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Fun Factory: Why China’s Tourists Are Queuing Up at Assembly Lines
(www.sixthtone.com)
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this post was submitted on 05 Jun 2025
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Interesting data points. I'd say that all this proves mainly that they have a lot of free time.
All sources have some bias, the trick is surely to understand those biases and to triangulate. Even the Global Times is credible if the subject is, say, basketball (OK maybe not, but Sixth Tone definitely would be). What bothers me about Hottentotzen is their relentless focus. This is a straightforward propagandist. They are single-mindedly obsessed with getting out their message, totally unconcerned with learning anything new. It's disturbing. The lack of interest in nuance or perspective is Orwellian. And let's be honest, this must be a Chinese person. I know I shouldn't get personal but I can only imagine it's a jilted exile of some sort. Fair enough, there's plenty to be jilted about. But it's not really what this community should be for.
I pretty slowly tend to avoid linking directly to state-run media, but there's a world of difference between, say, PBS vs Radio Free America. And I hate that the term "propaganda" doesn't really have a meaning, because a lot of inauthentic people can really abuse the language is a result. People inherently want to avoid bias, and they certainly want to avoid propaganda, so the ones who have the advantage are the ones who can define the words. I have seen pro-China evangelists declare anything with a modicum of American influence as propaganda, for example...
HP strikes me as the stereotype that tankies believe represents every liberal, constantly using state media sources. Interestingly, I've also seen tankies use American state media when those sources say the government sucks at something, or that the Soviet Union is somehow great.
This is something Orwell himself might have said. The word "propaganda" used to be neutral, and still is in some European languages (meaning "political communication" basically). But sure, it's now mostly an empty slur in English.
The problem with writing off "state media" is that, de facto, much of the best journalism that remains is by state-owned publications. Because if you follow the money, there's no escape from bias. The billionaire-owned media is billionaire-biased. Other media is advertiser-biased. Even reader-owned or cooperative media will have the biases of the kind of people who pay for that kind of thing. There's no obvious remedy except to be aware of the biases and try to get a varied diet. And also - this is my uncynical side talking - to trust in professional journalists to do their job conscientiously just as one would trust one's lawyer or plumber to do theirs.
After thinking about it for a while (read: years), I've realized that it's more valuable to put trust into journalists than media apparatuses. Sometimes those apparatuses happen to employ a bunch of really good journalists, but that's usually the exception, and that's usually fleeting.