• QinShiHuangsShlong@lemmy.ml
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      7 days ago

      A more openly militant, internationalist China would obviously be great in theory. But politics isn’t about theory alone, it’s about material conditions (the synthesis of theory and practice). Right now China is one of the main reasons the DPRK still exists at all. That’s not nothing. Trade, energy, diplomatic cover, and softening enforcement of sanctions are what keep the DPRK from total economic strangulation. The same logic applies, though much more weakly, to Cuba.

      Beyond that, China’s main global line currently isn’t exporting socialism, it’s breaking imperialist domination as a system. From a Chinese perspective, the USSR showed that trying to fight the entire imperialist bloc head-on through arms races, proxy wars, and ideological confrontation while still economically and militarily weaker is a losing strategy. It bleeds productive forces, isolates you, and eventually collapses the project altogether. China chose not to repeat that.

      Instead, China is focused on building their own productive base to the point where imperialism can’t dictate terms anymore, while also creating space for the Global South through investment, infrastructure, and multipolar institutions. That doesn’t abolish capitalism, and it doesn’t directly advance revolution, but it does materially weaken U.S. unipolar power and limit how aggressively imperialism can act.

      This approach is contradictory and deserves criticism. China operates inside global capitalism and often prioritizes stability over revolutionary change. But that’s an unfortunate strategic assessment based on balance of forces. They support socialist states when their collapse would clearly strengthen imperialism, but they avoid a posture that would force premature confrontation before they’ve reached parity with the imperial core.

      I think a much more real and interesting question than “why doesn’t China act like Mao-era China,” is what happens once the current goals are achieved. If multipolarity stabilizes and China reaches durable parity, the material constraints shaping this cautious line change. At that point, more explicit forms of socialist solidarity become materially possible in ways they aren’t now. Whether the CPC actually takes that path is an open question, but dismissing China as “doing nothing” ignores both what it’s already doing and the historical logic behind why it’s doing it this way.

      • Cowbee [he/him, they/them]@hexbear.net
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        6 days ago

        Excellent comment. I can understand wanting a return of USSR style internationalism, but it’s also important to see why China is taking their current stances, and where that’s likely to trend. Considering the more millitant trends among the youth, it’s likely to pivot more in that direction as time goes on and the productive forces more clearly put China ahead of the US Empire (which is already here).

    • eldavi@lemmy.ml
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      7 days ago

      the ussr proved that you can’t take on the imperialists head on and at their own game; they will always outspend & outflank you.

      also, history proves that a govt’s durability is tied to the legitimacy given by its own people; not by any external force.

    • ClathrateG [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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      7 days ago

      https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3340604/china-sends-emergency-food-aid-cuba-us-sanctions-worsen-shortages

      Obviously they could do tons more but to say they do literally nothing is bad faith, providing an alternative to the usurious IMF alone is not nothing

      Some Gaddafi style chucking arms to any vaguely left wing paramilitary group would be based, but their strategy is stability and leading by example. They’re trying to avoid the mistakes of the USSR even if err are too much on the side of caution for taste sometimes

    • Des [she/her, they/them]@hexbear.net
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      6 days ago

      i would be cool with them just setting up some ways for leftists to safely communicate outside the U.S. tech surveillance state.

      hell they could just “allow some stuff to be set up and ignore it” for plausible deniability

  • mathemachristian [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    7 days ago

    Crushed by the system it’s laid in, it’s just dead.

    “Help us the cuckoo is throwing us out of our nest”
    “gotta get out of your shell or you’re toast”

    I get the sentiment but I don’t think anyone’s gonna accuse china of coddling foreign revolutionary movements soon.

      • KuroXppi [they/them]@hexbear.net
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        7 days ago

        Unsolicited translation advice

        For ‘thoughts and prayers’ I think a better translation would be 关心与祝祷.

        想法 is more like ‘how one thinks’, one’s thoughts about a subject, or manner of thinking (法 being the key word here for ‘way of doing sth’)

        关心 on the other hand conveys what ‘thoughts’ in the English does, i.e. it means care, keeping 关something close to one’s heart 心 (which was the locus of thought in classical Chinese philosophy) other translations I saw are 关怀 for thoughts, where huai is also one’s heart/chest/bosom

        (I’m not a native speaker so even 关心与祝祷 sounds a bit skewiff to me, I looked at other online translations and they don’t translate directly, they translate phrasally e.g.

        Our thoughts and prayers are with them in this time of grief. 在这悲伤的时刻zai zhe beishang de shike 我们心中想到他们women xinzhong xiangdao tamen 并为他们祈祷bing wei tamen qidao

        lit. in this grief (possessive modifer) moment our hearts think (prep*, ‘to > of’) them, also (prep, ‘towards, for’) them pray

        *I’m not sure how to grammatically mark it. It’s not a particle, it’s like a completional verbal complement, it’s used here to show that ‘they’ have been thought ‘of’ (想到 think/arrive > think/complete). It’s been a while since I studied

        It’s also as distinct to 想+sbdy/sth which means to ‘miss’ someone (as in, you’re thinking of them because they aren’t there), i.e. 我想你 I miss you, 我想家 I’m homesick (I’m thinking of home)

    • LeninWeave [none/use name, any]@hexbear.net
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      7 days ago

      It’s not prosperity gospel to tell westerners that the revolution isn’t going to come from abroad to save them. The American revolution will have to come from America.

      I’m saying this assuming the anglophone twitter user is from the global north, it’s possible that’s not the case. Still, the revolution will have to come from the place it’s happening, not be imposed by another country.

      • Lussy [he/him, des/pair]@hexbear.net
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        6 days ago

        It’s not prosperity gospel to tell westerners that the revolution isn’t going to come from abroad to save them.

        I think people are well aware that revolutions aren’t spearheaded by foreign powers. But the OP would have been more palatable if China had a better track record of supporting AES states.

        The US is certainly not China’s responsibility, but they don’t exactly take care of their own backyard. I guess holding them up to the standards set by the Soviet Union’s ideological commitments in foreign policy is asking too much despite the former having achieved far bigger financial and productive dominance.

        • LeninWeave [none/use name, any]@hexbear.net
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          6 days ago

          See my other comments in the thread, I agree with you on this, it would be nice if China was more like the USSR. However, I think “China help us” as a tweet is just “China will save us” type of stuff and “the revolution has to come from within” is not only a reasonable reply to that, it’s 100% correct.

        • Boise_Idaho [null/void, any]@hexbear.net
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          6 days ago

          I guess holding them up to the standards set by the Soviet Union’s ideological commitments in foreign policy is asking too much despite the former having achieved far bigger financial and productive dominance.

          The PRC does not have military dominance compared with the SU. The SU during the 60s had more nukes than the PRC has right now in 2026. You can’t have a SU foreign policy without a SU military to back up that policy, and what the PLA currently has right now doesn’t cut it (although that will change very soon).

          The entire Warsaw Pact had 69k tanks ready to drive west and push the Atlanticist bourgeoisie straight to the Atlantic they love so much. The PLA does not have 69k tanks. The PLA doesn’t even have a nuclear powered aircraft carrier.

      • bdazman [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        7 days ago

        What is it about a commenter being from the global north that makes it thermodynamically impossible for China to, for example, send rifles and small arms ammunition to revolutions in the majority world like the USSR did?

        It is indeed true that the revolution will need to come from Americans in america, but the full extent of support for said movements in america, to my limited understanding, is that organizations like the PSL receive funding from overseas sometimes.

        In my opinion, socialist states issuing any kind of material influence whatsoever isn’t actually in contradiction with the fact that Americans need to actually do things.

        • LeninWeave [none/use name, any]@hexbear.net
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          7 days ago

          I agree, but I think “Help us China” without more context is just “China will save us”. IMO “we can’t save you, you have to take these steps yourselves” is a reasonable response. If “Help us China” was instead a detailed comment pointing out things that communists in other countries are asking China for that they could easily give and that would really advance their revolutions, I might feel differently.

          What’s relevant about the commenter being in the global north is that the global north has no real ongoing revolutionary movement that is even at a stage where it could seriously benefit from Chinese assistance. One day the PSL might need Chinese small arms and ammunition, but not today. Today, that would just lead to the PSL getting instantly shut down.

      • bdazman [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        7 days ago

        Quoting actual proverbs in this context is condescending in the same way the prosperity gospel is. I believe it is akin to “good things come to those who wait.” Materially, much like how the USA played an enormous hand in the “transformation” of the USSR, it is indeed possible for the CPC to hypothetically influence the fates of other nations too, especially given their power and capacity.

    • Hmm [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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      6 days ago

      hexbear.net/c/Sino sidebar description:

      This is a comm for news, information, and discussion on anything China and Chinese related.

      Reality:

      A mix mainly consisting of positive-leaning news posts from ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmygrad.ml (not taking issue with those) and drive-by posts of mainly memes and Tweets glazing China by @Yuritopiaposadism@hexbear.net that never seem to become more measured despite comments pushing back (and they don’t seem to engage with the comments on many of these very active posts they make despite also being a prolific commenter on this site).

      • LeninWeave [none/use name, any]@hexbear.net
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        6 days ago

        drive-by posts of mainly memes and Tweets … by @Yuritopiaposadism@hexbear.net … (and they don’t seem to engage with the comments on many of these very active posts they make despite also being a prolific commenter on this site)

        I think Yuritopia just cross-posts things Yuritopia finds interesting from off the site and doesn’t want to bother arguing in the comments when some of those things end up being a bit controversial. I don’t think it’s meant to be bait or anything like that.

        Yuritopia has 1k comments and 17k posts, so I wouldn’t say Yuritopia is a prolific commenter necessarily.

        • Hmm [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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          6 days ago

          Yeah, to be clear I don’t think it’s bait. It’s more so that I’m not a fan of the posts, especially because there’s little to no engagement with or learning from the critiques other users level against many of the popular posts.

          Edit: And it’s ironic in this case given how the post is titled “Much to learn.”