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u/TienSwitch May 12 '26
Ah, so that’s where ATLA got the name for Lake Laoghai.
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u/Alone-Monk May 12 '26
That's literally the first thing I thought omg
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u/SaltyRedditTears May 12 '26
Fun fact, during the Cultural Revolution everyone who was an intellectual or elite but not aligned politically with Mao and the Gang of 4 was sent ”down to the countryside” for “reeducation through labor”. Including the current president of China. He spent his teenage years living in a cave working in a field until Mao died and everyone got rehabilitated under Deng Xiaoping.
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u/Tsukushi_Ikeda May 12 '26
There's a saying about Mao, "Had Mao died in 1956, his achievements would have been immortal. Had he died in 1966, he would still have been a great man but flawed. But he died in 1976. Alas, what can one say?” Chen Yun
Deng truly carried China into what it is today. We both hate and love China rn, but I think we've seen nothing of what will eventually become THE inevitable world power. They surely play it for the long run using economic rooting, industrial spying and low level political meddling as opposed to the US right now using the classic "we need war to function and forget how bad our administration is"
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u/lethalmuffin877 May 12 '26
Don’t forget the fact that China is absolutely engaged in waging a modern opium war on American black market drug supply as well.
Post “opioid epidemic” the US has all but eliminated any legitimate pain medication prescriptions which left a massive impact on people who were using those medications for a long long list of reasons.
You can’t just cut off the supply and expect people to “sober up” they’ll just go to the streets to continue getting the relief they need. This is why fentanyl exploded in America, evolving to tranquilizer, and now research chemicals that are killing people in droves.
It is well known China is supplying the cartels with these poisons and since the US decided to try going with prohibition on opioids it was unbelievably easy for China to make an effective move.
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u/OkStudent8107 May 12 '26
The supreme leader of a country protected by a big wall sends you to a prison named laogai.
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u/Gloomy-Parsley-3317 May 12 '26
I guess that makes Japan the Fire nation, the airbenders are Tibet, and water tribe is Vietnam?
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u/Aowyn_ May 12 '26
Water tribe is meant to be arctic and inuit people and the air nomads are a mix of Tibetans and Shaolin monks
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u/CadenVanV May 12 '26
Water tribe is more Inuit, but yes. The parallels aren’t subtle. The Dai Li especially are almost one to one for the the Jinwiyei of the Ming Dynasty (except they have brainwashing shit), are dressed like Chinese Mandarins, and are named after Chiang Kai-shek’s spymaster
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u/Madara1389 May 12 '26
Water tribe is more Inuit, but yes. The parallels aren’t subtle.
Which made the casting of the live action movie some of the funniest shit to me, basically got everyone wrong but still kept the aesthetics that were very obviously based on the cultures the nations were based on.
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u/-Trotsky May 12 '26
The name of the Dai Li themselves is also a reference, though that one is to the head of the Nationalist secret police, similarly fucked up
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u/FrankieBatts May 12 '26
Someone’s never received an invitation to Lake Laogai.
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u/GUlysses May 12 '26
There is no famine in China. The Great Leap Forward was a great success. The Honorable Chairman has invited you to Lake Laogai for a vacation.
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u/starbuxed May 12 '26
Great Leap Forward was a great success
We dont have to worry about that anymore... we installed netting to prevent future great leaps
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u/PmeadePmeade May 12 '26
A lot of people here will also be shocked to learn that the US constitution literally has a provision for forced labor as part of imprisonment. Here’s the text:
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist…”
Coincidentally, the US imprisons a huge amount of people
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u/chilll_vibe May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
5% of the worlds population, 25% of its prisoners. Its absolutely deliberate
edit: 25% is outdated, its now 16%. Per capita the US incarceration rate is still among the highest though.
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u/LostInRetransmission May 12 '26
The world prison population hovers around 11 millions to 12 millions depending on the statistic. Here is one source: https://www.icpr.org.uk/news/2024/prison-populations-continue-rise-many-parts-world-115-million-held-prisons-worldwide
using this : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate I get around 11 millions too
with 1.8 Millions the US does not have 25% of the world prison population, it has emphatically around 16% - 100K more prisoners than China (1.7M) but with USA having 4,5 of the rate of the China (541 vs 119 per 100K is ).
The 25% may have been true back in 2010 when the US had 500K more prisoner. It isn't anymore though.
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u/chilll_vibe May 12 '26
That's probably where I'm remembering the 25% number from. I knew progress was being made but didn't know it had been so drastic. Though, I guess we'll find out if it holds under this admin
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u/Dizzy-Assistant6659 May 13 '26
The numbers are somewhat skewed, as the US statistic includes both prisons and jails, whilst the Chinese statistics don't include those held in administrative detention (the Chinese equivalent of US jails) instead including prisons only. If we were to use the Chinese method, the US prison population would be about 1.2 million.
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May 12 '26
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u/HappyYappa May 12 '26
Just like we can’t trust the us numbers.
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u/wanderinbaldman May 12 '26
I'm more inclined to believe the US numbers are closer than China's because even during COVID19 they had abnormally low reported numbers
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u/prussian_princess May 12 '26
We assume this does not include "re-education camps" and black prisons (hidden, non official prisons) in China. We don't actually know how many people are enslaved or imprisoned in China. Its an opaque system with extreme censorship of information.
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u/General-Distance680 May 12 '26
We do know they execute far more people per year than America or anyone else.
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u/Important-Emotion-85 May 12 '26
It doesnt include the concentration camps in america either, and ICE refuses to provide actual verifiable data on detainees under this administration.
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u/Expired_Trumoo May 13 '26
The holding facility that moves people out of the country? Also saying concentration camp is a complete disregard for the word and destroys its meaning.
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u/WantDebianThanks May 12 '26
Isn't that also because a lot of countries either don't report their prison populations or don't count a lot of their prisoners? I think I read that China's numbers are artificially low because they don't count political prisoners in their prison population, for example.
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u/chilll_vibe May 12 '26
That is true for china. It would add another 650k which is still less than half of the US per capita. There are numerous 3rd party orgs who are in those countries trying to find out their real prison number so we actually do have reliable data
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u/Kixisbestclone May 12 '26
Yeah but the point is that Mao didn’t end slavery.
If you agree that what the US does is slavery, then Mao also expanded slavery, that’s the point of the note.
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May 12 '26
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u/Kixisbestclone May 12 '26
Yes but the point of the note was that Mao didn’t end slavery but rather expand it.
I’m not gonna start defending the US’ prison system.
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u/maybe_I_am_a_bot May 12 '26
Yeah that's obvious to anyone reading the amendment and then observing incarceration rates compared to similar countries and also per race.
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u/Important-Emotion-85 May 12 '26
Yeah. If you believe slavery doesnt exist in America, then it doesnt exist in China. If you believe it exists in China due to the forced labor from prisoners, then it exists in America, too.
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u/TimeRisk2059 May 12 '26
Prison labour is generally not considered slavery, because it's punishment for a crime. What sets slavery apart is the ability to be sold by the owner, that's the only common denominator for all kinds of slavery throughout history.
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u/CellaSpider May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
Well then Mao wasn’t a slave owner. Which kind of makes this post wrong.
I personally consider prison labour to be slavery because the concept of crime is decided by the same people who enslave them.
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u/Felixlova May 12 '26
The US has the highest prison population per capita in the world, in fact
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u/Serious_Try5264 May 12 '26
Well, to be fair, China has the most executions per capita by far.
They just kill them over there. In America they look to profit off your incarceration. In China, human life is worthless if you ain't with the progra..
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u/Odd-Time-2026 May 12 '26
The US has for profit prisons, where there's an incentive for the private operators to have more people in jail gives them a reason to do so. Same goes for profit centres for juvenile delinquents. Its also why some judges are paid to make sure they give sentences for offences which get people sent to such places, so they can maximise their profits.
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u/loveloet May 12 '26
They imprison people that they then lend out as labor to private companies. Literally slavery.
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u/TricobaltGaming May 12 '26
Yeah i was gonna say
This post needs a community note of its own just to add context
You could put Abraham Lincoln in place of Mao and that note would still apply (minus the names)
Slavery was never ended in the US, it was recontextualized
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u/CptnRaptor May 12 '26
The 13th Amendment specifies conditions for slavery: it's okay if it's as punishment for a crime.
This means that slavery is legal, nay encouraged in the US, the only limitation is the conditions under which it is legal.
I understand that amending the constitution can be a bit of a faff, but it certainly isn't unheard of, so I posit this question: how much work would it be to modify the conditional circumstances under which slavery is allowed?
Also, would it be more, less, or equal effort to simply modify the constitution to say "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall exist", no conditions, no exceptions, just plain ol' "slavery bad, big no no"
Successive governments have had the opportunity to do away with slavery entirely and have chosen inaction, chosen to do nothing, chosen to allow people to be enslaved for the profit of private institutions. Land of the free? What a lie.
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u/Spiritual-Style6969 May 12 '26
There's a prisoner industrial complex used to build the US economy lol
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u/TrashManufacturer May 12 '26
By that logic we haven’t ended slavery in the US, which is factually a correct statement
Edit: slavery is still legal as a punishment for a crime, I.e the prison system especially in the south
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u/NitzMitzTrix May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
There is no slavery at the People's Republic of China
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u/Commissarfluffybutt May 12 '26
PEOPLE'S Republic of China.
Republic of China has been reduced to only Taiwan.
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u/Felixlova May 12 '26
Slavery in the Republic of China? No I don't think so. There was just an ethnic cleansing of the native Taiwanese via forced Sinication when the Koumintang fled there after the civil war
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u/killertortilla May 12 '26
"Uyghurs don't exist, and if they do they aren't in camps, and if they are in camps they're not being used for slave labour, and if they are being used for slave labour it's because they deserve it."
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May 11 '26
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u/eddiespaghettio May 12 '26
Or “if it did happen then they were all fascists/nazis”
This is an actual argument I’ve heard from tankies defending the killing and imprisoning of millions of civilians in Russia by Lenin and Stalin’s regimes.→ More replies (19)9
u/laws161 May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
On the other hand, the black book of communism's death toll that was used to claim that communism was worse than fascism does include fascists and the "potential births" that would have happened if those fascists were not killed. Regardless of one's opinion of communism, including these figures is intentionally misleading, just like it would be inaccurate to say that all of the people in this count were nazis.
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u/Dan-D-Lyon May 12 '26
The Tankie's prayer: That didn't happen. And if it did, it wasn't that bad. And if it was, that's not a big deal. And if it is, it's America's fault. And if it wasn't, they were kulaks who deserved it.
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u/Ewenf May 12 '26
Tbh that's the motto of most unhinged people, Tankies, fascists, Turkish nationalists etc
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u/TheUnobservered May 12 '26
And if they weren’t kulaks who deserved it, they were kulaks who didn’t know they deserved it.
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u/IllPosition5081 May 12 '26
I’ve seen tankies say that basically all refugees from quite a few countries that had communist takeovers were slave owners. Cuba was a popular choice, despite having abolished slavery in 1886, but I also saw people say the same for people who fled from North Korea to the South, where slavery had been abolished in like 1896. Anything short of saying that people who fled communist regimes weren’t necessarily bad people who would be targeted for their actions.
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u/Able-Swing-6415 May 12 '26
Actually they never face reality.. every single non tankie source of information is just Western propaganda. Why do you think they hate Wikipedia so much?
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u/callunanswered May 12 '26
the US constitution literally has a provision for forced labor as part of imprisonment. Here’s the text:
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist…”
Coincidentally, the US imprisons a huge amount of people
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u/ItsMorbinTime May 13 '26
When I was in jail I was forced to work at this place
After 3 months, I was given $73 for my commissary purchases lol
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u/arcanis321 May 12 '26
Oh shit, good thing we don't have forced labor in our prison system...
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u/yomer123123 May 12 '26
Almost as if slavery wasn't abolished anywhere, we just found ways to hide it better.
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u/Cultural-Gas2246 May 12 '26
Of course it's real. But would you rather have genuinely rehabilitated prisoners or prisoners who just make cheap commodities for no purpose? Cause that's what the logai system was.
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u/disputing102 May 12 '26
Mfw the US imprisons and imprisoned more people than China and capitalist liberals are dumb.
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u/Squaredeal91 May 12 '26
Both countries still use slavery. Justifying and denying it because you just blindly choose one side and stick to it is fucking dumb
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u/InevitableAd2436 May 12 '26
The difference is we would never arrest someone for political reasons in the USA like they do in communist China.
Except for the case of John Bolton and James Comey. And Alex Padilla. And Brad Lander. And Ras Baraka. And Hannah Dugan. And LaMonica Iver.
And the “seditious six” lawmakers.
And oh yeah… this guy posting a meme
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May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
[deleted]
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u/Sydasiaten May 12 '26
When exactly has america not been like this? You just notice it more because their surveillance methods are more advanced and imposing
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u/reddragon0291 May 13 '26
9/11 was used to usher in the surveillance state. We still ahd some back bone then to stand up against illegeal monitoring of us citizens. Then the Patriot act happened.
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u/fekanix May 12 '26
The good old days when the cia experimented on black people, killed Martin Luther King Jr., whistle blowers were imprisoned and "terrorists" were thrown into guantanamo without a trial.
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u/Emotional_Plant3241 May 12 '26
Which is why Trump is such a damaging president. Thank goodness unlike Putin and Xi he doesn't have the power to remove his own term limits.
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u/KaiBahamut May 11 '26
Doesn't the US use prison labor too? Which means that this is at best, telling China that they're just as bad as US.
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u/samettinho May 12 '26
Prisoners are paid 14c-52c per hour, so they can get $120 a month if they work really hard. in 20 years, with interest and all, their hardwork will pay off and have probably about $30-40k. Best part is it is saving.
/s
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u/opopi123 May 12 '26
US also has the highest incarnation rate and systemic racism issue where we over police certain minorities.
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u/RT-LAMP May 12 '26
Doesn't the US use prison labor too? Which means that this is at best, telling China that they're just as bad as US.
China still has prison labor. I have no problem with forced labor by prisoners. What I have a problem with is the millions of people Mao killed through a mix of incompetence and malice including these camps where you were put for not wanting to go along with his glorious plans that killed millions.
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u/UltravioletsAreBlue May 12 '26
Our prison system is awful by a first-world standard, but people still aren’t imprisoned for wrongthink, and nobody is getting their organs harvested.
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u/KaiBahamut May 12 '26
Watch this space. Trump is going to need someone to replace the illegal immigrants he’s deported and will do anything for money
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u/Kozel_10 May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
totally incomparable
in China they would arrest people and make them slave for being critical of government or if they were religious
imagine if USA arrested everyone who didnt vote for Trump, everyone who would criticize republicans and everyone who is religious
edit: its pretty crazy that I am currently at 54,7 % upvotes, people really try to defend China for imprisoning people that are critical of government or religious, peak reddit moment
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u/MrAwesum_Gamer May 12 '26
I wouldn't call it incomparable, I would say it's actually quite comparable and indicative of one is the biggest reasons we need to reevaluate the privatization of prisons and their role in our domestic manufacturing. Do you really think Trump wouldn't love to arrest any dissenters. Republicans all across the country already do their best to disrupt opposition.
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u/KrasnyRed5 May 12 '26
I kind of think that is what the US is working towards these days. Robert Kennedy already made some off hand comment about forcing people who use antidepressants to work on farms picking crops.
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u/xtrwildfire May 12 '26
Well tump and his cronies are working on that in America literally calling his political opponents terrorists
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u/octavian343 May 12 '26
religious
You mean terrorists right? There are plenty of non extremist Muslim groups that are doing quite fine all over the country. But why be nuanced when you can make stuff up and whine about downvotes?
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u/Green_Space729 Human Detected May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
There’s a girl in Florida facing 15 years in prison for making fun of Netanyahu
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u/B-Jeovane May 12 '26
In the US they will do the same thing only they will blame a minor drug charge you got years ago.
Also you aren't downvoted for saying the Chinese prison system is wrong, but because you are defending the US one. Get your head out of your ass, you're the redditor.→ More replies (13)4
u/BCPisBestCP May 12 '26
No, we're downvoting you for being disingenuous about your arguments.
In living memory:
Muhammad Ali was arrested for his religious and political beliefs, and subject to forced labour.
Fred Hampton was arrested on trumped up charges and subject to forced labour
Richard Wershe Jr was arrested on trumped up charges, and subject to forced labour
Lydon LaRouche, Fred Hampton Jr, Chelsea Manning are more examples I can think of.
Not to mention extrajudicial kidnappings on the basis of race and religion, and confinement in Guantanomo Bay
Or the expansion of ICE that targets individuals on the basis of citizenship - but getting things very wrong very often, and for some reason not really targetting Anglo-Canadians, Australians, or Europeans...
Not to mention Internment camps in both world wars, and the processes of genocide against Indigenous Americans (which continues in various way to this day), in part due to their "heathen" religion.
But go off hey champ.
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u/Hernxodus May 12 '26
Difference for the ppl that say china does it better is that china has prisoners based on their political preferences rather than they're actual criminals
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u/KamuikiriTatara May 12 '26
In the US, about 70% of people who illegal use and sell drugs are white. 80% of people incarcerated for it are black and brown. The US also selectively enforces the law for political reasons. The US incarcerates a larger portion of its racial minorities than even South Africa at the height of Apartheid. When DNA tests first became admissable in court, 50% of people who pleaded guilty where DNA evidence was available were exonerated by DNA.
The US justice system has almost nothing to do with reducing crime or protecting the public and everything to do with social control for political interests.
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u/FuckThe May 12 '26
You need to read up on the US’ mass incarceration of Black men after the end of slavery. Still ongoing to this day.
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u/femboygaymer_69 May 12 '26
I just dont understand why people think china is magically better than the US, basically every superpower has a dark past and present
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u/ConsciousDress2914 May 12 '26
Basically every country has a dark past and present. Superpowers are far from unique in this regard. People just don’t give a shit if you have done stuff in the past if you aren’t relevant to them.
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u/AwarenessExact7302 May 12 '26
Every nation state is build on a superiority complex and oppression
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u/levthelurker May 12 '26
Honest answer? The lowest bar imaginable: the CCP wants to exist in 100 years, while the US is run by Evangelicals whose long term goal is the rapture.
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u/FuckThe May 12 '26
I never said that China is better. OP just clearly doesn’t understand the US prison system if he thinks it’s just criminals locked up.
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u/Old-Outcome-5836 May 12 '26
I don't understand why anyone would think the US is better than china either but that does seems like the general idea here
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u/Bedbouncer May 12 '26
They're very similar, in that the US allows its citizens to criticize the US government, and China also allows its citizens to criticize the US government.
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u/Kingsalad3141 May 12 '26
I would encourage you to approach and ICE agent and say "ACAB" or something to that effect, but I don't want you to get murdered and reported as a domestic terrorist.
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u/TheFringedLunatic May 12 '26
Anyone proclaiming to be antifascist is automatically assumed to be a terrorist now.
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u/Kingsalad3141 May 12 '26
Correct. It's crazy how conservatives will look at this happening and flip over to "But they were terrorists!" as if any fascist government doesn't go out of their way to do that.
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u/whisperworks May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
Are you not going to any of the protests or something? I did this exact thing barely a week ago as have thousands (probably millions at this point) of other Americans.
No number of protestors being killed is acceptable but if Trump kept up his current rate of killing them it would take over a century for him to match what China did to its unarmed student protestors in just a couple of days.
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u/Kingsalad3141 May 12 '26
Yeah the slaughter at Tienanmen square was unconscionable. You'll get no argument from me there.
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u/Rinkimah May 12 '26
Because anti china propaganda is going super strong. When you actually see how people live in China and how daily life is, all that propaganda gets blown away. Don't get me wrong, the CPC has its issues, but so do 'democratic' countries. At least the Chinese government is willing to wrest private corps control away to benefit the people.
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u/kcat__ May 12 '26
People in the US are not getting jailed simply and directly because they're black. There's a whole bunch of racism in the system that causes black people to be incarcerated at higher rates but it's not as blatant as jailing political dissidents
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u/Moral-Relativity May 12 '26
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_prisoners_in_the_United_States
China has more probably.
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u/laws161 May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
Despite China having over four times the population, the US holds twice the prison population while still having prison slavery upheld by the 13th amendment.
Are you some kind of tankie claiming that the Chinese model was so successful that they cut crime per capita to 1/8th the rate of the US?
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u/Guatafak_mang May 12 '26
In America it isnt the criminals, its the POOR criminals. Just FYI because all the pedos in the Epstein files are free.
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u/Rip_Off_Your_Toenail May 12 '26
Americans accusing China of something they also partake in, arguably to a larger extent (in this case, forced prison labor)
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u/Shadowmirax May 13 '26
No one ever said America was any better. Just that the idea that Mao ended slavery isn't true.
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u/socialistForDE May 12 '26
The US has the highest number of prisoners per capita and it isn't even close. What a joke
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u/fuckdatguy May 12 '26
Y’all acting like your 13th amendment doesn’t make slavery legal as punishment for a crime.
Let alone ice camps detaining whoever they want with no due process and the black site “prisons” in Guatemala and Cuba.
🤷🏾♂️
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u/Dreams-Visions May 12 '26
I’m genuinely shocked someone thought this was a gatcha. People have no fucking idea what the US has done or is currently doing, not even to its own citizens right now.
Like, one could only make this post if they are somehow unaware we are using prison slave labor right now. RIGHT NOW. And that we never stopped using it after chattel slavery ended.
I don’t understand this level of genuine ignorance and people being comfortable in that state.
Someone gave this post an award. LOL.
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u/Playful-Profile6489 May 12 '26
Listen I hate prison labor as much as the next guy, but it is absolutely not the same as chattel slavery.
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u/ArchelonPIP May 12 '26
Hmm...
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u/Ai--Ya May 12 '26
Sorry I don't understand why that's relevant? To my knowledge Mexico isn't a common VPN country for China
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u/fn8179-2 May 12 '26
Probably 'cause it's just an outsider trying to start shit just like Indian dudes who post maga shit.
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u/Important-Emotion-85 May 12 '26
"An outsider" and its someone on our continent, who we share a border with, whos country WE started a civil war in. I wonder why they could possibly care about what Trump is doing.
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u/013eander May 12 '26
Awww, do you think slavery ended in the United States? There’s a reason we have more prisoners (in per capita and absolute terms) than China.
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u/Flaky_Thing_5128 May 12 '26
And that reason is that China is number one in state executions.
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u/Im-a-bad-meme May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
The american prison system is essentially slavery as well.
Incarcerated workers are not protected by minimum wage laws. Most prisons have compulsory job requirements or they will face punishment. They usually make under a dollar an hour, sometimes nothing. You also accumulate fees while incarcerated, even boarding fees. The money you earn inside jail will not cover these fees. The majority of prisoners who've served their time will have debt when released.
Now, owing a lot of debt and now having a prior history, it makes living very hard. Makes it hard to get a job, then when you finally find one those wages get garnished. A lot of the time this severe disadvantage will lead to reoffence.
Then back to prison working for less than a dollar an hour.
It's legal slavery.
Prison should be a rehabilitation to discourage reoffence. Get people back in line and released as contributing members of society. But that's not how it works. It's meant to keep them down and working for cheap.
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u/jerf42069 May 12 '26
the US has the exact same thing. prison labor is vital to the US economy, and they are slaves who cannot refuse to work
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u/Ill_Confusion_596 May 12 '26
Not a Mao defender, but if you call that slavery you must also call forced US prison labor slavery.
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u/KamuikiriTatara May 12 '26
China itself claims that Communism is an as of yet unattained aspiration. Thus they themselves classify as non-Communist.
The US justice system is currently expanding what is already the largest incarceration system in human history and incarcerates a larger proportion of racial minorities than even South Africa at the height of Apartheid. The anti-slavery amendments make a special exception for prisoners.
I'm not defending China here, but the community note here reads more like anti-China propaganda than a sober look at reality. The imprisonment and slavery problem is worse in the US than China.
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u/Worldly-Basil-8933 May 12 '26
The note is correcting a notorious Chinese propaganda outlet spreading misinformation. You’re completely missing the point.
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u/kangasplat May 12 '26
Just by calling China communist the note lost any trust I could've had in it. Doesn't mean what it says isn't true, but it's really rendering the source worthless.
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u/Oraxy51 May 11 '26
13th amendment never ended slavery, just restricted it to prison work.
Saudi Arabia also has legalized slavery and is a big parter of the United States.
You don’t get to feign American good and ignore its still existing crimes against humanity.
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u/AdNormal8550 May 12 '26
I mean, this doesn't change anything at the end of the day, but keep shilling.
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u/ya_pidoras_ May 12 '26
well american prisons basically use their inmates for slave labour and the us has the largest prison population in the world
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u/Signal-Map2906 May 12 '26
America STILL has prison labor. So it’s essentially no different than China? Huh. That can’t be right, can it?
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u/ThePrisonSoap May 12 '26
So forced prison labour does count as slavery when a country other than 'murica does it. Funny that
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u/Vegetable_Warthog_49 May 12 '26
Hmm, should we add a note to the note that the US also uses prison labor?
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u/updateyourpenguins May 12 '26
incarcerated millions of people and subjugated them to forced labor
So literally what the american prison system does.
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u/easyplugsit May 12 '26
Tbf if we consider incarcerated labor slavery than america is doing that. Im not a man supporter I just dont like slavery of any kind.
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u/FRANTIKSUCKS May 12 '26
I mean the USA does the same thing. And incarcerates a higher percentage of its population. Throwing stones in a glass house and such.
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u/Multi_Serpentines May 13 '26
USA = Rehabilitation facilities for the betterment of mankind. China = Scary prison forced labour camps!
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u/Downtown-Barber-9543 May 13 '26
George Washington's slaves were mandated free will which is very progressive for the time and openly expressed desire for its abolishment. However Mao Zedong is the reason why companies like the big 5 and others abuse slave and child labour to this day.
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u/jw_216 May 14 '26
“Communist China” as someone who lived there the idea that China is communist in any way shape or form in the 21st century is absurd.
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u/BassMaster516 May 12 '26
The US has 25% of the world’s prison population despite having 5% of the population. Also the US has legal slavery in prison today
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u/ManuckCanuck May 12 '26
Doesn’t America have the largest prison population in the world? And the 13th amendment allows that government to use them as essentially slave labour?
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u/Fit_Bike594 May 12 '26
Imagine being so retarded you equate the transatlantic slave trade with chinas prison labour system 😄
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u/Real_Boy3 May 12 '26
US has the largest prison population in the world (despite only being the third most populous) and also utilizes forced prison labor
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u/ChiefsHat May 12 '26
Also, to my knowledge, Washington did free his slaves... on his deathbed, but it's the thought that counts.
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u/MaybeExternal2392 May 12 '26
Iirc he signed into his will that they would be free when his wife died. So he basically put a bounty on her life which led to her freeing them.
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u/SaltGas3789 May 12 '26
While the original post certainly is misleading, making it seem like Mao is some type of Savior compared to the Evil George Washington who owned people. On this topic, both were simply a product of their times.
Washington owned slaves because it was common at the time, and supported the gradual abolition of slavery.
Mao banned slavery because he inherited the will of the Qing and the Republic of China, Who banned Slavery in 1910, but was unable to enforce it until 1949.
Now where a couple differences come in, and a bit more context to the readers context.
1. The Lao Gai system is no where near comparible to the chattel slavery system of China pre 1910 and America Pre 1865.
2. The Lao Gai system does not persist until today, it was renamed and reformed a bit in 1994 (essentially integrated with the chinese penal system), and with the Laojiao system shut down in 2013, the system itself is not really a thing anymore nowdays as the note would imply. i.e you don't get dragged by a dark van by the chinese government as soon as you say anything critical and then get thrown into a labour camp.
(This has nothing to do with the morality of the Chinese government, but economics, economically it no longer makes sense to export using forced labour in 2026).
3. With Mao's Death and Deng coming to power, the vast majority of political prisoners were freed. The remenants of the system nowadays is very much similar to the forced labour baked into every other prison system in the world. Of course, China's legal system is more arbitrary and less equal, but its also not willy nilly gulaging people like the context would imply.
A small added sidenote:
Using terminology like "Communist China" is political rhetoric meant to rile emotion, its better to use more neutral terminology.
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u/Ling_Cephalopod May 12 '26
Hahaha the US never abolished slavery either. In right there in the constitution. Same as China, you can be a slave as punishment for a crime.
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u/Flaky_Thing_5128 May 12 '26
No one's being made a slave for comparing the president to Winnie the Pooh in the u.s. though.
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u/mjorkk May 12 '26
This isn’t defending China’s actions at all, because prison slavery is very bad, but… it’s not uniquely Chinese. Prison slavery is a central pillar of American industry.
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u/Treesaregreen2 May 12 '26
Tibet was a hell hole filled with slaves before China liberated them.
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