If ~2-3 corporations control the speech, and they censor it according to their arbitrary whim and what the US government dictates as 'fake news' as the government wields the hammer of 'inquiries' that could lead to potential gigantic fines, even breakup over their heads, its the exact same thing with China's censorship.
The US government does not directly censor - it just 'outsources' the censorship to the 'free market' which has to do what the government wants or they will face inquiries, fines, regulations, break up or even persecution of their executives.
The same approach is employed in every other forms of repression and enforcement in US society too: The government does not repress people directly when they use their free speech dangerously. It just gets the police to enforce 'local ordinances' and then the courts make short work of the protesters by imposing fines on them for irrelevant things. Like how Occupy protesters were fined tens of thousands of dollars for 'trespassing' on PUBLIC property. No one's free speech was repressed. Its just that they were hooked up with fines and debt that will have them shut up and keep working like an indentured servant for decades to come in order to be able to pay those fines and debts.
> concentration camps
China does not have concentration camps. We, in the rest of the world have fed up with the constant smears and lies that the US media directs against the enemy they target. Each of our countries have passed from the same smear machine's target sights at least once in the past 60 years. The very fac that you are able to repeat such a smear on the public Internet without hesitating for even a second tells how strong is the censorship and control of 'free speech' in the US and its satellites.
Its not even 20 years after the tale of nonexistent Iraqi WMDS. You people still buy what is sold to you unquestioningly and ironically assert that you have 'free speech'.
One does not even need to mention the doublespeak of other countries having 'concentration camps', where in the US, actual slave labor are just called 'the private prison system'. The former 'concentration camp' de-radicalizes actual head-cutting terrorists, teaches them sciences, trades, and reintegrates them to the society as productive members free of charge. The latter just incarcerates people for trivial reasons to use them slave labor for their life. But the former is a 'rights problem'. Not the latter. You just 'rephrase' slavery differently, and its not slavery.
> They want to sell ads, not dominate the world.
They are appendages of the establishment that has over 800 military bases around the world. Especially around the targeted countries like China. So save that 'not wanting to dominate the world' thing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xinjiang_internment_camps
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/04/12/surviving-the-...
> its the exact same thing with China's censorship.
No, it's not. In a location with adequate free speech protections, posting content against the ruling government's agenda would not by itself cause the poster to face incarceration or worse, even if it is a sensitive topic.
Both of the above links (and all of HN) are inaccessible in China without a VPN, and the Great Firewall makes most VPNs and anti-censorship services extremely unreliable in China through heavy throttling and connection resetting.
> posting content against the ruling government's agenda would not by itself cause the poster to face incarceration or worse
Neither in China nor anywhere else posting anything against the government's 'agenda' does anything unless one is backed by NED. At most you get your post deleted.
> Its not even 20 years after the tale of nonexistent Iraqi WMDS. You people still buy what is sold to you unquestioningly and ironically assert that you have 'free speech'.
Look at this. Here you are on a US website, free to post critical things about the US government with no fear of being put in jail or re-educated.
Why don’t you go to China and post on Weibo about Tiennamen Square and then come back and tell me again how they are the same.
Is your office in US State Dept. building?
> Here you are on a US website, free to post critical things about the US government with no fear of being put in jail or re-educated.
A lot of Americans who have been kidnapped via 'rendition flights' and tortured for decades would disagree.
> Why don’t you go to China and post on Weibo about Tiennamen Square
Chinese people do that. Nothing happens unless they are backed by NED or they lie.
In contrast, why dont you start posting about the latest US foreign policy initiative and try finding out how much it will affect your life?
