I'd argue that both are political in nature. They're both cultural ideas (copyright and censorship have no physical manifestation) and cultural ideas are nothing but agreed upon ideas that unite us.
Copyright is a restriction upon sharing in order to prop up content creators, and censorship is a restriction on speech in order to prop up social harmony.
“Voltaire said about God that ‘there is no God, but don’t tell that to my servant, lest he murder me at night’. Hammurabi would have said the same about his principle of hierarchy, and Thomas Jefferson about human rights. Homo sapiens has no natural rights, just as spiders, hyenas and chimpanzees have no natural rights. But don’t tell that to our servants, lest they murder us at night.” - Sapiens
>> Because they're obviously qualitatively different to a significant degree. Only one is viewpoint-based political censorship.
> I'd argue that both are political in nature. They're both cultural ideas (copyright and censorship have no physical manifestation) and cultural ideas are nothing but agreed upon ideas that unite us.
You're wandering off into the weeds. The key point is that Chinese censorship is viewpoint-based, while copyright is not.
Under a copyright regime, you can express anything as long as you're original and don't do it by duplicating someone's recent work verbatim in ways that aren't fair use. Under a censorship regime, you can't express a censored idea, concept, or fact in any form at all.
There are only weeds if you think about anything long enough. Arguing from an existing moral or cultural framework is like fish debating the nature of water.
For example flipping the argument above: under a censorship regime, you can express anything as long as it doesn't threaten social stability such that the greater good is harmed by your words. Under a copyright regime you can't express a copyrighted idea, concept, or fact in any form at all.
To me the latter "can't express a copyrighted idea at all" seems a bit weak, but so does "can't express a censored idea at all", since in both cases you can express those ideas, you just pay the consequences.
Stepping back my original argument (maybe you consider it too far off into the weeds) is that it's not possible to bootstrap an argument for moral or cultural superiority without appealing to yet another framework like utilitarianism or divine right.
Copyright is a restriction upon sharing in order to prop up content creators, and censorship is a restriction on speech in order to prop up social harmony.
“Voltaire said about God that ‘there is no God, but don’t tell that to my servant, lest he murder me at night’. Hammurabi would have said the same about his principle of hierarchy, and Thomas Jefferson about human rights. Homo sapiens has no natural rights, just as spiders, hyenas and chimpanzees have no natural rights. But don’t tell that to our servants, lest they murder us at night.” - Sapiens