China

Bruh, the US has no room to speak. Overlooking the bluffs in Bakersfield, California looks way worse than any of this lol it's nothing but oil rigs for miles lol

Boycott, Deadvertise, Unsubscribe, No-Links: The New York Times, all the consent that is fit to manufacture. https://newyorkwarcrimes.com/

Like when the BBC put sepia filter on Jason's vids, got called out, then sneakily corrected it

Hello comrades, this thread is extra high quality. Wanted to say I've saved it for future reference and teaching. Got to dispel China myths.

I say it's more because of where and when they took these photos, those do the "grey filter" already. They took them in winter in northern provinces, where the trees and shrubs become bare and heating with coal is still prevalent so there's often a haze. Meanwhile the grassy oil silos are a stock photo by Reuters from spring 2020 in warmer Oklahoma.

The solar field in Shanxi is in a dry, eroded landscape that has lots of exposed soil: for comparison, below is such a landscape in summer, from China Daily. Then there's the black tarp of a construction site nextdoor on top.

The photo in Zhengzhou is literally a field of black and white cars in an industrial park. Roofs are the only bright colours present.

One could say: "It's barely spring, can't help it." But why bother taking your own photos now if you throw in stock photos anyway? I say it's because they wanted to give their photographer something to do and a contrarianism that goes: "China takes these photos when it shines, but it doesn't shine all the time, eh? "

Here's another hilarious set of photos.

For their article fearmongering about China leaking coronavirus from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, MIT Technology Press had their photographer pick the foggiest day of the year to lie in a ditch in front of the lab to make the ditch look like a wall. Of course, the Chinese security guards were very confused:

Another common trope is taking close-up shots of random Chinese police and security guards to make China seem oppressive and create the false impression that they sneaked into some compound.^[https://x.com/XuZeyu_Philip/status/1367623852029661187] This is how they get said shots:

And here is the shot being sold:

https://www.chinadailyhk.com/hk/article/369568

Shaanxi solar facility shot by China Daily, for comparison.

I'm less bothered by it now.

2 years ago, if you had shown someone both photos they'd have surmised that the Chinese version is oversaturated because it stands to reason because China bad.

It's very different now

The article itself is actually not bad (I skimmed).

Here's another comparison from photos I've personally taken.

First is Shanghai's Jin Mao Tower according to the BBC, second is a photo I took in the same area: