Thought experiment.
Suppose a hypothetical country has what we would consider a very bad human rights record. They imprison and torture people without explanation, violently suppress dissent, allow abuse of women and minorities. But also suppose that this country is extremely talented at swaying public opinion using big data, machine learning, social media. They're so good, that they succeed in getting more than 90% of their citizens to truly believe that their system is good.
Does that mean their system actually is good?
As outsiders, are we allowed to judge them and decide that their genuinely-held beliefs about themselves are just wrong? Would that mean we're imposing our values on other cultures?
Or, take the thought experiment a little further. Say this hypothetical country is really successful and ends up conquering the rest of the world. So there are no outsiders anymore. Almost everyone in the world now believes that the situation is great. While what we now consider human rights are being egregiously violated every day.
Is that a good scenario? If not, what's the basis for judging it as bad? Our own values now, imposed on the future when nobody holds them anymore?
