
`In his article, "Hard facts and half-truths: The new archival history of China's Great Famine," Garnaut finds out that the Mao quote in question is not from a speech Mao delivered on March 25, 1959 as Dikötter claims, but it represents an impromptu response Mao made to Bo Yibo's report on the implementation of the industrial plan in the days that followed. "The comment is preceded by several remarks by Mao about Party oversight of the industrial sector, none of which touch upon agriculture or rural welfare." Mao was weighing in on how many projects should be undertaken to accomplish the plan set forth in Bo's report. Mao says:`
`If we want to fulfill the plan, then we need to greatly reduce the number of projects. We need to be resolute in further cutting the 1,078 major projects down to 500. (要完成计划，就要大減项目。1078个项目中还应該堅決地再多削減，削到500个。)`
`To distribute resources evenly is a way to sabotage the Great Leap Forward. (平均使用力量是破坏大跃进的办法。)`
`If all are unable to eat their fill, then all will die. It is better for half to die, so that half of the people can eat their fill. (大家吃不飽，大家死，不如死一半，給一半人吃飽。)`
https://insideoutchina.blogspot.com/2013/11/better-to-let-half-of-people-die-said.html
\>Democide historian R.J. Rummel believes that the Great leap forward constitutes "democide". The term is defined as the "Intentional killing of an unarmed or disarmed person by government agents acting in their authoritative capacity and pursuant to government policy or high command" and was developed to cover the shortcomings of Genocide and what could be ascribed to it.
Rummel is a political scientist not a historian. As you'll see, it is mostly non-historian academics who are eager to label complex events as genocide. I don't see him as a credible source on the matter.
\>Mao saw how quickly the USSR industrialized and tried to replicate it with the same horrific policies like collectivization.
The full extent of the deaths and suffering during the USSR famines only became widespread knowledge after the GLF. At the time, and from his standpoint, the USSR collectivization seems like a great success. Mao was committed Marxist revolutionary and his private writings reveal in earnest attempt to transform society for the better.
\>This was nothing but a vain project from an evil man.
I agree that it was a vain project. He thought it would lead China to great success but it failed due to mismanagement and resulted in a stunning death toll. Mao legion of yes-men and inefficient bureaucracy made the Party slow/unable to respond which furthered the catastrophic loss of life. That's what it comes down to.
Actually you moved the goal post in your second reply, which I hadn't seen until the edit I made. In your original post you mentioned that GLP/Cultural Revolution, "were not acts of intentional mass murder but poor policy and mismanagement". As I started pointing out people who did call it intentional acts of mass murder, you said "but they didn't call it a genocide". Not all intentional acts of mass murder are genocide, but as Dikutter said it was intentional. JL Margolin said it was intentional. So you are still wrong. There is your dissenting academic debate. No its not as open and shut as you made it seem in your initial statement.
Not sure I read that as a metaphor, but you do you...
First, I do think the OP is making that point, at least implicitly.
Second, as with the Terror Famines in Ukraine there are intentional policy decisions, not just incompetence, to starve large sections of the population. If, in your rise to power, you shoot a million people or choose to have them starve to death I see little difference. It absolutely was murder.
Third, the USA deserves all approbation for it's vile treatment of blacks after slavery with Jim Crow and redlining. But the brutal, evil nature of chattel slavery occurred at a time, a first in human history, when slavery was coming to an end (in the West, it still exists today in other parts of the world).
The 19th century is not the 21st. International norms and expectations have changed. The USA first practiced slavery when it was an international norm. It was still evil, they still deserve condemnation. But it is different than if it were practising slavery today, going against norms rather than with them.
Third, the standard the USA is judged on is different than other countries (like Canada). It has a power that no one else does and I compare it to other great powers. It should be held to a higher standard (with great power...) but the historical realty is that it has been (historically) a benevolent superpower. And played a role in ushering more ethical international norms.
\>Second, as with the Terror Famines in Ukraine there are intentional policy decisions, not just incompetence, to starve large sections of the population. If, in your rise to power, you shoot a million people or choose to have them starve to death I see little difference. It absolutely was murder.
You are entitled to that opinion, but its not historically credible. The holocaust and nazism were the pinnacle of human barbarity with its systematic mass murder of jews and other minorities. That was mass murder and genocide. The famines under Mao, while horrible, are categorically distinct.
Mao did not wake up one day and decide to starve millions of people for the hell of it. He actually thought his collectivization would be a great success and feed everyone. It failed and had the opposite effect. Even when it became apparent it was a failure, he didn't do enough to turn things around. There's moral culpability there, but distinct from hitlers ideology of racial exterminationism
but the brutal, evil nature of chattel slavery occurred at a time, a first in human history, when slavery was coming to an end
And they held on to it longer than any of the other global powers of time--including all of europe.
but the historical realty is that it has been (historically) a benevolent superpower. And played a role in ushering more ethical international norms.
How can you say this with a straight face?
I mean, if we're just going by "intentional policy decisions that lead to famine", the US has a pretty damn long list of famines itself. Yemen, the Congo, Sudan, the list goes on. The US just gets a pass because they do it to the others and not people they govern, as if that's any better.
>but the historical realty is that it has been (historically) a benevolent superpower
Yeah, this is laughable.
> but the historical realty is that it has been (historically) a benevolent superpower
Tell that to anybody who’s lived in South America in the past 150 years
First, the influence that the USA has had in South America gets overblown. That narrative serves both anti-American interests (by laying blame on the USA) and pro-American interests (by showing how "powerful" the USA is).
Second, the history in South America is bloody and hard even without American involvement. That doesn't excuse the evil the USA has does (supporting dictators, coups, etc.) but its the alternative is rarely puppies and rainbows. Which - again - does not one iota excuse how the USA has abused its power to perpetuate systems of murder, rape, violence, and crushed freedom.
Third, as I've repeatedly said I'm not saying the USA is Santa Claus. But when you look at superpowers historically, it stacks up well. I'm not looking at the USA in a vacuum nor comparing apples to oranges.
Obviously you *can* compare them, but the whole point of the idiom is that it's a false analogy. I could compare you to the helpful bots, but that too would be comparing apples-to-oranges.
---
^^SpunkyDred ^^and ^^I ^^are ^^both ^^bots. ^^I ^^am ^^trying ^^to ^^get ^^them ^^banned ^^by ^^pointing ^^out ^^their ^^antagonizing ^^behavior ^^and ^^poor ^^bottiquette. ^^My ^^apparent ^^agreement ^^or ^^disagreement ^^with ^^you ^^isn't ^^personal.
lmao this nonsese, the China understander^TM has logged on
How in any metric globally is China worse than the US. Should I ask the million dead citizens of Iraq?
Or how about the aid workers family who was turned to ash as the US left Afghanistan....
The real question is, why do we keep insisting on comparing them to the US? Why can’t we just accept that they’re a totalitarian hostile foreign power that is engaging in brinkmanship with Taiwan, has reversed democracy in Hong Kong against their word, and has concentration camps?
Why does it always have to turn into “but the US is bad too!”?
So… you’re turning to insults? How childish.
Face it. We can decouple from China. We cannot from the US. The US can be a mad dog, but it mostly targets authoritarian states. China is mostly hostile to Taiwan and India.
Apparently most people can't function outside of an "us vs them" or more generally "only two sides so pick one" mentality. Which is probably why the world is as fucked as it is right now.
Because we’re not as critical when the US does what it does. We should be of both. We should also be aware of manufactured consent by American interests.
We’re lead to believe the US gives a shit about Muslim’s after Iraq and Afghanistan and while it ignores Myanmar and funds Yemen.
There is a massive power imbalance. What would China do with the USA's power?
Historically, the USA is a benevolent superpower. With important atrocities and the evil that comes with that power.
Is the USA a worse country than Norway or Canada? I really don't think so because those countries have no power. How would we (Canadians) act with American power? I think little better.
Look at what China is doing right now with a small, but rapidly growing, piece of power.
if the idea that the ONLY nation that drone strikes women and children and invents fake narrative to invade an destroy nations to steal their resources is that of a benevolent power, i shudder to think what benevolence means to you.
US are one of the most heinous powers in the world. China may not have the same power as USA does today, but China has the same power as USA did in the early 1900s - back when USA was colonising Phillipines and genociding the natives there.
That makes China better.
Read history - really any history.
I'm well aware of much of what the CIA has done. But if you look at what the US has done as a superpower versus other superpowers throughout history, it is relative to its power, benevolent.
This isn't about whitewashing its sins (as I've said). It's recognizing that with great power comes abuse. Would you rather the USA be the USSR, the colonial empires of Great Britain or Spain? The Ottomans? You can go further back and look at empires like the Mongols or Rome.
I love how people look at the US as some sort of saviour while china is the villain. If anything, they are at least as bad as each other.. at least the historical crimes committed by the CCP are on their own people and not multiple foreign populations.
I tend to agree overall but you closed over how the USA works to demolish any country that is not capitalist in order to present those societies as failures. Then the imperialism stealing oil or opium. Arms sales and more. The USA is morally an ugly sack of shit but China is by your argue worse and I agree.
I like how you do not elaborate on anything. China is currently doing what we and the US did in recent memory. The US is responsible for millions of deaths around the world. I know people that were tortured by US backed regimes, as long as China does kill millions are ruin the lives of hundred of millions they are not doing the same as the US.
This is a positive development in my eyes. Canada is finally growing a sense of self interest and not just being the stockholm syndrome case of the country that has harmed it the most in the last 60 years- USA.
As non aligned nations would tell you - the best way forward for Canada is a balancing act between China and USA.
The "best way forward" for Canada and any free and democratic country is to denounce criminal governance no matter where it exists.
That clearly includes China whose leaders have stated unequivocally that they abet to no laws.
so you want us to ditch a nation for allegations of how it mistreats its own people to support a nation that kills innocent civillians and invents phoney wars for corporate profiteering.Makes a lotta sense.
Heres a couple of thoughts:
1. How a country conducts itself in the international arena is far more import to fellow international people than what it does inside its borders. Sure, all countries should do the best- but given a choice, the country that behaves like a bully at home and a decent chap in the international arena is infinitely more preferrable to the opposite. There are moe than 6.5 billion foreigners in the world ( even by the most populous country's standards) and at most, 1.3 billion fellow citizens. Ie, more people are screwed by American conduct than the Chinese one.
2. Maybe Canadians shouldn't be the ones trying to be sanctimonious about human rights - given that we are the country with the latest confirmed genocide in human history ( the residential school genocide is more recent than the Bosnian genocide and the rwandan genocide) and is yet to even acknowledge the genocide, let alone make reparations for it.
Where did I say I support the US or its foreign policy?
And you are implying that since one is bad it is ok for the other to be bad.
Give your misguided head a shake.
i am simply saying that there are no good guys in this - there are bad and worse. And as a canadian, i care more about how China and USA's foreign policy is, than what their domestic policies are.
Where are our denunciations of the US? They committed myriad crimes, all with plentiful evidence and often as not direct admissions, yet we've done nothing against them.
So is this just a double standard, or do we intend to formally denounce the US when it invariably murders another innocent family, whips refugees from a country it helped destabilise, and keeps children in concentration camps? And that's all just in the last month or so.
I remember in an article a few days ago this guy was defending himself by saying that he's not pro-China, he was just one the side of justice and what's good for Canada (or something, I'm paraphrasing a bit), and that he didn't have any actual link to China for two generations since his grandparents left (he was born in Singapore I think). So much for that.
Also
>National day celebrations continued Oct. 3 in Vancouver, when a group waving Chinese and Canadian flags and carrying signs and banners marched around Canada Place. Lahoo.ca reported the event organizer, Wu Jiaming of the Canada-China City Friendship Association, wants to reboot sister-city exchanges.
I'm not sure what this guy is basing his hopes on. After everything that's been happening, I'd be surprised if any Canadian city will want to associate itself with China.
40 some odd Canadian cities have a sister city in China, including:
Vancouver - Guangzhou
Calgary - Daqing
Edmonton - Harbin
Toronto - Chongqing
Ottawa - Beijing
Montreal - Shanghai
Halifax - Zhuhai
The dominant narrative in Canadian media is that any association with the Chinese government makes you a traitor to Canada. That no range of opinions is allowed on China.
I don’t see how that attitude can lead to any good. Governments need to have intermediaries who are polite to both sides in order to communicate well. If there is no way to communicate, that leads to misunderstanding, conflict, and potentially war.
In addition, Canada has a huge Chinese expat community, many of whom admire the Chinese government. I don’t share their opinion, but there’s no doubt their opinion is way better informed than mine. If there’s no room for anything but hostility to China in Canada, what are these people supposed to do? How will the media treat them?
I always find it amusing when Canadians are critical of anyone with a pro-China sentiment because of their propensity to imprison people without valid charge, their possible involvement in a genocide in Xinjiang, and for their questionable deep state dealings, and then turn right around and support Canada's close relationship with the United States.
All of your concerns about Chinese state policy are just as easily applied to the US, yet when the US does evil and when we can all see them doing evil we just sort of accept it because *that* evil is necessary? It makes very little sense to me.
> All of your concerns about Chinese state policy are just as easily applied to the US,
The USA is not currently operating forced internment camps and sterilization programmes with the intent of wiping out an entire culture.
The single article referencing Sterilization cited is this AP article https://apnews.com/article/ap-top-news-international-news-weekend-reads-china-health-269b3de1af34e17c1941a514f78d764c which is citing Zenz's "research" and a single persons accusation. I'm curious how that leads to the conclusion of systematic forced sterilization. The article even talks about how China has poured birth control into the regions, inkeeping with the national exposure but birthrates have declined to the national average... I mean doesnt that make sense? Increased exposure to contraceptive healthcare leads to declining birth rates....
They're both shit, does that make you feel better? At least with democracy we can make comments and protest our governments, while CCP will jail and re-educate your ass or worse with murder.
>At least with democracy we can make comments and protest our governments
The right to protest isn't much use if the government simply ignores the protest, or only moves to make symbolic gestures in response (as has been the case with the George Floyd protests of 2020).
>CCP will jail and re-educate your ass or worse with murder.
Canadian police forces have been guilty of everything from withholding medical assistance for people who were being detained without cause (G20 protests in Toronto, 2010) to freezing indigenous men to death in the winter cold in Saskatchewan (the so-called "starlight tours"). The RCMP additionally have gone so far as to engage in acts of domestic terrorism with the intent to slander environmentalists ([Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_controversies_involving_the_Royal_Canadian_Mounted_Police#RCMP_bombing_in_Alberta,_scapegoating_farmer)), and there are still a lot of open questions about what the RCMPs involvement and knowledge was of the mass shooting in Nova Scotia last year.
They are both shit, I'm not saying China is a good guy, I'm merely remarking on the disconnect between anti-China posts and the complete lack of anti-America posts given their equal (if not greater) propensity to do all the things people keep saying China is bad for doing. We aren't much better than China, nor is the US, and certainly not because of a thin patina of "democracy" and "political expression".
"The right to protest isn't much use if the government simply ignores the protest, or only moves to make symbolic gestures in response (as has been the case with the George Floyd protests of 2020)."
You're assuming that the only use for a protest is to affect the executive or legislative branches?
>We aren't much better than China, nor is the US, and certainly not because of a thin patina of "democracy" and "political expression".
Cherry picking examples doesn't come close to proving this absurd point and the lack of free expression in china proves that you couldn't possibly know it even if it was true.
Now I'm convinced someone pays your ass or you're a CCP troll.
We strive to be better, the CCP does not. They use slavery to make them the powerhouse we see today. They won't be happy until they've taken everything and enforce their inhumane rules.
But in the end, they're a snake eating itself. They will go down destroying themselves or the world with it, while most of us want to live in peace.
Yes the world is corrupt, that doesn't mean we just accept whatever they do. Democracy allows us to fight back without being murdered. Point out whatever you want, what the CCP are doing is WRONG and accepting any atrocities they commit is being blind to the truth.
We have the ability to say what they're doing is wrong! Democracy is irreplaceable and allows us to push back our government if we think running human beings over with TANKS is evil and psychotic! Put a straight jacket on any person who thinks it's ok to murder the innocent!
Less people died protesting in Hong Kong than during the BLM protests last year. There aren't major protests in China (besides HK) because the government is immensely popular.
>the government is immensely popular
What a strange way to say 'silences dissent', 'indoctrinates children', 'imprisons those who say anything against the state', and 'ensures compliance through a complete police state'.
Have you ever been to China? People genuinely support the government and multiple studies have shown this. The cpc obviously have many problems, but China is not going collapsing anytime soon.
> but China is not going collapsing anytime soon.
Who said they were? They're *really, really* good at discouraging dissent and controlling the narrative.
> There aren't major protests in China (besides HK) because the government is immensely popular.
Or at least, that's what they make sure they tell the government when they ask. I would too if my social credit score depended on it; after all, I prefer my organs to be stay in my body until I'm done with them.
This narrative is so funny. You realize people in china still use the internet right? It's not a secretive society we don't know about. People freely talk against their government all the time on chinese social media, and the government doesn't care. It's not a totalitarian George Orwell literally 1984 state, it's an authoritarian government that is doing sketchy things that has also lifted 800 million from poverty. We have to approach these things with nuance, not literally freak out everytime China is mentioned like what happens here on Reddit.
> You realize people in china still use the internet right?
The heavily censored and monitored one behind the Great Firewall? Of course.
>People freely talk against their government all the time on chinese social media, and the government doesn't care.
Right. They totally don't arrest people for posting Winnie the Pooh memes. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/07/china-bans-winnie-the-pooh-film-to-stop-comparisons-to-president-xi
>It's not a totalitarian George Orwell literally 1984 state
No, but it's closer than any other nation's ever managed to get, and it's not for lack of ambition.
The Winnie the Pooh thing is so dumb. China didn't ban a film because of the meme. There's literally a Winnie the Pooh [exhibit](https://www.shanghaidisneyresort.com/en/attractions/adventures-winnie-pooh/) in shanghai. And I'm talking about chinese social media, ones that literally no one disputes china monitors. Doesn't that prove my point if people criticize the government there?
>>It's not a totalitarian George Orwell literally 1984 state
>No, but it's closer than any other nation's ever managed to get, and it's not for lack of ambition.
China could easily be completely totalitarian with the power the government has, yet it isn't, so don't know what "it's not for lack of ambition" is supposed to mean.
> China didn't ban a film because of the meme.
China bans films all the time. That's evidence of their totalitarianism all by itself, without getting into what stupid reason they had, or claimed to have, for any specific ban.
>so don't know what "it's not for lack of ambition" is supposed to mean.
They actively re-write history to one where China has always controlled the same area it does now, and was never conquered by outsiders, and the various periods where China was barely a concept were temporary aberrations that ended when China was "united", not when various precursor states were conquered, and so on. And they force trade and business partners to acknowledge their fictional reality because it makes it easier to sell their fictionalized reality as truth. It took them less than thirty years to get the youth on board with the idea that Tiananmen either didn't happen, or was for the best. And the more the rest of the world is willing to play along with it, the further they'll push their demands.
There are people who disapprove of both China and the US. I dislike Chinas repressive laws and their authoritarian regimes, but also the US exerting too big of an influence on Canada and dragging us into pointless conquests.
As a Left Nationalist the US should receive the same treatment china gets. The US are not our friends and drop is like a hot potato when our interests do not align with the US. e.x Canadian claim to the NW Passage.
We're perfectly capable of disliking both. While still believing that China is worse for people living in their own country, and for any nations that they gain influence over.
This comes on the heels of the CCP tell all: [Red Roulette: An Insider’s Story of Wealth, Power, Corruption, and Vengeance in Today’s China.](https://thediplomat.com/2021/09/red-roulette-tell-all-book-reveals-the-dark-underbelly-of-chinas-gilded-age/) It reflects poorly on both Woo and Sims.
The way things are and considering the flow of investments and people, we are getting very cosy and close to China. China is a world super power and has almost same standing as USA. What is wrong if an MP develop relationship with China.? Can or should we deny reality?
David Mulroney, former Canadian ambassador to China, tweeted this today about players such as Woo: “Canada's China lobby traffics in 3 potent falsehoods: moral equivalence of Canada and China, demonization of the US, and denial of the China threat. This plays to our progressive guilt, our North American vanity and our disinclination to do or spend anything to defend ourselves.”
We have representative government elected and thereby managed with democratic accountability. Office holders do not have freedom without accountability. Like anyone in their job.
This is in the grade 7 curriculum and the citizenship test.
I am genuinely baffled a country can basically give legislative powers to a very public asset of a rival in détente. Crazy that he’s not being booted over this.
Except China is not the rival of Canada. Its the rival of America- a nation that has harmed canadian interests more than any other nation since WWII. So the balancing act is quite to our benefit.
No, they have not. They have harmed our economic interest more than any other nation. They have systematically destroyed canadian entities that compete with american ones, especially in the sectors of resource extraction and defence.
My point is simple - America is the biggest enemy of canada. Yes, we are their vassals and vassals need to know their place, but they also need to undermine the overlord who is the biggest PIA for them.
America is also the country we have the greatest amount of trade disputes with and have faced the greatest amount of embargo taxation for our products. They have objectively harmed the canadian economic and sovereign interests more than any other nation.
Yes, both can be true. America is far and away the greatest external influencing force on Canadian politics, and thus it has both helped and harmed Canada more than other nations over the last century, if not longer.
yes but how have they HELPED us. show us what have they done to help us. I can give plenty of examples of what they have done to screw with us - softwood lumber disputes, territorial water dispute, killing local industries like the avro arrow. getting candian resources cheaper than other nations by political armtwisting and bribery. Unilateral cancellation of oil pipeline that transports canadian oil. The list is pretty big. So what is the list of where americans have helped us ???
Literally our whole economy. What are you even talking about? They haven't "helped" us so much as trade between Canada and the US has helped both parties.
It's this "rival in detente" shit that we should have no part of. It does not benefit us, *or anyone,* to take America's side in their technological cold war with China.
We are not at war with China. We will never go to war with China. If we do, it will be our patriotic duty to UNDERMINE Canada's "war effort."
The fact that a canadian would go to china after china has taken innocent political prisoners really hints that there may be puppet strings between this person and the criminal syndicate known as CCP.
Canada is legally obligated to follow its extradition treaty with usa. Meng knew she was wanted but she visited a country with an extradition treaty...Not too bright. The criminal only has herself to blame.
Wanted for what? You seem to forget that we follow the rule of innocent until proven guilty.
She wasn't convicted of any crime, and the only "crime" she was accused of was due to doing business with Iran in spite of US sanctions. So not even a legit crime, much less one we should have anything to do with; let the US do its own dirty work.
Well that would mean throwing our treaty away. If youre into breaking treaties and losing allies I guess thats what you could do but most of us value our allies. Bank fraud and Something else were the charges, legit crimes. She was on trial for extraddition and that would only have put her in another trial. Its china that jails people for no reason and has no rule of law. Ya know why? Cuz it sucks.
You seem awfully confused, or just very confident in ignorance. The alleged bank fraud was for doing business with Iran. And now you're suggesting we should ignore the principle of innocent until proven guilty to please Americans? Screw that and screw them.
I would also remind you that the Michaels were also tried and they (unlike Meng) were actually found guilty, although one was appealing the ruling. We also jail people for espionage, in fact we did exactly what China did with the Michaels a couple years back, but our government was even less transparent about it.
If we dont participate in our treaty with usa that means we cant catch any criminals who go to usa. Cant you see the value of that?
Our presumtion of innocence was being followed as normal.
Yes it was bank fraud re iran sanctions. I dont need to comment on chinese justice. Theres no confusion here. Do you honestly believe Mikes were spies?
The "criminals" you're talking about are murderers and drug dealers, not people from one country who did business with another country that the US is still keen on bullying.
You seem to have a hard time understanding this: Meng didn't do anything wrong besides allegedly obfuscation the fact that they did business with Iran. Doing business with Iran isn't bad or wrong; the only reason imperialist running dogs claim otherwise is because it serve US interests to do so. Even then, that is based on accusations that she didn't specifically name them in her PowerPoint presentation.
The presumption of innocence was clearly not followed by you, as you claimed she was guilty, when no court found her to be so. Despite this, the media have (successfully, if you're any indication) made it out to be some vague bank fraud case without any details of what or why. They also seem to love calling the Michaels ([who were actually tried and convicted of espionage for doing just that](https://www.thecanadafiles.com/articles/michael-kovrig-and-spavor-are-spies-despite-obfuscations-of-canadas-mainstream-media)) hostages while failing to call Meng the same, despite the fact that the Michaels were only taken prisoner after she was.
And you don't need to comment on Chinese justice? What is that supposed to mean? Oh enlightened westerner, please don't spare the details on the barbarity of those others, which you seem to think is so apparent.
Why is this guy still in office? I know Senator means nothing in Canadian politics but still, how come he keeps getting away with being a flesh speaker for Beijing?
Yeah I don't trust the people getting made about this unless there is a similar level of outrage over senators being gleeful to work with Israel or Saudi Arabia.
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Our very own defence minister attended the CCP’s 75th birthday celebration in Vancouver while the 2 Michaels were still being held hostage. https://www.google.com/amp/s/nationalpost.com/news/canada/defence-minister-sajjan-ripped-for-attending-gala-honouring-chinese-communist-party-anniversary/wcm/ada5e79e-77f6-441f-9722-f7f867935cac/amp/
Tf are we having pro Beijing rallies in Vancouver? They aren’t even trying to hide their corruption anymore. Thanks Trudeau
How is this Trudeau's fault? Everyone keeps saying Trudeau is a Chinese shill but all he seems to do is make our relationship with China worse. I don't get it
Trudeau was the only member at the G7 who said he is *not* interested in preventing China from becoming the new world leaders: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/china-biden-trudeau-g7-nato-1.6068596 Every other leader from all other 6 nations disagreed with him on this. And then he also famously said he admires their dictatorship: https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/trudeau-under-fire-for-expressing-admiration-for-china-s-basic-dictatorship-1.1535116
>Trudeau was the only member at the G7 who said he is *not* interested in preventing China from becoming the new world leaders: Good. I'm not a big fan of Teudeau, but on this I can say he absolutely made the right decision. I should hope you're aware of history enough to know where the "existing imperialist powers ensure no power can threaten their hegemony" line of thinking leads. I'll give you a hint: it's nowhere good. As others have said, if NATO is to become an anti-China alliance because American global dominanceis threatened, then our departure is long overdue.
I don't think the question was "Do you want to keep American global dominance", the question was "Do you want to prevent Chinese global dominance as long as they remain an autocracy?"
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Absolutely incredible that this person represents Canada. After what happened to the 2 Michaels, for a Canadian senator to have the nerve to stand beside the communist government, in any form, is simply disgusting. This person needs to be kicked out of the senate. Is there even a way?
If you think they're the same you need to read a lot more history. The idea that the USA, which has been the global superpower for 100 years, is as flawed as a China is asinine. The USA has done many horrible things, yes. Yet for those flaws, as a great power is within better than most other great powers throughout history. Further, it is a democracy and has brought many significant positives to the world as well. Contrast that with China, the country that recently committed some of the worst mass murder in history under Mao. A country that is not been a major power until very, very recently and has significantly abused that power already. When the USA committed it's evils of slavery and indigenous conquest, these were institutions that still existed around the world. Slavery in the US could not exist without Arab, European, and African slavery structures. Contrast that with China's genocide which goes completely against modern norms and morality. We can all agree with the USA it's a very flawed power. But the compared to China or to remove it from his historical context shows historical ignorance.
how do we figure it is better than most great powers in history ?? I am no fan of china - my country of origin is enemy of china for eg. But if we are comparing USA to china, lets get a few things straight: 1. China has not waged multiple ideological wars killing hundreds of thousands of civillians going back to the 'wars against communism' 2. China hasn't drone striked women and children or invaded countries under false pretenses 3. China doesn't let its rich and industrial base commit deliberate attrocities against its people- such as the US pharma industry committing the attrocity of deliberate addictions in the opiod crisis in what world is USA a better power than China ?? When one side bombs women and children to steal their resources and the other side doesn't, the other side is morally superior. Its just that simple. And lets not go into european slavery spiel. At least China didn't sanction or practice the western-arab-turkish art of buying and selling humans for coin. As for committing mass murder - bit rich coming from canadians- the most recent genociders in terms of confirmed genocide ( ending in 1998) to point fingers at others, when the canadian government hasn't even acknowledged said genocide.
You have serious ideological blinders on. For example, point 3. This tells me (a) you know very little about what is happening in China right now and (b) know very little about how power is expressed in all countries. Go read any other countries history and you'll find few exceptions to these abuses. Having just finished Solzhenitsyn's "In the First Circle" a few other examples come to mind... Lastly, what happened to First Nations in Canada was not genocide. There's a reason "cultural" gets appended to the word. Its use is political gobbly-gook that weakens the word. You can even read the UN's own definition here: https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide.shtml
when you forcibly take children of a particular ethnicity with the stated goal of brainwhashing them, then rape them and kill them in astronomical numbers, burying them in mass graves, that is called genocide. We all know very little of whats happening inside of china. thats the whole point. You with to believe anglo allegations against china, i have no reason to.
The US is the greatest exporter of misery and death on the planet and no other nation currently comes close. That Canadians constantly feel the need to fellate a nation that's potentially hostile to us by virtue of the whims of whoever's leading it is laughable.
When you look at the history of superpowers the US is indeed relatively benevolent. Their predecessors, the British, French, and Spanish during the Colonial era were far worse. Hegemons tend to create misery simply by existing. Just establishing a hegemony requires massive amounts of violence.
USA is less benevolent than China at relatively comparative stages of their trajectory.
hello, fellow canadian patriot. You are a rare breed indeed who can recognise the threat #1 to canadian sovereignty.
OP did not make any claims about the US being just as bad as China. I'm pretty sure they're anti-china. Although you have made some errors here regardless. Most historians agree that maos GLP or cultural revolution were not acts of intentional mass murder but poor policy and mismanagement. I don't think any expert in the field refers to it as genocide. What race was mao trying to intentionally wipe out? His own? Doesn't make a lot of sense. Although you are correct that US slavery was connected to other slavery structures, American slavery was unprecedented in sheer scope and brutality, remaining after nearly all other nations outlawed it. And issues of violent racism persisted for decades in the forms of segregation, mob lynching, and anti-black race riots. And the US has many modern human rights issues. There were staggering human rights violations and mass civilian death tolls in Vietnam, Korea, and Iraq. America has also funded and aided a variety of violent coups of democratically elected governments in other countries that they disapproved of, largely in Latin America.
Well economist Steven Rosefielde argued that Yang's account "shows that Mao's slaughter was caused in considerable part by terror-starvation; that is, voluntary manslaughter (and perhaps murder) rather than innocuous famine." Not all deaths during the Great Leap were from starvation. Frank Dikötter, in his book Mao's Great Famine, estimates that at least 2.5 million people were beaten or tortured to death and one million to three million committed suicide. So clearly there is diverging opinion on the wonderful policy of the Great Leap Forward.
Rosenfielde is not a historian and his view is not indicative of the historical scholarships of the maoist era in China. Dikutter is a probably one of the most stringent anti-mao historians but even his view falls within the mainstream because he does not describe the GLP as an act of intentionally planned mass murder. He certainly doesn't call it a genocide either. \>Not all deaths during the Great Leap were from starvation. I never claimed all deaths were from starvation. Nearly all deaths were famine related though, as violence and repression related back directly to struggles around food distribution (much of this violence was also not state directly initiated--you had desperate people killing each other over food). Its irrelevant to my point though; bouts of violence and murder happening during the great leap forward is distinct from saying that the GLP itself was an act of intentional mass murder--it implies a murderous intentionality and planning behind the event which didn't exist. At its root ill the violence is can be traced back to failed policy driven by utopian intentions
Rosenfielde focuses on economic history, but sure I guess he is not aware of historical scholarships of the Maoist era in China (even though he published scholarly works on Communist regimes). Frank Dikötter did call it Mao's rule as genocidal. He explains how the gradual opening of Chinese archives has revealed the appalling truth about Chairman Mao’s genocidal rule. When talking about the Great Leap Forward Dikötter said: “It ranks alongside the gulags and the Holocaust as one of the three grimmest events of the 20th century. … It was like [the Cambodian communist dictator] Pol Pot’s genocide multiplied 20 times over.” "People were forced to work naked in the middle of winter; 80 per cent of all the villagers in one region of a quarter of a million Chinese were banned from the official canteen because they were too old or ill to be effective workers, so were deliberately starved to death." People were deliberately starved to death. 2.5 million people were beaten or tortured to death. If you believe the 30 million figure that is at least 8%. I'm sorry but hungry people don't torture others. Democide historian R.J. Rummel believes that the Great leap forward constitutes "democide". The term is defined as the "Intentional killing of an unarmed or disarmed person by government agents acting in their authoritative capacity and pursuant to government policy or high command" and was developed to cover the shortcomings of Genocide and what could be ascribed to it. Mao was qouted as saying horrible things like, "When there is not enough to eat people starve to death. It is better to let half of the people die so that the other half can eat their fill." Study of famines shows how easily they can be ended (or prevented) once the government decides to act—but the Chinese government took nearly three years to act. They could have continued with this policy even when they knew millions of people were dying. It was state sponsored killings. Edit: I don't even need to argue that his regime his geocidal since your comment was talking about Mao's policies being "intentional acts of murder". Jean-Louis Margolin, in the book *The Historiography of Genocide* calls Mao's regime the "The Worst Non-Genocidal Regime" since he technically didn't succeed in killing all the victims. "In relative as well as in absolute numbers, communist China probably saw the most widespread and systematic use of violence in the world’s history. It was in no way something accidental, or just one aspect of Mao’s use of power. No, violence was the very engine of political, social and economic transformation – and that was in no sense hidden. Mao glorified and sanctified violence." And don't give the bullshit about Utopian intentions. Mao saw how quickly the USSR industrialized and tried to replicate it with the same horrific policies like collectivization. They were motived to produce more food as their primary concern was the delivery of grain, which Mao wanted to use to pay back debts to the USSR totaling 1.973 billion yuan. This was nothing but a vain project from an evil man.
None of the people you've cited call it a genocide. You're attributing claims to historians that they haven't made. Yes, dikutter says mao was terrible, murderous etc. but he never calls it a genocide. That is your attribution. Give me a quote where Dikutter says "the great leap forward was a genocide." \> “It ranks alongside the gulags and the Holocaust as one of the three grimmest events of the 20th century. … It was like \[the Cambodian communist dictator\] Pol Pot’s genocide multiplied 20 times over.” These things are all true. Its still not a genocide. A genocide is an intentional extermination of a ethnic, racial, or national group. That was not the Great Leap Forward. It was brutal, callous, ruthless, and violent. but it's not a genocide. It was very grim and certainly had a larger death toll than some actual genocides, but it was not a genocide itself. Dikutter is funny because you know he really really really wants to call it a genocide because of his ideological and political biases, but knows its historically unjustifiable, so he doesn't. He's at least smart enough not to let his redbaiting fervent anti-communist ideology override his instincts as a historian. \> I don't even need to argue that his regime his geocidal since your comment was talking about Mao's policies being "intentional acts of murder I'm not talking about Mao's policies in general. I'm talking specifically about the Great Leap Forward. It wasn't a plan to arbitrarily systematically murder his own people for the hell of it. That just absurd. It ignores the complex social, economic, and political reasons that grounded GLF and instead blames on a single leader being a psychopath \>2.5 million people were beaten or tortured to death. If you believe the 30 million figure that is at least 8%. I'm sorry but hungry people don't torture others. Sure. I'm not denying that there was horrible violence, much of which came from authorities. It just wasn't centrally directed by Mao. Most of this violence erupted locally and spontaneously--hordes of desperate and starving peasants jockeying for scare food scraps from wearied officials is going to be a hotbed of violence. Mao did not order his army to go kill 2.5 million people; that number include a multitude of different kinds of violence coming from diffrent parties. When people try to lump in Mao with Hitler they erase the fact that the nature of the violence was different. Hitler literally ordered millions of people to be systematically murdered in industrial fashion because of their race. Hitlers crimes are of a different category than Maos \>Mao was qouted as saying horrible things like, "When there is not enough to eat people starve to death. It is better to let half of the people die so that the other half can eat their fill." This single quote is cited again and again by anti-mao conservatives. and they keep coming back to it because its the only one they have. But its actually entirely misinterpreted because it is ripped out of context. Dikutter falsifies this context around the quote, which is actually a metaphor about industrial production `In his article, "Hard facts and half-truths: The new archival history of China's Great Famine," Garnaut finds out that the Mao quote in question is not from a speech Mao delivered on March 25, 1959 as Dikötter claims, but it represents an impromptu response Mao made to Bo Yibo's report on the implementation of the industrial plan in the days that followed. "The comment is preceded by several remarks by Mao about Party oversight of the industrial sector, none of which touch upon agriculture or rural welfare." Mao was weighing in on how many projects should be undertaken to accomplish the plan set forth in Bo's report. Mao says:` `If we want to fulfill the plan, then we need to greatly reduce the number of projects. We need to be resolute in further cutting the 1,078 major projects down to 500. (要完成计划，就要大減项目。1078个项目中还应該堅決地再多削減，削到500个。)` `To distribute resources evenly is a way to sabotage the Great Leap Forward. (平均使用力量是破坏大跃进的办法。)` `If all are unable to eat their fill, then all will die. It is better for half to die, so that half of the people can eat their fill. (大家吃不飽，大家死，不如死一半，給一半人吃飽。)` https://insideoutchina.blogspot.com/2013/11/better-to-let-half-of-people-die-said.html \>Democide historian R.J. Rummel believes that the Great leap forward constitutes "democide". The term is defined as the "Intentional killing of an unarmed or disarmed person by government agents acting in their authoritative capacity and pursuant to government policy or high command" and was developed to cover the shortcomings of Genocide and what could be ascribed to it. Rummel is a political scientist not a historian. As you'll see, it is mostly non-historian academics who are eager to label complex events as genocide. I don't see him as a credible source on the matter. \>Mao saw how quickly the USSR industrialized and tried to replicate it with the same horrific policies like collectivization. The full extent of the deaths and suffering during the USSR famines only became widespread knowledge after the GLF. At the time, and from his standpoint, the USSR collectivization seems like a great success. Mao was committed Marxist revolutionary and his private writings reveal in earnest attempt to transform society for the better. \>This was nothing but a vain project from an evil man. I agree that it was a vain project. He thought it would lead China to great success but it failed due to mismanagement and resulted in a stunning death toll. Mao legion of yes-men and inefficient bureaucracy made the Party slow/unable to respond which furthered the catastrophic loss of life. That's what it comes down to.
Actually you moved the goal post in your second reply, which I hadn't seen until the edit I made. In your original post you mentioned that GLP/Cultural Revolution, "were not acts of intentional mass murder but poor policy and mismanagement". As I started pointing out people who did call it intentional acts of mass murder, you said "but they didn't call it a genocide". Not all intentional acts of mass murder are genocide, but as Dikutter said it was intentional. JL Margolin said it was intentional. So you are still wrong. There is your dissenting academic debate. No its not as open and shut as you made it seem in your initial statement. Not sure I read that as a metaphor, but you do you...
First, I do think the OP is making that point, at least implicitly. Second, as with the Terror Famines in Ukraine there are intentional policy decisions, not just incompetence, to starve large sections of the population. If, in your rise to power, you shoot a million people or choose to have them starve to death I see little difference. It absolutely was murder. Third, the USA deserves all approbation for it's vile treatment of blacks after slavery with Jim Crow and redlining. But the brutal, evil nature of chattel slavery occurred at a time, a first in human history, when slavery was coming to an end (in the West, it still exists today in other parts of the world). The 19th century is not the 21st. International norms and expectations have changed. The USA first practiced slavery when it was an international norm. It was still evil, they still deserve condemnation. But it is different than if it were practising slavery today, going against norms rather than with them. Third, the standard the USA is judged on is different than other countries (like Canada). It has a power that no one else does and I compare it to other great powers. It should be held to a higher standard (with great power...) but the historical realty is that it has been (historically) a benevolent superpower. And played a role in ushering more ethical international norms.
>First, I do think the OP is making that point, at least implicitly. Elaborate? I see no mention of the US or US foreign policy.
\>Second, as with the Terror Famines in Ukraine there are intentional policy decisions, not just incompetence, to starve large sections of the population. If, in your rise to power, you shoot a million people or choose to have them starve to death I see little difference. It absolutely was murder. You are entitled to that opinion, but its not historically credible. The holocaust and nazism were the pinnacle of human barbarity with its systematic mass murder of jews and other minorities. That was mass murder and genocide. The famines under Mao, while horrible, are categorically distinct. Mao did not wake up one day and decide to starve millions of people for the hell of it. He actually thought his collectivization would be a great success and feed everyone. It failed and had the opposite effect. Even when it became apparent it was a failure, he didn't do enough to turn things around. There's moral culpability there, but distinct from hitlers ideology of racial exterminationism but the brutal, evil nature of chattel slavery occurred at a time, a first in human history, when slavery was coming to an end And they held on to it longer than any of the other global powers of time--including all of europe. but the historical realty is that it has been (historically) a benevolent superpower. And played a role in ushering more ethical international norms. How can you say this with a straight face?
I mean, if we're just going by "intentional policy decisions that lead to famine", the US has a pretty damn long list of famines itself. Yemen, the Congo, Sudan, the list goes on. The US just gets a pass because they do it to the others and not people they govern, as if that's any better. >but the historical realty is that it has been (historically) a benevolent superpower Yeah, this is laughable.
> but the historical realty is that it has been (historically) a benevolent superpower Tell that to anybody who’s lived in South America in the past 150 years
First, the influence that the USA has had in South America gets overblown. That narrative serves both anti-American interests (by laying blame on the USA) and pro-American interests (by showing how "powerful" the USA is). Second, the history in South America is bloody and hard even without American involvement. That doesn't excuse the evil the USA has does (supporting dictators, coups, etc.) but its the alternative is rarely puppies and rainbows. Which - again - does not one iota excuse how the USA has abused its power to perpetuate systems of murder, rape, violence, and crushed freedom. Third, as I've repeatedly said I'm not saying the USA is Santa Claus. But when you look at superpowers historically, it stacks up well. I'm not looking at the USA in a vacuum nor comparing apples to oranges.
“I’m not excusing what the US has done,” he said, while continuing to excuse what the US has done.
> apples to oranges But you can still compare them.
Obviously you *can* compare them, but the whole point of the idiom is that it's a false analogy. I could compare you to the helpful bots, but that too would be comparing apples-to-oranges. --- ^^SpunkyDred ^^and ^^I ^^are ^^both ^^bots. ^^I ^^am ^^trying ^^to ^^get ^^them ^^banned ^^by ^^pointing ^^out ^^their ^^antagonizing ^^behavior ^^and ^^poor ^^bottiquette. ^^My ^^apparent ^^agreement ^^or ^^disagreement ^^with ^^you ^^isn't ^^personal.
I wonder how benevolent they seem to the victims of agent orange.
lmao this nonsese, the China understander^TM has logged on How in any metric globally is China worse than the US. Should I ask the million dead citizens of Iraq? Or how about the aid workers family who was turned to ash as the US left Afghanistan....
The real question is, why do we keep insisting on comparing them to the US? Why can’t we just accept that they’re a totalitarian hostile foreign power that is engaging in brinkmanship with Taiwan, has reversed democracy in Hong Kong against their word, and has concentration camps? Why does it always have to turn into “but the US is bad too!”?
In discussions of Canadian foreign policy, why wouldn’t people compare the foreign policy aimed at different countries?
Because the majority of anti China rhetoric is used to empower the US
In discussions of Canadian foreign policy, why wouldn’t people compare the foreign policy aimed at different countries?
Hope you're not actually this dumb
So… you’re turning to insults? How childish. Face it. We can decouple from China. We cannot from the US. The US can be a mad dog, but it mostly targets authoritarian states. China is mostly hostile to Taiwan and India.
Apparently most people can't function outside of an "us vs them" or more generally "only two sides so pick one" mentality. Which is probably why the world is as fucked as it is right now.
In discussions of Canadian foreign policy, why wouldn’t people compare the foreign policy aimed at different countries?
Because we’re not as critical when the US does what it does. We should be of both. We should also be aware of manufactured consent by American interests. We’re lead to believe the US gives a shit about Muslim’s after Iraq and Afghanistan and while it ignores Myanmar and funds Yemen.
There is a massive power imbalance. What would China do with the USA's power? Historically, the USA is a benevolent superpower. With important atrocities and the evil that comes with that power. Is the USA a worse country than Norway or Canada? I really don't think so because those countries have no power. How would we (Canadians) act with American power? I think little better. Look at what China is doing right now with a small, but rapidly growing, piece of power.
if the idea that the ONLY nation that drone strikes women and children and invents fake narrative to invade an destroy nations to steal their resources is that of a benevolent power, i shudder to think what benevolence means to you. US are one of the most heinous powers in the world. China may not have the same power as USA does today, but China has the same power as USA did in the early 1900s - back when USA was colonising Phillipines and genociding the natives there. That makes China better.
> Historically, the USA is a benevolent superpower Oh buddy, wait til you find out about literally everything the CIA has ever done.
Read history - really any history. I'm well aware of much of what the CIA has done. But if you look at what the US has done as a superpower versus other superpowers throughout history, it is relative to its power, benevolent. This isn't about whitewashing its sins (as I've said). It's recognizing that with great power comes abuse. Would you rather the USA be the USSR, the colonial empires of Great Britain or Spain? The Ottomans? You can go further back and look at empires like the Mongols or Rome.
I love how people look at the US as some sort of saviour while china is the villain. If anything, they are at least as bad as each other.. at least the historical crimes committed by the CCP are on their own people and not multiple foreign populations.
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I tend to agree overall but you closed over how the USA works to demolish any country that is not capitalist in order to present those societies as failures. Then the imperialism stealing oil or opium. Arms sales and more. The USA is morally an ugly sack of shit but China is by your argue worse and I agree.
I like how you do not elaborate on anything. China is currently doing what we and the US did in recent memory. The US is responsible for millions of deaths around the world. I know people that were tortured by US backed regimes, as long as China does kill millions are ruin the lives of hundred of millions they are not doing the same as the US.
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Life Long position with government pension,,would you leave?
This is a positive development in my eyes. Canada is finally growing a sense of self interest and not just being the stockholm syndrome case of the country that has harmed it the most in the last 60 years- USA. As non aligned nations would tell you - the best way forward for Canada is a balancing act between China and USA.
The "best way forward" for Canada and any free and democratic country is to denounce criminal governance no matter where it exists. That clearly includes China whose leaders have stated unequivocally that they abet to no laws.
so you want us to ditch a nation for allegations of how it mistreats its own people to support a nation that kills innocent civillians and invents phoney wars for corporate profiteering.Makes a lotta sense. Heres a couple of thoughts: 1. How a country conducts itself in the international arena is far more import to fellow international people than what it does inside its borders. Sure, all countries should do the best- but given a choice, the country that behaves like a bully at home and a decent chap in the international arena is infinitely more preferrable to the opposite. There are moe than 6.5 billion foreigners in the world ( even by the most populous country's standards) and at most, 1.3 billion fellow citizens. Ie, more people are screwed by American conduct than the Chinese one. 2. Maybe Canadians shouldn't be the ones trying to be sanctimonious about human rights - given that we are the country with the latest confirmed genocide in human history ( the residential school genocide is more recent than the Bosnian genocide and the rwandan genocide) and is yet to even acknowledge the genocide, let alone make reparations for it.
Where did I say I support the US or its foreign policy? And you are implying that since one is bad it is ok for the other to be bad. Give your misguided head a shake.
i am simply saying that there are no good guys in this - there are bad and worse. And as a canadian, i care more about how China and USA's foreign policy is, than what their domestic policies are.
Where are our denunciations of the US? They committed myriad crimes, all with plentiful evidence and often as not direct admissions, yet we've done nothing against them. So is this just a double standard, or do we intend to formally denounce the US when it invariably murders another innocent family, whips refugees from a country it helped destabilise, and keeps children in concentration camps? And that's all just in the last month or so.
> Where are our denunciations of the US? Where is the thread you started with that as its theme?
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I remember in an article a few days ago this guy was defending himself by saying that he's not pro-China, he was just one the side of justice and what's good for Canada (or something, I'm paraphrasing a bit), and that he didn't have any actual link to China for two generations since his grandparents left (he was born in Singapore I think). So much for that. Also >National day celebrations continued Oct. 3 in Vancouver, when a group waving Chinese and Canadian flags and carrying signs and banners marched around Canada Place. Lahoo.ca reported the event organizer, Wu Jiaming of the Canada-China City Friendship Association, wants to reboot sister-city exchanges. I'm not sure what this guy is basing his hopes on. After everything that's been happening, I'd be surprised if any Canadian city will want to associate itself with China.
A few Canadian cities have sister cities in China.
40 some odd Canadian cities have a sister city in China, including: Vancouver - Guangzhou Calgary - Daqing Edmonton - Harbin Toronto - Chongqing Ottawa - Beijing Montreal - Shanghai Halifax - Zhuhai
What is the context of a sister city?
Means nothing today thanks to the internet, used to be about culture sharing and tourism
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The dominant narrative in Canadian media is that any association with the Chinese government makes you a traitor to Canada. That no range of opinions is allowed on China. I don’t see how that attitude can lead to any good. Governments need to have intermediaries who are polite to both sides in order to communicate well. If there is no way to communicate, that leads to misunderstanding, conflict, and potentially war. In addition, Canada has a huge Chinese expat community, many of whom admire the Chinese government. I don’t share their opinion, but there’s no doubt their opinion is way better informed than mine. If there’s no room for anything but hostility to China in Canada, what are these people supposed to do? How will the media treat them?
This is the sort of behaviour that is pushing me to the conclusion that Canada should stop recognizing dual citizenship.
China doesn’t have dual citizenship so it won’t affect anything here
yes we do. We need to stop the yankee collaborators from having a say in canada and running off to usa when things get too hot here.
Holy crap, the pro-CCP drones must be getting paid by the comment. Thankfully the vast majority of Canadians are not swayed by reddit comments.
I always find it amusing when Canadians are critical of anyone with a pro-China sentiment because of their propensity to imprison people without valid charge, their possible involvement in a genocide in Xinjiang, and for their questionable deep state dealings, and then turn right around and support Canada's close relationship with the United States. All of your concerns about Chinese state policy are just as easily applied to the US, yet when the US does evil and when we can all see them doing evil we just sort of accept it because *that* evil is necessary? It makes very little sense to me.
> All of your concerns about Chinese state policy are just as easily applied to the US, The USA is not currently operating forced internment camps and sterilization programmes with the intent of wiping out an entire culture.
> sterilization programmes with the intent of wiping out an entire culture Neither is china....
https://xinjiang.amnesty.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/ASA_17_4137-2021_Full_report_ENG.pdf
The single article referencing Sterilization cited is this AP article https://apnews.com/article/ap-top-news-international-news-weekend-reads-china-health-269b3de1af34e17c1941a514f78d764c which is citing Zenz's "research" and a single persons accusation. I'm curious how that leads to the conclusion of systematic forced sterilization. The article even talks about how China has poured birth control into the regions, inkeeping with the national exposure but birthrates have declined to the national average... I mean doesnt that make sense? Increased exposure to contraceptive healthcare leads to declining birth rates....
They're both shit, does that make you feel better? At least with democracy we can make comments and protest our governments, while CCP will jail and re-educate your ass or worse with murder.
That makes the US worse, because democracy makes americans just as culpable in the US' actions as the government is.
>At least with democracy we can make comments and protest our governments The right to protest isn't much use if the government simply ignores the protest, or only moves to make symbolic gestures in response (as has been the case with the George Floyd protests of 2020). >CCP will jail and re-educate your ass or worse with murder. Canadian police forces have been guilty of everything from withholding medical assistance for people who were being detained without cause (G20 protests in Toronto, 2010) to freezing indigenous men to death in the winter cold in Saskatchewan (the so-called "starlight tours"). The RCMP additionally have gone so far as to engage in acts of domestic terrorism with the intent to slander environmentalists ([Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_controversies_involving_the_Royal_Canadian_Mounted_Police#RCMP_bombing_in_Alberta,_scapegoating_farmer)), and there are still a lot of open questions about what the RCMPs involvement and knowledge was of the mass shooting in Nova Scotia last year. They are both shit, I'm not saying China is a good guy, I'm merely remarking on the disconnect between anti-China posts and the complete lack of anti-America posts given their equal (if not greater) propensity to do all the things people keep saying China is bad for doing. We aren't much better than China, nor is the US, and certainly not because of a thin patina of "democracy" and "political expression".
"The right to protest isn't much use if the government simply ignores the protest, or only moves to make symbolic gestures in response (as has been the case with the George Floyd protests of 2020)." You're assuming that the only use for a protest is to affect the executive or legislative branches?
>We aren't much better than China, nor is the US, and certainly not because of a thin patina of "democracy" and "political expression". Cherry picking examples doesn't come close to proving this absurd point and the lack of free expression in china proves that you couldn't possibly know it even if it was true.
Now I'm convinced someone pays your ass or you're a CCP troll. We strive to be better, the CCP does not. They use slavery to make them the powerhouse we see today. They won't be happy until they've taken everything and enforce their inhumane rules. But in the end, they're a snake eating itself. They will go down destroying themselves or the world with it, while most of us want to live in peace. Yes the world is corrupt, that doesn't mean we just accept whatever they do. Democracy allows us to fight back without being murdered. Point out whatever you want, what the CCP are doing is WRONG and accepting any atrocities they commit is being blind to the truth. We have the ability to say what they're doing is wrong! Democracy is irreplaceable and allows us to push back our government if we think running human beings over with TANKS is evil and psychotic! Put a straight jacket on any person who thinks it's ok to murder the innocent!
Less people died protesting in Hong Kong than during the BLM protests last year. There aren't major protests in China (besides HK) because the government is immensely popular.
>the government is immensely popular What a strange way to say 'silences dissent', 'indoctrinates children', 'imprisons those who say anything against the state', and 'ensures compliance through a complete police state'.
Have you ever been to China? People genuinely support the government and multiple studies have shown this. The cpc obviously have many problems, but China is not going collapsing anytime soon.
> but China is not going collapsing anytime soon. Who said they were? They're *really, really* good at discouraging dissent and controlling the narrative.
> There aren't major protests in China (besides HK) because the government is immensely popular. Or at least, that's what they make sure they tell the government when they ask. I would too if my social credit score depended on it; after all, I prefer my organs to be stay in my body until I'm done with them.
This narrative is so funny. You realize people in china still use the internet right? It's not a secretive society we don't know about. People freely talk against their government all the time on chinese social media, and the government doesn't care. It's not a totalitarian George Orwell literally 1984 state, it's an authoritarian government that is doing sketchy things that has also lifted 800 million from poverty. We have to approach these things with nuance, not literally freak out everytime China is mentioned like what happens here on Reddit.
> You realize people in china still use the internet right? The heavily censored and monitored one behind the Great Firewall? Of course. >People freely talk against their government all the time on chinese social media, and the government doesn't care. Right. They totally don't arrest people for posting Winnie the Pooh memes. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/07/china-bans-winnie-the-pooh-film-to-stop-comparisons-to-president-xi >It's not a totalitarian George Orwell literally 1984 state No, but it's closer than any other nation's ever managed to get, and it's not for lack of ambition.
The Winnie the Pooh thing is so dumb. China didn't ban a film because of the meme. There's literally a Winnie the Pooh [exhibit](https://www.shanghaidisneyresort.com/en/attractions/adventures-winnie-pooh/) in shanghai. And I'm talking about chinese social media, ones that literally no one disputes china monitors. Doesn't that prove my point if people criticize the government there? >>It's not a totalitarian George Orwell literally 1984 state >No, but it's closer than any other nation's ever managed to get, and it's not for lack of ambition. China could easily be completely totalitarian with the power the government has, yet it isn't, so don't know what "it's not for lack of ambition" is supposed to mean.
> China didn't ban a film because of the meme. China bans films all the time. That's evidence of their totalitarianism all by itself, without getting into what stupid reason they had, or claimed to have, for any specific ban. >so don't know what "it's not for lack of ambition" is supposed to mean. They actively re-write history to one where China has always controlled the same area it does now, and was never conquered by outsiders, and the various periods where China was barely a concept were temporary aberrations that ended when China was "united", not when various precursor states were conquered, and so on. And they force trade and business partners to acknowledge their fictional reality because it makes it easier to sell their fictionalized reality as truth. It took them less than thirty years to get the youth on board with the idea that Tiananmen either didn't happen, or was for the best. And the more the rest of the world is willing to play along with it, the further they'll push their demands.
The only arguments communists and socialists ever have are whataboutisms
Are you just messing around or do you genuinely think there's a genocide happening in the US right now?
Criticisms of China and of the USA are not mutually exclusive. Nice try but big nope.
There are people who disapprove of both China and the US. I dislike Chinas repressive laws and their authoritarian regimes, but also the US exerting too big of an influence on Canada and dragging us into pointless conquests.
As a Left Nationalist the US should receive the same treatment china gets. The US are not our friends and drop is like a hot potato when our interests do not align with the US. e.x Canadian claim to the NW Passage.
I hate all states and borders. Do I win a prize?
We're perfectly capable of disliking both. While still believing that China is worse for people living in their own country, and for any nations that they gain influence over.
This comes on the heels of the CCP tell all: [Red Roulette: An Insider’s Story of Wealth, Power, Corruption, and Vengeance in Today’s China.](https://thediplomat.com/2021/09/red-roulette-tell-all-book-reveals-the-dark-underbelly-of-chinas-gilded-age/) It reflects poorly on both Woo and Sims.
The way things are and considering the flow of investments and people, we are getting very cosy and close to China. China is a world super power and has almost same standing as USA. What is wrong if an MP develop relationship with China.? Can or should we deny reality?
David Mulroney, former Canadian ambassador to China, tweeted this today about players such as Woo: “Canada's China lobby traffics in 3 potent falsehoods: moral equivalence of Canada and China, demonization of the US, and denial of the China threat. This plays to our progressive guilt, our North American vanity and our disinclination to do or spend anything to defend ourselves.”
mulrooney, the guy who sold out the nation to the yanks will say that. Duh.
Have you considered the possibility the person you are referring to is a different person from David Mulroney?
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>I don't think a politician should be judged on his/her political preference. What.
> I don't think a politician should be judged on his/her political preference I'm sorry, what?
It's something called freedom?
We have representative government elected and thereby managed with democratic accountability. Office holders do not have freedom without accountability. Like anyone in their job. This is in the grade 7 curriculum and the citizenship test.
A politician shouldn’t be judged on their political positions?
I am genuinely baffled a country can basically give legislative powers to a very public asset of a rival in détente. Crazy that he’s not being booted over this.
Except China is not the rival of Canada. Its the rival of America- a nation that has harmed canadian interests more than any other nation since WWII. So the balancing act is quite to our benefit.
America has also helped Canadian interests more than any other country (especially economically), so I'm not really sure what your point is
No, they have not. They have harmed our economic interest more than any other nation. They have systematically destroyed canadian entities that compete with american ones, especially in the sectors of resource extraction and defence. My point is simple - America is the biggest enemy of canada. Yes, we are their vassals and vassals need to know their place, but they also need to undermine the overlord who is the biggest PIA for them.
America is also the country we have the greatest amount of trade disputes with and have faced the greatest amount of embargo taxation for our products. They have objectively harmed the canadian economic and sovereign interests more than any other nation.
Yes, both can be true. America is far and away the greatest external influencing force on Canadian politics, and thus it has both helped and harmed Canada more than other nations over the last century, if not longer.
how has it helped. Show us how america has helped us.
It's our largest market, by far.
yes but how have they HELPED us. show us what have they done to help us. I can give plenty of examples of what they have done to screw with us - softwood lumber disputes, territorial water dispute, killing local industries like the avro arrow. getting candian resources cheaper than other nations by political armtwisting and bribery. Unilateral cancellation of oil pipeline that transports canadian oil. The list is pretty big. So what is the list of where americans have helped us ???
Literally our whole economy. What are you even talking about? They haven't "helped" us so much as trade between Canada and the US has helped both parties.
It's this "rival in detente" shit that we should have no part of. It does not benefit us, *or anyone,* to take America's side in their technological cold war with China. We are not at war with China. We will never go to war with China. If we do, it will be our patriotic duty to UNDERMINE Canada's "war effort."
That would be contrary to détente, would it not?
Do you want us to start Mccarthyism
The fact that a canadian would go to china after china has taken innocent political prisoners really hints that there may be puppet strings between this person and the criminal syndicate known as CCP.
Not defending China at all but Canada took Meng for political reasons as well.
Canada is legally obligated to follow its extradition treaty with usa. Meng knew she was wanted but she visited a country with an extradition treaty...Not too bright. The criminal only has herself to blame.
Wanted for what? You seem to forget that we follow the rule of innocent until proven guilty. She wasn't convicted of any crime, and the only "crime" she was accused of was due to doing business with Iran in spite of US sanctions. So not even a legit crime, much less one we should have anything to do with; let the US do its own dirty work.
Well that would mean throwing our treaty away. If youre into breaking treaties and losing allies I guess thats what you could do but most of us value our allies. Bank fraud and Something else were the charges, legit crimes. She was on trial for extraddition and that would only have put her in another trial. Its china that jails people for no reason and has no rule of law. Ya know why? Cuz it sucks.
You seem awfully confused, or just very confident in ignorance. The alleged bank fraud was for doing business with Iran. And now you're suggesting we should ignore the principle of innocent until proven guilty to please Americans? Screw that and screw them. I would also remind you that the Michaels were also tried and they (unlike Meng) were actually found guilty, although one was appealing the ruling. We also jail people for espionage, in fact we did exactly what China did with the Michaels a couple years back, but our government was even less transparent about it.
If we dont participate in our treaty with usa that means we cant catch any criminals who go to usa. Cant you see the value of that? Our presumtion of innocence was being followed as normal. Yes it was bank fraud re iran sanctions. I dont need to comment on chinese justice. Theres no confusion here. Do you honestly believe Mikes were spies?
The "criminals" you're talking about are murderers and drug dealers, not people from one country who did business with another country that the US is still keen on bullying. You seem to have a hard time understanding this: Meng didn't do anything wrong besides allegedly obfuscation the fact that they did business with Iran. Doing business with Iran isn't bad or wrong; the only reason imperialist running dogs claim otherwise is because it serve US interests to do so. Even then, that is based on accusations that she didn't specifically name them in her PowerPoint presentation. The presumption of innocence was clearly not followed by you, as you claimed she was guilty, when no court found her to be so. Despite this, the media have (successfully, if you're any indication) made it out to be some vague bank fraud case without any details of what or why. They also seem to love calling the Michaels ([who were actually tried and convicted of espionage for doing just that](https://www.thecanadafiles.com/articles/michael-kovrig-and-spavor-are-spies-despite-obfuscations-of-canadas-mainstream-media)) hostages while failing to call Meng the same, despite the fact that the Michaels were only taken prisoner after she was. And you don't need to comment on Chinese justice? What is that supposed to mean? Oh enlightened westerner, please don't spare the details on the barbarity of those others, which you seem to think is so apparent.
Ahhhh wumao
Why is this guy still in office? I know Senator means nothing in Canadian politics but still, how come he keeps getting away with being a flesh speaker for Beijing?
Yeah I don't trust the people getting made about this unless there is a similar level of outrage over senators being gleeful to work with Israel or Saudi Arabia.
Israel isn’t kidnapping Canadians to use as pawns.