Hasan Piker knew his first trip to China would provoke backlash. What he did not expect was how quickly the debate would collapse into a binary: propaganda or patriotism.
The live-streamer, and one of the most influential political commentators on the left among young Americans, travelled to China last year and live-streamed his experiences to over 3 million followers across platforms, including Twitch and YouTube.
Clips of his visit circulated widely, some carried by Chinese state-linked…