We were having a nice conversation, but this last reply is so full of strawmen and false equivalencies that I’m going to drop out. Have a good one.

But they argue over a shared history. Mainlanders don’t get confused when someone from Taiwan talks about Tienamen. Taiwanese people don’t stare blankly at the name Chiang Kai-Shek. Folks from Hong Kong aren’t unfamiliar with the British Occupation.

Obviously. My reference to Tiananmen wasn’t implying that people are ignorant of it, but rather that it can’t be discussed openly in a public forum. Write an analysis of it on Weibo that criticizes the government and see where that gets you (whereas in the US you can freely write about the war in Iraq, slavery, or whatever else strikes your fancy)

People aren’t simply ignorant of the facts. They tend to be biased due to their material conditions. If you’re a mid manager at the Houston branch of Sinopec, you didn’t get there because you were a John Bircher. Meanwhile if you’re on the payroll of the Foremost Group, you’ve got a very real financial incentive to oppose Chinese unification (but also a real incentive to oppose US tariffs on China).

Also very true, but at least opposing viewpoints aren’t actively suppressed by the government. Equating the two is off by several orders of magnitude.

65o feet, for reference, is exactly the height of this building in NYC: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/712_Fifth_Avenue

I must say I’m very surprised that your HK and TW people share your views. I don’t know any Hong Kongers or Taiwanese but most people I know (generally northerners, which is ironic) have more, shall we say, nuanced opinions.

Cool, how long did you live there? Do you still have contacts on the mainland?

Eh, they were also instrumental in defeating Napoleon, which counts for a lot.

It’s very difficult to talk about the English Empire as the world’s premier opium cartel without taking a bit of the blush off the rose of liberal democracy and free market capitalism. These historical blemishes get dusted over for a reason.

I agree, but that reflex is unfortunate because the ability to openly discuss and confront those things is what sets democracies apart from totalitarian states. You could never see that kind of frank introspection in China regarding June 4th '89, for example.

Please see my reply to UnderpantsWeevil

Do these citizens not trust their government’s thorough and stringent safety regulations?

Nah, it was just a throwaway joke, the west obviously doesn’t intend to colonize China this time. What they did in the 19th century was egregious, though, and should be much more common knowledge than it is.

I don’t mean to pick on you specifically with this comment, but good lord people, there’s more to history than WW2. Anytime anyone tries to make a historical reference to current events it’s awkwardly shoehorned into a WW2 framework. It drives me crazy. Anyway, sorry for the rant there. No, it’s an older gang. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scramble_for_China

Getting the old gang back together! Too bad Russia is on the other side this time.

What’s the value-add over just buying a SFF PC?

I guess Aussies aren’t familiar with “Boss makes a dollar, I make a dime; that’s why I poop on company time”

Thanks, that’s good news. I don’t know much about Iran since the Islamic period but it’s truly a shame to see one of the greatest nations of history reduced to what it is today. At least there’s a rough framework of democracy that can hopefully be built upon once the current regime is finally gone.

What would you estimate as the percentage of the population who are pro-theocracy?

In October 2018, a report by Saeed Kamali Dehghan in The Guardian linked Iran International’s funding to Saudi Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Lmao is there anything more enduring than middle-eastern infighting? They invented the state and have been undermining each other ever since.

They need to be making more progress on peace talks. It’s unacceptable this war has gone on for this long and killed this many people.

Vatnik-tier opinion. No need to waste anybody’s time on a serious reply.

Not only is this tiresome post the literal definition of whataboutism, it’s also completely wrong. Israel makes its own SRBMs.

Is Russia running out of Iskanders already? I bet the Houthis are gong to be mad about this. Iran can’t supply everybody at once.