China Points the Way to Anti-Free Speech American Libs
Any American over the age of 40 is painfully aware of how quickly a society can change and freedoms can erode. Don’t be pedantic — 40 is close enough for this cautionary tale.
If you want a glimpse into the future that American leftists are driving us toward, you don’t need a crystal ball. Twitter will do just fine:
Outspoken billionaire Sun Dawu jailed for 18 years in China https://t.co/Ig0NtB143s
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) July 29, 2021
Outspoken! The horror.
The details of the story are even creepier.
A prominent Chinese billionaire has been sentenced to 18 years in prison, the latest in a string of punishments against outspoken corporate bosses.
Sun Dawu runs one of the country’s largest private agricultural businesses in the northern province of Hebei.
Sun, 67, has in the past spoken out about human rights and politically sensitive topics.
He was found guilty of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” – a charge often used against activists.
“Picking quarrels and provoking trouble.” Is this Chinese law or the Twitter Terms of Service?
Make no mistake: This kind of thing is — and always has been — the end game for the “hate speech” crowd. Once you begin criminalizing words it’s just the tiniest of steps to criminalizing thoughts and then you’re on a precipitous slippery slope that someone just slathered in motor oil.
Like all insidious leftist usurpations of freedom, the “hate speech” nonsense is presented as a way to make the world a better place, In a sense, it is, as the world is undoubtedly better for those who get to designate what is and is not hate speech. Of course, those lusting to be in such a position in a more totalitarian version of the United States of America never grasp that they can have their own rules used against them in a heartbeat.
The “hate speech” label is especially ridiculous when used by American liberals. They don’t care if you actually hate anyone. They hate everyone, including (especially?) themselves. One thing American libs don’t hate is a big, powerful government that can make their political opponents shut up.
The parallels here are truly disturbing. See if this bit of information about Sun seems familiar to you:
He was one of the few people to openly accuse the government of covering up an African swine flu outbreak, which affected his farms in 2019, and later devastated much of the country’s industry
Getting in trouble for questioning the government’s handling of a public health crisis? Welcome to what we’ve been dealing with here in conservative media since the beginning of last year.
Someone playing devil’s advocate here might counter that I’m being melodramatic because we don’t arrest people for stuff like that here in the good ol’ U.S. of A.
Well not yet, anyway. Academic M.D. and occasional CNN guest Peter Hotez recently suggested that the Biden administration extend federal hate-crime protections to Anthony Fauci to discourage people from criticizing him.
We dismiss the lunatic ravings of rabid totalitarians like Hotez at our great peril. Like all commies, he wants to be part of a protected class that the hoi polloi are forbidden to question.
Everything the Democrats are doing right now is either a direct or roundabout way to silence their political opponents. We are frighteningly close to a time when even a billionaire could get sent away for annoying the government. Anyone who thinks we aren’t, really, really hasn’t been paying attention, especially this last year.
There’s been a lot of joking on this side of the aisle about us getting sent to “the gulag” in the near future.
It’s all fun and games until Chairman Fauci’s Quarrel Police come for you.
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