Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, self-appointed Socialist spokesman for the Biden administration, recently said in a video that they are going to ”try” to rein in the media so that there isn’t going to be disinformation and misinformation spread.
She even went so far as suggesting that Democrats add “media literacy” as a mandate for a congressional “Truth and Reconciliation” Committee first suggested by former Clinton Labor Secretary Robert Reich last October. Their hypocrisy never ceases to amaze me!
Social Media in all repressive regimes is but a euphemism for surveillance. Look at the democrat’s bosom buddies in China. WeChat censors private and group chat conversations, banning words linked to Tiananmen Square, Tibet or the forbidden religious group Falun Gong, as well as nicknames mocking its or its allies’ leading politicians. The ban on “keywords” constantly adapts to the political situation in the country.
In the past, China’s twitter, WeChat, would actually notify the user that they had been censored but today, according to a recent study by the Toronto based research center Citizen Lab, users aren’t notified so they have no idea their message was never sent. Maybe ignorance is bliss!
Previous investigation into the former Chinese version of Skype, TOM-Skype, has shown that the Chinese government went one step further: not only were the contents of private messages censored, but conversations deemed suspicious were meticulously logged. According to Masahi Crete-Nishihata of Citizen Lab, “if TOM-Skype’s conversations are logged, it would make sense that other chat apps are also logged.
In China, sending sensitive messages can have dire consequences. There are cases of individuals that have been incarcerated for sharing pictures on sensitive topics, such as the Dalai Lama, on WeChat. And you’re not safe even if you don’t engage in politics.
China’s Social Credit Score is right out of Orwell’s “1984.” When announced several years ago, the Chinese government and their communist controlled media said the project was designed to boost public confidence and fight problems like corruption and business fraud. It will “enhance trust and social stability by creating a culture of sincerity to restore social trust.” What it actually will create is a culture of fear and a nation of informants.
Most of the information the government needs for tallying the score is already being collected. That restaurant bill you didn’t pay on time, that day you came to work a few minutes late, the fact that your doctor said you should stop smoking but you didn’t. All of that information is in the hands of WeChat or its competitors. China Daily reports that your score will also be influenced by your “hobbies, interaction with friends, shopping habits and lifestyle.”
If your score is too low, don’t worry, you can earn extra points by reporting friends, family, neighbors, coworkers, etc. who violate China’s repressive lifestyle such as Christians who illegally meet to pray in private homes, or the Muslim Uyghurs and Kazakhs in China’s far west whom they spot praying in public, fasting during Ramadan or who just grow a beard. I know Karen isn’t a popular name in China but maybe it should be.
Australia’s ABC News reported that the government has already produced a “Deadbeat Map” via an app on WeChat, which shows a radar-style graphic identifying every laolai in the vicinity of the user. “Tapping on a person marked on the map reveals their personal information, including their full name, court-case number and the reason they have been labeled untrustworthy. Identity-card numbers and home addresses are also partially shown.”
WeChat’s main opponent in the financial branch, AliPay, already keeps a score on its users through a system called Sesame Credit Score. The app combines offline purchases made through its payment system and the shopping history online to compile financial creditworthiness. And even though AliPay isn’t directly part of the government’s Social Credit System, the data they collect is accessible by the government.
Where did China get the technological ability to control 1.44 billion people? As Pogo would say, I have seen the enemy and he is us! Namely, Google, Facebook, YouTube, Apple, Oracle, Intel, Cisco, and all those other American high-tech companies eager to get a piece of the fat Chinese pie. The technology was taken piece by piece by the Chinese from all of them to execute, with some local improvements, the Social Credit System. In a certain sense, these companies provided the inspiration for it—and the impetus. The Chinese copied them. That’s what they do.
Both the American and Chinese social media have more similarities than differences. It’s almost as if they are about to converge. China, after all, has its own Amazon, Alibaba. And we—both our companies and our government— sometimes working together, are monitoring all of us in a Chinese manner. Facial recognition is poised to take over our lives.
Considering the total disregard for the 1st Amendment by Google, Facebook, YouTube, etc. within the last few weeks I’m pretty sure Chairman Mao is already smiling.
Source: Hello, Big Brother: How China controls its citizens through social media, DW.com; AOC’s suggestion of commission to ‘rein in’ media slammed as ‘wholly un-American’ by Brian Flood, Fox News; China’s new ‘social credit system’ is a dystopian nightmare by Steven W. Moshe, New York Post’ China’s Scary Social Credit System Made in USA by Google and Facebook by Roger Simon, PJ Media
