Shoot to Incapacitate

[SCCY Marshal]

[I]...Most urban Chinese buy into the manufactured notion that the police are all just kindly social service workers...

Imgur won't take the video so my own slow hosting will have to do with a screenshot to avoid blind linking:

https://tinyurl.com/3jcmeya5

[Aisin Gioro]

Good to see you back.

I've noticed that tyrannical governments are inevitably corrupt governments, so no real surprise there.

Thanks, I'm happy to have the time to be back reading and posting here.

It's so true. Opaque, unilateral governments are almost always kleptocratic in addition to all of their other terrible aspects. China has a long history of it, but for most of that time it was highly disorganized and decentralized. Now, the state has consolidated its power and is organizing its corruption in a way that hasn't been seen since the days of Mao. Even the "social credit" scheme that puts huge pressure on the population is really venal in practice and serves as both a means of control and a source of revenue, since there are all sorts of semi-official or ingrained corrupt ways to pay up or trade favours and restore someone's score.

[Aisin Gioro]

Imgur won't take the video so my own slow hosting will have to do with a screenshot to avoid blind linking:

https://tinyurl.com/3jcmeya5

There you have it. Being drunk and careless with words gets you the tiger chair (a device I could go on about, but that's too much thread drift even for me), in this case most likely because somebody else in the chat group reported him. The situation they describe isn't a public posting like someone's Facebook page, it's nominally private, more like an email group except with chat. Under laws enacted (I wont' say "passed", because laws are by made by government fiat) about 5 years ago, all members of a chat can be held liable for the actions or statements of one member if they don't turn them in. Since the government only permits the use of approved APPs from providers who are required to engage in cooperation with the authorities, the government has complete access and records of all chat communications, even the ones in "private" chat groups. Notice also that they poor guy is basically the definition of a "nobody" in modern China: unemployed, likely limited education, thick accent. He doesn't have the resources to work the system, and his type get targeted and hurt the most by government extortion like motorcycle confiscation. He then gets sweated for raising the issue because he isn't part of the economic or social growth engine that the government favours. It's almost like statism is really about maintaining power and progress by controlling the proletariat and enhancing the elite. But that can't be true, can it?

Also, people have noted that "Uncle Police" isn't a common term, and it shows how humiliated the guy is. "Uncle" is a common term of respect for senior or higher-up people, but it's often meant in a somewhat submissive way, especially when the junior is being called out on something. In this case, there is an air of desperation to it, since the man is sort of grasping for words to pacify the police, awkwardly mixing expressions to show them how under their power he is. It's also worth pointing out that "Big Brother" in Chinese really is a traditional expression for a senior authority figure, especially one who is seen as exercising authority to take care of people while being respected for their power. Bosses with strong personal identities in the company - and gang bosses - are commonly called "Big Brother" in Chinese, so you can see the connection with Orwell where they intersect. In the video, "Uncle Police" is really just a slightly more formal version of the same thing.