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   cavewoman rika :nonbinaryFlag: (mrjunge@raru.re)'s status on Friday, 12-Sep-2025 04:19:48 JST cavewoman rika :nonbinaryFlag:

   in reply to

   • Kaito

   @kai I’m just being hyperbolic because I am pissed Kai. The only serious part about what I am saying is China is a competitive global hegemon, the stuff I said in my initial post, and that do-nothing Americans whining about China is getting old when they are do-nothing Americans and refuse to understand why China is rising. Ultimately we either have the Do-Nothing party or the Shoot-Myself-in-the-Foot Party, in realpolitik terms.

   • NeonPurpleStar :heart_bi: likes this.
   • Embed this notice
     Kaito (kai@ajin.la)'s status on Friday, 12-Sep-2025 04:19:50 JST Kaito

     in reply to

     @mrjunge I don't think China is coming to the US any time soon, but China is definitely coming for Taiwan, held off by the apparent threat of the US military intervening.

   • Embed this notice
     cavewoman rika :nonbinaryFlag: (mrjunge@raru.re)'s status on Friday, 12-Sep-2025 04:19:51 JST cavewoman rika :nonbinaryFlag:

     in reply to

     • Kaito

     @kai I am aware. But I like bringing up China as potential new global hegemon because it makes recalcitrant do-nothing American Sinophobes piss their pants and show their ass. I’m not likely to move to China at any point. Not that it matters. It’s not like needing to learn Mandarin would have required that I had moved there anyway in a few decades or in a century (tho I doubt I’ll be around by then).

   • Embed this notice
     Kaito (kai@ajin.la)'s status on Friday, 12-Sep-2025 04:19:52 JST Kaito

     in reply to

     @mrjunge China is fine as long as you agree that politics are the party's business (and hopefully you're not Uighur or Tibetan or whatever. 😅) You also may not have been too happy during covid. I would just caution you against placing life in China on too high of a pedestal.

     And it does seem like national populism is surging globally.

   • Embed this notice
     cavewoman rika :nonbinaryFlag: (mrjunge@raru.re)'s status on Friday, 12-Sep-2025 04:19:53 JST cavewoman rika :nonbinaryFlag:

     in reply to

     • Kaito

     @kai The other thing is endlessly comparing one country to another is not really going to change anything about the country you’re in except for assuaging your feelings about this one. It’s a useless endeavor. And if we are going to make comparisons what we should be looking at is why they are getting ahead and seeing what we will and will not emulate instead of whining about China “cheating” us because they happen to operate on entirely different economic principles. Anything else is kind of useless.

   • Embed this notice
     cavewoman rika :nonbinaryFlag: (mrjunge@raru.re)'s status on Friday, 12-Sep-2025 04:19:55 JST cavewoman rika :nonbinaryFlag:

     in reply to

     • Kaito

     @kai I have moral objections to surveillance and other stuff yet China has many countries beat on a few measures: economic investment and reinvestment, large infrastructure projects, and some level of pragmatism in their governance (however cynical it may or may not be). No moral grandstanding and moralism—even my own—is going to change what nation-states are actually being competent right now in competitive global capital. And in the long-term I’m sure China will have its own imperialist projects. To tell you the truth I would rather Europe but many EU countries feel like they are teetering on the edge of becoming the same shitshow.

   • Embed this notice
     Kaito (kai@ajin.la)'s status on Friday, 12-Sep-2025 04:19:56 JST Kaito

     in reply to

     @mrjunge shocked pikachu face

     also, https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/02/business/china-chongqing-protest.html?unlocked_article_code=1.jE8.uReg.2kWS3TgOsfdQ&smid=url-share

   • Embed this notice
     cavewoman rika :nonbinaryFlag: (mrjunge@raru.re)'s status on Friday, 12-Sep-2025 04:19:58 JST cavewoman rika :nonbinaryFlag:

     The more time I spend in this country the more I realize a lot of people, though especially Americans, are overgrown children. They have childish understandings of history, social movements, violence, etc. Their sense of morals has childish foundations and so it flounders in the wind and is only capable of producing chaos—something reflected perfectly in the “workings” of the current administration. It’s as if they based their whole approach to life on simplistic googoogaagaa pre-K cartoons they watched as kids, and in that surety everything is at a level and interachangeable, such that they can grant themselves the luxuries of antisocial attitudes while reaping the benefits of prosocial ones. This, too, is reflected in the current administration. That’s about all the commentary I have to give as I process the implications of this, because I will not let this distract me or take my eye off the ball.

     Aside from that, unfortunate to have heard a school shooting happened yet again around the same time though. Hopefully one day kids will be able to live without this sort of worry. Speaking for myself at this point I have little to no hope for the American project even at the national domestic level (at the foreign policy level it was already a foregone conclusion a long time ago..). Maybe at some point I’ll need to learn some Mandarin.