[yetihehe]

I would agree with you, if I didn't hear many times about Chinese government repressing other nations just for being near China and not being fully Chinese. Maybe people near you are kind and friendly and I would like to help them, but I'm afraid that some Chinese people with guns will also come to me. How would you solve that problem?

[lpapez]

This same argument you laid out here also works if you replace "Chinese" with "US".

For much of the globe, the US is the bad guy/bully, and not the "world policeman" - epecially in countries they bombed (like my country).

With recent US administration changes, this attitude is also becoming more prominent in countries which used to consider the US to be an ally!

[eptcyka]

All big countries do that, look at the US meddling with the while of South America and the Middle East. China does the same.

[yetihehe]

Does that mean I can help Americans and Chinese (and maybe Russians too), because everyone is doing bad things? Like IBM provided equipment to nazis during WW2? Business is business, right?

[eptcyka]

You can help whomever, but I suggest doing things to push powers to do less harm. I don’t think we should argue against more international cooperation with the argument that any party is or has committed atrocities, otherwise the only international collaboration that will takr place will be between states too small to be useful.

Although the Putin regime can enter the sea and never return.

[yetihehe]

> You can help whomever, but I suggest doing things to push powers to do less harm.

I'm so comically bad at pushing powers to do anything that even my wife doesn't listen to me. From what I've seen, most people making things are bad at demanding things from others. Those who are good at demanding things from others don't really need to make things themselves.

[mensetmanusman]

What precisely do you mean in regards to South America? Or are you referencing 19th century policies?

[kelipso]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_involvement_in...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_interventions_by_the...

There are lots more.

[nerdsniper]

1954 - The USA overthrew a democratic government in Guatemala and replaced it with a violent dictatorship so that we could keep getting cheap bananas.

[owebmaster]

Just yesterday: https://apnews.com/article/trump-venezuela-destroyers-maduro...

[Teever]

You took the bait.

The person you're replying to would much rather have a discussion about the well-documented atrocities of a waning American empire than the far less documented atrocities of a waxing Chinese Empire that has no democratic institutions to keep it in check.

[kjkjadksj]

You act like our democratic instutions keep us in check. Note how most of our disruption in central america came from actions by clandestine intelligence agencies that are unaccountable to the democratic american government. Yes, there are two governments in the U.S: the one the public elects and then the one that the public is never to fully learn about.

[moomoo11]

Bro they intervened in Guatemala because in almost every case where communism was preferred over capitalism that country went to shit and became a backwater.

Commi didn’t work as an experiment after all those death camps and purges anyway. And anyone “communist” today is basically authoritarian capitalist with mini purges and dictators. They take Jack Ma to a “camp” and factory reset him or put all the Muslims out west in a prison city.

America has to play the way it does sometimes because the lobby is dominated by cheaters and toxic scumbags who don’t want to actually score points and win.

[kjkjadksj]

Guatemala and El Salvador, famously thriving countries today. Glad we stirred the pot and shipped weapons into the conflict zone that are still there.