Chinese propaganda is rampant on the fediverse. We need to discuss ways to combat this. One group- memes or something is wholly controlled by Chinese state actors. What do you think?
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Treat it like a troll post. Downvote and move on, if the name becomes familiar block them.
This goes for all propaganda not just the stuff you are against.
I still don’t understand the point of downvoting here since it doesn’t seem to affect visibility. You’ll have the dumbest take on something sitting there at -36 and I still have to look at it.
Entire subs and communities, and servers are Chinese state actors. I wish we could daylight this bullshit, a single serving page with a method for rankings subs, servers with biases?
Show your evidence
There’a a global positive shift in opinion on China that’s happened over the first year of Trump. The trend was already there in the “Global South” but it’s now happening everywhere. This shift is driven by real economic and geopolitical pressures. E.g. US tariffs and military threats, Chinese investment and cheap EVs, etc. Add to that there are more people on Lemmy from non-NA/EU countries than on US-centric platforms like Reddit and this shift becomes even more apparent here. In Western countries the positive opinion on China is less one of an ally and more of a necessary partner. In Canada, the opposition to trade with China shifted from 80% in 2020 to 32% at the end of 2025.
If you’re primed to not see anything positive about China, then even positive views around partnership could appear as pro-China propaganda. Also people in the Global South are much more aware of US and European atrocities so when you present China’s atrocities as a counter to people’s positive opinions, it looks unserious and hypocritical to them. If you see their hypocrisy callout as a propaganda method and you call it out as such, you lose all good faith credibility with them.
Pics:
PS: Along with this shift, comes the realization among some that a lot of what they thought about China came from corporate US interest via US-owned media that pushes a line useful for that interest. This has happened to me and multiple RL friends and family in Canada. The conversations on the last thanksgiving table have changed a lot since 2024. At present we’re in the necessary partner camp.
I’m no fan of Tankies or the CCP, but I’m really not seeing any more pro-china propaganda than you see elsewhere, mostly excitement as a result of their green tech stuff or HSR (while ignoring why China has a need for HSR)
I am seeing a surprising amount of anti-china paranoia from the UK press right now that frankly seems like it’s engineered by the US given its timing. Like articles about diplomats using burner phones as if that isn’t standard (for all countries).
There are a lot of people supportive of the PRC, both because the US Empire is declining and the PRC is positioned as an alternative to the US Empire’s naked terrorism, and because Lemmy has a lot of communists. Lemmy has a lot of communists because the lead developers are communists, FOSS attracts communists, and because as Reddit bans communist communities they are often suggested to come here.
There’s absolutely no credible evidence of CPC interference in Lemmy, this is a normal thing to happen to a FOSS alternative to Reddit.
Removed by mod
To a degree, perhaps, though the CPC largely sticks to the Chinese sphere of the internet. I haven’t seen any evidence for CPC interference in Lemmy though, nor of widespread CPC influence over western, English-speaking spaces. China doesn’t really care as much for that, plus the implication is that the US Empire is fundamentally weaker than the PRC at propagandizing on the Statesian “home turf” when we know the opposite is the case.
Prove it
I used to be critical of PRC even though I’m American Chinese. Nowadays however I just don’t want to be governed by a pedo king. Seeing a bunch of teslas around when Elon is also very clearly on the list sucks too. Guess this is Chinese propaganda…
Man’s freaking out cos he just learned .ml stands for marxist-leninist 😂 Glad to find something we strongly agree on tho comrade.
To be clear, .ml stands for Mali, and it was allegedly chosen because it was cheap/free. Lemmy.ml is just the flagship, test instance, and happens to have a lot of communists because the devs are communists. Lemmygrad.ml is explicitly ML.
Ah cheers for the clarity, my mistake
No worries!
the PRC is not nearly an alternative to the US empire, its a replacement to it, with different but overlapping trade-offs. what about neither? It’s seriously like instagram users fleeing to tiktok, then to upscroll or whichever other corporate platform.
the bad of the US does not make the PRC good. I want change, big changes, but definitely not that kind.
The US Empire is currently exporting mass death and destruction globally, threatening Greenland and Canada with annexation, kidnapped another country’s president and first lady, is performing piracy for oil, threatening Cuba, and on top of all of these overt acts of terror, is super-exploiting the global south for super profits. The PRC, on the other hand, as a socialist country, is far more peaceful, maintains a defensive millitary, has ~3 overseas millitary bases compared to the hundreds of the US Empire, and offers mutual development opportunities like Belt and Road.
The differences are staggering. When countries in the global south partner with the US Empire, they are trapped in cycles of underdevelopment, where their surplus value is plundered. When countries in the global south trade and partner with the PRC, they achieve rapid development, and escape the never-ending cycle of impoverishment. This win-win development isn’t because China is more morally good, but because their economic structure and geopolitical position compels them towards mutual cooperation over plunder and terror.
Further, there isn’t really an alternative to the US Empire and PRC. The US Empire is actively invading countries to make sure they comply. The EU is vassalized by the US Empire. When we look at who the global south goes to for development opportunities, they are increasingly rejecting western imperialism in favor of cooperation with China and BRICS, and forming mutual partnerships with neighboring countries (like the Alliance of Sahel States).
The bad of the US Empire isn’t why the PRC is better, the sheer benefit of working with the PRC is why the PRC is better.
This seems right. Personally I’m not sure I could roll my eyes harder at the fact that so many people in 2026 are so ignorant as to be prepared to call themselves “communists” - after all the famines, the purges, the 40 years in which much of Europe was struggling to escape (literally) from communism… And then I saw that you, too, call yourself a communist! So I guess I’ll stop there.
Except to recommend you the Ones and Tooze podcast, in which the brilliant host (an ex-communist) recently did a whole series, in great and illuminating detail, on the various communist thinkers. Which I listened to… dutifully.
Communists govern the largest economy in the world by PPP, and capitalism is falling apart at the seams as the spoils of imperialism are beginning to be cut off. The global south is escaping underdevelopment, and this is forcing austerity in the west, explaining the surge to the right. In the US Empire, communists are more and more common than ever before:
Famine was ended by communists in Russia, China, Vietnam, Cuba, etc. These areas had woefully inefficient systems of agriculture, such as the kulak system, which served to enrich one group of people over the laborers they employed. Collectivization combined with industrialization is why food security was achieved after the introduction of socialism to these countries, and the famines commonly attributed by western historians to communism were the last of a long line of regular famines.
Similarly, purges in the largest majority of cases meant expulsion from the party or position, not execution, except in times of crisis, like the 1930s when fascism was on the rise. They were not done arbitrarily, but as a response to corruption, subterfuge, and sabotage.
It’s also a bit silly to suggest that people spent “40 years trying to escape communism.” Right up to the end, the majority of people in the USSR wished to retain both the USSR and the system of socialism. This is proven not just from eyewitness reports of support, but also vote totals:
Moreover, after the fall of socialism in Europe, the majority of people want it back or say they are worse off. This is compounded by the fact that over 90% of the Chinese population supports their government and system. Socialist countries run by communists have higher approval rates than capitalist states.
Looking at Adam Tooze, I don’t see much indicating him as a former communist. He grew up in West Germany in the height of the Cold War, is trained in liberal economics such as Keynesian economics, though his grandfather was allegedly a soviet recruiter, which is cool. I’m not really convinced I could find much out of his mini-series on Luxemburg, Trotsky, Stalin, or Lenin, considering I’ve already read works both by them and about them in greater detail than a podcast is going to cover.
I don’t see much indicating him as a former communist
He talked about it - some variety of Trotskyism IIRC. A bit of a surprise but shouldn’t have been. Tons of former Maoists have been in high positions. Even a neoliberal head of the European Commission (Barroso).
On the supposed virtues of communism, you won’t convince me but I suppose you know that already. IMO the world would have done very well to listen to George Orwell, someone who saw through it all on the basis of up-front experience 90 years ago. That might have saved an awful lot of needless suffering. Or Orlando Figes, who wrote a book whose title says it all: “The USSR: A People’s Tragedy”.
On the supposed virtues of communism, you won’t convince me
Just straight up admitting your anti-communism is an unshakable article of faith that no argument or evidence can change.
To be fair, I don’t think many communists globally are fans of Trotskyism, considering it’s predominantly western and liberal-compatible. The vast majority of communists globally are Marxist-Leninists, Trotskyism is seen as more fringe. Trotskyists tend to already begin with anti-AES stances (for a variety of reasons, usually a combination of Red Scare propaganda mixed with alienation from capitalism), so going from “socialism is a good idea but never existed” to “socialism is a bad idea because what’s existed hasn’t worked” is a common jump. A former Trotskyist making loads of money off of denouncing communism is both entirely predictable and hardly compelling for those who’ve studied communism in theory and practice.
As for the rapist Eric Blair, also known as George Orwell, the western world listened to him too well. He didn’t see through anything, rather, his position as a British fed (known for keeping a journal of people he knew and suspected of being Jewish and/or communists) and propagandist was extremely useful to western intelligence agencies. On Orwell is a good essay going over his dreadfall past and role in propagandizing. Orwell has been taught in countless schools not because of any truth, but because of his utility.
As for Figes, another that earns an enourmous sum of money from preaching the bible of anti-communism to serve capitalist interests, better historians exist. Syzmanski’s Is the Red Flag Flying? The Political Economy of the Soviet Union today, Pat Sloan’s Soviet Democracy, Human Rights in the Soviet Union, Anna Louise Strong’s This Soviet World, Mary Stevenson Callcott’s Russian Justice, the recently deceased Dr. Michael Parenti’s Blackshirts and Reds, all the way up to Professor Roland Boer’s Socialism in Power: On the History and Theory of Socialist Governance, there’s tons of academic resources to get a much better view of socialism in practice.
I don’t expect you to read these, of course, my point is that just like you don’t expect to change your mind by me sharing evidence counter to your views, I’m unlikely to be swayed by professionals repeating standard anti-communist dogma. It takes a much greater amount of study and reflection to go against the dominant, hegemonic culture, nearly every common anti-communist talking point has been wielded against me at some point simply by me stating that I support socialism.
Is there anything specific you’d like to discuss, regarding the effectiveness of socialism/communism? We can have a constructive conversation surrounding specifics.
Their idol Mao killed approx 160 million humans.
Damn, out jerking the black book of communism by an order of magnitude. You’re really going for it
Do you have a source on that? Even if you include landlords killed by the peasantry during land reform, all of the deaths by unintentional famine, and the excesses of the cultural revolution as deliberately killed by Mao, the numbers accepted by Historians are nowhere close to 160 million. This is such a fantastical number that even the famously debunked Black Book of Communism doesn’t go over 100 million, and that was including the entire history of the soviet union as well as PRC. The Black Book of Communism famously included both non-births as deaths, and Nazis killed by the Red Army as “victims of communism.”
Sinophobia will get you nowhere. Those “Chinese State Actors” on the Fediverse are largely Western crackers who read theory and oppose Imperialism. You shouldn’t bogeyman an entire nation you don’t know anything about, this is xenophobic and also works against the working class.
I tend to agree with sentiment. Its more useful idiots type then cynical profesionals feeling.
You should go away and stop wildly fear mongering.
I heard they’ve stopped all fear mongering in China
Lol right? Dude the Chinese bots and reply guys are so obvious.
Poo bear’s gotta up his game on 🐻
On the topic, I’ve been seeing plenty of war-hawk think-tank accounts who only post propaganda, like:
- Scotty@scribe.disroot.org
- Hotznplotzn@lemmy.sdf.org
- randomname@scribe.disroot.org
- 0x815@feddit.org (and all their alt-accounts, including 0x815@feddit.de and thelucky8@beehaw.org )
They are clearly not involved in our communities.
Pretty sure these are all the same person. If you ever engage, you can recognize the same asshole attitude. I’ve seen multiple of them up/down vote comments where no one else has. Don’t think they do that anymore cause it’s too obvious.
Ironically, the most active user on the current #2 China community, !china@sopuli.xyz, is an absolutely indefatigable anti-Chinese propagandist.
This person, @Hotznplotzn@lemmy.sdf.org posts multiple times per day, usually quite sensible and well-sourced articles, but always on the same downer subjects (repression, Uighurs, corruption and so on) and never anything that paints China (let alone its government) in the slightest positive light. Since nobody else in this community can match their posting stamina, the end result is a community that, to newcomers, looks like one rando’s “I hate China” blog. Hardly surprising that it’s not a very successful community.
I’ve asked this user to consider dropping the tempo a bit, and been met with defensiveness. I complained in private to the mod, who is completely AWOL, and they didn’t care. Oh well.
It’s not even 1 account. It’s a collection of sockpuppets. I started noticing them when they started posting in !Canada@lemmy.ca but apparently the streak goes quite further back. The latest ones are Sepia and tardigrade.
I’ve also suggested changing tactic a bit from being a complete bad-faith asshole to good-faith commenters to at least being nice. Nada.
Ultimately the problem is that the mods for the communities they frequently post to have allowed this to go on for years. They have to know by now what’s going on, and by doing nothing they tacitly endorse it.
I don’t mind it too much. If the community itself can deal with ir by voting on the posts, it’s a more democratic solution and it has a built-in consensus. Mods killing it makes life easier but it produces more quesrions among the community abt whether that was the best course of action. Kinda like how some people feel about being censored on .ml, no offence. Isn’t that a dialectical relarionship of sorts, the effects of more vs less moderation?
I guess it depends on the people’s culture. If they come from a lib background, less moderation is more productive. If they’re used to authority taking care of things instead of them having to do the work, then more moderation is better suited or else people would complain mods aren’t doing their job.
And speaking of moderation. OP got banned. 😄
Out of interest, how do you know it’s sockpuppets?
To be honest I’m genuinely a bit interested in who this might be. I’m imagining a disgruntled Hong Kong exile with too much time on their hands. Also seems likely to be Chinese in that they have a top-down concept of information, not seeing that obvious and relentless propaganda will just backfire with a sophisticated and relatively informed audience. Perhaps I’m being slightly optimistic, but I can’t see how they’ve convinced anyone here that “China bad” who didn’t already think that.
What I’ve noticed:
- The posts themselves follow almost identical structure. Large quotes with poster emphasis.
- The posting topics is almost identical.
- The reliability of sources is hit-or-miss on all posts. Some are from legit sources, some are from really questionable ones. The questionable ones are common between accounts.
- The communities where they’re all active are the same. Lately there’s a bit more separation where some accounts frequent some communities more than others. E.g. some time ago we used to get Hotznplotzn, randomname and Scotty in !Canada. Now we mostly get Scotty.
- When you engage in conversation the lang expression, attitude and arguments are identical. This when I really noticed the pattern.
- I’ve had multiple accounts from this set group up/down vote their/mine comments, deep into a discussion that didn’t attract other up/down votes.
- I’ve had a discussion that reached a dead end with one account, only for another to show up and restart it from a different angle attempting to reach a different conclusion. E.g. first discuss an economic side of some China-related issue, reach a dead end, restart with human rights abuses side on the same topic. That’s while having the group up/down voting action going on.
- Two of the accounts were created on the same date, on two different instances, a few minutes away from each other. This was the smoking gun for me that this is the same person.
Some of these aren’t damning on their own, but put altogether make me believe it’s one person. Also they never deny that when pressed. The conversation just stops and they disappear for a day or two until the next post.
a disgruntled Hong Kong exile with too much time on their hands
Quite possibly. I think they may live in Germany or be German because I’ve seen some activity in German. Who knows. I doubt they’re a paid actor because there’s enough money in the official media machine pushing this line so I think you’re right. Someone who really hates China/CCP/CPC, perhaps for a good reason of their own, with a lot of free time. It really sucks because there are really interesting discussions that can be had on any of these topics. There’s another guy around here whose family emigrated from China because they weren’t having a great time with the 1-child policy among other things. He’s in the US and can have rational and interesting discussion about this stuff without bursting in flames.
E: Here’s a recent unhinged discussion with Scotty.
Amusing. And what detective work! Your time is valuable, careful not to waste too much of it.
Personally I’m not especially bothered by sockpuppetry in itself (talking of people wasting their time…). But it’s obviously important to have a plurality of viewpoints. If only they would sockpuppet more creatively!
Yeah, I do spend too much time here but I think it’s important to keep the community active because we haven’t won the anti-corpo social media war yet. So we have to overcontribute in content, funding, etc. From each according to their ability, etc.
I’m sorry to say that lemmy is not popular enough to be on CPC’s radar.
The CPC’s propaganda budget is mostly focused on what Chinese people would read if they get over the great firewall (mainly YouTube and Twitter).
Second to that is the general “feel good” stories, like scenery, food, or panda (recently high-speed trains), aiming at the mainstream Western public. You may see those on lemmy, but it’s very unlikely that the state propagandists are the ones posting them here.
What’s rampant is imperial core propaganda. You see the “Chinese propaganda” as “rampant” because you’re used to seeing only imperial core propaganda, which is how the internet looks on corporate media, including corporate social media.
The first step is to understand the media, which Media Bias/Fact Check and the Ad Fontes Media* are never going to teach you. The only people who are taught it are those who get degrees in marketing, public relations, political science, history, and journalism; and even then only some of them.
The new post-Trump/“post-truth” media literacy curricula won’t teach it to you either, because it was paid for and crafted by the US military-industrial complex: New Media Literacy Standards Aim to Combat ‘Truth Decay’. This week, the RAND Corporation released a new set of media literacy standards designed to support schools in this task.
The standards are part of RAND’s ongoing project on “truth decay”: a phenomenon that RAND researchers describe as “the diminishing role that facts, data, and analysis play in our political and civic discourse.”
None of it is a secret, though, and it can be learned.
- Noam Chomsky - The 5 Filters of the Mass Media Machine
- Propaganda model
- Edward Bernays
- Walter Lippmann
- Council on Foreign Relations
- Powell Memorandum
- The Trilateral Commission’s report, The Crisis of Democracy
* I’ve criticized MBFC & Ad Fontes before:
ah yes, corporate media such as… the BBC
truly yank brained
Are you trying to be ironic? Of course the BBC is pro imperialism.
Never said anything about imperialism. Only that they’re not corporate media.
Chinese media is also imperialist. Any media that is controlled by an imperialist state is imperial media.
They’re an IDF apologist, so probably not
whats that mean
It means you frequently defended the IDF genociding in Gaza
in what way?
because by lemmy definitions thinking that israel can still exist as a sovereign state makes you a nazi lol
leftists* are rampant on the fediverse
🫡 A natural consequence of leftist ideology.
Agreed, I find comrades of all kinds of colours and stripes here.
Not all leftists are supportive of China, anarchists certainly aren’t.
That’s not a rule, though. Many anarchists critically support the PRC and consider socialism to be better than capitalism, even if they disagree with Marxism and seek communalization over collectivization in the final analysis. As an alternative to the US Empire’s naked terrorism, the PRC plays a positive role.
Some of the worst things happen in the US are adoptions of PRC style domestic policy and some of the worst in the PRC is the adoption of both British and US style imperealism.
Can you elaborate? The US isn’t adopting PRC style domestic policy, nor is the PRC adopting British nor US-style imperialism, so I have no idea what you’re talking about. The PRC isn’t imperialist to begin with, it has no colonies nor neocolonies and isn’t plundering the surplus value created by the global south. Trade deals with China don’t come at the barrel of a gun either.
Sure. US takeover of TicTok is really direct example. The current ethnic cleasing operation empowering state protected slavery. Tighter interaction between buisness and goverment where failure to toe the party line is punished through unfavorable legal action and loss of goverment contracts for them or assoiciates. A heavy investment into domostic survellence and again forced cooperation for survellence capitalists.
On the US side.
On the PRC side, the expainsion Hong Kong style loan aggreements in order to establish maritime control globally. The attempt to expand territorial rights in the south china sea in order to expand their of control on their neighbors. Exporting survelence and censorship systems and models to keep favoriable dictatorships in power (as well as probally establish backdoors though that is an assumption). The funding of any group that fights their rivals influence as well. Just things imperialist do.
The US taking over Tik Tok isn’t “PRC style domestic policy,” though. The PRC has knowledge transfer agreements with any company that does business with China, I think this may be what you’re hinting at, but this is just the standard “sell it to us or we’ll ban it” style of US policy.
The PRC isn’t committing ethnic cleansing nor is it enslaving Uyghur peoples in Xinjiang, just like South Africa wasn’t committing “white genocide,” nor is there “christian genocide” in Nigeria. These are all examples of atrocity propaganda, where the west heavily distorts and often fabricates narratives in order to foment resistance and to give their own populations free excuses to not support anti-imperialism, in essence supporting it.
In the case of Xinjiang, the area is crucial in the Belt and Road Initiative, so the west backed sepratist groups in order to destabilize the region. China responded with vocational programs and de-radicalization efforts, which the west then twisted into claims of “genocide.” Nevermind that the west responds to seperatism with mass violence, and thus re-education programs focused on rehabilitation are far more humane, the tool was used both for outright violence by the west into a useful narrative to feed its own citizens. I highly recommend Qiao Collective’s Xinjiang: A Resource and Report Compilation for more on this subject.
In the context of tighter control between the state and business, it’s important to understand the class dynamics. The US Empire is a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, the large firms and key industries are privately owned, and the state entrenches their power. In the PRC, public ownership is the principle aspect, and the working class is in control of the state. The commanding heights of industry in China are all SOEs, and the bourgeoisie that controls small and medium firms are kept in check by the socialist state. You’re confusing form for essence, by only looking at similarities and ignoring the differences, you come to false conclusions.
Here’s more on the SOEs governing the commanding heights of industry in China:
As for surveillance, the US Empire has a far deeper level, the PATRIOT Act makes that clear. The US never copied China on this, they’ve always been worse. Further, in China surveillance is largely used against capitalists, while in the US Empire it’s used against the working classes.
On to the PRC side.
The PRC is expanding trade, but not dominance, nor does its trade deals come at the barrel of a gun. The PRC recognizes territory that has been consistent with what China had while the ROC held the UN seat for China, until it was transfered over to the PRC, leading to territorial disputes, not naked piracy and invasion like the US Empire does. They also are not “exporting surveillance and censorship systems.” They trade with pretty much everyone, and support their allies, but this is not imperialism.
To the contrary, the PRC is acting against imperialism.
-
Is China a Better Partner for Africa than Europe and the West?
-
The Fallacy of Denouncing Both Sides of the US-China Conflict
And many, many more sources back this up. It’s no secret that imperialists have been trying to smear China into being “no better” than the west, but the reality on the ground is that partnering with China results in mutual development and cooperation, while partnering with the west results in stripped autonomy, underdevelopment, and exploitation.
Gonna share any examples? Is the Chinese propaganda in the room with us?
Lol
I’ve been banned from several communities because I addressed the issues with slavery in China in a comment, and because I dared to critize the CCPs antiworker policies (like denying unions that dont align with what the leadership idea of the national interest).
I can get some evidence in some of the time but then ill be sudenly banned.
Which communities are problematic? I’ve not experienced any censoring when I’ve argued with tankies in the past, even got away with using ‘red fascist’. I assume I’ve been blocked by a few folk tho aha…
I cant remeber tbh. They kind of benign places like asklemmy but on the lemmy.ml server
I’m sure plenty others have said so already but you can block the instance if you find its content not to your tastes. It’s the beauty of Lemmy after all.
Tbh, I guess I’m more frustrated with moderation there then content, you know?
Do you have a shred of actual evidence for this? Or is it just the standard lib ad-hom of accusing those who disagree of being evil foreigners?
lemmy.ml is just like that, maybe you want to look for a new home instance.
One group- memes or something is wholly controlled by Chinese state actors.
As one of the moderators of !memes@lemmy.ml i encourage OP to look at the sort of posts i make and tell me - do you really think i’m a “Chinese state actor”?
Do you think all these posts i make in, eg, !hoch@lemmy.ml and !goodnews@lemmy.ml and !badnews@lemmy.ml and !eleven@lemmy.ml… these are all part of a carefully-crafted cover, and I’m actually being paid by China to delete totally-not-racist posts depicting their president as a yellow cartoon bear?
And for this service, to maintain my cover, they also pay me to create memes like this and this and this and this and this and this (and defending that one against less informed nerds) and this and this and this (a small sample of my OC here)?
And do you think China paid for this understandable explanation of asymmetric cryptography using high-school level math, because someone asked, deep in a thread about a service which I’d also already debunked the snake-oil privacy claims of?
Really?
