Thread:

1. Who runs Taiwan's media? For the longest time, I've said that Taiwanese media is just US MSM translated into Chinese, regardless of whether it is pan-blue (KMT-leaning) or pan-green (DPP-leaning). Below is a breakdown of some shareholder information.

2. Significant shareholders of Eastern Media International Corp (東森國際), which runs ETTV, a pan-blue station, include Dimensional Fund Advisors, Mackenzie Financial, and Northern Trust Investments. They would never lie about US imperialism, right?
3. One of the biggest shareholders of pan-green Sanlih E-Television (三立電視) is Daniel Tsai (蔡明忠), who runs Fubon Financial Holdings (富邦金控). You might know Fubon as the bank that bought up Taipei city government-controlled Taipeibank.
4. Fubon's shareholders include Vanguard Group, BlackRock, and Dimensional Fund Advisors. Look these companies up. They would certainly never want TV stations they control to lie about what bourgeois governments do, right?
5. The biggest shareholder of Formosa Television (民視), which was founded by the DPP, is managing dir. Chen Ching-fu (陳清福), who is incidentally the CEO of Ve Wong Corporation (味王), a food company, whose sharehldrs include Dimensional Fund Advisors & SSgA Funds Management
6. Notice a common theme here? It's quite genius and sinister really - you let these stations have their differences, but at the end of the day, they pump out propaganda for the same people.
7. Sure, Formosa TV will be more sympathetic towards separatists than ETTV, but both are instrumental in getting viewers to accept the Washington consensus, while keeping them hyperfocusedfocused on the issue of reunification vs independence (in a controlled manner)
8. If TeleSUR, which is operated by the Venezuelan, Cuban, Nicaraguan, Bolivian, and Uruguayan governments, reflect their interests, then it should be obvious that Taiwan's TV stations reflect the interests of US imperialists.
9. Blue or green media, scratch off the paint & it's the same imperialist-controlled media. These news stations will never serve as the voices of the working poor or the oppressed peoples of the world. There is no such thing as freedom of information divorced from class politics.
10. The News Lens, an "independent" news publication that is the favorite of Taiwan's gentrified "left," is at least partially funded by North Base Media, a NY-based investment firm, and venture capitalist Herbert Chang. Hmmm... nothing suspicious here, right?
11. This sort of stuff happens not only in Taiwan, but all throughout the world. If we agree that individuals can be groomed by ill-intentioned individuals, then certainly it shouldn't be controversial to say that entire societies can be groomed by empire.

More from China

THREAD: Last week, China’s Cabinet announced that, for the first time, fees will be charged for “excessive” freedom of information requests, potentially meaning huge out-of-pocket expenses for lawyers and others who rely heavily on public information from the Chinese government.

According to a notice published Dec. 1, government offices will be able to choose from two different rate schemes: one based on frequency, one based on size.
https://t.co/KxUSE3dXEu


The “size” route is especially problematic. Here’s why:

If you’re an activist or a lawyer seeking a copy of an 800-page environmental impact assessment report, it’s going to cost you around $4,000 under this scheme.

In the past, disclosure requests were essentially free in China because there were no rules for charging fees.

In fact, last December an administrative agency in Shenzhen was ordered to reimburse an applicant after sending him a pay-on-delivery parcel.

According to the State Council’s Dec. 1 notice, the aim of adding the fees isn’t to generate revenue, but to “guide applicants to exercise their rights reasonably.”

Regardless of intention, however, the new costs will likely be a hindrance to those seeking public information.

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