I don’t understand how people here can be sold on the idea that the mega-rich use their wealth to corrupt institutions but can’t believe that Chinese billionaires could possibly be using influence to better themselves at the expense of the working class. Surely Mr. Make-Everyone-Work-12-Hours isn’t using his massive accumulated resources to corrupt any facet of Chinese governance. What level of cognitive dissonance is required to believe that he “earned” his wealth, in a socialist country no less.

I’ve found that people here are passionate in their hatred of capitalism and the unlimited ways it makes life worse for nearly every living thing on the planet, and that’s great. Then they’re told that socialism/communism is the answer that the other people who hate capitalism already accept so now they’ve got something to build an identity around. And once that happens it’s nigh impossible to convince them that China or even Russia is doing some heinous shit too because at some point the notion that “since the imperialists are awful, the socialists are perfect” became part of their DNA.

It’s no different thatn someone who sees the horrendous words and actions of America’s Republican party so they become a rabid Democratic, furiously defending anyone with a (D) next to their name. It’s the same polarization but it feels like the right kind to people because socialistis/communists are always the little guys and underdogs in every fight.

Instead of using something closer to the scientific method to learn and iterate on all good ideas from history, the “real leftists” like the one who dismissed my last comment and told me to read theory takes the Communist Manifesto - published 175 years ago - more as an immutable religious text instead of the start of sussing out some good ideas.

Anywho, vote down my comment because I didn’t say how amazing it must be to live in China and even questioned that the socialism itself is imperfect and subject to corruption as we see time and again from - you guessed it - China.