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Business At The Price Of Freedom
An anonymous reader writes "The TechZone has an article on how much technology companies setting up shops in China have to kowtow to the Chinese government. All the major search engines have given in to Chinese demands to throttle liberty in exchange for access to the Chinese market and Microsoft has blocked users of its MSN site from using the terms 'freedom,' 'democracy' and other concepts China has designated as dangerous. From the article: 'Most disconcerting are recent reports that Yahoo!'s Hong Kong operation is turning over emails which helped convict a reporter. Journalist Shi Tao was jailed and sentenced to 10 years in prison for "illegally sending state secrets abroad." The secrets that he revealed were information his newspaper received from the state propaganda department about how they could cover the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. He was identified because he had used Yahoo!'s free email service for which Yahoo! turned over log files to authorities that were later tracked back to his computer.'"
If you don't like it, don't use them. You do have a choice, you know.
Striking fear in the authors of godawful fanfiction, I am here, appearing in darkness, Tuxedo Jack!
The companies that are already in China know how to work with the government. They're not going to do anything stupid.
This seems like a warning message to companies like Google and Microsoft, who in recent events expressed interest in targeting China (in a marketing, not tactical, sense). Will these large corporations fall flat on their face when they move into China?
In America we don't kowtow to the government, we bend over and grab our ankles.
How about US corporations cooperating with CALEA (all wiretaps, all the time), broadcasters knuckling down on popular entertainment figures for fear of reprisals from the FCC, and ISPs who almost always say "we are cooperating fully with authorities," code for "we're not going to challenge the dodgy search warrant (or the fact that there's none at all), but will turn over subscriber records at the drop of a hat to avoid abusive regulators getting tough on us over other issues if we don't play ball. Other examples, anyone?
Everybody's a libertarian 'till their neighbour's becomes a crack house.
What is so interesting is these businesses are operating in direct opposition to the position of the Presidend of the United States. His position is to forward democracy and democratic values. These businesses are supporting just the opposite. I wonder what the president will do about this.
This is the same ole shit. Just like when all these companies supported Apartheid in South Africa. And China supports oppresive regimes in Africa now.
Do we really want our debt financed by China? What type of barganing power does this give them over us while our economy is so fragile?
There was a recent article on the same topic in SF chronicle.
One of the compelling argument was "If the Chinese custom is to make children work or to kill women, you wouldn't do it," said Julien Pain, head of the Internet Freedom Desk at Reporters Without Borders.
I wonder where should the line be drawn.
95% of all sigs are made up.
If ever the US government took a sharp turn towards authoritarianism, we can assume that no large US corporation would take a stand against it. In fact, these will be the first organizations to tow the line, like the spineless Iraqi politicians who, while dissidents were being led out and shot by Hussein, responded by standing up and declaring their allegience.
IBM's role in the holocaust had nothing to do with a shared ideal with Nazism, and everything to do with the fact that dirty money spends just as well as anything.
And there's usually more of it.
Since when in this modern production age hasn't this been the case? China had almost always had "Most Favored Nation" trading status with us, even when their tank treads were rolling over protesting college students.
And while American corporations MAY want access to their markets now that they are growing as consumers, were that market not growing, corporations would be perfectly happy to only exploit the Chinese labor force to make cheaper widgets.
Once again showing that the US could give a RATS ASS about democracy. All ourt leaders care about is serving their corporate masters and opening foreign markets to exploitation.
Ignore Alien Orders
I would be worried if China even acted like a "free country", but they don't. They are pretty open with the idea that they are restricting speech on the Internet, they aren't hiding it.
Now, OTOH, my country claims to be free - and it isn't. Your examples show this fact. So, let's stop talking about China and start talking about something we might be able to change: America
Get your Unix fortune now!
Actually the stock holders are probably pleased with this behavior. Business is not about people, it's about money. Playing nice with the Chinese government, no matter how ridiculous it is to the rest of the world, means tapping into a rich, delicate market. It means more money. More money = happy stock holders.
The only "real" way to protest against China's disregard for honest society, would be to go to war with them and eliminate those responsible for this disgusting mistreatment of human beings. Now, are we really going to start a war to solve someone else's problems ? No. The revolution has to start from within. If the chinese population wants to see change, they'll have to do it themselves.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Right, Americans are dying everyday, but no one asked them to come. It is the same in China. Believe it or not, but most Chinese stand behind the government in principle.
There will be a day when China is ready for democracy, but that is still ahead of us. When the day comes, the instruments (Google and other Internet tools) will be in place to facilitate the regime shift.
Today, our goal is to tie China as tightly as we can to the rest of the world, so as to make it inevitable that democracy is on the roadmap. That is why we want to see Beijing host the olympics. That is why we want China in the WTO. That is why we want Amurcan and other Western companies having a strong presence in China.
To spell it out: democracy in prez-speak means freedom for corporations to make money. Democratic values is the value of being able to make money without being hampered too much. You see, those damn Arabs don't buy much of our stuff, so we need to bring democracy to them.
Okay, a bit over the top this, but the point is that from the US point of view, business comes first, democratic values come second. This has always been the case, and I don't see a change under the current administration. You don't think that the American benevolence towards Iraq has nothing to do with the fact that Iraq is important for business? Unlike, say Sudan?
Actually, what I don't understand is this:
It's okay to do business in communist China where they have plenty of nukes and seem quite willing to go nuts on us at any moment and we decry their terrible human rights record. But it's not alright to do business in communist Cuba where they couldn't realistically harm a fly without foreign help.
And yeah, the same thing is often done in the states that happened in China (which doesn't justify what happened in China as Yahoo! should have some base set of ethics and morals for their company to run by and those shouldn't be given up just because it's the way things are in a certain region) - but the difference is that the Chinese are godless communists. It's okay of an (all but officially) Christian Republic democracy does so.
Remember, only a country that pledges their allegiance to a flag and god can be trusted with safely ignoring your freedom!
Parent is not insightful at all. It's flamebait that the Slashdot audience agrees with, just like random anti-Microsoft bashing.
Not everyone wants the "freedom" that the American military is exporting. Look at Iraq now for example. The constitution that they came up with is certainly not at all what the Americans wanted. Pure and simple, Iraqis don't want the "freedom" the Americans have. They want to live by their Islamic law. So let them. If you force "freedom" on Iraq, it is becomes something far more sinister; imperialism. Saying that the Americans need to export "freedom," where freedom is their particular implementation of it that the rest of the world may not agree with, is equivalent to saying that the Americans are better than everyone else and needs to take care of them. Wait, we've heard this line of reasoning before; it's the classic "White Man's Burden" argument for Europeans to justify conquering Africa, and it's been discredited already. The situation in China is similar; American media reports on the matter are heavily skewed and are not to be relied upon.
Students in China did not "die for freedom" in Tian'an men Square. This is a Western myth. They were mere puppets, and their strings were being pulled by crime organizations and Western governments. Quite simply, the Western governments wished to topple the Chinese government, just like they did to the USSR. Look at what has happened to Russia. Obviously it's better for Americans that the USSR is not there anymore, but Russia has been in a shithole for the last 15 years, and is only beginning to climb out of it. Put another way, those students were traitors. And do your research; we gave them plenty of opportunities to stand down, and they refused. They weren't even unarmed; they had taken over a munitions truck that was supposed to protect the people inside Zhong Nan Hai (the government complex). The western coverage of the incident was so biased that it is totally unreliable.
It's been repeated over and over that one doesn't need to be clean to make money. There's no need to even make the opposite argument.
There will be a day when China is ready for democracy, but that is still ahead of us. When the day comes, the instruments (Google and other Internet tools) will be in place to facilitate the regime shift.
The point about companies like Yahoo restricting content and reporting dissent is that at some point, the Internet *won't* be able to assist in facilitating a regime shift. The American revolution was brought about, among other things, by people distributing inflamitory pamphlets. Guess what? Despotic regimes now tightly control printed media. The newspapers won't be bringing China to revolution any time soon, and if you don't watch out, the Internet will lose that capability as well.
"Because Science" is one step from "Because old book". Try "Because of my experiment testing my falsifiable assertion".
I'm an American born Chinese whose parents are from Taiwan. I have friends who are Chinese from China who've moved here, and I'll be damned if all of them oppose the Chinese government.
Sure, you've got a large number of people in China who want democracy, who want elected officials and a say in government. But you've also got a large number of people that are either so caught up in nationalism to notice or sincerely don't believe it's that bad. For a change from totalitarianism to democracy to occur, the idea of change has to be internally ubiquitous.
When you've got a Chinese telling me that the Taiwanese form of government is worse than the Chinese form of government, we've got a problem here. Although the Taiwanese form of government may not be perfect, especially in its beginnings, at least officials are elected by the people, at least it's a multi-party system, and wow, there isn't this rampant totalitarian censorship and control exerted over the people.
When you've got people pointing to the Chinese legislature as a legitimate form of legislature, that's a problem. A one-party legislature is not legitimate, it's a pathetic excuse.
When you've got people saying that there should be a balance between control and freedom (which isn't false at all - for instance, you don't have the freedom to murder) and pointing to CHINA as an example of this, we have a problem. Especially when that same person cites the PATRIOT Act as a problem in the United States.
When you've got people failing to recognize that China is rampant with censorship and has a foreign policy that's worse as ours (Tibet, anyone?), that's a problem. They simply fail to recognize this as a human rights violation. Yet when we bomb Iraqi civilians, they're completely opposed to it, citing human rights. So when the United States kills people it's wrong but when China does it's not? Bullshit. Nationalism at it's peak.
These aren't conservative or totalitarianistic-thinking people either. In America's terms, they'd be considered liberal. It's just when it comes to the subject of China, they're automatically in support.
And it's so hard to show them how absurd this mode of thinking is.
Right now, I have little confidence in the Chinese people to change their government. I also have little confidence in foreign nations to have the ability to change the Chinese government. Not only that, I oppose any attempt by any nation other than China itself to change the Chinese government. Change must come from within. And it doesn't seem like it's coming anytime soon. Tienmen Square shut dissenters up pretty damn good.
You can't blame Yahoo or Google for complying with the Chinese government. If they don't comply, guess what? They're going to be blocked from China. Lot of good that'll do then, right? All those websites about democracy are going to do the Chinese real good if they can't even get there. At least with search query censorship, a clever search may yield good results. When blocking the entire search engine, that whole mode of finding information is lost.
Students in China did not "die for freedom" in Tian'an men Square. This is a Western myth. They were mere puppets, and their strings were being pulled by crime organizations and Western governments.
I see we have a Maoist in the audience. Is any movement against authoritarian government simply a tool of Western imperialists? Is wanting other people to enjoy the same rights under a liberal democracy that we in the USA have cultural chauvinism? Do you not believe in the concept of universal human rights? While we're on this subject, what's your opinion on the case discussed in the article?
I'm frankly sick and tired of hearing this moral relativism applied to human rights. Islamic law as currently practiced in, say, Iran, allows the government to execute you for consensual adult sex. China just threw someone in jail for exposing government propaganda and routinely tortures religious minorities. I don't think it's bigoted or imperialist of me to say that these actions are awful and immoral. I don't think we should invade them, but I will do everything I can to promote alternatives, and that includes boycotting any company that supports such totalitarianism.
Look at what has happened to Russia. Obviously it's better for Americans that the USSR is not there anymore, but Russia has been in a shithole for the last 15 years, and is only beginning to climb out of it.
Seventy years of communism followed by fifteen years of rampant corruption will do that to a nation. If the US hadn't won the Cold War the way it did Russia would have collapsed on its own anyway thanks to their ridiculous economic system and intellectually bankrupt leadership. (Of course, Bush may do the same for us.)
Put another way, those students were traitors. And do your research; we gave them plenty of opportunities to stand down, and they refused.
Since we have freedom of assembly and speech in our country, the idea that a mass demonstration against the government constitutes treason is a little hard to swallow. In fact, our constitution states that the government is responsible to the people, not the other way around. I know there are plenty of people here who'd like to see antiwar demonstrators rounded up and shot, but we have laws against that, unlike China. What's your excuse for the persecution of the Falun Gong and Christians in China? Are they traitors too?