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Stephen Diamond's avatar

The topics that were pointed out were largely different from bad things the American government did (as far as those things were publicly known at the time), so the US government appeared less hypocritical.

They weren't largely different. The main thing bewailed about Russia was that dissident political opinions were ruthlessly suppressed. Qualitatively, this was the same bad thing that the U.S. Government did. It outlawed certain political opinions and used the outlawry to frighten others in their broad vicinity.

Accordingly, I thoroughly disagree with you that demonizing China on democracy would make the U.S. more democratic. As in the Cold War, it would only serve to justify American violations of the same principles it was supposedly upholding. The popular logic, if they don't fight fair neither should we, is far stronger than the mere desire to avoid hypocrisy.

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Overcoming Bias Commenter's avatar

During the Cold War the US government pointed at bad things the Soviets did and that influenced the collective thinking of Americans. The topics that were pointed out were largely different from bad things the American government did (as far as those things were publicly known at the time), so the US government appeared less hypocritical.

If today the US was locked in a cold war with China and put emphasis on the fact that China is a police state that monitors its citizens that would make Americans care more about their own privacy. But the US government doesn't spread propaganda like that about China, they are busy fighting terrorist groups that are not known for being massive privacy violators.

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