> The thing is there's this strange, "uncanny" feeling I get whenever these things are shared too
I posted this because I got super frustrated with all the derails and distractions that utterly destroyed the Xinjiang indoctrination camp post from yesterday. If you don't believe me you can look at my comment history.
Your comment history is extremely problematic for Hacker News, because you've been using it to engage in nationalistic flamewar. I don't care what your views are or which nations you have feelings about: doing this is as toxic as it gets.
Edit: actually you went so far over the line that we banned the account. No one is allowed to turn HN into nationalistic hell, regardless of which nation they're fighting for.
Okay, so I understand how you feel. The thing is I clicked on that post and the top comments are critical of indoctrination camps. There's one top-level comment you replied to that pointed out an irony given the imprisoned population here in the US.
The article details, AFAICT, the CCP's attempts to spread propaganda to its own people, not to the west, although I have no doubts it does try to spread it elsewhere. So given that, what is the likelihood that most of the critical, anti-US comments are in fact CCP propaganda hires? I don't know, but it seems a little bit much to assume everything is a plot to subvert people's opinions.
I'm not a propagandist. I agree with the sentiment in the comment on that article (I missed) about the US imprisoned population. People can disagree with you and point out opinions you disagree with.
I said earlier, somewhat sarcastically, it sucks that people are pushing things in this comment thread and voting down and flagging comments that point out other countries do the same. I am always somewhat paranoid, and anyone would given Snowden leaks and having read history about things like COINTELPRO, etc., but it was somewhat tongue in cheek (yes, I'm not perfect, I say mean things online like most people). Do I really believe all of you are US gov't plants trying to sway people to be belligerent to China? I don't think so.
I get we should keep our eyes open, but we should be willing to accept that there are people who disagree with us, and not everyone who disagrees with us is a Russian/Chinese/etc bot. I'm actually really bothered by the attitude online these days that calls everyone who disagrees with us as being an astroturf. I'm not saying it doesn't happen, but it really helps to further strengthen the echo chambers we've created for ourselves.
I posted this because I got super frustrated with all the derails and distractions that utterly destroyed the Xinjiang indoctrination camp post from yesterday. If you don't believe me you can look at my comment history.