No i didn't say you did say it was the same, i said you believed it to be equivalent (which would be the same as saying different methodology but in principle the same)
If you receive a visit from the security services tonight who want a word with you for criticising what i would agree is a stupid idea to crack down on fake news (fake news wouldn't be a business without people stupid enough to believe what it reports) than i will somewhat concede your point.
Indeed make yourself public and well known and criticise the way the way Western governments work and the worst you can expect is to be ignored, or indeed in this country maybe subject to our ridiculous libel laws (which i think is intolerable, but you won't be arrested or found to have met with an "accident")
And indeed if the neo liberal globalism you so despise was as irreversible as the systems in China and Russia, these populist right victories would have never happened but they did....I don't like the fact that they did because i think the people who will be in power are even worse than the people before them but the fact that they did (and you celebrated that they did) rather dislodges this unalterable regime lodged within the system as they won within the system rather than violent revolution.
Like I say you will find I agree with you about at least a fair amount of what is wrong within western democracy, but you are going to have all your work in front of you for me to ever believe there is an equivalence to eastern regimes.