bluerobotcat

But then some countries have visas on arrival that are less of a hassle than ESTA.

You can keep your purchases these days.

Though I when last changed countries I did find that I lost some purchases. I would guess it can happen when an item is not available in the new country.

There’s a rate limit on how often you change countries and you’ll need a payment method from the country you want to change to (e.g. a credit card issued in that country, the address on the card doesn’t matter).

You’ll also need to cancel e.g. your Apple TV+ subscription before you can switch.

Normative approach versus a descriptive/empirical approach.

I was banned too. I filled in the form 2-3 times already, but I never heard back from them.

My working theory is that I was banned due to using a VPN (Mullvad) with a location set to Europe, at a time when Europe users were not allowed to use the app.

I wasn’t actually in Europe, to be clear, but I live in a country where even WhatsApp voice calls are blocked and so I routinely have my VPN turned on.

The country I live in is officially supported by Anthropic, and so is Europe these days, so it’s quite frustrating that they won’t unban me.

I can’t use ChatGPT and Perplexity either when I have my VPN turned on, but at least they don’t ban my account.

Fortunately, Poe is VPN friendly.

I don't think debating counterfactuals is a productive way to have this discussion.

I also want to point out that the reason I mentioned Gui Minhai was to counter the claim that escaping the grip of China was a simple matter of moving abroad.

With respect to this original topic, there are also various examples where Chinese who moved abroad are threatened either by phone calls from China (with reference to their family) or by Chinese agents (presumably) in the new country. (I could list some if you want, but I assume you're familiar with them.)

These are things that the US does not really do.

But, yeah, US's track history in foreign policy is terrible. But China has its own take on terror and it's not pretty by any means. If you care about things like democracy or freedom of speech I will assert that China is emerging as the bigger threat by far.

(I take terror to refer to the systematically frightening people with the threat of violence, to make them behave in a certain way.)

I'm not sure why you think I'm American.

The group that was being attacked was something like 'Westerners who criticize China' (I can't find the exact quote since the OP is no longer visible to me). I'm part of that group and that is why I replied.

Your point that "they're just making a bit of noise in the hope that the protest goes away" is true regarding the establishment. I don't see how anyone would disagree with that.

But we have a right to vote and a right to loudly voice our disagreement. And that's different from China. Right now in HK the government is now basically saying that voting against legislation proposed by the establishment 'might be' a violation of the national security law. That's insane.

The US certainly flirts with this kind of politics too.

However:

- Snowden was an American citizen. Gui Minhai is Swedish.

- Snowden didn't get kidnapped abroad. The possibility seemed real but, for whatever reason, that line did not actually get crossed.

I certainly wouldn't defend the US in this (let's not pretend that the US has a good reputation regarding world politics). But the things the US does pale in comparison what China does.

I strongly disagree. If you care enough about an issue to repeatedly go outside during a pandemic and protest, then you are not ignoring it.

The set of 'Westerners' does not exclude the protesters.