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I wanted to welcome Harry Chen PhD to #QOTO his account is @HarryChenPhD
He lives in China, and from what I can tell is currently living in Wuhan, the epicenter of the #coronavirus where he posts videos updating us all on the situation. He labels himself as a "renegade journalist".
He was recently banned from twitter because, well, China doesnt really like renegades or journalists. So we are proud to act as a platform to help him host his videos and get the word out on how things develop. Consider following him.
You can read a bit about how twitter oppressed his freedom of speech and what ultimately brought him to the fediverse at these two links:
https://reclaimthenet.org/twitter-suspends-harry-chen-phd-cornavirus/
https://www.reddit.com/r/Conservative/comments/f938j3/twitter_suspends_harry_chen_phd_known_for/
#Wuhan #CoronaVirus #FF #FollowFriday #China #Journalism #Journalist
Not even sure what that means. Its mostly just posts of videos by the look of it. Anything "anti-china" about it seems to mostly just be honesty around their practices (manipulation and dishonesty) to their citizens.
Ahh yes, I agree, I was skeptical of that wording as well. But when I pressed him he basically just said "well they arent telling us what is int he disinfectant".. which is kinda fair, I lived in china I think id be constantly scared of them slipping something in the chemicals they spray me with too.
In the end when I pressed him though his responses sounded rational enough. Could also just be a language barrier thing.
Why not ask him about it?
From what I can see so far it does seem like just biased opinion if not agenda. Not what I would expect from a journalist, renegade or not.
In my opinion a journalist shouldn't just sit back and complain that the government doesn't go out of its way to do their job for them. A journalist will go and ask the driver what they are spraying, then go inquire in local government building/unit/whatever, maybe even take a sample and take it to a lab(or closest renegade equivalent) for examination. Report on all of that exactly, and then maybe express an opinion under a disclaimer.
Not saying there is anything wrong with expressing an opinion (even if biased), just scrutinizing the "renegade journalist".
Fair criticism and all.
Though to be fair your basically saying "Why didnt you do more and get arrested"... Well if he actually followed your advice we would never hear from him again as he would be locked away against his will.
Im not sure you realize how risky it is for him to do even this much.
hmmm, I don't think anything I said can be used as an excuse for an arrest, I didn't mean to suggest to snoop out evidence with any means necessary. If the government stands on the way, reporting on that would be enough. Are police battalions escorting the workers not letting anyone close? Do the workers refuse to talk?
If it's about evil government abusing power to arrest people they don't like, even without an excuse, then actively speaking against said government is more dangerous in my opinion, than unopinionated journalism. None of those things require anti-government rhetoric, they can even be framed as pro-governmant - "look at the amazing technology and state of the art chemistry out government deployed!".
An analogy would be firefighting equipment or even police arsenal. I can't see why would the government go out of it's way to publish a thorough explanation on the technology used up to the chemical composition. On the other hand it would be totally normal for a journalist to do that. Nothing incriminating or out of ordinary there.
That said I don't know what the situation is in the quarantine(or the evil China in general), so maybe there is something I'm missing. I'm as usual out of touch.
Umm I dont think you know china then... Yes what you suggest will almost certainly wind up in an arrest. They do **not** have any measure of freedom of speech there. By accusing the government of wrong doing in any sense you will get arrested presuming that accusation is loud enough that they care.
I think you forget, the videos he is posting here even without any details already got him in trouble. The chinese government told twitter to ban him and they did. Could you imagine how much more trouble he would get in if he actually did what a real journalist would do and ask questions and probe deeper....
Sure I know nothing, but I don't understand your logic either... I'm saying "you don't have to accuse the government, you can just report on facts", and you are arguing that "accusing the government will get you arrested".
If what is posted here is the same as what was posted on twitter, you can't claim that it was the videos alone, they are clearly accompanied with anti-government rhetoric, which according to you is more than enough to warrant an arrest, not just a ban. There is also one pointless video of street violence, which might be against terms of service there.
I really don't see how trying to ask a couple of questions to the operator of the spray (after their shift even), or a visit to local government office in good faith, will put you on the radar of the evil government anymore than what @HarryChenPhD and anyone else involved are already doing there.
Let me rephrase.. reporting on fact that people ould or would use to accuse the government will get you arrested...
In other words, the chinese government is very strict on wanting to be able to review what "facts" yu have and ensure only facts that are favorable to them are released.
So in the end it means the same thing in this context.
I really just think you underestimate how easily you can be put ont he radar.
Again he already is on the radar, he didnt even ask those questions and the chinese government already stepped in to silence him. So if you think his current videos lack "facts" could you imagine how they would respond if it had any real hard hitting facts in it?
I don't underestimate the radar, I actually accepted everything you claimed about evil government and their super sensitive radar as truth for the purposes of this discussion. Just as the government is able to silence or arrest, they are also able to refute any facts presented, it's not exactly a mathematical proof. Government can not filter/alter the presentation of entities that do not wish to cooperate, they can only silence those. This case hardly looks like cooperation in fear of retaliation.
You're not addressing my main point of how openly speaking against the government is any safer than a simple "hey fine worker of our glorious empire, what great deeds are you up to today?" in this context.
Then ask Harry, he is the one living it... Seems to me he agrees with me that it would likely wind him in jail if he did.
I think what he wants is instead of you just videoing the trucks spraying or other incidents, you actually record yourself asking questions and trying to do some research, which would make the videos have more value.
I am arguing that you already put yourself at a lot of risk and doing that would likely put you in too much risk.
@freemo @namark @elia hahahaha, that's a great way to get never heard from again.
I wont be doing that, he is welcome to, he can even sing the praise of the communist party in the streets of wuhan, the people will love him for it and he would be a national star overnight in China...I mean why wouldn't so many reputable public figures stand up for China and how great it's doing? They could all be stars too.
I would like to see a report of someone using their own white face to say how great China is...that video would go viral, I recommend him to do that...I'm sure many westerns would support his affirmation towards communism
So if whoever took the video of spraying, tried to talk to the guy spraying, he would go to jail, but taking the video and posting it along with anti-government rhetoric is totally ok, no jail?
I'm not suggesting you to show your face in a video, or even link the identity of the interviewer to the identity of the publisher, or change your rhetoric.
@namark @freemo @elia I dont know, personally I would risk getting close to one of those things just to prove something to some stranger on the internet. Besides it's an older video, it was a good performer on twitter and I was just seeing how the hashtags would work on this app...seemed to have drawn out a super uncomfortable amount of pro communism commenters.
I dont think anyone responding is pro-communism. I think most just dont understand just how extreamly oppressive and violent the chinese government can be.
Looking foolish on the internet is pretty much the whole point of the internet... Trust me ther eis no shortage of that :)
For the purposes of this discussion I accepted all of your claims about Chinese government and expressed no opinion of my own on that.
Not at all, all I'm saying is that you shouldn't call yourself a journalist, not with what you have presented so far at least.
By the sound of it, yes, thats the only word he seems to disagree with. I kinda understand why hs is saying that (though I think he is being a bit too harsh given the circumstances)
Nothing would make a grump like me happy, I would latch on anything I can to gripe about and snark at, so beware! Both of you!
He does :) trust him when he says he likes to complain about everything, I can attest to that :) Don't take it personally its just how he is.
I need sound logical argument I can hope to win with. I seem to latch onto those naturally.
@elia @freemo would you say that china has been totally transparent with the international community?
To be clear, there is a lot of evidence to back up the claim that china is hiding evidence or in other words, covering something up...there is overwhelming evidence in fact.
In regards to the video itself, It's just a short video clip with a title...dont think too much, and, I am trying to learn this app, I was keeping things concise because if a bad twitter habit. Not trying to attack the noble and righteous government of china...we all owe them a thanks for saving the world.
For my part, I think China is one of the worst violators of human rights. They hide virtually **everything** from everyone they can get away with. They are not transparent in any way.
With that said I would not be surprised int he least if they are "hiding something" in fact they are certainly hiding many somethings.
My criticism is more that saying "they are hiding something" is so non-specific that it isnt really saying anything.. What is being hidden? Why do you think its hidden? What are the rumours or concerns? These are important questions, and to me would be useful to hear about, which is why I press you for details.
But I think just saying "they are hiding something" may work against you a bit because people need more than that to judge the situation.
Yea understood. Dont worry not trying to give you a hard time. Just talking openly about my thoughts.
Keep in mind the environment here is much different. On twitter people usually give sound bites and you never heard from them again. Here people engage in real conversations and you usually will hear from the same people again and again.
One of the advantages of a platform that doesn't prioritize celebrities.
Ahh understandable. You will find the opposite is true here. People really love engagement and we dont use algorithms so dont worry you wont be penalized. Engaging with users is always a good thing I find, if your considerate (as i'm sure you will be).
It may look like twitter here but keep in mind this whole community is built mostly by people who fled twitter by choice. So naturally the culture here is very different than twitter despite looking similar.
Happy to help. Like I said feel free to reach out anytime if you need some advice or just want to chat.
Thats fair, there is a lot of judgement and hate on the internet, and sadly sometimes not saying too much helps avoid that.
But you've been here only an hour with just a few posts and already have 14 followers. I'd say thats not bad for someone who is brand new here.
As for being called anti-china, he may not have meant it as harshly as it sounded.
Let me say that while China is a human rights violator this is nothing compared to the US Empire and what it did for decades and is currently doing to the rest of the world, in addition to their hypocrisy in presenting their selves as defenders of democracy.
Also it's worth noticing that during this virus crisis Italy didn't get any help from other European countries like Germany or France nor from USA. What Europe got from USA now are 30 000 soldiers which officially came for military exercises as if the coronavirus was not here.
On the other hand China sent us in Italy masks with encouraging messages (see image below, it says: "we are with you, come on Italy!").
Little update:
Xiaomi donates tens of thousands of masks to Italy; "We are waves of the same sea, leaves of the same tree, flowers of the same garden"
https://it.mashable.com/coronavirus/2275/xiaomi-dona-migliaia-di-mascherine-allitalia
No news from Western politically correct corporations like Apple, Google, Microsoft and so on, they are in just when it's a matter of exploiting workers rights in China.
We should think about what's worse: the Chinese government or our neoliberist and neofeudal world?
And in the meanwhile Assange...
Again, they are the ones who released the virus on the world... Sending a few masks is hardly enough to make up for that. Better than nothing, sure, but it doesnt come close to making up for the problems they caused in the first place.
(hey it's great here there isn't a character limit! Many thanks!!)
First of all I don't feel this division between my people and chinese people, we are all humans and this could had happened to every country in the world. My criticism is always towards governaments and not people. Nobody in China deserved this, no matter how bad their governament is.
Also I think yours are too early assumptions: a few years ago a virus research center was opened in Wuhan. As the Western world felt that China was appropriating scientific research conducted in there, an agreement was made to share more research in this area and this agreement included the construction of this laboratory in Wuhan. China would have shared its resources with the Western countries but the latter, through the World Health Organization, would have had some control over this laboratory.
A few months ago there was a news about a coronavirus transfered from USA to this laboratory without informing the China, who expressed disappointment and we didn't get any further news on this.
Later right in Wuhan appears the famous Covid-19.
Also in 2017 the World Bank in collaboration with the already mentioned WHO issued the so called Pandemic Bonds, that were basically a bet there would had been a coronavirus epidemic, probably from China, for at least 12 weeks and between 2020 and 2022.
So there is chance this was planned on some degree by Western organizations and maybe they lost control of the phenomenon.
@post I dont think there is a division between my people or chinese people either... But we cant escape the fact that the chinese government were the only ones who could do anything about handling hte virus before it got into he wild.
Failure to contain the virus rests solely on their governments shoulders. They have a history of suppressing information during outbreaks to reduce panic and to ensure the government doesnt look bad. The end result of this dishonesty, and general lack of trust int he government, is exactly why the virus spread as it has.
So as much as I agree with your spirit of "we are all one people" in any functional sense that doesnt help your argument much.
As for the transder of the coronavirus... thats mostly unrelated. There are many types of coronavirus in the wild already, they arent noteworthy (10% - 20% of all cold cases are a type of corona virus). So mostly a moot point.
Plus we already know where the coronavirus came from anyway, so not much guessing needed.
The president of the Italian professional order of biologists claims that the Italian virus is different from the Chinese one and it originated from Italian zootechnical industry (animal farming).
It's too early for conclusions like yours...
