Should be fairly easy to defeat, no?

What if I am? Very ageist question.

I got a lot of people attacking me right now so I didn’t read as carefully as I should have, so I didn’t know it was a concept created before Lenin came into power. That changes my understanding of the context in which he created it, specifically.

However, that doesn’t change the fact that auth-left people use this confusing language that is in total contradiction to how the rest of the anglosphere uses the word exactly as it’s being used here–to deflect from actions that are very obviously of the same nature as historical imperialism. Yet because the PRC claims to be socialist, suddenly we ignore all of the power dynamics and all of the coercion and decide this is benign simply because it supposedly doesn’t match Lenin’s definition.

Such that even when it does match the common definition, I get tons of people attacking me and saying I don’t know what imperialism is when I’m not even using the word in the Marxist sense. Marxism isn’t of much interest to me, so yeah, I’m not an expert on it. That is not relevant to the fact that China’s attempts to crush Taiwanese autonomy and seize control of the island are textbook imperialism.

You’re right, Lenin, not Stalin. The two are very ideologically similar so I hope you’ll forgive my misremembering. It doesn’t change the validity of my argument however. You can change Stalin for Lenin in my original comment and it remains true.

Any analysis that automatically rejects 90% of historical imperialism as suddenly not imperialism is unserious. If you wish to call it capitalist imperialism that would be one thing but one obscure and frankly not all that serious theorist doesn’t just get to tell everyone else in the world they’re suddenly using a word wrong just because they decided to and because it’s convenient for their, yes, imperialist politics.

Forceful conquering by military might or other coercion means makes it imperialism. There is no history that could make it otherwise.

Ok I’ll accept the correction, it was Lenin, not Stalin. Whatever. Two peas from the same pod whose ideological differences are frankly scarcely noticeable to most people.

The word imperialism relates to empires. It predates Lenin’s work and its definition continues to be used in that way by most people outside of your tiny political faction. If you want to refer to it as capitalist imperialism or something that’s fine but it’s absurd to claim that Lenin’s work invalidates the long-standing use of the term to describe the behavior of empires before capitalism before and through to the modern time. Especially when your new definition invalidates virtually all of its historical uses.

I am using the word imperialism as the dictionary defines it, not your weird made up version which you unilaterally declare correct in contradiction to the vast majority of English speakers.

I am familiar. How is that relevant here?

That’s just a nonsense definition invented by Stalin to apologize for his own imperialism. No one else uses that definition. I’ll agree that this is a form of imperialism but it is far from the only form. The absurdity here is that by this definition classical empires like Rome didn’t even engage in imperialism. When your definition excludes the textbook empire, maybe that’s a sign that something has gone wrong here…

Although arguably the PRC has done that even by this muddled definition.

World power attempting to subordinate and subsume its neighbor by threats of invasion? How is it not imperialism?

Arguably the US’s defense of Taiwan is also imperialist but a more benign form than the CPC’s actions here. The Taiwanese people are just pawns in the struggle for global domination.

I don’t expect it to be resolved peacefully. Imperialism rarely is.

Edit: also, the UN is a joke. It’s just a tool the security council uses to bully other nations. It exists entirely for their benefit. This is like pointing to law under monarchy to support the king’s position. It’s totally circular.

Are you implying UN law is even remotely relevant here? Or anywhere?

I have absolutely zero faith that the US government will side with people’s safety over a new toy for the oligarchs. And these companies are openly saying their whole business model is urban transportation. So they will be lobbying to change those laws as soon as they can, and, as we’ve seen with self-driving cars, it will be difficult to stop them.

This is exactly what terrifies me though. Cars are already incredibly dangerous. Now make them 5x as fast and more difficult to control, and allow them to go anywhere and imagine the carnage.

It’s mostly marketing honestly. They’re both total ass.

The idea that these vehicles will ever be adequately safe, quiet, or efficient is very dubious. Any regulatory agency that isn’t outright rejecting them at this point should be viewed with suspicion.

If I’m ever proven wrong then great but I don’t see that happening for decades at minimum.

Oh that’s good news. However their stated business model is in cities so I expect heavy lobbying to lift that ban to start. It could be worthwhile to have layered bans at different levels of government to provide protection in case one layer gets paid off.

These should be banned in cities immediately. The danger here seems insane.