Jenifer (Zarknorph) said:  China doesn't just monitor you, it judges you on your Social Credit score.

And my society doesn't do the same thing?

How come at least three people I've known were called up for jury service while still in their yoof and, for all I know, have been doing it regularly every few years since?

I've only been called up once.

ABC News

France's digital tax targeting US tech giants could spark a new disruption in world trade

Amazon, Facebook and Google have hit back at a move by France to tax their sales, but Australia may soon follow.

Read more from ABC News

Jenifer (Zarknorph) said: I've only been called up once.

You're probably a bad girl, unable to accept any evidence put in front of you.

Jenifer (Zarknorph) said: Amazon, Facebook and Google have hit back at a move by France to tax their sales, but Australia may soon follow.

Please don't remind me of another terrible result from Brexit.

Trump has told us we'll not get a trade deal with the US unless we agree to forego taxing US corporations.

Di (amina046) said:

I actually do not care who spies on me. 

I care a great deal about who intercepts the electronic communications of myself and my neighbours.

Nowadays, a large portion of political discussion is online.   Someone who can identify dissenting opinions, and who has the power to penalise them, is in a position to leverage that power into tyrrany.

Even just being able to profile individual voters well enough to manipulate them via micro-targeted arguments is a game changer.

True, many people have voluntarily given such information to big companies such as Facebook.   And, as we've seen in the Cambridge Analytica scandal, that's dangerous because even if Facebook don't have that sort of political ambition, those who do have it may be able to winkle the data away from Facebook.

But, even so, there's a big difference between that, and between spying happening at the hardware level where most people won't have the ability to opt-out of being listened into.

Di (amina046) said:

Thinking about it, I actually prefer the Chinese over the Americans.

Neither the Donald Trump administration nor the Xi Jinping administration have my best interests at heart.   They are both, first and foremost, pursuing their own national interest (or possibly just the interests of certain leaders and financial backers).

But, on average, over the last 50 years America has been for global trade, free markets, democracy and the rule of law.    While China has not.

So I'd say my interests coincide more closely with those of America than those of China.   If you're in doubt about that, you don't know enough about Tibet, or the Falun Gong.

AletheiaAtha said:  I'd say my interests coincide more closely with those of America than those of China.   

I'm rather reluctant to accept that. It could be wholly and definitely true - but only because I'm white and speak English. If I was brown and spoke some minority language and was under occupation, Chinese colonialisation might suit me better.

AletheiaAtha said:    If you're in doubt about that, you don't know enough about Tibet, or the Falun Gong.

I'm not sure that Tibetans are suffering worse than native Americans did.

While Falun Gong has twice as many members as the Communist Party of China - its a much, much bigger threat than American communists ever posed to the US government and social stability.

BerrySteph said:

I'm not sure that Tibetans are suffering worse than native Americans did.

That's a pretty low bar.

And, even so, I'd like to think that America today isn't the same as America 75 years ago (internment of ethnic Japanese American citizens) or America of 175 years ago.

AletheiaAtha said:

That's a pretty low bar. 

Well, yes, the native Americans were reduced by 90% or more, much of it by shootings. Their pathetic remainder is being wiped out by alcohol and opiates, as best I can tell. (Absolutely no Indian staff in "Indian" casinos). I doubt if Tibetans will suffer as badly.

No evidence that Chinese Muslims are likely to suffer as badly as native Americans.

And of course, China's complaint and concern is most likely 100% valid - the Uighuirs probably have been radicalised by fleeing Afghans and others.

AletheiaAtha said:   even so, I'd like to think that America today isn't the same as America 75 years ago (internment of ethnic Japanese American citizens) 

Only because they've found new and less obviously ghastly means to carry out genocide of communities and minorities.

Over and over again I hear how terribly antisemitic were the Germans (today in a discussion about WW1) - and yet Americans were and are much more brutal towards their own minorities - and much more antisemitic.

You know that the first chapters of Mein Kampf (1925) are plagiarised from "The International Jew" of 1920 by some bloke called Henry Ford? There was a newspaper full of the same stuff "The Dearborn Independent". Only stopped by BDS - a tactic that cannot be used by people outraged by kiddy-torturing and the coming Holocaust II and possibly WW3.

Oops, my talking like this upsets some people in this very forum - I hope you're more robust.

BerrySteph said:

Over and over again I hear how terribly antisemitic were the Germans

Oh, I agree, Germany was not the only country in which anti-Semitism was rife.   Have you ever read stories by John Buchan?   Apparently he was considered less anti-Semitic than average, for writers of that time.   It was just the done thing back then, to comment on races and generalise about them. :-(