[zozbot123]

> a lot of us

Who is "us" here? Anecdotally, a lot of Chinese people just don't care that much about the specifics of their political system as long as the economy keeps growing strongly and social harmony is encouraged. And yes, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory and now Xi Jinping Thought are regarded as important models and doctrines for how China should develop in the future. And they seem to be working well enough so far. "Democracy and individual liberty" may be okay for the West (though even here they're quite recent developments historically!), but China is a huge country with a very significant legacy of its own, and we should respect that.

[luddy]

What you don't get (or try to spin away) is this:

- the money that China spends at Oxford and at US universities is an attempt to spread the ideology I describe

- inside China (I lived there for many years) there is ZERO ambiguity about the purpose of these soft power programs. it is only wumao working outside China who push the fiction that to object to propaganda programs that are focused on the West is to interfere in Chinese internal affairs.

- this has absolutely nothing to do with respecting the legacy of China inside its own borders. it is about a concerted "Unified Front" that is an open policy of the Chinese gov't and is being pursued using every manner of soft power or sometimes sharp power, but most especially money, outside the borders of China.

[geofft]

My question is what is unique to China. Do the Five Eyes not also invest in universities so they can spread their ideology throughout the world, using both soft power and bombs? Do they not also have ethnonationalist leaders?

If we are going to reject money for principled reasons, let us first have principles and see who fits them. Let us not say who we don't like and then find better-sounding reasons to dislike them.

[dTal]

luddy already comprehensively answered your question further up the thread with a list of power abuses unique to China. Nor is it some great mystery what principles we have that China does not respect. "Freedom of speech" is a big one. "Representative government" is another.

When you ask "can you list specific things", and someone does so, and then you ignore the answer and ask again, it begins to look like "whataboutism" in bad faith, rather than an attempt to further the discussion.

[luddy]

rejecting for example Confucius Institutes at universities because they are promulgating an ideology that is diametrically opposed to the foundational principles of universities in the West -- open discussion without political interference -- is a principle and a principle that fits perfectly. Tsinghua would reject a program from the West that pushed principles that for example reject Maoism. It doesn't fit. Where's the mystery?