this post was submitted on 31 Dec 2025
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Thoughts?

Is this imperialism by China, a country which is supposed to be left-wing? Leftists are normally anti-imperialism. Wouldn't it be better to let Taiwan democratically decide whether they want to be part of China or not?

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[–] zd9@lemmy.world 154 points 1 week ago (17 children)

Lol calling China Leftist isn't quite the thing. They are technically "communist" but no more so than the National Socialist German Workers' Party was socialist.

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[–] adhd_traco@piefed.social 101 points 1 week ago (6 children)

Alternative headline:

China's authoritarian leader Xi Jinping reiterates intent to subjugate neighboring country Taiwan in New Year's Eve speech.

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[–] BlameTheAntifa@lemmy.world 92 points 1 week ago (4 children)

Yes, it is imperialism. Also, China has an authoritarian state controlled by a privileged ruling class and is therefore far-right.

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[–] minorkeys@lemmy.world 65 points 1 week ago (5 children)

China hasn't exerted any political authority over Taiwan in 80 years and Taiwan declared itself a separate nation long ago, supported by the will of the people of Taiwan. Anything else is the will of a conqueror.

[–] Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca 15 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I wonder how many people living in Taiwan were alive back when China controlled it. Probably 90% + of the population has never known anything but independent Taiwan

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[–] mcv@lemmy.zip 63 points 1 week ago

China is only nominally left; they're deeply conservative, and don't exactly empower the people. They are imperialist, as was the USSR.

And Taiwan did democratically decide what they want. It would be better if China also got to democratically decide what they want.

[–] Hello_there@fedia.io 57 points 1 week ago (38 children)

Invading Taiwan without damaging the things that make it valuable seems tough.

[–] Aljernon@lemmy.today 1 points 6 days ago

Conquering Taiwan is more about pride and ego then any material gain, though the Island has strong maritime strategic value.

[–] ms_lane@lemmy.world 24 points 1 week ago (5 children)

They don't care about damaging things now.

Almost all of TSMC's output is now powering US' Stargate AI project. They also have their own fabs, they have equivalent to TSMC fabs (from stolen TSMC research) in larger numbers - the only reason we don't see it flooding the market here in the west is that TSMC got injunctions against all the Chinese fabs selling 7nm and smaller chips.

If TSMC is gone and Intel+Samsung can't keep up, then those injunctions are going to disappear pretty quickly to keep the economy rolling.

TSMC is no longer a card Taiwan holds, largely due to corporate greed.

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[–] vga@sopuli.xyz 48 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (20 children)

Xi Jinping is an evil scumbag whose goal is to destabilize the world. China needs and deserves Taiwan just as little as Russia needs Crimea.

Taiwan's sovereign status should be ratified in UN asap.

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[–] PumaStoleMyBluff@lemmy.world 35 points 1 week ago (3 children)

China, a country which is supposed to be left-wing

Uhh, citation needed? Communism by name only does not a left wing country make

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Isn't it just such a fucking coincidence you have all these assholes coming to the same conclusions at the same time?

Putin invaded Ukraine and would love to Hitler his way across Europe in the name of "unity."

Trump invades Venezuela, yet pretends to be an antiwar isolationist only taking necessary action to protect the U.S. from the flow of fentanyl (which has never been coming from Venezuela, but why let facts get in the way of a shitty narrative).

Now China will invade Taiwan and the U.S. will refuse to get involved because Trump is totally an "isolationist." (At least when it comes to other continents).

Yep. Totally a coincidence and not a shared strategy for a global fascist takeover by a new axis of evil.

[–] Etterra@discuss.online 29 points 1 week ago (2 children)
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[–] MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip 23 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

One sentence that fell during the Merkel phone spying affair:

Countries don't have friends, they only have interests.

Don't think of countries as people; people have morals and one direction they go. This to some of the comments here.

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[–] GreenKnight23@lemmy.world 21 points 1 week ago (1 children)

West Taiwan: baby let's get back together!

Taiwan: no! you were an asshole to me!

West Taiwan: I wasn't asking.

Taiwan: this is what I'm fucking talking about!

[–] chaogomu@lemmy.world 24 points 1 week ago

The break-up was a little different... Chiang Kai Shek was just as much of a monster as Mao. He was just a capitalist monster so the west supported him.

He was just as much of a monster after he was driven off of the mainland.

He and Reverend Moon directly funded literal Nazi death squads in South America.

But that fucker is dead, and Taiwan is a functional democracy, unlike the mainland.

They don't want to "unify", they can see what happens to places China "unifies" with.

[–] REDACTED@infosec.pub 17 points 1 week ago (8 children)

For the first time ever in my life, I see someone claiming that China is left-wing. Left and authoritarian are usually at the opposite spectrums.

[–] drapermache@lemmy.world 22 points 1 week ago

That is what Animal Farm was talking about - that authoritarianism can take over any political ideology. It isn't a anti-communism book, but anti-authoritarianism.

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[–] SabinStargem@lemmy.today 17 points 1 week ago (13 children)

I hope the EU and nations in the Asian sphere decide to have a military alliance. Taiwan is pretty dang valuable, and also shouldn't be bullied for the sake of some strongman's wet dream.

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[–] nutsack@lemmy.dbzer0.com 15 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

it really sucks for the 90%+ of Taiwanese people who don't want to become part of China

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[–] Formfiller@lemmy.world 14 points 1 week ago

WW3 all the imperialists are acting at once

[–] Mulligrubs@lemmy.world 14 points 1 week ago (8 children)

Now is the perfect time for them to do it, I can see why! America may not even respond.

Yes, I know we are an ally and we're supposed to immediately go to war. So what? We promised to defend Ukraine from Russia, too. Look what happened.

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[–] daannii@lemmy.world 13 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Pretty sure tawain ain't interested in being absorbed back by China.

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[–] kerrigan778@lemmy.blahaj.zone 13 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

There is an expression in science that needs to be used more in polysci 'all models are wrong" The right wing vs left wing political spectrum is a model of political ideologies and a very simplistic one at that. It is also used interchangeably for fundamentally different political tenants. Large government-small government, authoritarian - libertarian, capitalist - socialist. Models are only as good as their ability to predict reality and they are always wrong, they are just simplified models of reality. The moment you are confused saying "but if this country is X-wing, why are they Y" You are either misunderstanding the model, misapplying the model, or are misunderstanding the actual value of a model.

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