On the other hand, a lot of claims about China that are very easy to disprove - even with limited media freedom - are still widely believed in the West.
I'm thinking of two huge examples from recent times:
* The widespread belief that people in China have social credit scores.
* The belief that zero-CoVID was fake, and that CoVID was actually spreading like crazy in China, but was somehow covered up.
These are claims that can be disproven just by knowing people in China and asking them about their lives. Given how many millions of Chinese people live abroad, how many expats live in China, and how many cross-border connections there are in general, it's crazy that so many people still believe the above theories.
There's very little knowledge about China among the Western public, and there's a strong tendency towards conspiratorial interpretations of everything regarding China.
I'm thinking of two huge examples from recent times:
* The widespread belief that people in China have social credit scores.
* The belief that zero-CoVID was fake, and that CoVID was actually spreading like crazy in China, but was somehow covered up.
These are claims that can be disproven just by knowing people in China and asking them about their lives. Given how many millions of Chinese people live abroad, how many expats live in China, and how many cross-border connections there are in general, it's crazy that so many people still believe the above theories.
There's very little knowledge about China among the Western public, and there's a strong tendency towards conspiratorial interpretations of everything regarding China.