In Australia it's very hard to get hold of cigarettes under 18. Determined kids will find a way, of course. But vaping is more prevalent currently, and is held in higher regard by teens here.
I haven't lived in Europe some years, but I was amazed at how smoking was perceived as more acceptable there.
Right. The idea that Jira has been replaced made me laugh.
There's probably a crowd of people that want to move on to the next issue tracker flavour and that's fine but I've got work to do that isn't tool shuffling.
I'll use the one that integrates with so many of our systems and, though flawed, does a great job.
I said "no power is doing anything _of substance_ about China expanding" and that is a _fact_.
Coast guards attacking illegal Chinese fishing boats is a good step for illegal fishing but it is laughably small if it's meant to rebuke China for installing military bases on islands into the contested waters.
I don't see how Vietnam subsidizing fishers is relevant.
The US and other Navy forces are _entitled_ to sail through international waters by definition. Calling it "freedom of navigation" and doing _nothing_ else is on those trips is, for want of a better word, "cute".
None of these are acts _of substance_.
The _fact_ is that no power wants to poke the bear.
For the avoidance of doubt, I'm not saying those nations are wrong to avoid a substantial act. I'm not even saying China occupying those islands is wrong, nor am I saying it's right. I'm simply saying that no power has or will stand up properly to China. The govt / armed forces / press / etc don't like the expansion but they're not actually going to do anything about it.
As a result, in a couple of decades, the frog will be slowly boiled, and eventually the whole region will be assumed to be China's. That's all I'm saying.
> Similarly, it's absurd to claim that there's no opposition to Chinese expansionism
If you mean me, I made no such claim.
I simply said there have been no acts of substance to demonstrate this opposition.
I dearly wish I could read and speak Chinese. I haven't read the blogs you speak of (so I'll accept I'm ignorant on that), but with that said, is it really a shock that right wing blogs in country A says that nefarious forces in country B or C are itching to invade them? I see that ridiculous narrative often. Americans / Australians / insert-preferred-power-here thinking China will invade. It's tiresome and repetitive. For all of China's expansionist angst and insecurity-driven surveillance, I don't think of it as a warmongering nation.
It's not "yellow peril" or "Orientalism" to criticise China or its foreign policy.
It is legitimate to criticise a nation state based on their behaviour, foreign policy, etc.
I criticise the US or "western" countries plenty, just not on the top of expansionism in the south China Sea.
My point above is that no power is doing anything of substance about China expanding and laying a tacit claim out to the nine dash line, and that in a generation, give or take, it will be taken for granted that the region is China's territory.
Granted, this is beyond the scope of the article, namely fishing in that region, but the article suggested (though did not state, and may well have not intended) that some of the aggressive Chinese boats were military.
Realistically, no entity, government or otherwise is taking any concrete steps to say no to China in the south China Sea.
Doing "drive bys" is hardly actual action, like say dismantling a Chinese base made in international waters. THAT would be concrete action, and I bet they would get all upset but ultimately do nothing (unless it's too Australia, in which case they'll find some other product to ban).
If nobody is going to stand up to them, it's all over already. In a generation, people will just say "oh isn't that all China's territory?"
I'd really like to read more Chinese-from-China views on this kind of article.
Although the content of the article scares me personally, it would be interesting to have more of a discourse about more plausible reasons why this kind of surveillance is "good" from a genuine different perspective. One mistake the Chinese govt makes is never explaining themselves in a plausible way so it always comes across as Orwellian. Further, because no Chinese national is supposed to acknowledge the govt power, most nationals can't comment on it without getting themselves or their family in serious trouble.
I have a (non-Chinese-from-China) friend who works most of the year in China and he explained the surveillance state as "well, if you've got a nation of more than a billion people and a huge range of wealth levels and, culturally, you value stability of the nation more than individual liberty, yeah, you're going to go to extremes on security and surveillance. It's all about ensuring stability and adherence to 'normal' behavior. Yeah it's creepy but it's _safe_ if you stay in line."
I'm not saying I agree with the exchange of individual liberty vs surveillance but it would be refreshing to read more plausible takes on the "China has it right" viewpoint.
And how did the process start? The poverty situation in the better off countries didn't start improving because of magical fairy dust.
One end pushes the other end, sure, but you've got to start it somewhere.
People and politicians took action and improved laws, businesses still kept going and the cycle repeats upwards.
I don't see that happening in the US. I don't mind if the change isn't minimum wage (not going to happen in America), but at least do /something/ positive.
m not sure if you'll classify it as "credible" but the wikipedia article on HPI shows a clear ranking of countries that roughly correlates to the minimum wage (higher the wage, lower the poverty ranking). Which.. Doesn't seem like rocket science.
Perhaps, rather than theorize about improving the American minimum wage, look to other countries that have higher minimum wage and evaluate their level of poverty (or lack thereof). Look at Australia and Norway, for example.
Granted, the lack of poverty in those countries is not solely caused by a humane minimum wage - but it's a huge factor, and a positive indicator.
I lived in the US for 7 years and could never fathom how the country as a whole could tolerate such a system.
For all of the talk about "all men created equal" and "do to others as you would have them do to you", fundamentally Americans are brought up to believe they are different or "exceptional" to other humans. This belief let's them distort reality so that spying on innocent foreigners is ok but spying on innocent Americans is an abomination. Hypocrisy.
Timothy McVeigh and others prove that the domestic threat to the US is as serious as the foreign.
I wonder if it is conceivable that a government agency that wouldn't like what Tor offers, could reduce Tor's attractiveness by bombing it from a botnet, much like what they've done by arresting people who host a tor node for traffic that runs across it.
With that said, I accept that this is much less likely explanation than just some Russian group just using it to facilitate their usual crime.
I haven't lived in Europe some years, but I was amazed at how smoking was perceived as more acceptable there.