“Whether you hate me, like me or are indifferent, do you want the best car, or do you not want the best car?” [Apartheid Manchild] told audiences at an event in November.
Well, for starters I don’t want a car at all. I’d rather use public transit. You know, an actually effective means of reducing emissions.
If I were in the market, yes, I would want the best car. Which is why I’d never buy a Tesla. I’d buy an XPeng or a BYD or the like.
Well, good for you. Personally I’m not buying an internet connected Chinese car. If a car has the option of spying on you, and potentially be used in a hybrid attack, I’d prefer to get a car from a western manufacturer. And not Tesla either, Musk is too unstable and seems to be influenced by the same powers that has Trump’s ball in a vise.
My current car is an internet connected EV, but it sure isn’t Chinese or a Tesla.
China can spy on me. I feel safer with them having my info than Musk (Or if you really want to get in the weeds, GM or Ford who’s happy to share that info with big insurance and law enforcement)
One is a totalitarian state who could unleash all its might on you if they wish; the other is still subject to rules and regulations despite being corrupt. I’d rather have Ford and GM spying on my information for corporate interest than a state who wants to micromanage every aspect of your life, thank you very much.
Let’s be real…those statements are true of both nations…the only thing that’s different is the propaganda you listen to.
China will use my info to market me more and better cheap shit. The US will use my info in litigation or worse.
If China wants to launch a full scale assault, they could, and they’d win. They’ve got better tech these days and our number the US by like 10 to 1.
I’m less worried about China knocking on my door for political descent than I am of the US these days.
Everything you said is literally the other way around.
Ideally, no spying at all. My car just gets a radio and nothing else. My phone can be a GPS with a plastic piece that is stuffed in the air grill.
As someone living in the United States, China spying on me doesn’t do much. I’m not really a target for them. My data is just sold to the highest bidder, often Facebook or Google to sell me more ads.
If the US government wanted me gone, I’d be gone in 2 days and Fox News and its brainwashed masses would say I deserved it since I never voted for Trump and didn’t sing the pledge of alliance every day. If China wanted me gone, they’ll have to work for it and it’d be front page news that would become an October surprise.
That’s my main two things. As an American, I am impacted by American laws more than China or even Canada’s or Mexico’s laws. If China banned me (which they have and still do, I’m a queer anarchist) I’m not super impacted by it. If America banned me (I’m a queer anarchist, they’ve done it before) I need to go into hiding.
Does America want to kill me? Not intentionally, at least. I don’t think there’s a personal FBI man watching my webcam, seeing me type up the same shitty memes I tell my friends for a quick laugh as we play games. But if America start getting more cult-y with Trump and his ilk, I have to watch my back more than if China suddenly wanted the same body on their doorstep.
To be fair, the egregious provisions of the PATRIOT act which allows unilateral spying by the US government has not been renewed. But on the one hand, there have been cases of law enforcement agencies buying information from data brokers, which companies have sold to. The Chinese government different, they can straight up spy on you and question you at any time.
This thing isn’t something that would personally affect me because here in Europe we have GDPR and the EU is consumer-friendly, but privacy is still I would be concerned of for other parts of the world.
Why the flying fuck would I want a western car spying on me here in China?
As I indicated by using first person singular in my comment, I was talking about me. What car you (second, singular) get is up to you.
While I did write “If a car has the option of spying on you[…]”, I hope my usage of “you” as an informal pronoun was clear. I do realize that I could have used the word “one” instead, or rewritten the sentence entirely. I wrote like I speak, and I unfortunately do not speak like an English professor.
Please remind me, where did you tell me that you live in China?
In the same place you assumed I lived outside of it, I presume.
You’re the one who got mad that I didn’t know that you live in China. You hadn’t told me, or given me any clues. I mean there’s 1.450 billion people who speak English either natively or as second language. 10 million of those live in China. That means there’s a 99.3% chance that a random English speaker doesn’t live in China. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_English-speaking_population
But do go on, keep staying pissed at me for something you misunderstood. I never said that you (as in you, not one) or anyone else for that matter, should not buy a Chinese EV. I said that I wouldn’t, and gave my reasons why. In the meantime, while you stay pissed, I’ll continue to not own a Chinese EV, maybe while telling my students about what happened in early summer 1989 on Tiananmen Square, and how Winnie the Poo is treating the Uyghurs in Xinjiang.
Because some American car company won’t disappear you for having the wrong political opinion.
I mean american aircraft companies wouldn’t that is for sure!
…unless they are boeing!
No, instead they’ll let the government use you to target a bomb because you drive near someone they don’t like.
That has not ever happened (to my knowledge).
This specific one? Not yet. But there is a rather long history of nations, including the USA, using seemingly harmless items to target people for assassination, etc.
And an even longer history of the USA dropping bombs on civilians willy-nilly.
So, people should be more worried about your hypothetical situation than a powerful surveillance state with many millions of dead people in its wake?
Not only spying, these cars are just like all other Chinese products.
Your electronics you used to post this were made in China. Apple’s $1000 phones are made in China. Nintendo consoles are assembled in China, as is Playstation and Xbox. If you used anything you liked in the last ~30 years, China had a hand somewhere in it.
China doesn’t have a magic power to remove all stability from its materials like a shitty alchemist, companies produce cheap bullshit because its cheaper to sell new ones than to fix old ones. It’s not some grand mystery of “MSG-elements” or whatever it will be called in the future. It’s simply that economics cares more about short-term profits than long-term gains. And cheap shitty materials will do that in any country that makes them.
There’s junk from Germany, shit from Spain, and ass from America. Borders don’t inherently change the outcome of a assembly line’s finalized product. I’ve had good paper from America, great pens from China, and nice leather from Italy. But I can also walk to any metropolitan area in each of those countries and find you the cheapest, filmiest bullshit possible within the hour of stepping off that plane, that proudly states “MADE IN $LOCAL_COUNTRY”.
It’s mostly the mentality, not the capability.
Say “I don’t know what I’m talking about” without using those words.
My Milwaukee tools were made in China and they are fantastic. Sure, some cheap chinese made stuff is crap but the higher end chinese products are every bit as good japanese or western made now.
Nearly a third of the world’s manufacturing is done in China. That’s good stuff and crap and everything in between. Chinesium exists because of engineering for a price point, and people are cheap.
This here exactly. There’s shit products made in China. There’s brilliant products made in China. It’s just like everything else as per the old adage: YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR!
If you only want to pay shit product prices, you get shit products. A variant of “play stupid games, win stupid prizes”.
“What do you mean, Doc? All the best stuff is made in Japan.”