I didn't fully express how I feel about this. Pre 2016, China was viewed as an economic rival. Post 2016, China is viewed as an adversary.

Being anti-China is something both the Left and the Right can agree on, but for different reasons. The left are anti-China based on China's human-rights violation and "anti-democratic" behavior during the 2018 Hong Kong protests, and in the Xinjiang region. The Left has also traditionally been anti-China based on how China has treated Tibet, popularized by Brad Pitt, Richard Gere, and Hollywood in general.

The Right is anti-China because tHeY tOoK oUR jOBs.

It benefits both the Left and the Right to be anti-China right now.

Speaking of Hollywood and how they viewed China pre-2016... Matt Damon was in a Chinese movie called The Great Wall. Movies like Her and Looper envisioned a far future where China represented wealth and success. We make memes about John Cena and bing chillin, but he was learning Chinese at the peak of his career because even he could see the market value of China's growing middle class. In my city, Chinese Mandarin was being taught as an elective in high school alongside Spanish and French. Culturally, we were preparing for "The Pacific Century," but now all of a sudden we've switched gears and are in full blown cold war mode... and people are willing to accept that.

People will stay where they're right, and avoid places where they're wrong. See: Facebook groups.

Post 2016, the worldnews/geopolitics subs that I follow on reddit have become nonstop sinophobic and anti-China hate subs. Prior to 2016, there were a lot of complaining about Chinese tourists and kids that shit on the streets, but after Trump got elected the cold war rhetoric went into full effect.

This got worse during and after Covid19, especially in America, Canada, and parts of Europe.

The cold war propagandizing is just so incredibly prevalent on reddit. It's like people forgot what the cultural/business relationship between the US and China looked like prior to 2016.