China’s fifth research station in Antarctica sparks concerns about its ambitions : worldnews

[+] [email protected] 51 points 9 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

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[–] [email protected] 31 points 9 months ago (32 children)

The absolute horror of research in Antarctica. Clearly a sign of colonial intent.

[+] FartsWithAnAccent 35 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (3 children)

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 9 months ago (1 children)

The Philippines, notorious for inventing and being the primary user of cyanide fishing?

Japan, largely responsible for decimating bluefin tuna population in the Pacific?

Canada and the US, responsible for polluting waterways and putting salmon fisheries on the verge of collapse? Maybe for culling Northern Cod populations to 1% of their historical levels.

Oh, you mean China, which produces 73% of it's fishery output from aquaculture. China accounts for 19.2% of global catch (i.e., fishing) and 61.5% of global aquaculture.

[–] FartsWithAnAccent -1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Other countries doing bad shit does not make it OK: It's all bad and everyone needs to cut this shit out collectively. Just because another country did something doesn't mean another should be immune to criticism.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 9 months ago

You're arguing against... Numbers? By the numbers, China's contribution to the world's wild fishing is proportional to their population (~18% of the world), and most of China's fish supply comes from aquaculture.

The fact that you're focusing on this 18% (mind you, China does control a good chunk of the world's productive fisheries just due to the sheer scale of the rivers in China) rather than the remaining 82%...

Arguing that China is overexploiting global fisheries, frankly, doesn't look at the quantitative data.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago (1 children)

yeah they are the ones investing heavily in solar, evs and the like

[–] FartsWithAnAccent -1 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

They are not the only ones investing in renewable energy. It's good that they are, but that does not undo the many environmental disasters they have created in the pursuit of greed. Before you bring up another country or corporation doing it, it should be noted that it's wrong when anyone does it, full stop.

Wow, and the original comment was removed, nice censorship.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

i still see the original comment.

what disasters? china is the one country where they actually punish companies perpetrating environmental disasters.

i think you are thinking of the US here.

[–] FartsWithAnAccent 2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

Weird, I got a message that it was removed for supposedly violating rule 1.

Anyhow, as I previously mentioned, the illegal fishing at a global scale is a fine place to start but let's not pretend like China isn't guilty of all the same environmental sins as the US. It's bad when China does it, it's bad when the US does it, nobody should use the excuse of, "Oh, well this country does it, so that magically makes it ok"

The US and China have both punished some companies, but there are plenty who went unpunished for some pretty egregious stuff in both countries (along with other countries, this is a global problem). Whataboutism doesn't address the issue and neither country should be enabling the destruction of our environment.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

What i'm saying is China ain't doing it to nearly the scale as the US. It would be just as bad if they did. But they are not.

The US usually fines companies for a fraction of their profits while China makes sure the people responsible are actually jailed and the damage undone (whenever possible)

Its disingenuous to compare the two like they are equal in their damage or punishment for said damage.

[–] I_Has_A_Hat 20 points 9 months ago (2 children)

I try to stay away from conspiracies so I haven't gone down the rabbit hole too much, but there have been some weird things going on in Antarctica the last few years. Lots of visits from a ton of different heads of state for no officially stated reasons, civilian ships being turned away from certain areas, numerous reports of military aircraft flying around.

Like I said, I try not to dig into conspiracies too much, but this one sticks out to me. Maybe it's just because it reminds me of the pre-2016 days when conspiracy theories were fun to think about because they involved stuff like aliens and bigfoot. Now, every conspiracy is just some nonsense political BS that's clearly trying to push a message.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 9 months ago

They found the stargate

[–] ComradePorkRoll 4 points 9 months ago

Modern day conspiracies are so shit because they're all like 2 degrees removed from some antisemetic bullshit. The flat earth conspiracy has been hijacked by neonazis for fucks same.

[–] Thrillhouse 9 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It is just common sense. Nations never do things for just one reason. Possession is 9/10ths of the law - if they fill Antarctica with their facilities they can later claim they have so many facilities they should just govern Antarctica. Not a bad strategic move in times of global warming.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 9 months ago (3 children)

There are dozens of research stations. Argentina has 14. The US also has 5 research stations and makes up one quarter of the summer population (China makes up 4%). Don't see any articles hand-wringing about US ambitions in the region, for some reason.

[–] set_secret 3 points 9 months ago

Australia has already claimed 42% of the continent fwiw. yes when climate change makes the rest of the world unliveable Aus 2.0 is waiting just down the road.

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[–] Nobody 24 points 9 months ago (1 children)

China is threatening the West's strategic penguin reserves. This cannot be allowed to stand.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 9 months ago

Mr. President, we must not allow a penguin gap!

[–] [email protected] 15 points 9 months ago

Ok does it spark concerns or do China's enemies spark concerns about it?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

“I wouldn’t read too much into it until they have a more permanent and sustainable presence in the region… It’s more symbolic than anything. At the moment, it does not represent any strategic pivot beyond the regions China wants to go,” he added.

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Said Prof Ho: “While it is certainly possible for the Chinese to use these bases for strategic geopolitical purposes, I would not think the Antarctic is top of their list, given they have other domestic priorities like their economy to think about.”

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But the White Paper does not constitute an official Antarctic policy and there is no telling when such a policy, serving as a guide for China’s actions, may be put out, said Associate Professor Liu Nengye at Singapore Management University’s Yong Pung How School of Law.

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Since 2013, Beijing has proposed to establish an Antarctic Specially Managed Area around Kunlun station, which would allow China to maintain more stringent environmental protection of the surrounding space of potentially thousands of square kilometres. Such proposals have to be approved by the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Parties, which consists of 29 countries including Russia, the United Kingdom, the US and China.

While the Madrid Protocol permits such an area, the proposal received pushback from other governments, including the US, which questioned China’s motives.

There are currently seven such areas, of which two are managed by the US, one by Australia and the remaining four jointly managed by countries including Brazil, Poland, Chile and India.

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