TikTok to RedNote

TikTok to RedNote

The beginning of the end for sinophobia

“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.” — Mark Twain.

In a recent article, I talked about the impending TikTok ban and the motives for that ban and repercussions that we are already seeing.

One of the honestly hilarious side effects of the impending ban is that many users are migrating over to an app called RedNote. The reason this is so hilarious is that the U.S. government claims to be banning TikTok to prevent the Chinese government from stealing U.S. citizens’ information, and to prevent the spread of pro-Chinese propaganda amongst U.S. citizens.

For those that don’t know the CEO of Bytedance, the company that owns TikTok is a Singaporean citizen, and the founder of Bytedance lives in Singapore but does retain his Chinese citizenship. TikTok’s global headquarters are based in Los Angeles California. Now with that in mind yes the company Bytedance that owns TikTok does have 1% of its shares owned by the Chinese government, and they in theory could influence the company if they wish.

In comparison, RedNote (Xiaohongshu) is entirely based out of China, and the name actually translates to “Little Red Book”, a reference to “Quotations from Chairman Mao Zedong” a collection of excerpts from speeches and writings by Mao Zedong, the former chairman of the Chinese Communist Party. This little book was published in 1964 and became widely distributed during the Cultural Revolution in China. It was often printed in a small, pocket-sized format with a bright red cover, which is why it became known as the “Little Red Book”.

So of the two apps…which one would you guess may be a bit more likely to expose Americans to Chinese “propaganda”?

Americans who have already made the jump over to RedNote are realizing the high quality of life that Chinese citizens have, and are being blown away by how welcoming and friendly Chinese citizens are to interact with them there. I’ve seen numerous comments amazed that single women in particular in China have their own place and are able to afford large amounts of healthy groceries with a single job. All of this while also receiving taxpayer-funded education and healthcare. I’ve seen these commenters lamenting about how in the U.S. they’re working two jobs and barely able to afford groceries and rent.

Americans are realizing that perhaps China has it right by investing nearly 40% of its tax revenue into public programs that help everyone rather than less than 20% like the U.S. does.

They’re waking up to the fact that investing in your own population, rather than strictly in corporations and military spending actually benefits the country as a whole, by having a more informed and capable populace.

They’re beginning to see that perhaps the evils of socialism and communism that they’ve been taught their entire lives are actually lies spread by the wealthy elite who stand to benefit so much by them believing these tales. The same elite who own our politicians and keep our country in perpetual war.

We’ve been conditioned to believe that collectivism is somehow inherently evil, but if you give it any actual thought you begin to see why that is a lie. Anyone who’s ever worked on a project knows that you get exponentially more done when you’re able to work as a team, anyone who’s ever been sick knows it’s much better to have others to help you when you’re down than to try to make it on your own. Yet somehow as a society, we’ve been told that all of these concepts are evil when expanded to a more societal level.