Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.

[jhkim]

With globalism, we export our culture. And let's be fucking straight - we absolute have been. Our movies, our television, or music, our art, our games, it's all been penetrating undemocratic nations for generations. It helped bring down the Soviet Union, it created a middle class in China, it's transforming Viet Nam now. People see comforts we have, and they want those comforts and ask the questions about why they don't have them.

Man, we can't even agree on our own internal culture. Yeah, we've been exporting our culture, and at the same time we have deranged academics screeching about how we need to respect African tribal science, Muslim attitudes versus women, and that guns are the cause of all violent crime. A good turn of phrase for this might be 'schizophrenic'.

It's nice that you think movies and TV are going to bring everyone together to sing kum-ba-ya, but you're higher than an SR-71 in cruise mode if you think it's going to magically convince the CCP to give up power and shift to a republic or democratic mode of governance.

You say "schizophrenic" as if it's a bad thing - and that Americans should all conform to a single culture. To me, the point of America is that we have freedom of speech and freedom of religion and freedom to practice different cultures. That's the way it has always been.

As for the CCP shifting -- I'm skeptical as well, but on the other hand, I and most others said the same thing about the Soviet Union in the 1980s. Times do change, and governments can change. Within East Asia, reforms are currently faltering in Myanmar and Malaysia -- but in the long-term, I think that can change, and there has been progress.

Many people around the world--as well as many governments--view American "Culture" as being an anti-Christian, corrosive, corrupt, and immoral trainwreck full of shit, and reject American culture thoroughly. Feminism, divorce, celebrating and promoting homosexuality, trans rainbow-ism, abortion, and a culture which is obsessed with race, identity politics, and consumed in trivia and materialism. A culture that is essentially perpetually selfish, narcissistic, petulant, vindictive, emotionally hysterical, and juvenile. A culture that is arrogant and smug, self-righteous, and hostile, dismissive, and antagonistic towards anyone and everywhere that refuses to consent or embrace American culture.

People around the world are pretty aware of the differences within American culture. They have different reactions to American politics, though, with different dividing lines. Latin America is more Christian than the U.S. -- but also more socialist. Europe is both more socialist and less Christian. Northern Africa and the Middle East are less Christian and are wary of U.S. imperialism. Southern Africa is more Christian but still tends to see the U.S. as imperialist. Overall, most countries are more left-leaning than the U.S. From the polls I've seen, after Trump took office, favorable views of the U.S. decreased in all countries except Israel, Kenya, and Russia.

cf. https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2018/10/01/americas-international-image-continues-to-suffer/

[Shasarak]

You dont export your culture by globalism, you export it with your army.

[jhkim]

You dont export your culture by globalism, you export it with your army.

Christianity has spread over the globe far faster and penetrated more thoroughly than any army. By comparison, conquerers like Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, and Hitler have had only fleeting success in spreading their culture.

Within the Americas, English and Spanish culture have taken hold - but that's largely because of disease wiping out the former population, not armies per se. The same hasn't happened in Africa and Asia.

[Pat]

People around the world are pretty aware of the differences within American culture. They have different reactions to American politics, though, with different dividing lines. Latin America is more Christian than the U.S. -- but also more socialist. Europe is both more socialist and less Christian. Northern Africa and the Middle East are less Christian and are wary of U.S. imperialism. Southern Africa is more Christian but still tends to see the U.S. as imperialist. Overall, most countries are more left-leaning than the U.S. From the polls I've seen, after Trump took office, favorable views of the U.S. decreased in all countries except Israel, Kenya, and Russia.

I dispute the idea that most nations are more left leaning than the US. The people who talk about the "rest of the world" usually just mean Europe and a few other commonwealth states, like Australia and Canada, and ignore anything outside the Western world as if it was unclean and best ignored. But when you consider the real rest of the world, it's divided. While Latin American has socialist tendencies, Africa and much of Asia do not. Even more importantly, the simplistic Western left/right split doesn't really map well to nationalistic totalitarian states with mixed economies run by socialists (like China), tribalistic nationalism and cronyism (hate to say it, but most of Africa), and even the highly conservative and traditionalistic states swayed by democratic populist socialism (much of Latin America). And even the comparison to Europe is fallacious, because the US is usually framed as a bizarre outlier, which is only true when you count arbitrary political units with an arbitrary degree of sovereignty. The truth is the US is roughly comparable to Europe in size, wealth, political subunits, and to a lesser degree population. There's probably a way to control for the various variables and make a better assessment of the alignment of the world on a muddled, simplistic axis -- but nobody ever does that because claiming the US is right wing is really just an analogue of "all the cool kids do drugs!"

And regarding the world's impression of the US, what do expect, when the domestic media has been presenting even the most innocent Tweet as the worst thing ever? Propaganda works.

[Visitor Q]

From the mid 20th century to present day, Africa has had its fair share of countries with left wing governments of varying degrees of intensity/extremism and constitutional recognition.

No idea how they all compare with the US in 2021 in terms of left wing ideology.

[Mistwell]

The problem with globalism is that it presumes a commonality of culture that straight up does not fucking exist.

Period. End of line. Do not tell me about how 'oh they're just like us', because no sir, some of those cultures outside the U.S. (and for that matter, the Western societies) are NOT particularly compatible.

And when you have major cultural clashes, eventually things get very, very ugly.

With globalism, we export our culture. And let's be fucking straight - we absolute have been. Our movies, our television, or music, our art, our games, it's all been penetrating undemocratic nations for generations. It helped bring down the Soviet Union, it created a middle class in China, it's transforming Viet Nam now. People see comforts we have, and they want those comforts and ask the questions about why they don't have them.

Man, we can't even agree on our own internal culture. Yeah, we've been exporting our culture, and at the same time we have deranged academics screeching about how we need to respect African tribal science, Muslim attitudes versus women, and that guns are the cause of all violent crime. A good turn of phrase for this might be 'schizophrenic'.

It's nice that you think movies and TV are going to bring everyone together to sing kum-ba-ya, but you're higher than an SR-71 in cruise mode if you think it's going to magically convince the CCP to give up power and shift to a republic or democratic mode of governance.

It's already made MASSIVE changes to Chinese culture. People like to talk about slave labor there, and that used to be the case. Now adays it's mostly bullshit. Instead China has a thriving middle class, which buys homes, and they now IMPORT a bunch of OUR GOODS when before that was impossible. They also negotiate for higher wages. Which happens around Chinese New Year, where a mass strike can happen where all the workers simply never come back to the factory after they go home for New Years. And as this has happened, the Government HAS given up power over the years.

You know what put a halt to those changes? Fucking asshole Trump, whose customs charges threw a wrench in everything. It caused the Government there to feel like they were looking weak, so they cracked down. A lot of progress was lost in that one stupid move.

[Mistwell]

  You mean we export the hollywood version of our culture, which is to say a corrupt, amoral, shitshow.  It did not transform China, China realized they could take on our farmed out labor at slave wages and create a "middle class", but in a nation where the poverty line is around 700 USD per year, exactly what does middle class mean?  China realized they could use greed as a powerful tool and operate much like a fascist nation now.  Freedom wise, what exactly has China changed?  They just do not have to disappear or lock as many people into concentration camps these days thanks to a quite compliant society.    China also seems to be taking more and more control of that hollywood propaganda machine...I am sure it will not be to export more american culture.  The Soviet Union was brought down for a lot of reasons, Balkanism, being an empire (with too many different cultures under one rule), and wild spending on the military at the cost of care of citizens (sound familiar?), the Soviet Union didnt collapse because of blue jeans and rock and roll.

You continue to prove, on topic after topic, that you really talk out of your ass and have no clue most of the time.  The middle class in China is very real and has very serious buying power. I know many of them. I work with them every week. Freedom-wise China changed drastically. You can now own property. You can now travel freely. You can now invest in new businesses.

Do you even fucking know a single person in China and have asked them about it? I am betting you don't. Because you're talking out of your ass based on some vague bullshit notions you've picked up from other shit talkers over the years who also don't know what the fuck they're talking about but think they can substitute knowledge with bluster.

[Ghostmaker]

  You mean we export the hollywood version of our culture, which is to say a corrupt, amoral, shitshow.  It did not transform China, China realized they could take on our farmed out labor at slave wages and create a "middle class", but in a nation where the poverty line is around 700 USD per year, exactly what does middle class mean?  China realized they could use greed as a powerful tool and operate much like a fascist nation now.  Freedom wise, what exactly has China changed?  They just do not have to disappear or lock as many people into concentration camps these days thanks to a quite compliant society.    China also seems to be taking more and more control of that hollywood propaganda machine...I am sure it will not be to export more american culture.  The Soviet Union was brought down for a lot of reasons, Balkanism, being an empire (with too many different cultures under one rule), and wild spending on the military at the cost of care of citizens (sound familiar?), the Soviet Union didnt collapse because of blue jeans and rock and roll.

You continue to prove, on topic after topic, that you really talk out of your ass and have no clue most of the time.  The middle class in China is very real and has very serious buying power. I know many of them. I work with them every week. Freedom-wise China changed drastically. You can now own property. You can now travel freely. You can now invest in new businesses.

Do you even fucking know a single person in China and have asked them about it? I am betting you don't. Because you're talking out of your ass based on some vague bullshit notions you've picked up from other shit talkers over the years who also don't know what the fuck they're talking about but think they can substitute knowledge with bluster.

As usual, you are a fucking moron.

None of these things you invoke -- property, travel, investment -- occur without the tacit consent of the CCP. This is borne out by the new 'social credit' score system that is used to determine yes, what you can buy, where you can live, and where you can go.

But that suits you, doesn't it Misty?

Tell us more about how 'free' China is. Tell us about how they don't suppress religions, or crack down on dissidents. Oh wait. You can't.

[Shasarak]

You dont export your culture by globalism, you export it with your army.

Christianity has spread over the globe far faster and penetrated more thoroughly than any army. By comparison, conquerers like Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, and Hitler have had only fleeting success in spreading their culture.

Within the Americas, English and Spanish culture have taken hold - but that's largely because of disease wiping out the former population, not armies per se. The same hasn't happened in Africa and Asia.

How could Christianity not spread over the globe when there was the holy trinity of armies exporting it all over the world. England, France and Spain. 

Would Christianity have taken hold so strongly in South America if the conquistadors were not so successful at conquering the existing civilisations? Amen and Awomen

[Shasarak]

  You mean we export the hollywood version of our culture, which is to say a corrupt, amoral, shitshow.  It did not transform China, China realized they could take on our farmed out labor at slave wages and create a "middle class", but in a nation where the poverty line is around 700 USD per year, exactly what does middle class mean?  China realized they could use greed as a powerful tool and operate much like a fascist nation now.  Freedom wise, what exactly has China changed?  They just do not have to disappear or lock as many people into concentration camps these days thanks to a quite compliant society.    China also seems to be taking more and more control of that hollywood propaganda machine...I am sure it will not be to export more american culture.  The Soviet Union was brought down for a lot of reasons, Balkanism, being an empire (with too many different cultures under one rule), and wild spending on the military at the cost of care of citizens (sound familiar?), the Soviet Union didnt collapse because of blue jeans and rock and roll.

You continue to prove, on topic after topic, that you really talk out of your ass and have no clue most of the time.  The middle class in China is very real and has very serious buying power. I know many of them. I work with them every week. Freedom-wise China changed drastically. You can now own property. You can now travel freely. You can now invest in new businesses.

Do you even fucking know a single person in China and have asked them about it? I am betting you don't. Because you're talking out of your ass based on some vague bullshit notions you've picked up from other shit talkers over the years who also don't know what the fuck they're talking about but think they can substitute knowledge with bluster.

As usual, you are a fucking moron.

None of these things you invoke -- property, travel, investment -- occur without the tacit consent of the CCP. This is borne out by the new 'social credit' score system that is used to determine yes, what you can buy, where you can live, and where you can go.

But that suits you, doesn't it Misty?

Tell us more about how 'free' China is. Tell us about how they don't suppress religions, or crack down on dissidents. Oh wait. You can't.

You can not "own" property in China.  You can merely rent it from the CCP.

[Brad]

but that's largely because of disease wiping out the former population, not armies per se.

Like what man?

We just gonna ignore 600 years of Catholic missionaries? Are you insane?

[Ghostmaker]

  You mean we export the hollywood version of our culture, which is to say a corrupt, amoral, shitshow.  It did not transform China, China realized they could take on our farmed out labor at slave wages and create a "middle class", but in a nation where the poverty line is around 700 USD per year, exactly what does middle class mean?  China realized they could use greed as a powerful tool and operate much like a fascist nation now.  Freedom wise, what exactly has China changed?  They just do not have to disappear or lock as many people into concentration camps these days thanks to a quite compliant society.    China also seems to be taking more and more control of that hollywood propaganda machine...I am sure it will not be to export more american culture.  The Soviet Union was brought down for a lot of reasons, Balkanism, being an empire (with too many different cultures under one rule), and wild spending on the military at the cost of care of citizens (sound familiar?), the Soviet Union didnt collapse because of blue jeans and rock and roll.

You continue to prove, on topic after topic, that you really talk out of your ass and have no clue most of the time.  The middle class in China is very real and has very serious buying power. I know many of them. I work with them every week. Freedom-wise China changed drastically. You can now own property. You can now travel freely. You can now invest in new businesses.

Do you even fucking know a single person in China and have asked them about it? I am betting you don't. Because you're talking out of your ass based on some vague bullshit notions you've picked up from other shit talkers over the years who also don't know what the fuck they're talking about but think they can substitute knowledge with bluster.

As usual, you are a fucking moron.

None of these things you invoke -- property, travel, investment -- occur without the tacit consent of the CCP. This is borne out by the new 'social credit' score system that is used to determine yes, what you can buy, where you can live, and where you can go.

But that suits you, doesn't it Misty?

Tell us more about how 'free' China is. Tell us about how they don't suppress religions, or crack down on dissidents. Oh wait. You can't.

You can not "own" property in China.  You can merely rent it from the CCP.

This CCP dicksucking is really starting to piss me off. Especially from Misty who purports to be 'conservative'. My guess is he's a Lincoln Project degenerate.

[Shasarak]

You can not "own" property in China.  You can merely rent it from the CCP.

This CCP dicksucking is really starting to piss me off. Especially from Misty who purports to be 'conservative'. My guess is he's a Lincoln Project degenerate.

Its hard to get a true picture of China when you only speak American.

[jhkim]

Overall, most countries are more left-leaning than the U.S. From the polls I've seen, after Trump took office, favorable views of the U.S. decreased in all countries except Israel, Kenya, and Russia.

I dispute the idea that most nations are more left leaning than the US. The people who talk about the "rest of the world" usually just mean Europe and a few other commonwealth states, like Australia and Canada, and ignore anything outside the Western world as if it was unclean and best ignored. But when you consider the real rest of the world, it's divided. While Latin American has socialist tendencies, Africa and much of Asia do not. Even more importantly, the simplistic Western left/right split doesn't really map well to nationalistic totalitarian states with mixed economies run by socialists (like China), tribalistic nationalism and cronyism (hate to say it, but most of Africa), and even the highly conservative and traditionalistic states swayed by democratic populist socialism (much of Latin America).

Fair enough. I agree that Western left/right doesn't map well to the rest of the world, and I don't have major disagreements with the most of your characterization. I'd add that tribalism and cronyism are common throughout most of the developing world including Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Central Asia - not just Africa. Many of the worst ethnic wars in recent decades have been in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

[Pat]

Overall, most countries are more left-leaning than the U.S. From the polls I've seen, after Trump took office, favorable views of the U.S. decreased in all countries except Israel, Kenya, and Russia.

I dispute the idea that most nations are more left leaning than the US. The people who talk about the "rest of the world" usually just mean Europe and a few other commonwealth states, like Australia and Canada, and ignore anything outside the Western world as if it was unclean and best ignored. But when you consider the real rest of the world, it's divided. While Latin American has socialist tendencies, Africa and much of Asia do not. Even more importantly, the simplistic Western left/right split doesn't really map well to nationalistic totalitarian states with mixed economies run by socialists (like China), tribalistic nationalism and cronyism (hate to say it, but most of Africa), and even the highly conservative and traditionalistic states swayed by democratic populist socialism (much of Latin America).

Fair enough. I agree that Western left/right doesn't map well to the rest of the world, and I don't have major disagreements with the most of your characterization. I'd add that tribalism and cronyism are common throughout most of the developing world including Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Central Asia - not just Africa. Many of the worst ethnic wars in recent decades have been in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

Seems to be higher in Africa, and I've seen some good arguments about the strength of clan/tribal ties in Africa and how that makes them an outlier in that regard. But I'm not sure how broadly it applies, and there are tons of counterexamples. It's probably a better example of how complicated it is to align the world than anything else.