You've bought into the propaganda. China orchestrated a massive disinformation campaign to deflect responsibility. They played the race card when flights to China were stopped. This all worked masterfully on left leaning people who know a lot less than they think.
Science is about discovering consensus? Wtf is this garbage.
I'm an avid China watcher, and the propaganda there started almost immediately, even before Wuhan was locked down. There were already stories being bandied about accusing the US Army of spreading a bioweapon in Wuhan etc etc.
To think that China couldn't or wouldn't carefully control this situation and what information is available to external parties is being credulous to the point of this sounding like propaganda. They did everything they could to downplay the severity of the issue for months while they had people in hazmat suits trying to decon Wuhan.
Propaganda doesn't work like you are implying it does.
It's part "bullshit asymmetry principle", but it's mostly repetition of the same talking points.
I.e. find something true but inconsequential (Dominic Dwyer said that they weren't necessarily given enough to do all of the analises that they would do), and that's then blown out of proportion:
- what are the actual facts? What was Dwyer's role? Was he working with the same people that Daszak and Fischer worked (i.e. their chinese counterparts)? Why don't we hear testimony from their side?
- one scientist became several members of their team
- one statement became just part of a narrative (repeated headlines) about Chinese negligence in sharing information
- the supposed neglicence then justified "deep concern" from the WH
That works thanks to the fact that, even if people read the articles, and realize that there's no smoking gun..
All they remember is the newspaper headline, and people will uncritically trust authorities like NYT or Reuters... So even when there's no smoking gun, them referring to each others as source is enough to make their narrative seem legitimate
I'm wary of engaging, but this just makes no sense to me. Perhaps you can explain and actually make explicit some of the implied connections.
Previously the 'big lie' was that it was not from a lab. Now that it's assessed to be likely from a lab the new lie is the contention that it was done deliberately? Whose propaganda machine is at work here anyway? The Chinese govt or the US one? Or are they in cahoots now?
Right now US propaganda is in overdrive mode trying to lay the blame onto China ; there are no other views in mainstream media , and if anyone tries to doubt that, asking for evidence and reminding the world about presumption of innocence, they are instantly labeled chinese bots. So much for freedom of speech and thought
China supported this in a psyop. Remember when they tried repeatedly to push the origin of the virus to Italy?
I'm ethnically Chinese, so I'm in contact with a lot of mainlanders. The brainwashing is very effective. Even if most mainlanders know that their state media is bogus, and that Xi is a dictator, they'll take it deeply personally when you say anything that threatens the whole China # 1 narrative. All they had to do was hire a few shitposters, feed a few media narratives and the US fights with itself over stuff like anti-china, racists etc, while the CCP takes over Hong Kong.
Does no one else on earth remember the initial videos out of China of people laying dead on the streets? Does no one else remeber the WHO refusing to acknowledge Taiwan is its own state?
I really struggle that anyone is seriously buying a single “truth” that is coming out of China.
I don’t know it was a lab leak, but I agree, if you are at all reasonable you can just see that China thinks it was.
It's unbelievable how effective the west's disinformation, FUD and propaganda, lead by the US, against China has been. It's pretty much on par with the narrative leading up the the Iraq war.
Despite not having any concrete evidence, you don't trust China's numbers and that they have coronavirus contained. Have you considered that you might be thinking this way because of a coordinated propaganda campaign?
Objectively looking at the situation on the ground in China right now, life is going back to normal and there hasn't been massive outbreaks of covid19 and rushes to the hospital. You can't hide exponential growth if the virus was not contained.
What do you call a cabal of American newspapers, tech companies (policing social media), and politicians (attacking Trump/conservatives) simultaneously conflating the two theories (malicious artificial virus versus leak of natural virus), attacking anyone suggesting an accidental lab leak aggressively, and censoring discussion of the same? It isn’t just “China influenced corporate press”. It’s the entirety of the left and left-leaning institutions (news, tech) that voluntarily participated in this mass gaslighting.
People often stir up fears of foreign influence but in the last few years it really has seemed like the biggest sources of inorganic influence and “propaganda” has been domestic.
I'm with you that Chinese/Russian propaganda is a real thing, but your example is ridiculous.
> Anything anti-china is attacked as racist/nationalist.
This response always comes up when someone tries to point out racist and nationalist anti-china motivations, so clearly this argument is propaganda as well /s.
> It got so radioactive that the government had to change the pattern they used to name pandemics.
The Spanish Flu was named that way precisely so everyone would blame Spain. The participants of WWI censored any mention of the pandemic until the war was over, so Spain served as a convenient scapegoat.
This paper published by Harvard is an analysis of actual CCP propaganda tactics [1]. Arguing with people online about an issue you dislike just brings more attention to it. Instead, propaganda generally serves to distract. The average Redditor has no direct impact foreign policy in China, but they can riled up enough to cause politicians to focus on placating them rather than geopolitics. Indeed, if you observe the Russian propaganda ads on Facebook, they have nothing to do with Russia [2]. They're simply meant to sow discord.
While also providing proof that those statements predate China's antics. When China was accusing everyone of fear-mongering, and hints of travel restrictions were met with speeches about the holocaust and hypocritical appeals to the WHO, which US official is to blame for that? I've been watching this thing since December, the USG is pretty much the last one to the party - China's state run media has been saying crazy stuff since day one.
“The US has also launched biological warfare, cyber warfare and public opinion against China.”
This is quite some projection. China's role in the virus/biowarfare will never be affirmed with certainty due to their information suppression; however their cyber warfare and public opinion efforts are at full throttle.
If you look at any major news website, YouTube, Reddit, Slashdot, Facebook, Twitter, etc, the paid "shills" and "useful idiots" touting pro-Chinese, anti-America propaganda are everywhere. If you don't think you see it, the common talking points repeated are:
1) Amerikkka is full of white supremacists - this is an effort to change public opinion and have people believe that everyone in America is racist and hates Chinese people.
2) Nothing is happening in Xinjiang.
3) COVID disinformation in the forms of 'it started in Fort Detrick', disparaging Pfizer/Moderna/vaccines, etc.
4) The Imperialist/Colonial America is responsible for all the bad things.
5) Without Capitalism, the world would be a perfect place.
I can give China the benefit of the doubt that not everything was known. Or even blame them for suppressing info.
But we (the world, US) knew the severity 2 months ago and Trump was still trying to downplay it. Fox News is still downplaying it. They called a "Democratic Hoax".
I live in a conservative area and residents are cursing out local leaders for canceling events, canceling school...
You are the gullible and ignorant victim of western anti-china propaganda. Many independent studies have been done. They all show very high approval ratings. Higher now, after the pandemic.
This depiction of China is blown way out of proportion and it's basically thanks to US propaganda which is used to justify the kinds of military spending and activities it undertakes.
Science is about discovering consensus? Wtf is this garbage.
I'm an avid China watcher, and the propaganda there started almost immediately, even before Wuhan was locked down. There were already stories being bandied about accusing the US Army of spreading a bioweapon in Wuhan etc etc.
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