On November 23rd, Chinese workers rebelled against security personnel in white protective clothing at the “iPhone City” factory compound operated by Foxconn in Zhengzhou in central China’s Henan province. Chinese workers at the world’s biggest Apple iPhone factory were beaten and detained in protests over “Zero COVID” restrictions as tensions mount in the country over the Chinese Communist Party quixotic and increasingly bizarre, illogical, and unworkable COVID lockdown authoritarianism.
Vlad Savov for Bloomberg News:
Turmoil at Apple Inc.’s key manufacturing hub of Zhengzhou is likely to result in a production shortfall of close to 6 million iPhone Pro units this year, according to a person familiar with assembly operations.
The situation remains fluid at the plant and the estimate of lost production could change, the person said, asking not to be named discussing private information. Much will depend on how quickly Foxconn Technology Group, the Taiwanese company that operates the facility, can get people back to assembly lines after violent protests against Covid restrictions. If lockdowns continue in the weeks ahead, production could be set further back…
Apple and Foxconn increased their estimates of the Zhengzhou shortfall over the past two weeks due to growing disruptions, said the person, adding that they expect to be able to make up the 6 million units in lost output in 2023.
The tumult in iPhone City, as the Zhengzhou complex is known, is a stark reminder of the risks for Apple of its vast supply chain in China. Foxconn endeavored to quell protests — largely driven by new hires arriving at Zhengzhou and rejecting onerous Covid controls — by offering a bonus to any workers choosing to return home.
MacDailyNews Take: China is a powder keg. Hopefully, the country devolves to the next natural phase of communist authoritarianism and, someday, hopefully after a miraculous and rare nonviolent revolution, the Chinese people can be free of a desperate dictator’s whims and follies.
As for the CCP”s idiotic “Zero COVID” pipe dream, here’s a bit of how it’s going:
https://twitter.com/72powpow/status/1594588984155336704
https://twitter.com/72powpow/status/1594954912773083141
https://twitter.com/72powpow/status/1596251228349943808
https://twitter.com/72powpow/status/1596250355687256065
I've lived in China for 30 years, and I've never seen such a brazenly open and sustained expression of rage against the PRC govt. WeChat is exploding with protest videos and furious vitriol, and civil disobedience is becoming rampant. This is a serious test of CCP governance.
— David Moser (@david__moser) November 26, 2022
Protests in China are not rare. What *is* rare, are multiple protests over the same issue, at the same time, across the country. The protest below, apparently in central Beijing’s liangmaqiao, is astounding #China #protests pic.twitter.com/UHJCqqF1YG
— Tom Mackenzie (@TomMackenzieTV) November 27, 2022
China 🇨🇳
Protests are erupting across China as people have had enough of the draconian zero Covid lockdowns. This is what eventually happens when people power mobilises against oppressive governments that take away freedoms and human dignity. pic.twitter.com/NsZgZTxEYT
— James Melville 🚜 (@JamesMelville) November 27, 2022
Protesters in North Beijing have torn down the metal fences which have been set up to “quarantine” them.
The size of protests in China hasn’t been seen in decades. #China pic.twitter.com/LkmPndsvoc
— (((Tendar))) (@Tendar) November 27, 2022
See also: Tim Cook firmly latched Apple onto China’s CCP teat. What’s his plan for weaning it off? – November 2, 2022
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results.
The problem isn’t COVID. The problem is the illogical, unworkable, delusional, self-defeating authoritarian response to COVID.
The average age of a Foxconn worker is 23 (before the CCP drove them away with the threat of more quixotic lockdowns). A 23 year old who gets COVID might not even notice they have it. Protect those with co-morbidities who might be at risk of serious complications (don’t compel older retirees into a closed factory setting, CCP Cuomo impersonators).
Letting COVID simply wash through a population of healthy twenty-three-year-olds (many of whom have already acquired natural immunity) is the rational decision. — MacDailyNews, November 16, 2022
Clearly, Apple under Tim Cook had, has, and, for the foreseeable future, seems like it will continue to have far too much exposure to China and the CCP’s overbearing and often irrational whims.
Memo to China: There’s no such thing as zero-COVID. Duh.
As we’ve said for years now, for better and worse, Apple is wedded to China. It will take many years to even begin to extricate itself from this relationship, at least the the point where the company has some meaningful leverage that the CCP understands. – MacDailyNews, April 8, 2022
In general, human-transmissible coronaviruses do not disappear. There is no such thing as zero-COVID. Duh.
COVID-19 is here to stay. It will very likely become endemic, yet pose less danger over time. People will acquire immunity via vaccines (effectiveness TDB) and naturally as they contract and recover from variants like omicron since the partially-effective vaccines permit not only transmissibility, but also breakthrough infections. Influenza and the four human coronaviruses that cause common colds (OC43, 229E, NL63 and HKU1) are, of course, also endemic, but a combination of annual flu vaccines and acquired immunity means that sane societies tolerate the unavoidable seasonal deaths and illnesses they bring without requiring lockdowns, masks, social distancing, indefinite return-to-work delays, etc.
At which point, if ever, will some people decide that wasting away their short lives in abject fear of a bad flu, very likely engineered by China and partially funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health, is a hysterical self-defeating overreaction? – MacDailyNews, December 16, 2021
The COVID-19 data is clear: Stop the panic and end the total isolation… A severe economic disruption will very likely provoke the immeasurable costs of widespread unemployment, social isolation, and increased mental health issues, suicide rates, bankruptcies, civil unrest, crime, and war. – MacDailyNews, April 23, 2020
There are any number of countries where, prior to this ongoing COVID-19 collective behavior experiment, we could have imagined a compliant population capitulating to the random, illogical, and ever-changing whims of so-called “experts” and ignoramus politicians – actually allowing themselves to be quarantined, locked-down, restricted, put out of business, deprived of family and friends, tagged and tracked, digitally and otherwise, but not America. Obviously, we were wrong.
“The land of the free and the home of the brave?” Pfft. Seemingly just empty words today.
Yes, COVID-19 is real. Yes, COVID-19 is a contagious disease. Yes, COVID-19 can kill, especially those with underlying conditions who should be protected as best as possible. However, the reaction to COVID-19 has clearly been blown out of all proportion and the ramifications of such overreaction will be long-lasting and difficult, if not impossible, to overcome.
Those who have lived through this period (in other words, the vast majority of people) and who are still capable of rational thought, will understand implicitly how easily fear and bad data, especially as amplified, massaged, and repeated ad nauseam via mass and social media, can be used to control even so-called “free” people who, it seems, will cede their freedoms en masse with nary a bleat. – MacDailyNews, December 28, 2020
And you thought sheep were herdable animals. – MacDailyNews, March 9, 2020
The real virus is the panic. – MacDailyNews, March 9, 2020
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Wonder what the losses will look like if/ when CCP seals the borders like it did during Tiananmen. They don’t like the world seeing their dirty laundry (or there own people, for that matter)
Just goes to show you.
Covid: 1 Humans 0
Just goes to show you how callous, flippant, detached from human rights you have demonstrated scoring Covid a WIN over humanity… 🫢
Time to get Tony Fauci over there to address the folks–in person–preferably in Wuhan.
You want to send the habitual liar and story changer that funded Wuhan research to admit he and staff working with Wuhan created the virus?
Yeah, that will work…
1 million deaths just in the US alone. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that COVID is winning (that’s borderline eco-fascist) but we dropped the ball hard when it came to pandemic preparation. I really hope that lessons were learned from this but since we are dealing with the US government, I am being very generous about it.
*
You’re right, Covid is not winning despite whack job support from an Aussie locked in his home for months by his own government and police.
Disagree: One million deaths is FALSE. Like you said ‘government’ and their numbers say it all. Accounting deaths was easy to inflate and cheat and accountability arm non-existent.
Reason? Hospitals and nursing homes received stimulus funding money for Covid deaths. Know several relatives working in medical professions witnessed first hand. The most outrageous example was a guy who died in a motorcycle accident in Florida listed as a Covid death in less than 24 hours.
Courageous reporting was done by conservative media and the death numbers are estimated to be closer to 400,000-450,000. Whatever the REAL death count numbers, Covid is just another flu virus 🦠
But certainly a highly contagious and easily transmitted virus, hence reaching pandemic status. Lockdowns of children in schools caused more damage than Covid in the draconian blue states, while red states kept their wits and flourished.
Bottom Line: Almost 100 million contracted Covid in the U.S. and deaths were less than 1%. Cooler heads keep it in perspective…
The scary part is how many people here in the US thought we should behave in exactly the same manner. Stripping people of their rights, even for their “own good” must be resisted.
A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. – John Stewart Mill
This what happens in authoritarian organizations where leadership will NEVER admit they’re wrong, and conversely, NO ONE has a right to question leadership. Leadership latches on to some believe or insight or “truth” which is actually detrimental to their authority, support, economic well-being, and stability, but because they are completely incapable of self-analysis or self-critique, they can’t admit their mistake. Therefore the whole issue continues to get worse and spirals out of control.
Go watch the mini-series Chernobyl on HBO. Unbelievable hubris led to massive destruction because nobody in leadership could ever admit they were wrong about anything. Same thing happening in China–leadership cannot admit their Covid strategy is boneheaded and detrimental to their economy, their citizens, their hold on power, their attractiveness to outside investment—everyone. There is ZERO upside to their current Covid strategy.
Completely agree with everything except “There is ZERO upside to their current Covid strategy”. There is an upside – to be an excellent example of how not to behave and why no free person should invest the kind of power these people have into government.