Thread by @GSpellchecker

Hatchet.

https://twitter.com/georgeeaton/status/1115976877620047873

The New Statesman printed the above quote simply as "Each Chinese person is a kind of replica of the next one and that is a very frightening thing"

The original context makes it an attack on the effects of authoritarianism in China. Their editing just makes it racist. Shameful

There was a time when our own society constrained most women to a similar path (domestic work, motherhood, no autonomy)
"They’re creating robots out of women by so constraining what can be done. Each woman is a kind of replica of the next one and that is a very frightening thing"

Now, that's a perfectly sympathetic, feminist viewpoint. However, imagine that a magazine reported it as "Each woman is a kind of replica of the next one and that is a very frightening thing" to get you fired.

We have to be better than this. With our allies AND our enemies.

So, to be clear, they've essentially taken the words of a man who's criticising the Chinese state for mistreatment of its own people and edited it to make you think he said a variation of "they all look alike".

When people are constantly misrepresented as racist when they are not, an actual racist may be afforded an undue benefit of the doubt next time. Think of over-using accusations of racism the same as needlessly prescribing antibiotics. We become immune, and it's dangerous.

This is precisely why accusations of "white supremacy" have become the go-to smear. "Racist" has been blunted by those who shamelessly weaponized it.

Oh yeah, and racism is bad in case you didn't know.