this post was submitted on 10 Aug 2023
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I'm going to guess you're one of the people who defends tiktok and compares it to every other social media app by saying the US government is basically the same as the Chinese government
No it's not a "warning," it's just boring old whataboutism.
The first part of your comment is like a textbook example of the fallacy.
I'm not so sure. The China apologists are in every thread like this and I don't think it's something to dismiss
It seems to be a very common fallacy in geopolitics to believe that a rival of the US must automatically be morally better. You see plenty of "left wing" imperialism defenses that blame Ukraine for the invasion and insist they should give up and do whatever Russia wants them to do.
It's apparently disappointingly complex for some people to believe that X can oppose Y and both of them can be horrible bastards. They can't take criticism of China or Russia because they automatically see an implicit "America better" that's not really there.
yeah, that's fair. I think that it is more common to like a thing (tiktok) and defend it however you can.
Absolutely, yeah. I'd like to think I'm able to give a more objective take since I got into TikTok late, but I honestly don't know that I do.
It seems people can't understand this. Am not American so i have an outside view that's free from any patriotic feeling and the spoon fed propaganda since childhood.
Not op, I know for sure that China's been trying to grab as much intelligence as possible going as far as installing sniffing type software in network controllers and servers, and grabbing keystrokes from a keyboard is absolutely despicable and something they would do to grab more intelligence.
The thing I have trouble figuring out is why in the hell people would care about TikTok. What signal intelligence is coming from my wife swiping through 14,000 cat and home organization videos.
Location is turned off The app is sandboxed It's not allowed to access the camera or the speaker without giving some minor notification that they're on and people would notice.
I totally get the China will do bad if they can but I fail to see the ultimate danger of TikTok.
From "the olden times" (Reddit link):
I don't know what you mean by sandboxed but I'm pretty sure it cannot be as private as it seems, even if you're using a VPN. But regardless, 99.99% of tiktok users are not taking steps to protect their data. hundreds of billions of data points that help an authoritarian government know how people think is nothing to shrug at.
Mobile apps aren't in the wild west anymore. They don't get access to the other apps and can't wander around unlimited on your device without clear permission. If you say no location, they don't get location. It used to be different, but apple and google are on the same page now and they don't let apps abuse you without clear permission anymore.
Even pulling your IP and giving them a vague city level location, They're correlating that with liking 30 second random content videos and music. This isn't even the level of intelligence you 'd get from FB or Youtube people aren't searching tictok to see how to use software or edit code or how public infrastructure works. You're getting organziation, cat videos, kids coming home from the dentist saying crazy things. I just don't really see it as a big deal.
you say all this and trillions of dollars still ride on their ability, which we very much knows exists, to stitch together billions of datapoints to know things about their users.
I will now answer any questions that boils down to "but we're the good guys" to "not American"
What the fuck are you talking about? This has nothing to do with America, the problem here is you're falsely equating a horrifyingly authoritarian government and basically writing it off as the "sAmE aS gOoGlE"
I don't know. What i read on Wikileaks made me believe they're not that different you know. Go read it, it will open your mind.
How many times has the US military ever murdered 900+ protestors in broad daylight then censored it from all media and imprisoned anyone who talks about it decades later?
Educate yourself. Jesus fucking Christ.
For the record I don't need to read more about the US government corruption, that's known. The fact that you're comparing the two is disturbing af
Several in fact. Most famously they bombed Tulsa oklahoma when black people there got too wealthy. But now multiple states are banning the teaching of it, alongside banning the teaching of our genocide of the Native Americans.
We do most of our murder of innocent people these days abroad though which isn't really much better, but most Americans are apparently completely fine with children being murdered so long as they aren't white and they aren't here, or they aren't in an American school being shot by one of their peers.
You're right let's talk about America not China. No agenda there at all. Nope.
Starting with the native American or i don't count it ? I don't know ? Is shooting a bus full of kids and laughing about it saying they'll grow up to be terrorist anyway isn't that far off and this is the tip of the iceberg buddy. USA is good at hiding murdering brown people by prefixing the word terrorists.
And yet you won't face life in prison for writing that. Yeah you're right, SAME
Ask the dude from Afghanistan that was randomly taken and tortured beyond belief for just being in the place in the wrong time. He was repeatedly raped with a broom and his pelvis shattered from getting kicked repeatedly on the groin area. Oh yeah, he died. How human of them.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests_and_massacre
If.you lived in China you'd likely not know about this, since people who talk about it go to prison. Yeah the US is exactly like this so let's not talk about Chinese government being awful to their citizens
Some states are teaching kids slavery wasnt bad because "slaves had a place to live , could eat and learned useful skills". what's worse saying it never happened or saying it was good for the people that suffered ??
The fact that you even thought to make any of these comparisons is what tells me you're either extremely unintelligent or purposely deflecting to make China look better
Of course, i am extremely unintelligent. Why else would i argue with someone that use name-calling ? China isn't better. I just don't have a propaganda induced deep hatred for it. To me neither are worst than the other. Well, USA backed how many coup d'état ? I believe it's in the 100,no ?
You are minimizing the news article and it stands to reason you've motive to do so. Go away.
I have no motives. seriously, i have none. Go away ? A great response worthy of a toddler. Okey, just don't call mommy.
I'm sure the FBI is hinting you down for talking about it right now. SAME. Tienanmen square didn't happen history erased. China=USA. Happy?
I like how it's black or white with you guys. The Tienammen sqaure massacre did happen. Can your brain even understand that i said it ? or want me so hard to be a Chinese bot because you can't fathom anyone saying America is as bad of China. You're not the worst, japan takes the cake since they're like we did nothing wrong, ever.
I like how you're pretending you're not trying to deflect
Indeed, i am the one deflecting.
What is the article about? And what are you trying to make it about?
Weak ass response.
Read my first comment and then yours. What are you trying to make my response about ?
Honestly, you don't deserve a more indepth response that that.
Thank you for the block request. I will continue calling out other people's bullshit like yours 😘
Don't worry. I won't block you. It was an insightful argument beside your name calling and childish answers.
if you wanted to make this a whataboutism is bad argument i'd be with you, but you're still toeing the line of "oh but it's okay when america does bad stuff, it's not the same"
No I am towing the line of "stop changing the subject and erasing history"
lol literally no one is "erasing history" what
Actually you are if you don't vehemently oppose comparing the US to China
man the american school system really did a number on you huh. or was it youtube? or twitter? something sent you this way.
yeah only in school, yt and twitter do people learn that whataboutist horseshit is a thing