矛⋅盾

since Electric Antifada was mentioned earlier… ok so I’m not super familiar with them and I’m not pointing fingers at them specifically, just English-language news media overall, but - maybe a bit conspiracy theory-brained of me, but - I’m questioning where this wave is coming from. China and Russia have been nothing but consistent, and really this is nothing unusual, especially to people who have been actually paying attention and ability to remember milestone events.

the tumblrinas I’ve seen buoy the “China and Russia are traitors” thing have been, yes, the usual suspects (anticommunist leftists/people with “tankie” as a pejorative in their vocab, tho lately they’ve been nitpicking since I guess they now identify as ‘tankie’ and been using “chinese/russian nationalists” as their pejorative, and just straight-up leftcoms) but among them are people who I distinctly recall espousing afro-pessimism* and calling other tumblr users from the periphery (particularly latam) “antiblack” for using the word “usamerican” (to distinguish US americans from other people who live in both continents) – and for a long time I’ve suspected these people to be plants at worst but more likely convenient stooges to vector anticommunism and disunity - against budding communists in the imperial core to make connections with those either more seasoned or from the periphery. UGH, name-calling is just such an easy way to shut down peoples’ brains and stop them from turning on analysis functions and critical thinking or even just looking for sources.

*uh oh I’m feeling ranty again… alright. you’ve been warned. afropessimism. whenever and wherever I bump into it, it makes me feel like im going insane, like these people will go onto xiaohongshu and tell chinese people they’re all racist against black people because they think chinese people are basically white which automatically makes them antiblack, , antiblackness is king, it’s above all and it’s immutable, but also it’s incomparable to racism that nonblack people experience and because they could never intimately understand or experience real true racism at the heart of this world which is antiblackness. please, tell me more about how oppressed peoples of the world could never understand each other and should be forever divided, until maybe some world savior perhaps of the black variety instead of white comes to liberate us all. did i ever mention that afropessimists hate marxism for some reason, hm, maybe that’s by design!! maybe, just maybe someone doesn’t want a Black Panther Party 2.0, reading ML literature and all, to come back in the heartland of imperialism (edit for moderation: black struggles are real and hard! and yes I can’t say I fully understand because I don’t live it but it doesn’t mean I or any other nonblack folk can’t try to understand, including understanding enough to make a difference, and nor is it the struggle that has primacy over all others)

I’m of the opinion (echoing analysis I’ve seen recently but can’t remember who said it, sorry) that a veto in this particular case is actually worse than abstaining because

1. playing field for diplomacy is and must be states as the entities - if you go with smaller factions organized in forms that aren’t recognizable as such to an international body, we get into shit and muddied fields such as enemies making deals diplomacy etc with separatist groups. Palestinian resistance groups are many and not exactly cohesive as acting as one state-resembling unit and while the 2024 Beijing Declaration had got many of them together, right now most of the international body still sees the Palestinian Authority, which we know are collaborationist with the Zionist entity, as the defacto representative of Palestine. Sticking with the principle of doing diplomacy with states as the actor-entities, aligns with China’s steadfast and consistent call for the Two-State solution. This is a thing that has been unpopular since Day 0 with the pro-Palestine crowd in the western left (who I think see the word “solution” and think that would be the end of it and that Palestine would mire in perpetual genocidal relation with its neighbor like Armenia-Azerbaijan, rather than statehood being a very powerful tool!), something I think is quite relevant to this whole shebang. All that as a preface to say, the responsibility and burden to free Palestine should ALSO rest with their neighbors, their cultural brethren-Arab nations. It would be paternalistic/patronizing and against the spirit of respecting other nations’ sovereignty (foundational to anti-imperialism) - which would include what happens in ones’ neighborhood - to VETO when other Arab states in MENA have voted FOR this plan - HI ALGERIA!!! If more MENA states would have shown up for AGAINST then China and Russia would have more reason to back that consensus and VETO. And in everything but especially in the arena of diplomacy, China (and Russia) cannot simply decide they represent the will of anyone other than themselves including MENA, including Arab nations, including Palestinians. IDK maybe I’m stupid but I think principles with very good reasons should be upheld AND it’s not a betrayal because literally the UN/UNSC isn’t the only playing field omg because…
2. …obviously China and Russia have more material and meaningful ways to support Palestine outside of the UN/UNSC
3. even if the proposal clearly penned by the US that ‘passed’ is vague and only reports infrequently (iirc it calls for yearly stats reported to the UN/UNSC/appropriate division i think its just called BoP), that’s still better than them going ahead with their nefarious plans completely behind closed doors in the dark.

the rock I live under has a time dilation device preinstalled (non-negotiable, un-tinker-able), what about you?

regarding China, I recommend the articles & education pages that Qiao Collective has collated (and some of their larger ones are stuffed full of credible sources including ones from western media for those still skeptical). The 101 for socialism with chinese characteristics (under /education) is pretty good.

I’m sorry none of these are short, however.

However I also don’t think short quips without sourcing are good for dispelling short generalizations like “expansionism==imperialist”(for that specifically, gotta point to Grandad Lenin’s Imperialism The Highest Stage of Capitalism, to explain/define rather than to correlate by appearances*, right. And also that, the last expansion/border skirmish of China was almost 50 years ago, so China=expansionism==imperialist doesn’t even work – unless the people you’re talking to are considering Taiwan not part of China, which Taiwan doesn’t even agree - only recently has there been a TW separatism movement. Actually, thinking about it, western propaganda regarding China and painting it as “expansionist” is a good segue back to Qiao Collective. They have good resources particularly for the balkanization/separatism claims of parts of China including but not limited to HK, Taiwan, Xinjiang"“East Turkmenistan”", Tibet, and also explainers for BRI also – my tldr for BRI is that it’s a multitool that does many things in regards to anti-imperialism, from eroding US dollar hegemony to assisting materially in development for underdeveloped places)

*I know it’s sisyphean talking to western leftists and even newbie commies but. god. why is it so common for people’s understanding of imperialism being, like, aesthetic. Imperialism is when bigger country does anything with/to another smaller country. By virtue of power imbalance, there wasn’t real consent it means the smaller party was coerced. Expansionism means not just territory acquisition it also means spreading influence and making allies. It’s frankly absurd.

I’ve been too busy to engage that much in social media these days. I’ve mentioned it offhand before but usually my main haunt is tumblr and I’ve made many “mutuals” (friends, I suppose) with communists(many whose stripes arent super apparent, but I thought I’ve been good at filtering out hohxaists trots and generally leftcoms) and leftists (mainly the anti-imperialist sort, avoid the anarchists and anticivs, naturally) - most of them lgbt - from both imperial core and periphery.

Anyways I’ve been relatively inactive(by my metrics) over there for about a month but had some more time than usual yesterday and, well, I shouldn’t be so so surprised but turns out a lot of my mutuals (and I’ve very selective about who I decide to follow) who I thought were more ML really showing their leftcom colors in regards to the recent UNSC vote regarding Palestine. I’ve even got one calling anyone who “defends” China anything from “Chinese nationalists(bad)” to “traitors to internationalism” to “actually you’re a Zionist”… very disappointed. Emotionally charged idealism over materialism (<- to be fair this is also common in Chinese social media too. maybe these tumblr leftcoms might be surprised that a lot of people they would denounce as “chinese nationalists” are unhappy with how conservative Chinese diplomacy is, and have been very upset about restraint in open direct support to Palestine - though lately of course their attentions have largely been on Japan wanting to (re)annex Taiwan - but I digress)

(Context:yes Hamas asked China and Russia for a veto in UNSC. Correction below. China and Russia abstained. But if even Algeria and other Arab states who are actually in the same region would not vote against TRUST then why should China be expected to go against the consensus of the other Arab states in the area? Why should anyone expect China to turn into interventionist-style diplomacy, USA-style but communist?)

IDK, maybe I’m belittling what’s happening but, why would anyone care That much about the farce/kayfabe/circus that is the UN/UNSC. Why does that feel like it’s SUPER BIG to them and why have they literally forgotten things like the 2024 Beijing Declaration or brokering and re-establishing relations between Saudi and Iran, i dunno, like the Real diplomacy in MENA (which, surprise surprise, should include MENA states involved. emphasis states, unfortunately, that’s the playing field). Why do western leftists get all the excuses when we have failed to reduce/eliminate support for the settler colonial project and literal weapon shipments to Israel but when China doesn’t show their cards in the circus lions den and none of the other Arab states don’t show either, suddenly aww China is a comprador, China is selfish, is imperialist collaborator (bwuh???), BRI is imperialism with chinese characteristics (if China doesnt bleed herself out in order to uplift global south nations then it’s not anti-imperialist, or at least, it’s not anti-imperialist enough), China is ~ Zionist ~ (lmao???), China is supplying a genocide (supposedly this statement is because China continues to trade with Israel, and has contracts building civilian port infrastructure. but??!? literally what are we doing here, running the NYT Atlantic? applying zionist logic that civilian infrastructure is also military infrastructure and legit war targets? US/West is supplying the weapons and tech. China does not sell or provide Israel with weapons). I can’t believe I’ve seen all these things come out of self-id’d anti-imperialist communists the last two days. That said, it’s only a portion of people, plenty of comrades have been reasonable about it.

Anyway, I’m glad to not see that kind of nonsense discourse appear here. Thanks for reading my small rant

edit: nvm lol. everyone’s acting like Russia and China voted FOR if they didn’t veto (they both abstained). anyway you can actually read what China has said about their reasonings here instead of thinking or saying frankly weird stuff like “china is zionist”

2nd edit/correction: this is on me for not seeking primary sources and just relying on what the naysayers were saying. Palestinian groups did not ask for it to be vetoed specifically, but asked for it to be condemned and an alternative put forth (Russia is doing that/has penned one) and yes Russia and China both abstained and condemned it. Now I’m even more confused why people were so mad. PFLP’s statement | I can’t find a definitive statement BEFORE the vote was called from Hamas - if anyone has it, please point me to it thanks

and have major issues bringing them back down to Earth also.

I’m not fully versed on TCM but as chinese diaspora/being casually exposed to parts of it, I know it’s some serious stuff (as in, definitely has effects. that I have personally experienced…) and it’s not “Just” “traditional” (connotation: some ancient rites that have never changed or evolved in use/practice). Also my layman understanding is that TCM and general culture regarding health/healthcare is that TCM is more preventative in nature, while attitudes about western (“modern”) medicine is that it’s for ailments/conditions that require immediate attention or reactive in nature… Additionally it’s important to note that TCM and western medicine aren’t in conflict, or at least it’s discouraged for people to believe that TCM is superior or should be the sole mode of healthcare to follow, if that makes sense (I have to note this because in the west I believe it’s very common for pseudoscientific/cultish “alternative medicine” to purport that all of modern medicine is bogus or unreliable while their alternative practice is superior).

Also I don’t have links on hand but iirc there have been modern scientific medical research into aspects of TCM, such as acupuncture being better than placebo for specific conditions… oh, and my personal observation that dermarolling and microneedling have an odd resemblance to guasha (tho I also see influencers/beauty bloggers telling people to use both/all. two comments: beauty industry has been ramping into skincare/dermatology territory for a while now… also the facial version of guasha popularized by beauty industry/influencers both eastern and western is Different from TCM guasha, which leaves marks that should fade relatively quickly).

Lastly I’ll die on this hill: TCM is [mostly]* real medicine while chiropractice is full-on quackery. *moxibustion spooks me and I have the least confidence about that. also cupping

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writing this post made me actually look up cupping, even if only briefly, which I thought was a TCM-only thing, but I learned that cupping and different variants are used in health practices associated with other non-sinosphere cultures, specifically wet cupping which I had never heard of until today. also learned that cupping wasn’t prevalent in TCM until 1950s ??

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//not really TCM related but recently I saw a post floating on rednote that was like “[foreign visitor posting]: I noticed yall don’t really use pain medications even ibuprofen, what’s up with that” and many cn responses being something to the tune of “don’t need to mask the pain in order to keep going, we try to find and treat the cause not the symptom eg pain. only use pain medications when it’s very hard/impossible to cure the cause such as chronic conditions”

Oh have they finally stopped being weird about xinjiang? or at least enough to get vetted or w/e onto the deprogram. like, ive blocked them on socialmedias for being basically a radlib who calls themself progressive (type of sino diaspora whos anti-PRC but still tries to leverage their ‘heritage’ for clout/career) but its been a few years and people can change but id be surprised

not entirely sure what you mean by “left thoughts” (eg what all that encompasses/excludes) but I’ll give it a shot

ngl most of chinese society isn’t very political and this is reflected in video games. (I’d say cinema is kind of an exception but also there’s established support structures esp. by the party for the film industry; even then it’s more common for “left themed” movies to be about specific historical events or important people, than like, Communism In a Fictional/Fantasy/Scifi setting, of which I can’t name a single one of those off the top of my head. IMO there’s good reasons for this*, even regardless of publications & RFT bureaus.) More popular setting/thematics of CN-based video games are culture or [older, usually not modern] history, or a fantastical mix of both. Additionally many games particularly the smaller ones are Chinese-language only, no English translation available.

When I played Genshin I remember some cleverly crafted writing that was ambiguous enough for western (sinophobic and anticommunist/anti-antiimperialist) audience to interpret differently, particularly the dendro area sumeru. I don’t play it myself but I have a friend who plays Honkai: Star Rail and who regularly gets excited about the more overt parallels to revolutionaries/history in the writing but I’m not sure if that’s only the Chinese language version/if that gets dulled down in English translation. Also not sure if grinding and slogging thru a gacha game just for some plot here and there is your cuppa tea.

.* alternative history even if overtly fictional is generally discouraged. i think the reasons are obvious (just look at how western media spins 6-4)

Israel has time and time again demonstrated that they don’t even care for their own settlers’ lives, willingly killing music festival attendees and hostages in order to pin it on hamas etc. And similarly to those “victims of their own regime”, the targets this time around weren’t anyone higher up, their loss of life was more useful to the zionist entity as fodder for their propaganda and media operations than them being alive. tbh when I heard the news I thought it was a false flag; it’s just some embassy workers. Former IDF are a dime a dozen. Maybe it woulda been bigger news if it was like head/upper staff of the embassy.

People are now saying “maybe it’s time for adventurism” but IMO attitudes like this function the way protests (violent or not) do in the imperial core: pressure release valve, with a side of bourgeois-owned media get to spin it however they want - and especially with the united healthcare ceo, the media has been blasting everyone with the insinuation that mangione is definitively the killer. We should measure actions by effect achieved in relation to our goals and adventurism is doing what adventurism does (shinzo abe case being very exceptional): this doesn’t get Palestine closer to liberation or stop the genocide, but it sure does make a lot of internet ‘leftists’ smug and some of them even satisfied, Israelis/zionists to fort up, and a lot of liberals incensed about “antisemitism”.

Right on. Sorry if I misread what was intended to be voiced from “average centrist” pov, there’s been a ton of ai/tech reactionary buzz even among nominally “communist” circles recently, to the point where I’m even irked when people call generative tools “slop machines” in the same way they say “chinese goods” to insinuate cheap/bad product, when it’s like, that’s what you (or rather, walmart and amazon and they’ve monopolized and limited what alternative options you have) ordered the cheapest crap (for highest markup). Does nobody remember handmade slop content farms like 5minutecrafts? Same “market forces” (if you wanna call it that) are just ordering the same “slop” just from different sources, it’s not like before genai came to wider prominence there was actually that much less “slop” and un-factual/poor quality/misleading content.

and speculative real estate (“investments”) also

um. factories [physical and organizational structures of productive labor] aren’t a “means of oppression”. Capitalists owning them and workers not having control or ownership of the conditions, operations, product etc of them are the “means of oppression”, not the factories themselves. Do we at the 'grad need a rehash of marxism/ML basics…?

qi gong/modified tai chi and meditation practices (by themselves) are at worst harmless, but unfortunately that cult uses that as a front/excuse/cover to describe and advertise as their primary activities, and they even go as far to ascribe spirituality to those activities and synthesize syncretize them into their belief system, particularly their version of faith healing.

Like it’s not even medical quackery it’s straight up faith healing, or rather, they believe that if you come down with bodily sickness, it’s a reflection of impurity in your thoughts/belief/practices. And furthermore, you shouldn’t even touch (evil, something to do with aliens/ufos) modern medicine at all: if you believe in their cult leader enough and do the Correct Practices and think the most pure/correct Thoughts particularly about their cult leader you will be healed. If you fail to be healed through FLDF practice it means you didn’t do enough. Worse, part of that “good deeds/practices” to idk up your spirit points would be to contribute labor to cult activities (for example proselytizing, putting up flyers, writing, etc, all for no monetary pay)… in order to ‘heal’!!!

iirc this belief system was AMONG the main reasonS they got kicked out of the PRC, family members of FLG “practitioners” lodged many complaints to the government that their loved ones were dying of colds and easily curable diseases as well as refusing cancer screenings/treatments.

so like… were these all diaspora from the fleeing aristocrat/theocrat class when the theocracy was ousted (obligatory “my recent ancestor had a monopoly on all eggs in china and the see see pee is evil” screenshot, except replace it with “my recent ancestor owned human skin drums of ritual importance”) or…?

anyway “I cry for freedom thousands of miles away while my country is inhabited by a language that is foreign to us” while congregating on the anglophone webbed site

0. accelerationism (someone else did mention in their reply)

1. lelouch vi britannica is an anime character and someone the likes of him doesn’t exist irl (intended tone:light)(sorry, couldn’t resist)

2. “socialist-sympathetic petty bourgeoisie and national bourgeoisie” don’t exist in the US at least not in any meaningful or organized capacity, and you more or less described why a hot mess contradiction would mean they self-select for “extinction” under a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, but they (well, at least the national bourgeoisie) exist in the PRC. Obviously the difference is that the PRC is a dictatorship of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie are not the ruling class, however, the national bourgeoisie are permitted and encouraged to cooperate in building the nation and the socialist project. One such guy [who’s shown up in english-language media from time to time] is a venture capitalist Eric Li 李世默, who I recall describing his venture capitalist role as “willing to take on more risk than the government normally would [in supporting/funding new businesses new tech new fields]”, but he’s just one example. I urge those curious to independently research the topic further, but keep in mind that the conditions, particularly historic and social, in the US are vastly different from those in the PRC.

(edit:I must note that all citizens in prc benefit from social goods and relevant conditions such as relatively affordable quality healthcare, with access still expanding to more rural areas, and relatively unprecarious housing. as such, there’s less pressure compared to both workers and capitalists in the US to scramble, squeeze, and cutthroat-compete, or blame others of their class or blame workers/immigrants [I can’t say non-existent tho. esp re:bigotry towards immigrants in places like hk]； well, for the blame game, there’s also some difference in political education [again not perfect… chinese liberals do exist and many are proletariats tho plenty are wannabe-bourgeois])

I don’t have personal experience here, but something I looked into for myself in the past (and don’t currently have much opportunity to get into atm) as a starting point is workforwater.org – more or less similar advice re:look at prospective career paths specific to what you’re looking for. That website/org seems to have a (nation)wide but not super deep network to help connect mentors, apprenticeships/ish (depending on the role/location), and intern programs, at least for both water utilities and wastewater treatment industry. Either way, it’s a leg up in terms of networking for that specific area. Many of the higher positions require engineering, although I can’t recall if it’s mechanical or civil or either/both.

Just thought to put it out there in case you had some interest in that field, infrastructure might be crumbling in this country but it’s still sorely needed, and will be needed always… so, points for job availability and stability.

Dark factories sounds really awesome (best bet would be mechanical->robotics or electrical??) but unless you plan to leave the US I can’t see heavy or innovative automation getting off the ground here unless it’s under the graces of bezos or musk or their ilk, or a startup looking to eventually get acquired by venture capital (this is an extremely precarious position to be in, startups fail all the time but even when they “succeed” eg get bought out, your position may be eliminated in the acquisition process).

obligatory posting quote from han suyin (specifically, a mortal flower 1966) regarding [western] sinology

spoilered for suicide mention

i’ve had people drive in from neighboring [US] states and be absolutely terrified of our urban highway interchanges [texas][many of them also sky-high but not quite this high I don’t think? - for reference, youtube practical engineering-why are texas highway interchanges so tall], imo it (the concern/fear?) is just something you might just be used or unused to

anyway yay for infrastructure 🎉

leguin’s work impressed me when i was still a liberal and when i was ancom but continually disappoints now.