s0ykaf

i mean it feels like he's that slightly unhinged uncle who just found out that Patterns Do Exist and can't stop thinking they now hold an immense power

i found it so funny that not only did he attempt to teach "the entirety of human history", but he tried to do it in 60 classes. my guy, that's like, a lot of years. and a lot of kilometers. maybe get started with a little less ambition

people do lean into the "china smol bean" thing way too much

china is way more vulnerable, even today, than the ussr ever was. maybe because of all the news of their impressive rate of development and growth, or because of the "high tech" nature of their coastal cities, or because of how the other side of american propaganda has been propping them up (your enemy must be both weak and strong enough to be a credible threat etc), we have lost sight of their actual conditions. but they have absolutely no way of facing america head-on. we're talking about a country that, despite everything, still has half the per capita gdp of the 1980s ussr (in today's dollars); a country that relies on trade to get their iron needs (importing a whopping 80% of what they use), whereas the ussr was self-sufficient; a country that still relies on trade to attend to their energy needs, especially oil (why do you think this whole iran thing escalated this much out of nowhere? where does a large chunk of china's oil needs come through?), while the ussr was self-sufficient; a military that, despite all the development, is still less advanced than the soviets', relative to their time; and the list goes on and on

the ussr had all those advantages over current china, and yet they collapsed under imperialist pressure. china knows that, america knows that, and this is why we're seeing one side insisting on being quiet and the other doing their best to provoke them into making a mistake. one side needs time, the other can't allow them that (or else they will, indeed, finally lose), and this is what's going to explain every major geopolitical decision you'll be seeing for the next few decades

look like China couldn't afford an embargo

i didn't say china couldn't "afford" an embargo, you brain damaged chimpanzee

i literally said it's not about money, and that my country should do more while china couldn't, and explained why. somehow you managed to miss that within that black hole of stupidity inside your head and made it all about money again, how can someone be that bad at reading

i mean, whatever, this is all fucking moot anyway. you're gonna keep crying, i'm gonna keep saying you shouldn't, china is gonna keep developing, iran is still gonna stop before mutual destruction, and the empire will keep doing its thing until enough of the structural needles have moved that it's unable to. wanna feel like something is being done, then go protest if you live in the empire, that actually has a higher chance of working than some deluded dream of global embargo lmao

Would you change your tune if China's embargo also allowed South Africa to ban their coal trade which is key for the economy and IDF operations?

colombia was by far israel's largest source of coal, accounting for more than half their imports. when petro shut that off, i was among those who celebrated

months later, what changed? nothing

as a side point, it's also bizarre to me that people mention the sanctions against apartheid in south africa as proof that such a thing works. because they always fail to notice that, while jamaica started the whole thing, it was really america and their allies that did it. i feel pretty safe saying it would have never worked if the west hadn't joined the action

show me an example, just a single one, of sanctions actually working against a western country or one of their allies and i'll gladly change my mind. i'm not kidding, i'll start advocating for more action from china right away; it would be a fucking relief as it's far easier to do that from an emotional standpoint. as it stands, it makes absolutely no sense to me

called solidarity, yeah

it's not solidarity if it has 0 impact lol. it's no different than saying bad words to israel, and china is already doing that so who cares

they buy scientific equipment and shit

buying scientific equipment is a large part of how china became what they are. why should they change the strategy now? in fact, even as an outsider from the 3rd world, it would be deeply undialectical of me to want china to do that. their rise is objectively the greatest threat to western hegemony. that hegemony, in turn, is the greatest impediment to revolutionary and independence movements all over. any action that brought short-term relief but made long-term success less likely would just be a bad decision, for china and for me

reality doesn't move linearly, and right now the contradictions are working in china's favor. for them, the correct action is inaction, and i'm glad they're not diverging from that

now, my country, on the other hand, could do more - despite being far less rich than china, because it's not about money. and it's unfortunate we ain't doing shit, but you can't expect much from lula and his shitlib lackeys

china's trade with israel isn't about the amount, but what is being traded

for one, that shithole has been trading western military tech with china for ages. and then when the US first started blocking china's access to semiconductors, israel managed to circumvent those restrictions to the point of over half their exports to china being semiconductors - and that continued until biden's bill in 2022 (when it dropped massively), but china obviously knows the importance of recovering access to that

meanwhile, the only real impact that some kind of embargo would have on israel is more american assistance, absolutely pointless

if you wanna make a mostly symbolic gesture that comes with a very real material loss just because it would make you feel better, be my guest. the cpc didn't get all the way here by doing that kinda shit though, and thankfully they still seem aware of this

every time i criticized china i later found out that their actions made sense and i just lacked the variables to understand them

i don't make that mistake anymore, i just wait to see how they're right and i'm wrong lol

he’s an idealist through and through

he's just uninformed as fuck about the shit he talks about come on

Very whacky ideas going on here.

he's an english literature graduate who decided to create a "new kind of history", based on asimov's psychohistory, after teaching a shallow as fuck course of "the entirety of human history" (lmao.) to some school age teenagers

of course he's whacky as fuck

at this point I don't see China acting against the status quo (even as the status quo is actively preparing to act against China)

the answer is in that line, the status quo is preparing to act against china because china's existence is already a challenge to it

it sounds paradoxical because how contradictions work, but china defends this part of the status quo precisely because it's the only way to permanently change it. that's why we keep memeing about how "china does nothing and still wins". and america is trying to destabilize the situation for the same reason, things can't keep going the way they are or the west is fucked

acting in any way differently would be reckless, and repeating the same mistakes communists have made before. by advocating for the right action before the right time, you're facilitating the enemy's work

that's not to say every foreign policy decision from china is good, but the spice must flow is definitely the most rational and (long-term) beneficial part of it

3 days in that job and i would be commiting seppuku

12 hrs is a lot mate

coupling the sacrifice with a chance of the greatest exclusivity a CEO is always craving for is a way to make all this much more acceptable to the members

the individual sacrifices his own life, his clanmates temporarily sacrifice their position. all for the Greater Good