China launched its most extensive war games around Taiwan on Monday to showcase Beijing’s ability to cut off the island from outside support in a conflict, testing Taipei’s resolve to defend itself and its arsenal of U.S.-made weapons.
The Eastern Theatre Command said it had deployed troops, warships, fighter jets and artillery for its “Justice Mission 2025” exercises to encircle the democratically governed island, conduct live fire and simulated strikes on land and sea targets, and drills to blockade Taiwan’s main ports.
The live-firing exercises will continue on Tuesday across a record seven zones designated by China’s Maritime Safety Administration, making the drills the largest to date by total coverage and in areas closer to Taiwan than previous exercises. The military had initially said artillery firing would be confined to five zones.
LGBTQ rights in China are… complicated. LGBTQ rights aren’t spelled out, leaving things ambiguous - but no same sex marriage, no pride orgs shut down, lots of workplace aggression and discrimination with no protections at all… homosexuality is decriminalized but there’s no trans rights. so yeah, that could be better.
social credit scores are downright orwellian - they experimented with these in some cities in the 2010-2020 decade but t hen nationalized all the private solutions they tried… not sure even they know if they want to continue but - hypothetically - anyone can report you for… anything that disturbs the peace or what the ccp thinks is the ideal order - your social credit score gets dinged, then you could have trouble with all kinds of stuff - make it harder receive loans, obtain a visa for travel, etc.
compared to us credit scores, it’s probably not that big of a deal (we let three companies decided who gets loans for houses, based on… voodoo afaik. the way credit scores are compiled is pretty opaque).