• Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    4 days ago

    Somehow China doing the exact same business is mutually beneficial trade to uplift them both and Finland doing that business is imperialistic exploitation. Come on now friend.

      • Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        4 days ago

        You claimed so and your point was that China is just built different (but the actions are actually same). That’s what makes this amusing.

        • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          4 days ago

          My point has never been that their actions are the same. You boiled down complex relations to simple “trade,” when the complexities and directions make it entirely different in outcome. That’s like saying a surgeon and a knife-murderer are the same, because they both cut people.

          • Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            4 days ago

            I’m just saying since both do the same actions with the same effect on the country, it doesn’t make much difference to the country in question. So I would judge them the same. But I think there might be a bit of an ideological bent at play here.

            • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              1
              ·
              4 days ago

              They don’t do the same actions, and they don’t have the same effect. I already explained some of the complexities back here. I’m sure there is an ideological bent at play trying to make you see Finland’s documented Imperialism in a way that surely can’t be any worse than a non-Western country.

              Again, Finland’s consumption is largely the labor of the Global South, and as such has played a role in depressing wages. China’s consumption is largely its own labor, and since it needs to export commodities, it focuses on improving wages in the Global South and takes a multilateral approach, as its most profitable for them to raise up more customers.

              • Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                1
                ·
                4 days ago

                Your mentioned differences are more due to the size difference between Finland and China than anything else, but Finnish companies have been involved in infrastructure projects too.

                I’m sure there is an ideological bent at play trying to make you see Finland’s documented Imperialism

                Hah indeed.

                Again, Finland’s consumption is largely the labor of the Global South, and as such has played a role in depressing wages. China’s consumption is largely its own labor, and since it needs to export commodities, it focuses on improving wages in the Global South and takes a multilateral approach, as its most profitable for them to raise up more customers.

                Finland (Finnish companies) is buying resources, involved in infrastructure projects, building factories, buying stuff they export. It’s just the same sort of business China does. China is just a much bigger player with a much more pronounced effect.

                • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
                  link
                  fedilink
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  ·
                  4 days ago

                  Read the sources I linked. There is both a quantitative and qualitative difference, and its driven by the fact that Finland deals with the Global South as an employer exploits an employee, and China deals with the Global South as a store selling to customers. Finnish people as a whole live similar to landlords, off the backs of others, while China lives off of its own labor and needs customers to sell to.

                  • Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
                    link
                    fedilink
                    arrow-up
                    1
                    ·
                    4 days ago

                    China also works as an employer, though they sometimes also bring their own workers for resource extraction which imo seems more exploitative tbh. Not sure China is doing imperialism when they are an employer if that’s what imperialism is.