Colonialism seems to leave quite a mindfuck on local populations themselves. The young people I knew from Hong Kong (at the time since this was a long time ago) considered themselves British. Ethnically Chinese yeah but if you asked they were British. If the locals can be propagandized by invaders it’s pretty easy to convince western zeitgeist that Hong Kong was anything but an occupied region of China.
Influencer is a fancy word for salesman. Instead of going door to door like grandpa did in the old days, they stream directly to your device.