Thread by @polijunkie_aus

Thread: this is a re-threading into a linear order for easy unrolling of my previous tweets about the prevalence of Russia propaganda in some overseas Chinese community.

Last week I was invited into a WeChat group mainly for Chinese migrants living in Australia, giving me a unique look at how they view the Ukraine war. The group logo has a Chinese national flag, so unsurprisingly their views are very pro-China, pro- Communist Party.

As the group members are mostly “little pinkies” (nickname for those who support the authoritarian Chinese government) even though they live in Australia, their views are much in line with Beijing’s, meaning pro-Russia, sharing many pro-Russia posts and propaganda, such as these

Naturally they are sharing the Tulsi Gabbard interview on Fox. Does Tulsi still deny being a Russian asset?

They share a prominent Chinese nationalist scholar Si Ma Nan’s pro-Russia video praising Putin’s military genius

They share video from Chinese media sources about the prowess of Russia precision attack and the decency of Russian tanks letting other vehicles pass at the Red Army’s own risk

They marvel at Russia’s propaganda skills with a video about Russian soldiers sharing food with Ukrainian children or Ukrainian POWs reflecting on their sins at a memorial for children killed by the evil Ukrainian Government…. Note these are all from Chinese state media accounts

They share a video about Russian youths protesting about the evil sanctions m.bilibili.com/video/BV11r4y1…

They share a video of a supposed phone tape phone call by Zelenskyy to arrange for his families to flee abroad

They share a comparison of the devastation of US bombing in Syria and serene and the peaceful scene at Kyiv spared by Russian attack. See? How nice the Russians are!

In response to a WeiBo post from a Chinese scholar who opines that history shows those who started a war always lost it, they regret that they used to be brainwashed by him

They mock the lack of weapons sent by the US (despite the other Chinese narrative that Biden is the warmonger )

They share the link to RT’s account on Bilibili

They suggest buying Russian food as a way of supporting Putin but worry that Russian food tastes terrible

They share a lame cartoon from Global Times (China’s state media tabloid)

They share a video paean to Putin from the account of a Chinese mining equipment company(!), the title is “Russia’s eagle at 70, burning for his country one last time! The legends are even more inspiring than a novel!”

Another one showing Putin being a maestro at piano, from the official account of a Chinese incubator firm (don’t ask)

Some worry that the way western media opposes Russia makes it difficult for the motherland to take back Taiwan

They share a state media video of Chinese citizens evacuating Ukraine, “ getting clear passage once one shows Chinese passport”. Of course no one questions why China didn’t warn them to leave BEFORE the war

They share a tweet about Chechen soldiers beheading the Azovites

Some sane person posts a story about a newly discovered case of serious domestic abuse in China, a (possibly abducted) woman held in cage by the husband. Of course, no one responds.

They cheer on the vandalising of the pro-Ukraine poster at the Canadian Embassy in Beijing

More Russian propaganda and whataboutism

They share a story about supposed Ukrainian Nazis killing people fleeing their city

Someone misunderstands a Arab tankie tweet praising China’s walled off internet against info warfare, attacking him as stupid and evil, asking doesn’t he know the western web-sphere is controlled by the US, before claiming the Arabs love China because we buy their oil

Some side discussions about the deficiencies of democratic system

They veer off to attack Google for highlighting Sydney’s Mardi Gras, of course referencing the evil 白左. One idiot thinks the letter Q stands for Queen, extreme feminism(?), proving again my thesis that the pinkies share a lot of common values with the hard right in the west

They accuse the 1989 generation as too subservient to America and too stupid to see the 9- dimension chess game Putin and Xi are playing, and claim the West boycott Russian ballet only because their dancers are straight while women

They share Russian propaganda from Tass

They post a common whataboutism reference to the Cuban Missile Crisis, without noticing that well, there are no US missiles in Ukraine before the invasion

They share a fake news post from a prominent pinkie account “台湾傻事”（Stupid things happening in Taiwan) about no NATO country’s media reported the anti-NATO protest in Italy, omitting the fact that it was organised by the Italian Communist Party and the Guardian covered it

Amid endless Russian war propaganda, someone posts a weird video about how woman gets addicted to the man after sex

They share a meme complaining the West has control of the media narrative of the war, claiming the West doesn’t represent the world.

They claim the applause for Biden’s SOTU speech is staged and coordinated (fact check: mostly true). I hate to tell them what will happen to a Chinese Member of People’s Congress if he/she doesn’t clap for Xi’s address.

I should point out a WeChat group is a bit like a private group on Facebook. It's closed to the public and one can only get in by invitation. That's perhaps why people are much more frank airing their views and bigotries than in the open. I have masked their names in the pics.

More celebration of the news that JD’s Russia store has sold out thanks to Chinese buyers eager to support Putin

A casual racist post about domesticating the 阿三 （derogative term for Indians) to make them China’s ally

After I post the anti-war tweet of Russian opposition leader
@navalny
, they react with mock praise for his “English skills”.

They call IOC a Nazi organisation for banning Russian athletes.

Another heart felt tribute to the Great Putin, from a finance magazine in Beijing: Ukraine has never produced a great statesman like Putin

They quote a report about a city under siege by Russian artillery, saying “kill all the Nazis”. In response to @ZelenskyyUa's claim that 9,000 Russian soldiers have been killed, one labels the President “motherfucking rumor mongering actor worse than a prostitute”

A meme from Taiwan asking why Taiwan has to buy expensive US weapons while Ukraine is getting it for free. A bit like asking why I have to buy house insurance when my neighbour gets emergency accomodation after his uninsured house is destroyed in a fire.

While they embrace Russia propaganda without questions, they are eager to challenge a Chinese video blogger in Ukraine's complaint about slow evacuation, accusing him of faking his location

Now a video from a subsidiary of Xinhua News of Putin telling Modi that Ukraine is holding Indian students hostage

Compared to the mostly positive reception here on Twitter, quite different reaction on WeChat where people criticised me for breaching the privacy of those pinkies. My response:

A voice of reason: A Wechat blogger living in Australia explains that once you post a comment on a (semi) public forum you give implied right to others to quote it. Everyone should be held responsible for their (political) speech and not hide behind claim of privacy afterwards

Sharing unverified report from Tass that a Chinese citizen has been shot by Ukrainian thugs

Sharing a prominent wolf warrior account’s praise for Russia’s genius invasion plan, a video mocking Zelanskyy’s acting career, and one Chinese blogger quoting Russian media praising China’s superiority over the US

One shares another pro-Russia video titled “the end days for Ukrainian Nazis are near” with another one replying with clapping and comment “iron fist of justice”
yidianzixun.com/article/V_0ptS…

They share an unsourced report about Ukrainian government bombing and killing Russian speaking population and complain that the western media don’t report this atrocity

A video from China’s state TV “debunking” western media lies on Russia, a report from state tabloid repeating Russian Defence Ministry press releases, and a social media video exhorting Chinese to follow the government line that it is not an invasion

They share a video with the caption: Russian precision attack sinking the Ukrainian Defence Headquarter, Putin the Great is a KGB legend. I point out that people were speaking Arabic in the video and it was actually the Israeli operation in Gaza. They ignore my fact checking

A pro-Russia dude claims that the many Chinese Australians he knows all share his view, not my pro-Ukrainian view. He thinks it’s understandable for me to be pro-Ukraine if I were born in Australia, but not if I came from China.

They complain that BBC’s
@BowenBBC breaches journalism ethics by tweeting a picture guide of how to throw a Molotov cocktail

A pinkie wants to know where to buy Russia products in Sydney (presumably hoping to show support for Putin)

A rare treat in this group! Some one posts a meme mocking the enthusiastic support Putin gets from the Chinese: “Putin is brought to tears. Without the war, he wouldn’t even know he had so many loyal sons and grandsons on TikTok China”

They promote RT

One of the favourite targets of pinkies is Vicky Xu

The video’s message is it is not important whether Russia’s attack on Ukraine is an invasion or not, it’s paramount we Chinese stay United behind our government because this world is a Darwinian forest and only the strong survives and the weak gets eaten

More whataboutism memes and cartoons

While they embrace Russian propaganda without any questions, they are extremely suspicious about a video posted by a Chinese in Ukraine complaining about the lack of help from Beijing. One asks why does the guy even have time to make TikTok videos? Must be a plant

They share an article alleging the pro- Ukraine community are full of fake news vendors and insurrectionists

They claim the Americans control Australia through the bought off Prime Minster @ScottMorrisonMP and the Murdoch Media (some hints of truth) and the Australians are all brainwashed. The irony is of course lost on them how they regurgitate Russian and Chinese state media everyday

They repost a tweet complaining the supposed double standard of media coverage of Ukraine and Palestine

They complain about sanctions imposed on Russia, suggesting Putin should bomb Chernobyl and let the radiation be blown to Europe as retaliation for banning Russian artists

They praise the widely shared Bernie Sanders floor speech of “what about our Monroe Doctrine?”, claiming he is telling the truth while ignoring the lastest statement from the Senator condemning Russian invasion unreservedly

They complain that the listed Chinese video sharing site Bilibili blocks RT’s war propaganda content. Only yesterday they were praising China’s Great Firewall blocking western content

They boast about dobbing in the British Embassy’s TikTok account. For what, I don’t know. Not pro-war?

They share a meme mocking the concept of “international community”, ignoring the fact 141 nations voted at UN to condemn Russia with only 5 supporting Putin

They share a screenshot of Chinese supporting Putin on China’s social media

They share a popular WeChat post complaining about economic, cultural and sporting sanctions against Russia. See? Sanctions are bad! (but invasion is totally justified)

Another sharing of
@TulsiGabbard
’s interview on Fox, this time from the video account of Guangzhou Traffic Radio. Tulsi, you must be so proud.

Now a video from the hawkish warrior account of
@realGuancha
about the verbal slip of Biden

They often post messages in original Russian. I am impressed. To migrate to Australia, one needs certain level of English. To be able to speak both English and Russian and Chinese, that’s UN Secretary General material

Taiwan suffers a massive blackout, with the usual jokes about all the pro-US voices are suddenly quiet (because they are all in Taiwan). Look, don’t they insist Taiwan is part of China? (1450 is a slang for Taiwanese DPP supporters posing as mainlanders)

They make a crude joke that @iingwen is still a virgin and that’s the reason @mikepompeo is visiting Taiwan and that’s why there is a blackout as they meet

The lone sane person again post a video about the woman in chain, again no one responds (it was big news a few weeks ago, maybe they discussed it then)

A dubious WeiBo post about
@ZelenskyyUa’s 35million Dollar house in Florida is shared

A rare concession from one about the fact that Russia did invade another country, before another ruins it with the claim that there were no borders before the disintegration of the Soviet Union. I point out it was called union for a reason. Another raises US war with Mexico….

They sympathise with Russian oligarchs for their loss of yachts: rich people, please know, your private property is not protected in the West (totally safe in China. That's why they move to the ... west?)

I post a link to an anti-war article. They respond with “whatabouttheamericannatives”, “might is right” and Putin’s lie that Ukraine was a manufactured concept

mp.weixin.qq.com/s/wpEOHA5W-tP_…

They quote a report about a city under siege by Russian artillery, saying “kill all the Nazis”. In response to
@ZelenskyyUa

’s claim that 9,000 Russian soldiers have been killed, one labels the President “motherfucking rumor mongering actor worse than a prostitute”

They share a press release from the Russian defence ministry, claiming Ukrainian Government has detained Indian students as hostages

A meme from Taiwan asking why Taiwan has to buy expensive US weapons while Ukraine is getting it for free. A bit like asking why I have to buy house insurance when my neighbour gets emergency accomodation after his uninsured house is destroyed in a fire.

One dude is so outraged about the western censorship of RT on YouTube he is testing it with a Dutch VPN to see if the channel is still available

Sharing unverified report from Tass that a Chinese citizen has been shot by Ukrainian thugs

Sharing a prominent wolf warrior account’s praise for Russia’s genius invasion plan, a video mocking Zelanskyy’s acting career, and one Chinese blogger quoting Russian media praising China’s superiority over the US

One comments that unlike the American invaders who bombed Iraqi Muslim civilians indiscriminately, Russia is very lenient to Ukrainians, laying siege without striking, so that civilians can safely evacuate (not true).

Another replies to my suggestion of Russia as the invader by asking why didn’t Russia invade other countries than Ukraine

Another link to the debunked claim from a French journalist about massacres committed by the fascist Ukrainian government

The pro-Russia dude wonders why I argue with them in Chinese language social media (he can’t understand why anyone of Chinese origin should support Ukraine) and why not go to English language platforms. I tell him I did plenty of argument in English and show him a sample

I should point out that not everyone in the group is pro-Russia. This person notes that 144 nations at the UN voted to condemn Russian aggression

One opines that only primary school children would naively sympathise with the weak antelope eaten by the leopard and not realise without food the leopard would die of hunger (Ukraine is the antelope if you are wondering)

One opines that foreign and Jewish dark forces controlled the Ukrainian election and Russia didn’t invade Ukraine but rather liberate it from the Jews and the Nazis ( why would the Jews AND the Nazis work together he didn’t explain)

They talk about how of the 100 Ukrainian oligarchs, 96 are Jewish and already escaped, the remaining 4 are Slavic but corrupt (so the Jews made a lot of money in Ukraine, but it is a Nazi country; now the Russians come to liberate them, but they all escaped to Europe?)

They discuss why Russia’s invasion of another country is ok because the US did it too

Replying to my observation that they are denying the reality of Russian aggression, the Putin fan accuses me of “black is white”: why can’t I see that Russia is acting in self defense?

The pro-invasion crowd now lecture me about the importance of promoting peace between China and Australia, so that the Chinese community overseas will benefit (but Russia launching a war against a smaller neighbor is totally fine)

They share a video from China titled “My country’s position is my position”. As they live in Australia, I am curious which country is their “my country”? (The Australian Government supports Ukraine. Shouldn’t they be supporting Ukraine then?)

Now they are sharing anti-vax misinformation. Another convergence of the pinkies and the hard right in the West.

One attacks Zelenskyy’s decision to distribute arms to civilians, saying bad people will use the gun to rob good people rather than fighting the Russians (but Chairman Mao's famous theory of "let's drown the enemy in people's war" is simply genius)

They are fact-checking my claim of visiting China in Jan 2020, saying the border was closed at the time due to Covid (it was not). For a group that swallows Russian propaganda wholeheartedly they are deeply suspicious of everything else

A pinkie is much annoyed that I posted a link to a NYT opinion article from a Russian reporter opposing Putin, asking “can’t you refrain from posting in English”? A strange request from a migrant who chooses to move to the English speaking Australia nytimes.com/2022/03/03/opi…

One shares report from Sputnik that the US is involved in making plans for Kyiv to attack the separatist regions

They regurgitate Putin’s lie that there is no such thing as an Ukrainian nation

They discuss the need for VPNs while visiting China, matter-of-factly, like hostages discussing what type of rope best fits their wrist

They share fake news about the wealth and background of the members of the Zelanskyy government, claiming without evidence that most of them hold US passports.. (the pinkies vehemently defended Eileen Gu for holding on to her US passport saying she can love both China and US)

The pinkies seldom share contents from mainstream English language media, when they do it’s for criticism. This repost is from a Chinese American complaining a NPR report by
@EmilyZFeng
on Beijing’s pro-Russia stance contributes to anti-Asian sentiments in the US

This is a common gripe from some Chinese migrants. They don’t care whether Beijing’s position is morally acceptable or not, all they care is the media coverage hurt *them*.
The pinkie then accuses me of being a race traitor just like @emilyzfeng
, wishes me killed by the rednecks

They share a dubious report from Sputnik about Ukrainians bombing the Azov Battalion, and opine that the Ukrainians were Nazis cooperators and more brutal in WWII, therefore Putin is totally justified to invade (despite their prior comment that “Ukrainians” are not a nation)

They don’t want Russia to return the territories it seized from China a century ago because it’s important to support the unity of Father Russia and it will be too costly for China to run the fast east land (strangely this logic doesn’t extend to Taiwan in the pinkies’ mind)

They think the border issues between China and Russia are resolved, demanding lost territories is what "old peasants" do, ( but not for Putin obviously) too hard to assimilate the Russians there, and China should sell nukes to “anti-American forces”

They share fake news from China’s state TV that Zelensky has escaped to Poland

They share a Foxnews clip from TikTok of the despicable Putin stooge Douglas MacGregor who said Russia is being too polite in Ukraine (google him, he is totally going off the rails in his support of Russia).
The pinkies LOVE @FoxNews

They quote the Bible that the strong gets more, and argues it’s not an invasion because Russia didn’t want to occupy or subjugate Ukraine (just good old self defense)

What about Palestine, they ask (the difference betweent pinkies and liberals is we liberals oppose BOTH Israel's occupation of Palestinian land AND Russia's invasion of Ukraine)

They claim Ukraine will become a total Nazi country had Putin not invaded, is a cancer that needs removal, we need to look at the big picture, Ukrainians hate the Jews (with a Jewish President?), Ukrainian women are either surrogate mothers or killed for organ transplant

They claim whether we should call it an invasion depends on the outcome of the war (winner writes history), citing China’s incursion into Vietnam, and the Chinese celebrate the war between Russia and the West, because they both bullied China

They share a video of an Aussie criticising the Prime Minister’s hostility towards China (only yesterday they were urging Chinese to stand behind the Chinese Government), and casually suggest it’s too early to call defeat for Putin because he hasn’t deployed WMDs yet

They share another fake news from
@CGTNOfficial
China’s State TV via state owned
@globaltimesnews
that Zelensky has escape Ukraine (they really want him to go)

They share a propaganda video from Russian Embassy in Beijing titled “how Ukraine ferments hatred toward Russia”

This pinkie complains that China spends too little on propaganda (not true) and there are too few YouTubers in support of reunification with Taiwan (maybe *not* banning YouTube in China will help?)

They share an article by China’s state media about the Russian Australian student being evicted from a live @abcnews Q+A TV show for repeating pro-Putin propaganda. They are outraged! An armed invasion? Totally justified! Evicting an audience member? Now *that* is fascist!

The pinkie explains away his whataboutism by claiming the Iraq War, the Vietnam were unjust while invasion of Ukraine is just. But his comrades were using those American wars as justification for Russia to flex its muscle.

This pinkie argues that actually “invasion” is a neutral word, even positive, by googling “Normandy invasion” (is that why the Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman refuses to use the word?)

A rare moment of insight from the pinkies, sharing Trump’s infamous answer when asked about Putin killing people “you think we are innocent?”. They suggest Trump should be President again so he will make a mess of the EU, then China can benefit from the infighting of the west

They share a report of Putin’s new law banning fake news relating to Russia’s military operation, oblivious to the irony they have been sharing fake news everyday

One pinkie takes issue of my retweet of a Putin as Hitler meme, as if I have insulted his own father

They share a widely circulated doctored video on Chinese social media of Putin ordering nuclear strike against NATO if Russia is attacked

After posting plenty of fake news themselves, they claim this photo of a Ukrainian kindergarten being hit by artillery is fake, because the windows are intact (there is no evidence the photo is fake)

They complain that BBC’s
@BowenBBC breaches journalism ethics by tweeting a photo of a brochure of how to throw a Molotov cocktail (their expectation of impartiality is much highter for BBC than for Chinese state media)

This question from a pinkie “where do I find shops or supermarkets that stock Russian made products in **Sydney**?” actually is the trigger for my decision to publicise the pro-Russia contents of the group.

What kind of twisted ideology would compel a Chinese living in the liberal democracy of Australia to take the trouble to seek out Russian shops to support Putin’s war on another country?

Seeing my tweets, naturally they are very very upset, accusing me of “inciting hatred, political persecution, inciting anti-Chinese sentiments, currying favor to obtain US passport, evil culprit responsible for the coming calamity against the Chinese community…”

One reacts like a kindergarten boy caught pulling a girl’s ponytail “but what about the Indians? They are for Putin on Facebook? Why didn’t you expose them?” (But I am not in a Chatroom full of Indians am I?)

They put out a meme praising Minister Wang Xining, China’s top diplomat in Canberra, as a genuine diplomat and I am just a lowly assistant (fact check: true. I was a junior diplomat 20 years ago)

They speculate I might a CIA spy, a Chinese spy pretending to hate China, or a double spy, doing this for money, to get a media job….

They spend a couple of hours shouting personal abuses at me before they realise the one most important thing they need to do: kick me out of the group. So that’s it. But thanks to a design feature (or a bug) of WeChat, anyone kicked out still can access the chat history.

I spent only five days in this chat group, and those are the snapshots of the avalanche of propaganda, disinformation mostly originating out of Russian and Chinese state media. China blocks western media by the GFW, but we as an open society don’t reciprocate. What should we do?

Some suggest banning WeChat as a solution to the information warfare, my response in the AFR:

Through my contact at ASIO I obtained this reaction to my tweets AFTER I was kicked out: “some Aussies’ comments are even more brutal than ours, why doesn’t that bastard expose *them* on Twitter? He is a race traitor who only bullied his own people”
Quilty conscience?

this @CNN report highlights the problem I have raised

edition.cnn.com/2022/03/10/chi…

/end of thread