[Peace-discuss] Pilger on Assange/wikileaks

Sat Jan 15 21:04:45 CST 2011

Cross-cultural plot: Sweeney Todd, The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.

Hopey-'em War...

On 1/15/11 8:32 PM, E. Wayne Johnson wrote:
> chinaSMACK seems to be seeking stories with some pop interest and shock value
> whereas the Hopium War seems to be about lullabying the huddled masses back
> to sleep with muted tones of gentle rhetoric, for a change.
>
> *
>
> In ancient China there was a legend about a roadside tavern that served /jiaozi/
> (a kind of Chinese ravioli).  Before they would  run out of meat they would add
> some sedative drug like Hopium to their dishes, and when next hapless customer 
> 'awakened'
> from his little nap he was the picture of a changed man -- exsanguinated, 
> eviscerated,
> depiliated, quartered, and made to hang on hooks in high places.
>
>
>
>
> On 1/16/2011 12:34 AM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>> Fascinating.  Thanks for this.
>>
>> ChinaSMACK as revenge for the Opium Wars?
>>
>> On 1/15/11 2:46 AM, E. Wayne Johnson wrote:
>>>> China is the worst offender. China has aggressive, sophisticated 
>>>> interception technology that places itself between every reader inside 
>>>> China and every information source outside China. We've been fighting a 
>>>> running battle to make sure we can get information through, and there are 
>>>> now all sorts of ways Chinese readers can get on to our site."
>>>
>>> Back in the early 90's the term "bamboo curtain" used to be used to describe 
>>> China's rather isolationist policy, as
>>> opposed to the Iron Curtain of Eastern Europe.  An iron curtain is nigh 
>>> impenetrable.  A bamboo curtain
>>> can snap closed suddenly, according to the analogy.
>>>
>>> Now I would describe it as more of a "Beaded Curtain".  The curtain is there 
>>> sometimes but it doesnt
>>> provide much of a barrier.  My Chinese friends are at least as familiar with 
>>> Wikileaks as I am.
>>>
>>> Most of the Chinese that I know are quite familiar with the means of 
>>> negotiating around the curtain, anyway.
>>>
>>> YouTube is seriously hindered in favour of the homegrown Chinese competitors 
>>> like YouKu.com and Tudou.com, etc,
>>> both of which often offer material that YouTube would not permit.  Lots of 
>>> YouTube videos are replicated
>>> on YouKu, Tudou, and Renren, etc.
>>>
>>> Woman going crazy down on Caroline Street.
>>> Actually its Nanjing...
>>> In a "flash" all hell has broken loose...'she was gone and I was black and 
>>> blue...'
>>> http://www.tudou.com/programs/view/1OZJg-XfbI0/
>>>
>>> Google is  partially blocked or harassed in some markets in favour of the 
>>> local competitors baidu.com, sina.com, sohu.com, etc while
>>> yahoo.com is not generally messed with.  I met Google's COO at a 
>>> get-together here recently and we discussed animal production in China
>>> and etc.  He said that Google's business in china is the sales of 
>>> geographically specific advertisements that appear on websites all over china.
>>> The fact that there search engine is often messed with does not interfere 
>>> with Google's core business in china, which is web advertising.
>>>
>>> ChinaSMACK (http://www.chinasmack.com) covers one portion of the often silly 
>>> side of urban Chinese pop culture and might be interesting to some.
>>>
>>>     chinaSMACK is a daily-updated collection of translated internet content
>>>     from the Chinese-language internet. These latest stories, pictures,
>>>     videos, and topics have become very popular, spreading across China's
>>>     major BBS forums, social networking websites, or through email forwards
>>>     sent between normal Chinese people everyday.
>>>
>>> Chinasmack is not blocked at all in Beijing.  I don't care.  I seldom have 
>>> much interest in pop kitsch.  The Chinese know much more
>>> about western and US pop kitsch than I do.
>>>
>>> chinasmack notes one way to circumvent the curtain (there are other ways)--
>>>
>>>     Certain parts of the website includes information from websites that may
>>>     be blocked in China (or other countries) such as YouTube, Twitter, and
>>>     Facebook. As a result, any page of our website that includes information
>>>     from these blocked websites may cause the page to load more slowly than
>>>     normal. When we embed YouTube videos and YouTube is blocked in your
>>>     country, you will only see a blank square. We have designed the website
>>>     to minimize this unfortunate effect upon your browsing experience and
>>>     thank you for your understanding that these are beyond our control. One
>>>     way to avoid this problem is to use a proxy or VPN. For example,
>>>     chinaSMACK has tested VPN services by Freedur
>>>     <http://www.chinasmack.com/go/freedur> and FBVPN
>>>     <http://www.chinasmack.com/go/fbvpn>.
>>>
>>> chinasmack has this to say about what some "liberals" would call "vile hate 
>>> speech": --
>>>
>>>     We believe racism and bigotry is a major part of the internet, including
>>>     the Chinese-language internet. We try to offer an honest look into the
>>>     big Chinese-language internet, so we will sometimes translate racist
>>>     Chinese and racist Chinese comments. As a result, we believe it would be
>>>     unfair to hide the racism and bigotry of non-Chinese people.
>>>
>>>     This does not mean we will not moderate racism and bigotry completely.
>>>     It only means that we will not pretend it does not exist. It is not our
>>>     goal or policy to hide the truths about people and society. Please fight
>>>     racism and bigotry by condemning it wherever you see it.
>>>
>>> chinasmack also has a glossary of popular internet slang.
>>>
>>> http://www.chinasmack.com/glossary#%E6%93%8D%E4%BD%A0%E5%A6%88
>>> http://www.chinasmack.com/glossary#SB
>>>
>>>
>
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