Should Opinions.Wiki be open to China?
The author of the opinions.wiki website's thoughts government censorship
Hi, I'm Andrew, the author of Opinions.Wiki. I have many reasons for starting this site and have many missions for this site. One of the many purposes is to educate folks on differing opinions and understand other people's internal values and how it reflects in their opinions.
In the United States, censorship on social media is a huge debate. From liberals complaining that they were being censored for saying "white" (and not writing it as "yt") and conservatives believing their political opinions were being silenced, there is no shortage of First Amendment lovers.
The appendix in the book 1984 and Claudia Mo of Hong Kong’s pro-democracy lawmakers speak to the control and eventual destruction of language to remove inklings of ideas of freedom. By destroying ideas, people would never know what hope is -- what freedom and its benefits are. I, personally, am not a fan of removing opinions (hence the code of conduct). To me, I see many Chinese citizens including my extended family valuing the stability of China and advocating for the continuity of the government in its current form and ideology. That's just who they are. On the other hand, I've personally seen WeChat group chats being completely deleted, recreated by one of the original members, and everyone but three people join the new chat. Though I personally do not like the idea of letting governments control its citizens, I would love for Opinions.Wiki to penetrate the Chinese, Indian, Pakistani, Saudi Arabian, Russian, and Iranian market with censorship for their respective citizens -- countries with known, active government censorship.
I believe Opinions.Wiki serves a global filling purpose. I believe opinions must be heard; it does not equate to the website being a champion of freedom of speech. If so, the site would champion protecting outright lies which this site does not. Instead, there are enough differing opinions on many topics. This site serves a rather humanitarian effort of bridging gaps in miscommunication. Helping folks understand one another. Educating folks on the complexity of certain debated topics and values that a large nation's citizens hold.
There must be an efficient platform and community for proper curation of opinions, and I haven't seen one doing something like Opinions.Wiki before. If it means certain dissenting opinions must be quashed and Opinions.Wiki must cooperate with authoritarian regimes/governments that actively censor, so be it to ensure that other useful topics can be debated and educate the public on.
Replies
Please read the community code of conduct. They're fairly lax, but we prioritize safety. No targeting.