We’ve got a lot going on in the Western hemisphere to keep our attention — a looming midterm election, Congressional leaders’ spouses getting assaulted with hammers under dubious circumstances, the non-stop transing of the children, etc.
But it’s worth taking a look at the authoritarian hellscape that is China — if for no other purpose than as a case study of how far an unconstrained government will encroach on human dignity if given the opportunity.
Here’s a brief survey of what’s been going on in the Orient and why it should matter to U.S. civil libertarians.
Foxconn workers flee COVID-19 lockdowns like runaway slaves
Foxconn — the Taiwanese-owned Chinese manufacturer that produces the iPhone — is infamous for its “suicide nets” from a few years back, which are designed to catch workers trying to kill themselves by jumping out of windows.
Now, desperate workers are jumping fences to flee facility-wide lockdowns and escape to freedom.
Workers have broken out of #Apple’s largest assembly site, escaping the Zero #Covid lockdown at Foxconn in #Zhengzhou. After sneaking out, they’re walking to home towns more than 100 kilometres away to beat the Covid app measures designed to control people and stop this. #China pic.twitter.com/NHjOjclAyU
— Stephen McDonell (@StephenMcDonell) October 30, 2022
Shanghai Disney Patrons Locked Inside Theme Park Due to COVID
Ten people tested positive for COVID in Shanghai, so the government locked everyone inside the Chinese version of Disney World as punishment.
Via the BBC:
As well as the theme park, surrounding areas such as the shopping street were also abruptly closed shortly after 11:30 local time (3:30 GMT).
Videos posted on Chinese social media site Weibo showed people rushing to the park’s gates following the announcement but finding them already locked.
Posting on Chinese social media site WeChat, the Shanghai government said the park was barring people from entering and those inside could only leave once they had returned a negative test result.
Chinese COVID police grab residents off the street to relocate them to quarantine sites
The Chinese people call them “Big Whites,” and they are universally feared for their brutal tactics. Here they are roughing up non-compliant citizens while forcibly relocating them to quarantine:
A human rights catastrophe. The world should not be silent. pic.twitter.com/QU3QSFuIc0
— Anthony LaMesa (@ajlamesa) April 14, 2022
COVID Robot dog barks orders at peasants on Shanghai streets
The CCP Public Health© authorities unleashed their mechanical beast a few months back to patrol Shanghai streets and enforce compliance with lockdown measures:
————
Given that China is, in fact, on the opposite side of the world (as Nancy Pelosi recently awkwardly pointed out), one might be tempted to throw up his arms: “Yeah, China’s an authoritarian hellhole, what can do you do? I’m an American/Canadian/Brit.”
The compelling reason to care is that the Chinese model of social control is the Western technocrats’ dream. It’s the World Economic Forum’s long-term vision for the West. WEF puppet and Canadian PM Justin Trudeau said so out loud when he lauded China’s “basic dictatorship.”
Justin Trudeau: "There's a level of admiration I actually have for China because their basic dictatorship is allowing them to actually turn their economy around on a dime." pic.twitter.com/Vxwn2DhpgZ
— Harrison Faulkner (@Harry__Faulkner) April 11, 2022
The Chinese Communist Party’s Orwellian social credit score system — which requires government permission to buy and sell basic goods and travel — is the social engineering Holy Grail for the likes of Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos.
China is merely the ideal testing ground for such projects because East Asia, especially the Chinese mainland, has no political culture that values individual autonomy. What afflicts the East today will befall the West tomorrow.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member