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Maker Naomi Wu is Silenced by Chinese Authorities (And Why I Blame Elon Musk) (www.youtube.com)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Can you elaborate? To me it reads like she outed herself by going against tencent, or more probably/accurately, her government and one of its convenience spyware. She had already said for many years that she was under scrutiny, and her assumption was that her western followers would somehow compel the CCP to back off.

I'm not a hater, but for anyone paying attention that's ludicrous. With her knowledge, she couldn't be that naive.

[–] [email protected] 48 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Vice exposed a lot of information about her in their article, which they were specifically asked not to; this compounded the situation beyond what she was prepared to deal with. Outing her sexuality, as an example. It was a terrible and inhuman move.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 year ago

Wasn't she an open lesbian on YouTube? CCP thugs could have watched her channel and gleaned the same info.

[+] [email protected] -41 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Ok, not to be pedant, but it's her activism that got her in trouble, not Vice? Just trying to connect the dots between this message and the previous one.

Also, not defending Vice, I did read the article and it looks like Naomi freaked out and lashed at Vice on social media before she even got to read the piece about her, which might have Streisanded the same things she wanted to keep under the rug (ironically and to the point, despite having watched many videos of her, it's your post that made me aware of the matter of her sexuality, which I suspect not many of her followers in the maker space care about).

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

You're being pedantic, and what's worse, you're very wrong.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

and what's worse, you're very wrong.

Fine, care to explain how? I'm legit curious (despite the hostile tone).

Regarding the Vice piece, here's what you find in it:

But Wu’s form of activism can also be hostile and combative. She wields her impressive Twitter presence to confront people she disagrees with. I know this from personal experience, as Wu took issue with my reporting after I returned from China.

Wu told me she didn’t want to discuss her marital status, but before publishing the piece, I followed up with her.

[...]

At the same time Wu responded to me, she started tweeting about VICE. Over the next several weeks, Wu publicly shopped our correspondence to journalists and tagged me, my former colleague, my editor, and VICE in dozens of tweets; her followers sent me many more.

In emails, Wu accused me of blackmailing her and writing a “hit piece.” Without having seen the story, she wrote that if I published the article under my byline, VICE “will throw you to the wolves.”

“If you don’t believe me, I’ll direct my tweets to your name- see if they come help under the VICE brand or make an excuse why they should stay out of it so they can blame you later for acting alone and cut you loose- with a reputation written where it can never be erased as the female journalist who signal-boosts harassment campaigns against women in tech,” she wrote.

Wu asked to see a draft of the story prior to publication, which we declined to do as it is against our editorial policy. She took issue with other standard editorial protocols, such as when a fact-checker reached out to other sources for this piece.

“We just need whatever article you vomit out to determine in just how many ways you violated basic journalistic ethics,” Wu wrote in an email to my editor.

I know this is one-sided, but if at least the chronology is correct, this seems overblown.

This other piece below mentions her not so recent history of activism "conflicting" with the law enforcement of her country, this predates Vice (2018):

https://www.hackingbutlegal.com/p/naomi-wu-and-the-silence-that-speaks-volumes?