• starman2112@sh.itjust.works
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    1 month ago

    Lmao “free speech that doesn’t threaten the government is tolerated everywhere”

    This statement would still be true if you were talking about Oceania. It’s totally meaningless. Who decides what speech threatens the government? The government. I can say fuck Joe Biden, fuck Donald Trump, and fuck every member of Congress and the Supreme Court. Can you point me towards someone living in China who’s comfortable openly saying “fuck Xi Jinping?”

    • OurToothbrush@lemmy.ml
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      1 month ago

      Who decides what speech threatens the government? The government.

      Uhuh. In other words, governments restrict speech that they think threatens them.

      I can say fuck Joe Biden, fuck Donald Trump, and fuck every member of Congress and the Supreme Court. Can you point me towards someone living in China who’s comfortable openly saying “fuck Xi Jinping?”

      First off, how many Chinese people have you actually talked to? You know there are Chinese people on the internet that you can talk to, right? And foreign exchange students? You can even visit the country if you want.

      And yes, you’re free to say things that don’t actually threaten the US, like saying fuck Trump or Fuck Biden. You’re allowed to be as ineffectual as you’d like. Compare your statements to all the black lives matter organizers who’ve been found to commit suicide by bullets to the back of the head or public hanging from trees.

      • starman2112@sh.itjust.works
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        1 month ago

        I haven’t actually met or talked to a lot of Chinese people, on account of not speaking the language, and the Great Firewall. I wonder why that’s there

        You’ve acknowledged that I’m allowed to say things that don’t actually threaten the US government. Does comparing Xi Jinping to Winnie the Pooh actually threaten the Chinese government?

        • OurToothbrush@lemmy.ml
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          1 month ago

          You know plenty of Chinese people speak English right? And Chinese citizens can pretty trivially bypass the firewall, the point of the firewall is protectionism for China’s tech sector.