not a fan of China government but in this case I tend to believe them, I've seen Wikipedia volunteers spread actual disinformation in a concerted effort especially on politically charged topics.
That's not what's happening here though. China has for years put enormous effort into promoting its worldview on the China/Taiwan issue in every way it can, even though that worldview contradicts the facts on the ground. Taiwan is de-facto an independent country with its own government and military sovereignty, and the majority of citizens of Taiwan are happy with that arrangement.
China saying that Wikipedia Taiwan is spreading misinformation is just an effort to warp reality to fit China's alternate-universe version of the facts.
I'm reasonably certain the "de-facto" wording is used as Taiwan isn't actually recognised formally and fully as an independent country internationally. Thats not to say it shouldn't be, but it acknowledges the current truth.
And I'd like to point out that the ROC and the PRC don't even have the same land claims. The PRC claims the mainland and Taiwan. The ROC claims the mainland, Taiwan, and Mongolia. Mongolia claims Mongolia. There are three separate countries making these claims.
The fact that (some of) their claims overlap doesn't magically mean that the ROC and PRC aren't two separate countries. It just means that they are two countries that claim more land than they control.
This is very much outdated and a relic of the times when anti-communist world powers believed they could maybe remove communism from mainland china. It is a believe held today only by a small minority. https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/3951560
As of today, the governments in Beijing and Taipei agree that there is only one China and that Taiwan is part of it. That's the "One China" principle.
Taiwan does not assert that there is a sovereign country whose territory consists of the island of Taiwan. Taiwan's government still claims that the Republic of China still exists and that it is the legitimate state in all of China including Tibet, Inner Mongolia, and Xinjiang. This position is accepted by very few countries.
The fact that they are able to act in many respects as though they are the government of a sovereign country whose territory consists of the island of Taiwan is what makes them a de facto country.
... the Taiwan independence movement claims only the island of Taiwan for the Taiwanese nation, and is a core aspect of the Pan Green Coalition, which has 56% of the legislative and the president.
It's true that Taiwan's official position no longer reflects either reality or the desires of its people.
I think it would be ideal of Taiwan could be come de jure independent and sovereign, but that would essentially require some deal between China and the USA which is certainly not forthcoming.
The ROC (i.e. what people mean when they say "Taiwan") and the PRC are most certainly two separate countries. The fact that they have largely overlapping land claims doesn't change that. The fact that they both historically claim to be the legitimate government of some no longer existent greater China doesn't change that. They are two separate countries. That is the current status quo.
Would you call the Army Council of the Continuity IRA the government of a country? They claim to be the government of the Irish Republic declared in 1916 and claim the entire island of Ireland as the territory of that state. Claims are very cheap.
> Would you call the Army Council of the Continuity IRA the government of a country?
Unlike both the ROC and the PRC, they don't actually govern anything in practice, irrespective of whether it is coextensive with their claims. Upthread post claimed the ROC and PRC are both governments of real and separate countries in practice, independent of their overlapping theoretical claims. Doesn't seem a related thing at all to your question.
> Would you call the Army Council of the Continuity IRA the government of a country? They claim to be the government of the Irish Republic declared in 1916 and claim the entire island of Ireland as the territory of that state. Claims are very cheap.
Exactly claims are cheap. Hence why the PRC's claim that Taiwan is its territory is so worthless given that it has _never_ controlled it. Also why the ROC's claims to the mainland and Mongolia are so worthless given that they haven't controlled any of that for more than 70 years.
The claims are cheap and meaningless. The reality is that China and Taiwan are two separate countries.
And the first example isn’t even that - it’s an editor who is trying to reduce the usage of sources that stem from Nazi propaganda and to limit flowery unsourced language around the Nazis.
Other editors get in her way, but that’s still in good faith. Not exactly a situation that backs up that commenter’s point, for sure.
Every US politician that anyone would actually know is extreme right, so this is a very big group. Not a very useful classification, you may as well have said "any US politician". Then we get to the point where it is unclear what your actual problem is with their wikipedia pages.
The only thing that can be concluded is that you apparently believe the wikipedia page of every US politician is somehow anomalous. It tells us nothing.
I mean, most of Republicans on wikipedia are vilified as "far-right conspiracy theorists" and all shades of evil, with links to fake news as source of information (Washington Post for example)
one can argue, that if MSM spreads disinfo what can you expect from wikipedians, but the problem is their "power editors" and admins are a small clique with very particular political bias, it's just another echo chamber
When it is just the truth, you don't need to spin it to have a certain kind of impact. The impact exists even when you view things impassively, without much care one way or the other.
Wikipedia absolutely has a conservative bent, I wouldn't call the editing body "liberal" for using a newspaper owned by a union-busting multibillionaire as a source
You didn't really respond to the assertion that all American politicians are right-wing, but it's true. We have a "blood and soil" far right party and a "diverse corporate oligopoly" center-right party.
> You didn't really respond to the assertion that all American politicians are right-wing, but it's true.
"Two people repeating it on HN comments" != "it's true".
It really boils down to: What's your standard of reference? You seem to want to use Europe (I assume) as the standard for defining left and right in US politics. Why do you consider that a reasonable thing to do?
And even if you consider it a reasonable thing, why Europe? Why not Asia? Or the Middle East? Or Africa? Or the world as a whole?
Or why not, you know, use the US as the standard for judging what left and right are in US politics?
China saying that Wikipedia Taiwan is spreading misinformation is just an effort to warp reality to fit China's alternate-universe version of the facts.