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Like I have said before, some folks act like even hearing doubt or what they perceive as doubt is going to cause everything around them to crumble. The kneejerk pushback and labeling of "doomer" is a thought-terminating cliche. It is not even people saying "China is going to collapse" or "Putin is abandoning Iran", it is any and all questions of "why is this thing not being done?" or actual analysis like "these defenses provably did not get replaced and now there are consequences", and that is somehow going to make the whole left collapse and become defeatist.

No one even wants to discuss and convince anyone, people just want to accuse one another of giving up at the drop of a hat. As if admitting or feeling that things are dire is an unforgivable sin.

At the end of the day 90% of the increasing doomerism, critique or negativity towards things, and china in particulalar is justifyiable anger about China's relative innaction towards the genocide in palestine from people that are hopeless, living in countries that directly found and facilitate the genocide and not being able to square the China that they have been hopefull about as a socialist force of good with the extreme suffering that is allowed to so shamelessly happen. I dont have the answers here. Im just saying that the whole shift has little to do with any real shift in China's own economic or developmental policy or even foreign policy compared to 1-2-3-5 years ago, or some slide back to neoliberalism or whatever. Any reasons one had to believe some years ago, after analysing China's system and choices, that they are on the right path and are doing socialism and slowly solving their contradictions and overtaking the US and gaining in the balance of power etc etc they can find the same ones still being true and even more validated and clear. The sentiment driving and allowing that mood shift comes from the other stuff

As far as specific users go imma be honest, ever since i saw XHS buying and using some obvious anti-china slop stories like some Chinese sub(s) sinking sourced from some taiwanese tabloid and a single sexpat analyst to doom post, i cant take them too seriously about other matters either. You cant find those comments because XHS deletes everything and has changed like 5 accounts in two years but still despite that i have made some effort posts against some of their most "interesting" claims. But its increasinlgy meaningless to argue Pekingology but from a "find the neoliberalism" perspective based on assertions and stats that can be sourced, explained and used 5 different ways . Reality itself is and will bring the receipts. The reality im seeing isnt one that aligns with negative coverage of pretty much every single Chinese foreign, monetary or developmental choice that happened in the last 2-3 years (they have spoken favorably about things that happened before they started commenting, and things no one can deny like tech or industrial development but almost never about any contemporary choise or moves, and that favorable coverage of past moves is to say "Back then i actualy thought this and they were doing the good thing but i was naive and they libed up now") and where every other US foreign or monetary policy move was a correct chess move for the empire. Sorry if thats presumptious but its increadibly easy to just dismiss super serious monetary analysis when i remember that they also intermittently post YT/ Twitter threads tier slop like this for years:

Over the past few months, China has experienced a political shakeup that has not occurred since the Cultural Revolution.

First, purge of the PLA high command (Li Shangfu still hasn’t resurfaced since his disappearance) and PLA’s Rocket Force chief replaced (Wang Houbin from PLA Navy replacing Xu Xisheng).

Meanwhile, the top echelons of PLA Rocket Force is being investigated for “corruption scandal” (Li Yuchao et al.)

Foreign Minister Qin Gang sacked.

Li Keqiang dead.

Finance Minister replaced (Lan Foan replacing Liu Kun)

Head of Central Bank replaced (Pan Gongsheng replacing Yi Gang)

Then there’s a rumor from Western media about a submarine incident in the Yellow Sea.

Xi’s political position is more precarious than ever. Biden has made incisive political, economic and financial offensives against China, and China is only starting to realize that de-dollarization is not so easy after all.

For now i will simply glance over a comment quickly, shrug and say to myself "meh, i'll believe it when i see it".

Am I massively misreading xiaohongshu's analysis because most of it doesn't even seem to be leading to the conclusion of China sucks? Like there seems to be some discontent in the user's analysis with China, but generally I took it as, "China is okay with taking this specific and narrow role to resolve a core contradiction of the modern era (i.e. the unbalance between the west and global south). I would vastly prefer if the nation did more, as it has the capabilities to do so, but it seems content with the role it currently plays."

Obviously, I'm paraphrasing and don't read every one of the xiaohongshu's post, but that is the vibe I got.

You have to assert an alternative economic model of reality that fits the facts better and uses materialist analysis, as well as just generally having a decent degree of knowledge of macroeconomics.

What? No! NGL this reads as someone who isn't even interested in Marxism economic side so why even beat yourself up for not discussing economics? Either you have the interest or you don't. I say this because absolutely nothing of what that user writes is ever complex or barely "correct" from a socialist viewpoint. The very basic principles of Marxist theory often disproves it, like with due respect, if you think you need a econ degree to contest them then idk... That said if you say "but it requires time investment and reading" then yes, I agree 100%. You need to spend some time reading and reading fairly regularly(one a month) to keep up.

Here even on reddit you can find this topic, what are some other Marxist sources. Monthly review is also a solid source though more varied.

Of course I mention Michael R. blog often because he also does excellent reviews of the broad situation e.g he does writeups on the econ confereces including the ones he visits(latest). BTW for an example talking point, you'll find Marxist economics has been trying to deal with China's "sub-imperialism" or "BRICS wont save us" for years now.

You do not need an econ degree to contest NakedCapitalism level takes, I'm sorry but no.

It is worrysome how all these people(cockshott, Roberts, Harvey, Hudson etc...) are all so old now I'm not sure who will replace their content but that is another discussion lol.