FYI, global times is a well known CCP mouthpiece.
Who do you think would have better data about Chinese trade than China?
white left assumes everyone except for other white sources are lying to them all the time
Who do you think would have a good reason to misrepresent the truth? China and Russia getting away with trade without US involvement is good for China and Russia, so it benefits them to state that even if that’s not exactly what’s going on.
In this case it makes a ton of sense given the sanctions against Russia, but I do try to look for independent verification of any large story when the only source has interests in misrepresenting the truth.
Pretty obvious that western media has a lot of great reasons to misrepresent the truth to keep people such as yourself thinking that disastrous policies western governments are pursuing are actually working.
Sure, which is why I try to get multiple sources.
The problem with countries like China (and probably Russia) is that their governments can directly interfere with news reporting. That’s possible to an extent in western countries, but it’s a lot less likely to happen without journalists making a big fuss because of our cultural and legal freedoms of the press.
I’m hesitant to believe anything when I have a single source, and I’m more hesitant if multiple sources are from the friendly countries where the governments have direct control over the media.
Doesn’t the US have a track record of literally assassinating journalists who dig into things they aren’t supposed to?
Doesn’t the US also have a track record of hunting down whistleblowers around the world? Of extrajudicial surveillance and illegal international surveillance and mass surveillance?
Not sure the Western world has a great role model there.
Yes, the US is far from perfect, which it why is a good idea to get news from a variety of sources. I try to read about the Ukraine war from other perspectives, for example.
But those instances are:
- illegal and therefore quite rare
- generally limited to instances of revealing state secrets (as in the case of Assange, Snowdon, etc)
- very unpopular
So in general, journalists have much more freedom to criticize their government here in the US vs Russia or China, and to me that has value. It’s not perfect and you can certainly get a lot of misinformation through strong biases here (i.e. many people assume their country is in the right), but it’s way better in pretty much any western country than a country with a much more authoritarian government.
You can argue pretty much the exact same three points about government intervention in journalism everywhere.
Not really selling your point.
Anybody who wasn’t born yesterday realizes that western governments constantly interfere in news reporting as well. What’s worse is that all the news is owned by a handful of oligarchs, and entire books have been written on how western media manipulates public opinion. Here are a couple you should read:
I agree with your thoughts on reading multiple sources, but in regards to your trust for Western over other countries see the Propaganda Model, specifically on sourcing, ownership, and anti-communism/fear
I’ll have to check it out. I’m a fan of Noam Chomksy (esp. in linguistics), I just don’t agree with a lot of his political conclusions.
Manufacturing Consent is a seminal work and consists of actual “case studies” where they contrast the coverage of similar news events occurring in communists countries at the time vs countries/groups allied with the US. It’s pretty eye opening.
It’s still applicable today, maybe even moreso with the increasing rate of media consolidation.
Just like many western outlets are mouthpieces for us in the West. If there are other sources that present different data please post them to dispute this.
I didn’t dispute the data, I’m saying that the source isn’t neutral.
The data may very well be accurate or not, I don’t know enough to comment either way. I suspect it’s not entirely accurate because both Russia and China have a history of massaging numbers and having inaccurate reporting.
But putting that aside - Russia and China both want to get rid of the US dollar as the dominant currency for their own interests. It’s not surprising that Russia-China trades are now conducted mostly without the use of US dollars. The fact that this comes from a known government mouthpiece means it’s just nationalist self-promotion.
Questioning the motive of the source is always good practice. If you see an article saying “Survey shows Hyundai emerges as the best car brand in 2023”, it would make a difference if this news was taken from the Hyundai website or BBC.
It’s not a matter of being pro-US or pro-Russia/China. There are skewed news sources in ever country, the US included.
What is CCP?
You could see this coming years in advance. People started dropping the dollar when American politicians weaponized the dollar to push their agenda on the rest of the world.
