The flip side of that for me at least is that the US government is a lot more likely to be able to come after me for something I say or do than the Chinese gove

The flip side of that for me at least is that the US government is a lot more likely to be able to come after me for something I say or do than the Chinese government is. Yeah, it's brutal for Chinese citizens, but I'm on the other side of the planet in a country that's unlikely to submit me to their justice system. Many of the laws affecting internet usage are nasty in the US too - you'll have a lot better luck torrenting, firing security scans or hosting certain leaked documents using a Chinese provider than a US one for example.