The Chinese state has a vast propaganda and censorship network that it uses to influence its people's opinions and information access on i.e. domestic affairs, Taiwan, Xinjang, Tibet and Hong Kong. Pointing that out is not orientalist, it's a fact.
-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
Blizzard has removed Hong Kong Hearthstone player blitzchung from Hearthstone Grand Masters and rescinded all his prize money
- Thread starter Lump
- Start date
- Status
The Chinese state has a vast propaganda and censorship network that it uses to influence its people's opinions and information access on i.e. domestic affairs, Taiwan, Xinjang, Tibet and Hong Kong. Pointing that out is not orientalist, it's a fact.
Want to give me some sources on that? And do you really think the US state isn't doing the exact same thing? Because if not, hoo boy have I got some news for you
Hong Kong still has 30 years left on their independence clock. A lot of this seems like attempts by China to slowly erode it over time so that when the 50 year period is up, there's nothing left to resist.
What? Who cares about the US right now? This is about the people in Hong Kong. Just because the CCP is communist (maybe??) and opposes the US doesn't mean they are automatically the best and can do no wrong.
What? Who cares about the US right now? This is about the people in Hong Kong. Just because the CCP is communist (maybe??) and opposes the US doesn't mean they are automatically the best and can do no wrong.
I've written a separate thread as an explainer on the sudden rise of Mei as a reclaimed symbol of the Hong Kong movement. I hope it's considered thread-worthy and stays up, as I do think it's an interesting game-related news story of its own.
Contributions, whether in the form of more art or more context, are highly appreciated.
Contributions, whether in the form of more art or more context, are highly appreciated.
Just to be clear: you want us to give you evidence of the CCP's vast censorship apparatus / political prisoners / current mass incarceration/cultural genocide of Uighur people?
Don't need to dig very deep to find any of that.
So your point is that people may have jumped the gun on social credit? Sure, maybe; but this is the first roll-out of what appears to be a totalitarian monitoring system, and people are just making an educated guess based on past CCP behavior. Even your article is a year old already (it's now being used to deny people train tickets and your score can be impacted by your political 'correctness'; doesn't take a genius to see where this is going).
Also, you're right: US foreign policy was a big pile of shit during the Bush years and they weaponized and debased liberal democracy, and color revolutions were a thing. Does that make all democratic aspiration around the world a 'color revolution,' for the rest of human history?
Do you seriously need me to provide sources that China is an authoritarian state that engages in massive internet and media censorship with regards to sensitive political issues?
Here is for instance a press freedom ranking from the NGO Reporters Beyond Borders:
As you can see China ranks 177 out of 180 countries, just beaten by three renowned totalitarian states (Turkmenistan, North Korea and Eritrea). If you do really think that the US engages in censorship on the same level, I am sorry to say that the burden of proof is on you.
why do you need sources if you're positing that the US does the same thing as China?
Xi would be almost 100 by then. It's pretty hard to tell what will happen in mainland China within that time.
I'm not american, and hardly an ardent flagwaving supporter of the US. China is committing atrocities right now, with Hong Kong only being one of a long list of transgressions, and deserves to be both criticised and held accountable.
User banned (1 week): leading thread derail, whataboutism over multiple posts in this thread
Hey, they're the one who stated they were facts
The US is relevant because they are literally involved in these protests and have a vested interest in causing trouble in the PRC. Do you not think that they'll be promoting the Hong Kong protests as much as possible in order to help destabilise the PRC? Why is the same amount of attention not given to the protests in Haiti, for example? I'm not saying people should just blindly believe everything but to at least have a critical eye to the sources and what narrative they'll want to promote
And you should also be cautious about drinking up the counter-narrative of vast US color revolution conspiracy around the world, which authoritarians everywhere now use to completely delegitimize any and all internal push for political reform. You rob the people of HK of all agency, and it's simplistic as shit. So basically the decade-or-so of political rumblings in Hong Kong (education reform, Occupy Central, and now this) are all a NED-masterminded color revolution?
Great critical thinking!
Its telling that he responded to my post about how he is a sea lion while ignoring posts like Rasgalen's post with the reporter's freedom rankings. Give me sources cries the sea lion, but does not read or respond the sources. A sea lion doesn't actually want to learn, they just want to drain your energy.
so like having a critical eye for globalreserach.ca?
Perhaps you should be more critical of your sources as well, which is basically just a blog by a guy in Thailand.
You post a link to a conspiracy website and then ask others to have a critical eye to their sources. Well done.
To be fair the thrust of the argument was from a WaPo article that was cited, but yes.
You forgot Inner Mongolia (everyone always forgets inner mongolia T-T)
It's always funny to see China whataboutists point the finger at US intervention and cry orientalism when active western solidarity is explicitly what many Hong Kong democrats are lobbying for on the international stage, alongside US/British/etc. citizens from the diaspora who fled Chinese tyranny and are expressly, democratically pressuring their own representatives at home. Ooh, scary US imperialism! Ooh, scary British colonial nostalgia! Come off it, you fools. Chinese control over the past twenty years has been far more interventionist and oppressive of the local culture than either of those have ever been.
Hong Kong is a beacon of civic nationalism where an affinity with the west over values, fairness, and governance trumps an affinity with the narrow Han ethno-nationalist vision of the PRC where they preen their sense of entitlement to the totality of the region's rich, diverse, and vibrant cultural heritage. China would very much like everyone to forget and deny that the British intellectual inheritance that built modern HK, inculcating a belief in due process and a free press, is an inextricable part of the city's history and identity. Bollocks to that. Hong Kong expresses western liberal ideals better than the west itself, and the west should stand with it. We should have the moral conviction to be causing trouble for the PRC. "Western influence = bad" might fly with hegemonic Chinese ethnic nationalists and gullible others with simplistic, one-size-fits-all ideas about colonialism, but Hong Kong democrats see right through that nonsense and know what's up. They know who's the real imperialist in the room.
I've actually been impressed with how little of that argument we've seen here up to this point given some of the fashionable anti-west anti-liberalism we often see around these parts. Instead, I've been heartened to see a more or less unequivocal unity, and not just here on this silly video game forum. Maybe because anybody with an informed look at this understands that the fight for liberty and democracy in HK is not a left/right issue in our narrow local terms, and is in fact a strong reminder of what we, in the west, like to imagine are the ideals we have in common with our political opponents.
Very well said. I allowed myself a bit of optimism yesterday as well. As someone who has been watching these trends unfold for a while now, the sudden pushback against the growing culture of self-censorship in Western orgs/companies came as a pleasant surprise. It's also stark how this is apparently something the left and right can agree on, at least when it comes to our own entities dropping supposed core values and throwing the HK people under the bus in the process.
I just hope that the response remains laser-focused on the CCP as a political entity, because they're going to be doing everything possible to cast ongoing events in racial/nationalist terms.
OP
OP
Thanks for the no comment
Blizzard knows that their only two options are to go into full sweep-under-the-rug mode or grow a spine and stop bending backwards to appease China. They will never have anything valuable to say if they're not willing to do the latter, and there's absolutely no evidence that they will ever do the latter.
So Blizzard will remain quiet, stomp out all possible protest wherever they have control, take a shit over their own core values, and pray that people just move on and forget.
Anyone who thinks Blizzcon will be run this year with live Q&As is delusional. There's a non-zero chance that Blizzcon 2019 will be outright cancelled if this shitshow doesn't calm down, and there's no evidence of it calming down.
They could just ask people to tell their question to the person holding the microphone, who will ask it for them to prevent last minute switches. But I agree it will probably be too much hassle.
Yup. Very disappointed in Taliesen and Eviatel as I fully expected them of all people to comment on this.
Thanks for the addition. I do not know a lot about the situation in Inner Mongolia with regards to Chinese politics, but I would love to know more. :)
the casters doing the interview were also fired and that seems to have gone under the radar. Unfortunately I feel for them the most, blitzchung was prepared for the fallout but the casters got fired for being in proximity to him. Heartbreaking video of one of the caster's talking about how he has been completely blacklisted and can't cast anymore.
"Just a reminder that the title is not a literal translation of what has been said in the vid, but the idea does follow.
The caster's name is M.Yee. He has worked very hard to get to where he is today. He is mainly an Overwatch caster who also casts Hearthstone and WOW. Very talented and the HearthstoneTW stream's audience absolutely loves him.
In the video he said that he prepared a ton for this weekend's Overwatch Pacific Showdown (as well as the HS Grandmasters Playoffs, needless to say) but it seems like he will not be casting Overwatch anymore either. He finds the situation very sad; years of cultivating his passion and hardwork may just be gone in vain.
This response from the fired caster absolutely broke my heart."
Incredibly pathetic and horrible state of affairs all around.
"Just a reminder that the title is not a literal translation of what has been said in the vid, but the idea does follow.
The caster's name is M.Yee. He has worked very hard to get to where he is today. He is mainly an Overwatch caster who also casts Hearthstone and WOW. Very talented and the HearthstoneTW stream's audience absolutely loves him.
In the video he said that he prepared a ton for this weekend's Overwatch Pacific Showdown (as well as the HS Grandmasters Playoffs, needless to say) but it seems like he will not be casting Overwatch anymore either. He finds the situation very sad; years of cultivating his passion and hardwork may just be gone in vain.
This response from the fired caster absolutely broke my heart."
Incredibly pathetic and horrible state of affairs all around.
Make China bend. Call all their bluffs. That regime needs all this entertainment for the masses, to keep them distracted. They can't kick them all out or the public will get mad at them for taking away their toys. China is all bark imo. I bet even the NBA starts getting broadcast there again despite the Leagues support for free speech. The only tool they know is fear. Fear of losing business, fear of persecution, fear of imprisonment. Push back and I bet they yield.
Taliesin and Eviatel were firmly on Blizzard's side on every issue ever, as far as I can remember. They'd be the last I would expect to criticize Blizzard in any way.
Shes more of a general Blizzard personality and not even a youtuber in the regular sense anymore, but Tradechat has been incredibly vocal of her disappointment at blizzard regarding this.
It is amazing to me it took the NBA and Blizzard to get people to talk about how much China has been silencing companies out of fear to lose their markets.
This has been happening for a while now, but people don't care until it affects their interest.
Nobody should believe the west (US and EU) has any good intentions when it comes to HK. They actively support an apartheid state, a terrorist state bombing civilians, nobody cared about Myanmar and the rohingya Muslims...
HK is a complicated situation since HK was given to China (thanks UK) and China doesn't like separatist movements. China is well known for not having any regards for the well-being of their people. If anything the west should support descalation and have a round table to try an reach agreements. Give China the chance to look good (We know they like to bribe about how modern they are) by releasing protesters and ensuring a peaceful agreement.
This has been happening for a while now, but people don't care until it affects their interest.
Nobody should believe the west (US and EU) has any good intentions when it comes to HK. They actively support an apartheid state, a terrorist state bombing civilians, nobody cared about Myanmar and the rohingya Muslims...
HK is a complicated situation since HK was given to China (thanks UK) and China doesn't like separatist movements. China is well known for not having any regards for the well-being of their people. If anything the west should support descalation and have a round table to try an reach agreements. Give China the chance to look good (We know they like to bribe about how modern they are) by releasing protesters and ensuring a peaceful agreement.
J Allen Brack is spineless. Knowing he's just a puppet for Activision it's going to be some stupid comment like "we do believe in players voice when done in constructive ways how we want"
It's a lot harder to find news coming out of Inner Mongolian cause China's pretty good at censoring them, here in the states you'll find them protesting along with the Tibetans in front of the Chinese embassy here in NYC from time to time.
Good. Still, havent seen anything from Taliesen, Pyromancer, Preacher, SignsofKelani, the lady with the pink hair (I forget her name sorry) etc
Or Rhykker although he is a Diablo guy.
Thijs the popular HS streamer's chat was heavily censored today. I unfollowed. At least Kripp let people speak in his chat. Thijs just banned all mention of China. Coward.
Brian Kibler, one of the bigger streamers, and casters (hired by Blizz many times to cast), is one of the first big names to speak out. He is also stepping away from any casting duty due to Blizzards actions.
- Status