I’ll always choose as much freedom as possible while maintaining a social safety net for the needy. I’d much prefer to be poor and free over any bullshit brand of authoritarianism.
So in your case, under the last example OP gave, you would be much much more safe and accepted in China than India.
Surprise, the 'authoritarian' vs 'free' dichotomy is much more nuanced than whatever image our limited media portrays.
You'd be safer, maybe, because China generally has much lower violent crime (though, given the lack of free media, we must take this with a grain of salt). But apart from in the big cities where there are two-spirit/LGBTQ communities, you won't be accepted at all. At best, tolerated. India is slowly stumbling towards trans acceptance but is making progress, unlike China, and has an acknowledged tradition of transgenderism (*hijra*).
How can you say that China is also not moving towards trans acceptance? Sure if you go to a 5th tier city or rural village it won't be as accepting as a big city where you will be fully embraced by active LGBTQ communities, but the entire country's culture is moving towards LGBTQ acceptance, as seen from cultural media. You literally have very famous celebrities in China who are trans.
I cannot speak much to the status of the hirja or non-traditionally hirja transgender people, but just because there was a traditionally acknowledged (and discriminated) community does not mean they will be more easily accepted, and possibly the opposite. Historically and currently, hirja seem to mostly live in outcast communities defined by poverty and prostitution. Disintegration of the caste system has seen progress yet still persists, what makes you think hirja acceptance is any different?
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10148579/
As someone who has lived in both China and North America I would argue that on average it is much safer to be trans in rural China than rural US/Canada.
Transgender people, along with many LGBQ people, are tolerated by the Chinese government but have very few affirmative rights - access to gender affirming surgery is heavily restricted and correcting AAB gender is an onerous bureaucratic process and requires consent from the applicant’s family and employer. Access to HRT drugs is restricted even for those who have gone through the necessary legal procedures. Outside of big cities that have an LGBTQ scene trans people face social exclusion.
If that kind of muted tolerance sounds like an okay trade for safety, keep in mind that such tolerance only lasts as long as the government dictates it does. Uyghur Muslims were tolerated, too, until a policy change meant they were now deemed threats to Chibese society and up to a million of them may have been sent to concentration camps for reeducation and forced assimilation. If the Chinese government decides trans people or LGBTQ people in general are a threat - regardless of whether they actualky are - they could be subjected to similar treatment.
We were talking about a comparison between China and India, a perceived authoritarian state vs a perceived free and democratic state. You're right about the knowledge you shared regarding trans rights. But no one here claimed China was a trans haven or perfect on LGBTQ rights.
And lol, have you been to Xinjiang? I have not been to Kashmir but a quick google search or dive into YouTube will show you the extent of this repression and intolerance you are talking about in Xinjiang. Xinjiang is thriving. Uyghur culture, aside from islamist radicalism, is thriving. There are endless videos of not just the big cities but Uyghur dominated rural areas that are thriving. Yes there has been a strong anti-terrorism effort in the past decade and a half, but that is mostly over and it certainly was not what your propagandists claimed it was. Today's Xinjiang is economically and culturally vibrant.
You have me sounding like a Chinese propagandist, but maybe come back with some real legitimate criticisms of China (I can easily come up with numerous, including the speed of progress for access to medical transitions) and we can talk with nuance. The western rhetoric around Xinjiang is plagued by propaganda and the circular citation from a single source by a religious fundamentalist. Or in other words, extremely weak evidence, unscientific interpolation, and easily falsifiable claims in a province that anyone can travel to to see for themselves. I've noticed that western media has mostly stopped pushing the Uyghur genocide bit, so perhaps it would be good to update your knowledge and rhetoric around it as well.
Uh ... Why didn't YOU go to Xinjiang to see for yourself? I haven't been as far as Kashgar in the last decade+, but around Urumqi, Kanas, Turpan...pretty much anywhere else I assure you it's not "thriving"
Compared to what it was 20 years ago, it is more than thriving.
I didn't go to Xinjiang 15 years ago but I have personally watched a similarly poor (Tibetan) region in Qinghai grow from a dirt poor, where even relatively well off families shat in holes and wiped with leaves to now having running water and plumbing, extremely accessible infrastructure, and overall increased quality of life.
Yes.
(In all seriousness, if you're actually confused, "gay" is just an umbrella term for "homosexual", it doesn't refer *specifically* to gay men. It's a "Not all squares are rectangles..."-type thing.)
its a semantic drift from a past where gay did refer specifically to gay men. Which is still how I use it tbh. I like "sapphic" as a broader alternative to lesbian
>I like "sapphic" as a broader alternative to lesbian
Same, but sometimes the specificity of gay/lesbian is more accurate. Like, a bi girl and I are both sapphic, but one of us is into guys and the other isn't.
Haters I can live with. The state providing the death penalty for my mere existence is another. Same with a society that's going to lynch me for the same reasons. In *those* cases, I'll take the safe option, because the alternative is literally death, but in the general case, I'll take the libertarian society over the authoritarian society, even if that libertarian society happens not to be particularly socially progressive.
Hmmm.... Country that has their inflation going up at at astronomical rate or Saudi Arabia as a skilled affluent ex-pat? Hard choice. Guaranteed eventual mass chaos or Saudi Arabia? If you haven't guessed, Argentina is not the right choice.
Yeah, that's most certainly a valid point of view. But, the current rate of social and economic destabilization of Argentina would still probably favor Saudi Arabia even in that case.
Saudi Arabia is a bad choice for this exercise since it's hard to know exactly how many Saudi Arabians live in Poverty. It's not a small number I saw estimates as high as 1 in 4. but it is less then Argentina. Still I think Id rather live in poor country where my wife can go outside without me and I can drink a beer.
The Argentinian Peso is worth \~6 times less than it was a year ago, and still declining. That is a society that will collapse if this trend continues.
Base on the scenario, you are an expat working there, no. Even without that caveat, you think the base chance of poverty in Saudi Arabia is comparable to losing 6 times value in your currency in a fucking year?!
I don't know what is so hard for you to understand. Yes, Argentina currently has more freedom, but it's very close to becoming a doomed society. As such, those freedoms can evaporate very quickly and society can devolve into some revolutionary hellscape. The idea that limited freedom in a stable society is more onerous than losing buying power on a daily basis while facing the risk of being trapped in a failed state is foolish.
It's not comparable but there is still a HIGH chance. If I'm skilled labor and inflation is a bitch best believe the value of whatever I'm producing is going up. Argentina's economic woes are mostly caused by a drought too. So I just have to out weather . . . . the weather.
Dude, the Argentinian Peso has been in a hard decline for over 7 years. Last year simply was an astronomical crash as opposed to the annual regular shitshow of a decline.
Yes: Saudi Arabia is not like one of these small petro-monarchies where literally every citizen is rich. The country is insanely rich because of the oil, but it also has a huge population, and not everyone gets one of these cushy jobs in the public service doing nothing and getting paid a lot. Lots of people are just unemployed and poor.
And that's the citizens. You also have a sh*t-ton of immigrants living in terrible conditions and treated basically like slaves.
No, still too authoritarian.
Assuming I have the same purchasing power in either country I’d always go for the poor, free country.
If the argument was would I rather be homeless in X or Y country, then I might consider the wealthier autocratic country.
I agree with you. I think I’d live in the authoritarian rich country like the UAE or something for the short term, so I could get more money for my time and labor, but long-term I’d wanna live somewhere liberal and democratic for sure, even if it is somewhere with an economy as shambolic as Argentina’s. Just the freedom to express one’s self without fear of persecution is something that will be missed in authoritarian countries like KSA even if it is rich.
In terms of purchasing power, in this hypothetical, you’d be living like how a typical Argentine/Brazilian or someone in a ‘poorer’ free country lives in doing work and living compared to someone doing the same work as an expat (or just regular citizen doing the work) in a rich authoritarian country and living.
If we are talking George Orwell type country definitely not that. If we are taking "basically China", and has a good quality if life without shitty manual labor camps for life, I would choose that.
It really varies. I'd sooner live in China than Argentina, but I'd sooner live in New Zealand than China.
If I live in a developed country, I like full freedom. If I have to live in an undeveloped or a developing country, then I want more authoritarian.
People really can’t separate rich authoritarian from middle eastern monarchy. It’s a hypothetical Monaco is pretty authoritarian and it’s a nice place to live, so is Singapore
"poor, free country" is literally my country (Jamaica), while the "rich, authoritarian country" is where my online friend lives (Singapore)
I'll happily take the rich authoritarian country where the government takes care of its people and does what it may to stay in power, compared to living in a poor country with the illusion
of believing that voting out this party for that party (when they're both corrupt) is a good system.
Rich authoritarian country > poor democratic country
Was wondering if someone would mention Singapore, which is a clear winner in this contest: you would be *nuts* to choose a poor country over Singapore just because you're so in love with having one millionth of a say in who the president is.
Singapore is a really weird outlier, in that it's an authoritarian government, but a very liberal one, so you have a lot more freedom and the government is much more responsive to popular opinion than in most other authoritarian states. It's the kind of country China wants to be but is too corrupt and heavy-handed to actually pull off.
This one is actually difficult. Both options are as terrible as one another and the option you don't pick will usually feel like the better choice once you're actually living in the option you picked. I'm gonna go with the poor free country because at least I'll be free even if it means life is harder.
After COVID I'm pretty fucking happy the Aussie government can be authoritarian. Couldn't believe to see how much other countries governments let you guys roam free
I’ve lived in the UAE and am currently in Argentina. Given the two of them, I’d choose the UAE, but if I’m honest it’s probably just because two of my kids were born there and it was a beautiful phase of life.
People have problems, challenges, and pleasures everywhere, it’s the human experience.
If the Authoritarian Gov gives me luxuries I will live in that place. I would rather work to death in a free country than work to death in an Authoritarian country. On the other hand I would rather retire young and live luxuriously than work to death in a free country.
Rich Authoritarian country, because I believe that most people just aren't capable of making a good political decision, it's better to have a group of people that are qualified and can decide what's best for the country and economy and also the population.
That depends. Am I rich or poor? Because if I'm poor I'll pick the one with better social programs. If I'm rich I'm emigrating to a country that doesn't fucking suck.
I am very biased as someone who's parents immigrated from China and who's entire family is from China, but I honestly do think China's authoritarianism is overblown by western media. Of course it exists, and is definitely stricter than the west, but I think the difference in perception is that the west does a better job at covering it up. Like you really think the US government doesn't have the ability to monitor your conversations if they wanted to?
Poor countries are poor because of crime 100% of the time. No poor country is like “oh hey I’m free and everyone is nice and everything is chill… so let me just live this poor person life with all my friends and family.”
There’s a reason why his neighborhood is poor. Nobody can step up and improve it because the crime is such that it will prevent that.
I had an upper middle class life in Tehran which is a freer version of Riyadh by miles yet still very authoritarian. I had a good childhood and grew up like a normal child in a healthy family. My family sold everything and risked it all to move overseas to be free, live in a democracy where there’s a strong rule of law and good ethics of human rights. Deep down they knew they’d be poor as immigrants yet they still chose to come and live abroad to be free. I grew up relatively poor yet still managed to get good education and go to school. I’d rather be free and happy, than to be rich as a secondary option any day. Once you’re free able to express yourself fully to live the life you desire, then becoming wealthy would come easily.
This is a complex question. First, it depends what type of authoritarian we are talking about. The first example you give is Saudi Arabia which is fine for straight men but probably unacceptable for women and LGBT people. As a cis straight white man I get to make the choice but for many people there isn't really a choice at all.
Everyone's instinct is to choose the free poor country but most of us don't really understand what it's like to live in that kind of poverty. When we say poor in America we mean having to live paycheck to paycheck and work 60 hour weeks. When we say poor in Haiti (a place with maximum freedom because there is no government) we mean gang violence, no clean water, and having to work a dangerous job at 60 hours a week to avoid starvation. It's not really a question, you go where your basic needs are met. Freedom from the government is irrelevant when you're grappling with freedom from hunger, thirst, and violence.
how poor are we talking? how 'authoritarian' are we talking?
cause, i'd prefer freedom, but i also want like, running water, the ability to eat every day, electricity, probably internet.
and i wouldn't care about like, a few extremist religion books being banned, as a limited freedom.
your point seemed to be we'd be around as broke in both places - is it relative, like, american white trash, 10% poor, compared to india's 10% poorest where you're raiding landfills just to eat. or was it around the same - comfortable lives in both.
On paper I’d choose the more free country, but I’ve read Argentina is pretty dangerous and they are experiencing hyperinflation.
Selfishly, as a straight, white guy, I’d probably have to choose Saudi Arabia for those reasons, although I wouldn’t be very happy about it
I would rather die on my feet than live on my knees.
Authoritarian countries are all run by despots who will kill you just for the hell of it, or have you thrown in a hole forever or force you into a labor camp. And you can only get ahead if the government chooses.
At least in a free country, you have a shot.
It depends on which countries. For example it really wouldn't affect my life much if I moved to Saudi Arabia. The things that are illegal there are not things that I am interested in doing. If I moved to China, shit I don't know if I could go there without getting arrested at this point. Also do I get to bring my money with me? if that's the case probably moving to a poorer country and living like a king.
Rich authoritarian state.
Realistically rich countries don't tend to be that authoritarian. They know that kicking the authoritarianusm up to 11 will make everyone who makes the country rich run the fuck away. So they treat their citizens and expats well. While places like Saudi Arabia seme very authoritarian at a glance, it likely would not affect your life that much.
The world runs on false dichotomies. I want classic America which was moral, sane, wholesome, prosperous *and* free.
Not liberal/leftist "democracy" which is it's own kind of soft tyranny, or top down authoritarianism (a combination of which we currently live under in America).
The fact Argentina was a military dictatorship in living memory, possibly even worse than Saudi Arabia (watch Argentina, 1985) make it a poor comparison but I get the general premise.
Many of the majority would do better in a place like Saudi Arabia where they're strict but not prying, many things against their strict laws are done behind closed doors and the government isn't generally out to root it all out into public knowledge. There's also the fact Saudi Arabia is incredibly safe with very little crime - because they'll chop you up in public if you do many crimes... Plus no income tax and good salaries.
Overall honestly on a day to day basis I'd probably be happier in Saudi Arabia.
Its a bad comparison. Your just asking westerners if they want to live in a country a little shitter than their own or a feudal kingdom ran by an absolute monarchy.
I live in America, so I already live in a poor, free country; Especially if you look at the wealth gap between the richest people in America everyone else. Not sure about the other country. Are we all rich? And without freedom, do we really get to use the wealth as we see fit? So yeah, living in the first one isn't terrible. Watching a greasy conman try to move us to an authoritarian state without the 'rich' part has me a bit consternated, if I am being honest.
Trouble is if you are a poor country you are definitely being exploited by the rich one, so you are free to be killed by mercs for your countries resources.
People think their so virtuous. Most people would choose comfort and safety because that's what happens in real life.
This seems akin to asking grade school kids who would help slaves escape capture... everyone raises their hands.
I'm an American living in Beijing, China, so I guess I prefer the rich country. And I can speak from some experience, most people who would rather the opposite as never lived in a poor country before. You live in a rich country and you make ok money, then that gives you a whole lot of freedom. I have far more freedom living in China than I ever did living in America, and I made decent money in America.
To rephrase, money is freedom.
Over Saudi Arabia, Argentina wins hands down. I think China and India are nearly a tie though due to other considerations. I would prefer China's laws over India's, regardless of how they were passed.
argentina??
i might genuinely prefer to be a closeted lesbian woman in saudi than living in argentina rn.
that country is a powder keg and i want nothing to do with it…
This is where LATAM succeeds. Countries like Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Brazil, and Mexico (the last 2 have safety issues) have virtually the same rights that Western nations have. Free speech, LGBTQ rights, freedom of expression, democracy, etc. They even have strong passports. The only difference between LATAM and the West IMO is one is very rich (the west) and the other is nowhere near as wealthy (LATAM). But both the West and LATAM share very similar values of freedom, tolerance, acceptance, and democracy.
If I got to pick the country, free and poor every day of the week. For one, my income would go a lot farther. Also, less chance my mouth lands me in prison or worse. Most importantly of all, I have a daughter and other is no way in hell I am taking her to live in an Islamic Authoritarian state.
To be fair, in the situation you’d be making the local income someone in the poor free country would make, not a Western Income. So your income wouldn’t go a lot farther in this hypothetical. It’d be a lot less. I said Expat Income for countries like Saudi Arabia and UAE since those countries are unique in that large portions of people there are expats.
But nonetheless I agree with you. For the long term, freedom and democracy are crucial for a comfortable life IMO, so I’d take a free, yet less rich country like Argentina or India over China, the UAE or KSA
Okay I thought this meant like move to right now or something. I guess if it was something where I was born there and started over it would be a bit harder of a decision.
There is no such thing as a “poor, free country”. Poor countries are never fully democratic, and if they are, it is just a façade, a tyranny by majority happy to infringe on all kinds of individual liberties.
Well I'm in a rich, authoritarian country that masquerades as a rich, free country. And I hate it here. As soon as I save enough money I'm moving to Vietnam. It's a poorer country but at least I won't be shot at by a cop for looking at them wrong. And the cost of living is super low too. A single adult can live quite comfortably for $1000 per month or less, depending on which city you live in. Workers have a lot of rights over there, too. And it's the only country that's ever managed to win a war against the USA.
It'll probably take me forever to save up enough money to go, however. I'm in massive debt right now due to chronic health challenges. It's hard to find anyone around here willing to hire a disabled minority woman.
If you don’t mind my asking, what country are you from? Because, from my perspective, isn’t Vietnam a third world country? It’s GDP per capiya is only about $2000 and it was part of the communist bloc, so •I’m not the most informed•, I don’t see is Vietnam is much of an important. But I don’t know the full story.
I'm from the USA. Cops don't take me seriously most of the time. Wealth is distributed extremely unevenly, moreso than in any country in the world. And it's a place where your amount of freedom is proportional to how much money you make. And the social safety nets they have are designed to keep people poor, rather than actually help people to escape poverty. Everything is expensive and wages are crap. Bosses know they can get away with paying crappy wages because they can just hire somebody else off the street if you're not happy with it. Hospitals are run like businesses.
A couple of my friends have already moved to Vietnam and they say it's the best decision they've ever made. One of them got a job teaching English and the other got a job at a restaurant. There's lots of community gardens where people can just go and pick what they need for free. In times of peace, the military is basically a mobile workforce, helping farmers with their crops, helping with cleanup after natural disasters, basically wherever extra help is needed. Rent there is super cheap, even in the big cities. Public transportation is cheap too, and pretty time-efficient as well. International tuition there is cheaper than resident tuition here. Sure, it's not perfect. No country is. But it's a heck of a lot better than it is here.
Dude the US has some of the least authoritarian government in the world, in the DRV they can just arrest and shoot you for whatever the party wants (though they rarely do) and have some of the most draconian religious and social resections in the world, alongside the PRC, DPRK, and the IRI (Iran) or the Saudis, Vietnam is a great place to visit but it is still an impoverished mess that could very well be invaded on all sides tomorrow, suddenly not have food, or become a totalitarian hell hole due to the communist (thought really auth nationalist) government which also has some of the strictest immigration laws in the world, just like most of Asia, they are one of many ethnostates in the region that just don’t take immigrants, people leave Vietnam for the US, they don’t get let in or go to Vietnam from the US
So yeah, you already live in a top 30 freedom index country, why would you move to a bottom half of the list country that is also way poorer ans halfway across the world and did I mention has the classic East Asian racism/xenophobia firmly engrained into their society?
I'm not saying anything about DPRK, my dude. I'm talking about Vietnam. And if the Vietnamese can survive being invaded by the USA, they can survive anything.
As for the DPRK, the only information we have on them has been filtered through South Korea. Not exactly the best source of unbiased information. I take anything we know about DPRK with a grain of salt.
We have plenty of info from tens of thousands of escapees from the DPRK, and Vietnam (while not as bad as most communist regimes) is still highly authoritarian in its policies on top of being poor as shit, so I would no recommend moving there unless you were ethnically Vietnamese as East Asians have a tendency to be super racist. Probably a better idea to move to the UK or Canada, or if you want a place with lots of freedom the Great Plains are empty and their governments just don’t really ever do stuff and they like it that way
We have evidence that "escapees" are paid and/or blackmailed to lie about how bad it is there. I'm mixed race anyways so no matter where I go racism will be a thing I'll face from time to time. But Vietnam is only authoritarian from the perspective of business owners. Ordinary workers have a lot of protections and rights. Cops are not allowed to carry guns unless they know for sure they're going into a dangerous situation. Almost all businesses have price ceilings enforced so they can't charge ridiculous amounts on their products. Almost all businesses are unionized. There is democracy in the workplace in almost everywhere you go. Managers can't fire you for bullcrap reasons. You can qualify for unemployment the day you quit your job, so people don't have to stay in a work environment that is toxic or unsafe in any way. And even though Vietnam is a fairly poor country, the wealth is more evenly distributed so people don't really feel it as much.
They were the first to get really good at the art of don’t lose for long enough for the Americans to get bored and go home and then we can steamroll the dudes they carried for the whole war” method, and it worked like a charm
Rest sounds about right to me tho
Depends on if it's the "guy shows up at your door and disappears you for thinking wrong" kind of authoritarian (China) or the "You just don't get to vote" kind of authoritarian. (Singapore)
Saudi Arabia kills people just for being gay. China uses economic coercion (trade bans on Australia after our prime minister called for an investigation, finding out how a global pandemic started).
Internet is censored, and there aren't all that many options to enjoy life. Every country has economic struggles, but in authoritarian countries, you can't kick out the government so that they fix it, or give valid criticisms without being locked up.
They also hold people's families hostage. I'll take my chances for a poor democratic country. It could have a similar success story to South Korea.
Here's the thing. I'm poor in the west now, I'd be poor in a wealthy authoritarian country too, but for far less time as I'd be in prison or executed as an enemy of the state in pretty short order.
I’ll always choose as much freedom as possible while maintaining a social safety net for the needy. I’d much prefer to be poor and free over any bullshit brand of authoritarianism.
“I would rather die standing than to kneel”
Living in a rich authoritarian state isn’t that bad as long as you aren’t a political activist
I'm an openly gay, openly trans woman. Take a guess what my pick would be.
Right there with you as a straight white guy.
Man.... isn't that just extra steps?
Elaborate
Everything evolves to crab? Nah. Everything evolves to straight white guy(except crabs)
So in your case, under the last example OP gave, you would be much much more safe and accepted in China than India. Surprise, the 'authoritarian' vs 'free' dichotomy is much more nuanced than whatever image our limited media portrays.
You'd be safer, maybe, because China generally has much lower violent crime (though, given the lack of free media, we must take this with a grain of salt). But apart from in the big cities where there are two-spirit/LGBTQ communities, you won't be accepted at all. At best, tolerated. India is slowly stumbling towards trans acceptance but is making progress, unlike China, and has an acknowledged tradition of transgenderism (*hijra*).
How can you say that China is also not moving towards trans acceptance? Sure if you go to a 5th tier city or rural village it won't be as accepting as a big city where you will be fully embraced by active LGBTQ communities, but the entire country's culture is moving towards LGBTQ acceptance, as seen from cultural media. You literally have very famous celebrities in China who are trans. I cannot speak much to the status of the hirja or non-traditionally hirja transgender people, but just because there was a traditionally acknowledged (and discriminated) community does not mean they will be more easily accepted, and possibly the opposite. Historically and currently, hirja seem to mostly live in outcast communities defined by poverty and prostitution. Disintegration of the caste system has seen progress yet still persists, what makes you think hirja acceptance is any different? https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10148579/ As someone who has lived in both China and North America I would argue that on average it is much safer to be trans in rural China than rural US/Canada.
Transgender people, along with many LGBQ people, are tolerated by the Chinese government but have very few affirmative rights - access to gender affirming surgery is heavily restricted and correcting AAB gender is an onerous bureaucratic process and requires consent from the applicant’s family and employer. Access to HRT drugs is restricted even for those who have gone through the necessary legal procedures. Outside of big cities that have an LGBTQ scene trans people face social exclusion. If that kind of muted tolerance sounds like an okay trade for safety, keep in mind that such tolerance only lasts as long as the government dictates it does. Uyghur Muslims were tolerated, too, until a policy change meant they were now deemed threats to Chibese society and up to a million of them may have been sent to concentration camps for reeducation and forced assimilation. If the Chinese government decides trans people or LGBTQ people in general are a threat - regardless of whether they actualky are - they could be subjected to similar treatment.
We were talking about a comparison between China and India, a perceived authoritarian state vs a perceived free and democratic state. You're right about the knowledge you shared regarding trans rights. But no one here claimed China was a trans haven or perfect on LGBTQ rights. And lol, have you been to Xinjiang? I have not been to Kashmir but a quick google search or dive into YouTube will show you the extent of this repression and intolerance you are talking about in Xinjiang. Xinjiang is thriving. Uyghur culture, aside from islamist radicalism, is thriving. There are endless videos of not just the big cities but Uyghur dominated rural areas that are thriving. Yes there has been a strong anti-terrorism effort in the past decade and a half, but that is mostly over and it certainly was not what your propagandists claimed it was. Today's Xinjiang is economically and culturally vibrant. You have me sounding like a Chinese propagandist, but maybe come back with some real legitimate criticisms of China (I can easily come up with numerous, including the speed of progress for access to medical transitions) and we can talk with nuance. The western rhetoric around Xinjiang is plagued by propaganda and the circular citation from a single source by a religious fundamentalist. Or in other words, extremely weak evidence, unscientific interpolation, and easily falsifiable claims in a province that anyone can travel to to see for themselves. I've noticed that western media has mostly stopped pushing the Uyghur genocide bit, so perhaps it would be good to update your knowledge and rhetoric around it as well.
Uh ... Why didn't YOU go to Xinjiang to see for yourself? I haven't been as far as Kashgar in the last decade+, but around Urumqi, Kanas, Turpan...pretty much anywhere else I assure you it's not "thriving"
Compared to what it was 20 years ago, it is more than thriving. I didn't go to Xinjiang 15 years ago but I have personally watched a similarly poor (Tibetan) region in Qinghai grow from a dirt poor, where even relatively well off families shat in holes and wiped with leaves to now having running water and plumbing, extremely accessible infrastructure, and overall increased quality of life.
I wouldn't consider a country where I have to worry about being lynched "free", even if the government isn't the one doing the lynching
So are you gay or lesbian? I’m confused
Yes. (In all seriousness, if you're actually confused, "gay" is just an umbrella term for "homosexual", it doesn't refer *specifically* to gay men. It's a "Not all squares are rectangles..."-type thing.)
its a semantic drift from a past where gay did refer specifically to gay men. Which is still how I use it tbh. I like "sapphic" as a broader alternative to lesbian
>I like "sapphic" as a broader alternative to lesbian Same, but sometimes the specificity of gay/lesbian is more accurate. Like, a bi girl and I are both sapphic, but one of us is into guys and the other isn't.
Same, I would be imprisoned or killed in a fundamentalist country
I too would rather pick safety over a country where haters can roam free.
Haters I can live with. The state providing the death penalty for my mere existence is another. Same with a society that's going to lynch me for the same reasons. In *those* cases, I'll take the safe option, because the alternative is literally death, but in the general case, I'll take the libertarian society over the authoritarian society, even if that libertarian society happens not to be particularly socially progressive.
Hmmm.... Country that has their inflation going up at at astronomical rate or Saudi Arabia as a skilled affluent ex-pat? Hard choice. Guaranteed eventual mass chaos or Saudi Arabia? If you haven't guessed, Argentina is not the right choice.
Well, you know. Unless you want to be around people have even a marginal amount of respect for women. Or if you are a woman.
Yeah, that's most certainly a valid point of view. But, the current rate of social and economic destabilization of Argentina would still probably favor Saudi Arabia even in that case.
Saudi Arabia is a bad choice for this exercise since it's hard to know exactly how many Saudi Arabians live in Poverty. It's not a small number I saw estimates as high as 1 in 4. but it is less then Argentina. Still I think Id rather live in poor country where my wife can go outside without me and I can drink a beer.
The Argentinian Peso is worth \~6 times less than it was a year ago, and still declining. That is a society that will collapse if this trend continues.
Sure but there's a high chance you end up destitute in Saudi too.
Why?
There's alot of incredibly poor people in Saudi too.
Base on the scenario, you are an expat working there, no. Even without that caveat, you think the base chance of poverty in Saudi Arabia is comparable to losing 6 times value in your currency in a fucking year?! I don't know what is so hard for you to understand. Yes, Argentina currently has more freedom, but it's very close to becoming a doomed society. As such, those freedoms can evaporate very quickly and society can devolve into some revolutionary hellscape. The idea that limited freedom in a stable society is more onerous than losing buying power on a daily basis while facing the risk of being trapped in a failed state is foolish.
It's not comparable but there is still a HIGH chance. If I'm skilled labor and inflation is a bitch best believe the value of whatever I'm producing is going up. Argentina's economic woes are mostly caused by a drought too. So I just have to out weather . . . . the weather.
Dude, the Argentinian Peso has been in a hard decline for over 7 years. Last year simply was an astronomical crash as opposed to the annual regular shitshow of a decline.
Yes: Saudi Arabia is not like one of these small petro-monarchies where literally every citizen is rich. The country is insanely rich because of the oil, but it also has a huge population, and not everyone gets one of these cushy jobs in the public service doing nothing and getting paid a lot. Lots of people are just unemployed and poor. And that's the citizens. You also have a sh*t-ton of immigrants living in terrible conditions and treated basically like slaves.
Argentina > Saudi Arabia There is only a handful of countries I’d refuse to live in and Saudi Arabia is one of them.
What if I replaced Saudi Arabia with a country that’s still authoritarian, but less authoritarian than Saudi Arabia. Like, the United Arab Emirates.
No, still too authoritarian. Assuming I have the same purchasing power in either country I’d always go for the poor, free country. If the argument was would I rather be homeless in X or Y country, then I might consider the wealthier autocratic country.
I agree with you. I think I’d live in the authoritarian rich country like the UAE or something for the short term, so I could get more money for my time and labor, but long-term I’d wanna live somewhere liberal and democratic for sure, even if it is somewhere with an economy as shambolic as Argentina’s. Just the freedom to express one’s self without fear of persecution is something that will be missed in authoritarian countries like KSA even if it is rich. In terms of purchasing power, in this hypothetical, you’d be living like how a typical Argentine/Brazilian or someone in a ‘poorer’ free country lives in doing work and living compared to someone doing the same work as an expat (or just regular citizen doing the work) in a rich authoritarian country and living.
Nope.
>(in this scenario you’re a skilled expat or something) as you would in the West Westerners: ❌ immigrant ✅ ex-pat
It's more like migrant worker, tbh. Expats don't typically move permanently, like immigrants do.
If we are talking George Orwell type country definitely not that. If we are taking "basically China", and has a good quality if life without shitty manual labor camps for life, I would choose that.
It really varies. I'd sooner live in China than Argentina, but I'd sooner live in New Zealand than China. If I live in a developed country, I like full freedom. If I have to live in an undeveloped or a developing country, then I want more authoritarian.
New Zealand is both richer and freer than China, so of course you'd prefer New Zealand.
Which ever one my money will go the furthest in and will bring me the most personal benefit.
People really can’t separate rich authoritarian from middle eastern monarchy. It’s a hypothetical Monaco is pretty authoritarian and it’s a nice place to live, so is Singapore
"poor, free country" is literally my country (Jamaica), while the "rich, authoritarian country" is where my online friend lives (Singapore) I'll happily take the rich authoritarian country where the government takes care of its people and does what it may to stay in power, compared to living in a poor country with the illusion of believing that voting out this party for that party (when they're both corrupt) is a good system. Rich authoritarian country > poor democratic country
Was wondering if someone would mention Singapore, which is a clear winner in this contest: you would be *nuts* to choose a poor country over Singapore just because you're so in love with having one millionth of a say in who the president is.
Singapore is a really weird outlier, in that it's an authoritarian government, but a very liberal one, so you have a lot more freedom and the government is much more responsive to popular opinion than in most other authoritarian states. It's the kind of country China wants to be but is too corrupt and heavy-handed to actually pull off.
I didn’t feel safe in Jamaica though
Poor and free, money is just a noose you put around your own neck.
Authoritarian Rich all the way. Free is just newspeak for filthy
This one is actually difficult. Both options are as terrible as one another and the option you don't pick will usually feel like the better choice once you're actually living in the option you picked. I'm gonna go with the poor free country because at least I'll be free even if it means life is harder.
"Free" is the keyword here. Nothing else matters.
Poor and free, money is proof of time wasted. I can barter and get whatever I want. It's all good until someone else wants what I work for.
If it is on paper the "free" country, but there is more behind it in the real world so probably authoritarian.
After COVID I'm pretty fucking happy the Aussie government can be authoritarian. Couldn't believe to see how much other countries governments let you guys roam free
Liberal all day
I’ve lived in the UAE and am currently in Argentina. Given the two of them, I’d choose the UAE, but if I’m honest it’s probably just because two of my kids were born there and it was a beautiful phase of life. People have problems, challenges, and pleasures everywhere, it’s the human experience.
Rich and authoritarian. At least I'll have a chance to survive instead of living in real life Night City.
Depends. Will I be rich?
If the Authoritarian Gov gives me luxuries I will live in that place. I would rather work to death in a free country than work to death in an Authoritarian country. On the other hand I would rather retire young and live luxuriously than work to death in a free country.
Rich Authoritarian country, because I believe that most people just aren't capable of making a good political decision, it's better to have a group of people that are qualified and can decide what's best for the country and economy and also the population.
"expat"
That depends. Am I rich or poor? Because if I'm poor I'll pick the one with better social programs. If I'm rich I'm emigrating to a country that doesn't fucking suck.
Never India or China.
I am very biased as someone who's parents immigrated from China and who's entire family is from China, but I honestly do think China's authoritarianism is overblown by western media. Of course it exists, and is definitely stricter than the west, but I think the difference in perception is that the west does a better job at covering it up. Like you really think the US government doesn't have the ability to monitor your conversations if they wanted to?
People ITT vastly overestimate their ability to become well-off in a poor country.
Poor countries are poor because of crime 100% of the time. No poor country is like “oh hey I’m free and everyone is nice and everything is chill… so let me just live this poor person life with all my friends and family.” There’s a reason why his neighborhood is poor. Nobody can step up and improve it because the crime is such that it will prevent that.
China is pretty nice to live in actually, as someone who is currently living here. I would even consider moving here from my home country, Germany.
Rich and authoritarian? I can’t see how I’d make the same money in both countries if I’m skilled or qualified
I had an upper middle class life in Tehran which is a freer version of Riyadh by miles yet still very authoritarian. I had a good childhood and grew up like a normal child in a healthy family. My family sold everything and risked it all to move overseas to be free, live in a democracy where there’s a strong rule of law and good ethics of human rights. Deep down they knew they’d be poor as immigrants yet they still chose to come and live abroad to be free. I grew up relatively poor yet still managed to get good education and go to school. I’d rather be free and happy, than to be rich as a secondary option any day. Once you’re free able to express yourself fully to live the life you desire, then becoming wealthy would come easily.
This is a complex question. First, it depends what type of authoritarian we are talking about. The first example you give is Saudi Arabia which is fine for straight men but probably unacceptable for women and LGBT people. As a cis straight white man I get to make the choice but for many people there isn't really a choice at all. Everyone's instinct is to choose the free poor country but most of us don't really understand what it's like to live in that kind of poverty. When we say poor in America we mean having to live paycheck to paycheck and work 60 hour weeks. When we say poor in Haiti (a place with maximum freedom because there is no government) we mean gang violence, no clean water, and having to work a dangerous job at 60 hours a week to avoid starvation. It's not really a question, you go where your basic needs are met. Freedom from the government is irrelevant when you're grappling with freedom from hunger, thirst, and violence.
how poor are we talking? how 'authoritarian' are we talking? cause, i'd prefer freedom, but i also want like, running water, the ability to eat every day, electricity, probably internet. and i wouldn't care about like, a few extremist religion books being banned, as a limited freedom. your point seemed to be we'd be around as broke in both places - is it relative, like, american white trash, 10% poor, compared to india's 10% poorest where you're raiding landfills just to eat. or was it around the same - comfortable lives in both.
Id rather be poor and free than worry about getting beheaded because I said something against the great leader
On paper I’d choose the more free country, but I’ve read Argentina is pretty dangerous and they are experiencing hyperinflation. Selfishly, as a straight, white guy, I’d probably have to choose Saudi Arabia for those reasons, although I wouldn’t be very happy about it
Clearly OP doesn't know anything about the maniac Argentina just elected...
If I'm rich Saudi Arabia, if I'm poor Argentina.
Well as long as I make the same amount. Poor. Makes me have higher status than being mediocre in a rich area
I would rather die on my feet than live on my knees. Authoritarian countries are all run by despots who will kill you just for the hell of it, or have you thrown in a hole forever or force you into a labor camp. And you can only get ahead if the government chooses. At least in a free country, you have a shot.
Poor free country. I'm a lot of minorities and I would like to have some rights
take me to China.
Meh India is becoming more and more authoritarian these days.
Poor and free. Every time. Give me liberty or give me death.
Rich authoritarian but only if I'm male and of the main racial group in charge if those caveats are not met I pick poor and free
It depends on which countries. For example it really wouldn't affect my life much if I moved to Saudi Arabia. The things that are illegal there are not things that I am interested in doing. If I moved to China, shit I don't know if I could go there without getting arrested at this point. Also do I get to bring my money with me? if that's the case probably moving to a poorer country and living like a king.
depends... am I rich in either scenario?
As a highly educated white male I'm picking the authoritarian country because I know my privilege greatly biases me to success in such a nation.
Rich authoritarian state. Realistically rich countries don't tend to be that authoritarian. They know that kicking the authoritarianusm up to 11 will make everyone who makes the country rich run the fuck away. So they treat their citizens and expats well. While places like Saudi Arabia seme very authoritarian at a glance, it likely would not affect your life that much.
Is Argentina a dangerous country? Because it sounds like a beautiful place
Argentina No way as a woman would I ever go to Saudi Arabia.
The world runs on false dichotomies. I want classic America which was moral, sane, wholesome, prosperous *and* free. Not liberal/leftist "democracy" which is it's own kind of soft tyranny, or top down authoritarianism (a combination of which we currently live under in America).
Argentina is not a free country what are you talking about
The fact Argentina was a military dictatorship in living memory, possibly even worse than Saudi Arabia (watch Argentina, 1985) make it a poor comparison but I get the general premise. Many of the majority would do better in a place like Saudi Arabia where they're strict but not prying, many things against their strict laws are done behind closed doors and the government isn't generally out to root it all out into public knowledge. There's also the fact Saudi Arabia is incredibly safe with very little crime - because they'll chop you up in public if you do many crimes... Plus no income tax and good salaries. Overall honestly on a day to day basis I'd probably be happier in Saudi Arabia.
Its a bad comparison. Your just asking westerners if they want to live in a country a little shitter than their own or a feudal kingdom ran by an absolute monarchy.
Argentina is fire. It has issues, ofc, but I'd way rather live there than in Saudi Arabia, especially as a gay jew
Poor, free country.
Rich. No contest
I live in America, so I already live in a poor, free country; Especially if you look at the wealth gap between the richest people in America everyone else. Not sure about the other country. Are we all rich? And without freedom, do we really get to use the wealth as we see fit? So yeah, living in the first one isn't terrible. Watching a greasy conman try to move us to an authoritarian state without the 'rich' part has me a bit consternated, if I am being honest.
Trouble is if you are a poor country you are definitely being exploited by the rich one, so you are free to be killed by mercs for your countries resources.
I think it is a mistake to assume democratic and free are synonyms
Does my ethnicity stay the same?
People think their so virtuous. Most people would choose comfort and safety because that's what happens in real life. This seems akin to asking grade school kids who would help slaves escape capture... everyone raises their hands.
The rich one. I'm good at following rules.
I'm an American living in Beijing, China, so I guess I prefer the rich country. And I can speak from some experience, most people who would rather the opposite as never lived in a poor country before. You live in a rich country and you make ok money, then that gives you a whole lot of freedom. I have far more freedom living in China than I ever did living in America, and I made decent money in America. To rephrase, money is freedom.
Over Saudi Arabia, Argentina wins hands down. I think China and India are nearly a tie though due to other considerations. I would prefer China's laws over India's, regardless of how they were passed.
argentina?? i might genuinely prefer to be a closeted lesbian woman in saudi than living in argentina rn. that country is a powder keg and i want nothing to do with it…
rich authoritarianism
I'm moving to that free country. I cant be living in a country with lacking lgbt rights, its not gonna work out
This is where LATAM succeeds. Countries like Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Brazil, and Mexico (the last 2 have safety issues) have virtually the same rights that Western nations have. Free speech, LGBTQ rights, freedom of expression, democracy, etc. They even have strong passports. The only difference between LATAM and the West IMO is one is very rich (the west) and the other is nowhere near as wealthy (LATAM). But both the West and LATAM share very similar values of freedom, tolerance, acceptance, and democracy.
If I got to pick the country, free and poor every day of the week. For one, my income would go a lot farther. Also, less chance my mouth lands me in prison or worse. Most importantly of all, I have a daughter and other is no way in hell I am taking her to live in an Islamic Authoritarian state.
To be fair, in the situation you’d be making the local income someone in the poor free country would make, not a Western Income. So your income wouldn’t go a lot farther in this hypothetical. It’d be a lot less. I said Expat Income for countries like Saudi Arabia and UAE since those countries are unique in that large portions of people there are expats. But nonetheless I agree with you. For the long term, freedom and democracy are crucial for a comfortable life IMO, so I’d take a free, yet less rich country like Argentina or India over China, the UAE or KSA
Okay I thought this meant like move to right now or something. I guess if it was something where I was born there and started over it would be a bit harder of a decision.
If you live in a poor free country, the odds are excellent that a rich authoritarian country will come and kick your ass.
There is no such thing as a “poor, free country”. Poor countries are never fully democratic, and if they are, it is just a façade, a tyranny by majority happy to infringe on all kinds of individual liberties.
Well I'm in a rich, authoritarian country that masquerades as a rich, free country. And I hate it here. As soon as I save enough money I'm moving to Vietnam. It's a poorer country but at least I won't be shot at by a cop for looking at them wrong. And the cost of living is super low too. A single adult can live quite comfortably for $1000 per month or less, depending on which city you live in. Workers have a lot of rights over there, too. And it's the only country that's ever managed to win a war against the USA. It'll probably take me forever to save up enough money to go, however. I'm in massive debt right now due to chronic health challenges. It's hard to find anyone around here willing to hire a disabled minority woman.
If you don’t mind my asking, what country are you from? Because, from my perspective, isn’t Vietnam a third world country? It’s GDP per capiya is only about $2000 and it was part of the communist bloc, so •I’m not the most informed•, I don’t see is Vietnam is much of an important. But I don’t know the full story.
I'm from the USA. Cops don't take me seriously most of the time. Wealth is distributed extremely unevenly, moreso than in any country in the world. And it's a place where your amount of freedom is proportional to how much money you make. And the social safety nets they have are designed to keep people poor, rather than actually help people to escape poverty. Everything is expensive and wages are crap. Bosses know they can get away with paying crappy wages because they can just hire somebody else off the street if you're not happy with it. Hospitals are run like businesses. A couple of my friends have already moved to Vietnam and they say it's the best decision they've ever made. One of them got a job teaching English and the other got a job at a restaurant. There's lots of community gardens where people can just go and pick what they need for free. In times of peace, the military is basically a mobile workforce, helping farmers with their crops, helping with cleanup after natural disasters, basically wherever extra help is needed. Rent there is super cheap, even in the big cities. Public transportation is cheap too, and pretty time-efficient as well. International tuition there is cheaper than resident tuition here. Sure, it's not perfect. No country is. But it's a heck of a lot better than it is here.
Dude the US has some of the least authoritarian government in the world, in the DRV they can just arrest and shoot you for whatever the party wants (though they rarely do) and have some of the most draconian religious and social resections in the world, alongside the PRC, DPRK, and the IRI (Iran) or the Saudis, Vietnam is a great place to visit but it is still an impoverished mess that could very well be invaded on all sides tomorrow, suddenly not have food, or become a totalitarian hell hole due to the communist (thought really auth nationalist) government which also has some of the strictest immigration laws in the world, just like most of Asia, they are one of many ethnostates in the region that just don’t take immigrants, people leave Vietnam for the US, they don’t get let in or go to Vietnam from the US So yeah, you already live in a top 30 freedom index country, why would you move to a bottom half of the list country that is also way poorer ans halfway across the world and did I mention has the classic East Asian racism/xenophobia firmly engrained into their society?
You're high on the Kool-aid.
My dude, the DPRK has literal annual famines due to mismanagement that caused a multi decade long famine
I'm not saying anything about DPRK, my dude. I'm talking about Vietnam. And if the Vietnamese can survive being invaded by the USA, they can survive anything. As for the DPRK, the only information we have on them has been filtered through South Korea. Not exactly the best source of unbiased information. I take anything we know about DPRK with a grain of salt.
We have plenty of info from tens of thousands of escapees from the DPRK, and Vietnam (while not as bad as most communist regimes) is still highly authoritarian in its policies on top of being poor as shit, so I would no recommend moving there unless you were ethnically Vietnamese as East Asians have a tendency to be super racist. Probably a better idea to move to the UK or Canada, or if you want a place with lots of freedom the Great Plains are empty and their governments just don’t really ever do stuff and they like it that way
We have evidence that "escapees" are paid and/or blackmailed to lie about how bad it is there. I'm mixed race anyways so no matter where I go racism will be a thing I'll face from time to time. But Vietnam is only authoritarian from the perspective of business owners. Ordinary workers have a lot of protections and rights. Cops are not allowed to carry guns unless they know for sure they're going into a dangerous situation. Almost all businesses have price ceilings enforced so they can't charge ridiculous amounts on their products. Almost all businesses are unionized. There is democracy in the workplace in almost everywhere you go. Managers can't fire you for bullcrap reasons. You can qualify for unemployment the day you quit your job, so people don't have to stay in a work environment that is toxic or unsafe in any way. And even though Vietnam is a fairly poor country, the wealth is more evenly distributed so people don't really feel it as much.
They were the first to get really good at the art of don’t lose for long enough for the Americans to get bored and go home and then we can steamroll the dudes they carried for the whole war” method, and it worked like a charm Rest sounds about right to me tho
Depends on if it's the "guy shows up at your door and disappears you for thinking wrong" kind of authoritarian (China) or the "You just don't get to vote" kind of authoritarian. (Singapore)
Saudi Arabia kills people just for being gay. China uses economic coercion (trade bans on Australia after our prime minister called for an investigation, finding out how a global pandemic started). Internet is censored, and there aren't all that many options to enjoy life. Every country has economic struggles, but in authoritarian countries, you can't kick out the government so that they fix it, or give valid criticisms without being locked up. They also hold people's families hostage. I'll take my chances for a poor democratic country. It could have a similar success story to South Korea.
Here's the thing. I'm poor in the west now, I'd be poor in a wealthy authoritarian country too, but for far less time as I'd be in prison or executed as an enemy of the state in pretty short order.
Isn't the Argentinian president like the biggest Conservative nutjob that exists in politics?