Over the past couple of years, I’ve had several conversations about China, exploring why much of what we believe is either fabricated or completely false.
For example,
- Chinese people are oppressed
- China has a social credit score
- There is a genocide of Uyghurs
- The Chinese government harvests organs
- The Tiananmen Square massacre
All of the above narratives are bunk.
To piece together the bigger puzzle, especially with China in the US’s crosshairs again, it’s fitting I push back against psychological operations.
The West calls China an enemy to justify its own fading empire—Beijing’s just playing the game we wrote.
— John Pilger, journalist
China as the enemy
I’m not sure if it’s a post-Cold War hang-over, but the US fears losing its lead on the global stage.
As it happens, many think tanks and White House advisory groups paint China as a baddie to be dealt with.
- The Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), funded by Lockheed Martin and Taiwan’s government, frames China as a military-industrial threat.
- The RAND Corporation, backed by the Pentagon and wealthy neocons, views China as a threat with advanced military and economic power.
- The Hudson Institute, tied to Taiwan’s government and Mike Pompeo, sees China as an ideological threat.
- The Atlantic Council, funded by Taiwan’s government and linked to the CIA and NATO, claims China’s tech and military threaten America.
And, of course, Trump's 'tariff wars' with China are part of the aforementioned. What he is doing was planned long before he became president, all recently written down by Stephen Miran, one of his key advisors.
In fact, Trump spoke about his anti-China position back in 2012 already.
China’s not out to destroy us—it’s out to outlast us, and we’re handing them the playbook with our infighting.
— Ian Bremmer, political scientist
In a nutshell, what he is doing is all about keeping the US in charge of global trade and stopping China from becoming the top economy.
🎙️ Podcast episode
Lee Barrett is a British YouTuber who has lived in China for over a decade. He runs a YouTube channel where he posts videos about his daily life there.
He chatted with me about censorship, oppression, food, culture, and why many Westerners hate China without ever visiting.
It’s not a utopia, but nor is it some totalitarian hellhole.
Oh, by the way, he didn’t use a VPN or anything to dodge the Great Firewall of China. He just recorded with me like any other guest.
