Ah yes, history has shown that this is a good idea. I'm sure it'll end well this time. 
this post was submitted on 15 May 2025
143 points (99.3% liked)
news
24645 readers
878 users here now
Welcome to c/news! We aim to foster a book-club type environment for discussion and critical analysis of the news. Our policy objectives are:
-
To learn about and discuss meaningful news, analysis and perspectives from around the world, with a focus on news outside the Anglosphere and beyond what is normally seen in corporate media (e.g. anti-imperialist, anti-Zionist, Marxist, Indigenous, LGBTQ, people of colour).
-
To encourage community members to contribute commentary and for others to thoughtfully engage with this material.
-
To support healthy and good faith discussion as comrades, sharpening our analytical skills and helping one another better understand geopolitics.
We ask community members to appreciate the uncertainty inherent in critical analysis of current events, the need to constantly learn, and take part in the community with humility. None of us are the One True Leftist, not even you, the reader.
Newcomm and Newsmega Rules:
The Hexbear Code of Conduct and Terms of Service apply here.
-
Link titles: Please use informative link titles. Overly editorialized titles, particularly if they link to opinion pieces, may get your post removed.
-
Content warnings: Posts on the newscomm and top-level replies on the newsmega should use content warnings appropriately. Please be thoughtful about wording and triggers when describing awful things in post titles.
-
Fake news: No fake news posts ever, including April 1st. Deliberate fake news posting is a bannable offense. If you mistakenly post fake news the mod team may ask you to delete/modify the post or we may delete it ourselves.
-
Link sources: All posts must include a link to their source. Screenshots are fine IF you include the link in the post body. If you are citing a Twitter post as news, please include the Xcancel.com (or another Nitter instance) or at least strip out identifier information from the twitter link. There is also a Firefox extension that can redirect Twitter links to a Nitter instance, such as Libredirect or archive them as you would any other reactionary source.
-
Archive sites: We highly encourage use of non-paywalled archive sites (i.e. archive.is, web.archive.org, ghostarchive.org) so that links are widely accessible to the community and so that reactionary sources don’t derive data/ad revenue from Hexbear users. If you see a link without an archive link, please archive it yourself and add it to the thread, ask the OP to fix it, or report to mods. Including text of articles in threads is welcome.
-
Low effort material: Avoid memes/jokes/shitposts in newscomm posts and top-level replies to the newsmega. This kind of content is OK in post replies and in newsmega sub-threads. We encourage the community to balance their contribution of low effort material with effort posts, links to real news/analysis, and meaningful engagement with material posted in the community.
-
American politics: Discussion and effort posts on the (potential) material impacts of American electoral politics is welcome, but the never-ending circus of American Politics© Brought to You by Mountain Dew™ is not welcome. This refers to polling, pundit reactions, electoral horse races, rumors of who might run, etc.
-
Electoralism: Please try to avoid struggle sessions about the value of voting/taking part in the electoral system in the West. c/electoralism is right over there.
-
AI Slop: Don't post AI generated content. Posts about AI race/chip wars/data centers are fine.
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
True enough. But in Stalin's time EU policy institutions weren't churning out ream after ream of "we're being vassalised (already have) and need to do something about it".
Nor was this accompanied by the very clear indicator that the EU is genuinely cozying up to China. It's not clear in the public eye although it's obvious that propaganda outlets have stopped doing anti-China content, but the quieter behind the scenes stuff is making it very clear they want to be closer.
The EU is stuck. It either fully vassalises, something that will result in a nationalist anti-US reactionary takeover that leads to conflict in Europe, or it gets closer to China. Those are the options. Closer Russia ties is obviously off the table right now but that's what they were doing prior to this war breaking out, even up to the very very start of the war Europe was still working on closer ties to Russia.
And if you think the above policy institute isn't still worrying about sovereignty, here is their take on Merz 10 days ago: https://ecfr.eu/article/from-fence-sitter-to-pace-setter-how-merzs-germany-can-lead-europe/
The very final point of it is their concern about sovereignty.
It is the primary concern of EU policy tanks right now. Every single thing they do is filtering through "how do we maintain sovereignty" and a "the US is untrustworthy".
China is not a threat to sovereignty, we know this and so does everyone in Europe. Europe IS going to get closer and closer to China in a bid to escape vassalisation. It's not a theory it's actively what they are already doing. Trump even gave them excuses to accelerate it with the Tariff bullshit, European sentiment to China took a big boost especially when they didn't back down one bit, population views them as a necessary partner: https://ip-quarterly.com/en/what-europe-thinks-about-china-2025
All China has to do is handle their relationship with EU as well as they've handled Taiwan and things will improve. China is the only way.
Perhaps we are yin and yang on this matter. I am optimistic and you are pessimistic. I agree that it could go one of either of these directions and we seem to both agree on the possible directions, merely sitting on different sides as to what the final outcome might be. My opinion is that EU will do as it does, turtle along bureaucratically for 30 years pursuing a de-vassalisation strategy. The alternative is far riskier.