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iSuck posted:How liberal is the drug law in practice? More liberal than America's with regard to harmless drugs such as weed, shrooms, etc. Don't even mention opiates, though, even in casual company.
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Feb 16, 2012 21:16
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Adrastus posted:It is true, China is severely lacking in terms of infrastructure compared to Japan. However, people are quick to attribute these difficulties to government incompetence, corruption or even flaws with the system while overlooking the fact that it is more likely the direct result of colonialism and imperialistic aggression perpetuated by Japan, and various other countries in the West, the damage of which China is still struggling to overcome. This has to be a troll.
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Sep 18, 2012 01:07
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Munin posted:Well, troll or not the posts are hitting all the official PRC talking points down to a T. The PRC also has very little humour about its official talking points. In China they call these types of posters "wumaodang," which literally means the "fifty cent party." The implication is that members of the half-dollar party are paid fifty cents every time they post something nice about the Chinese government.
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Sep 18, 2012 01:58
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It's not something that really happens. It's just an insult commonly used against stupid jingoists.
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Sep 18, 2012 02:06
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Most educated Chinese people see those claims as farcical. They are held unironically only by officials, the uneducated, and the brainwashed. Unfortunately for China and the world, that's a lot of people.
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Sep 18, 2012 02:17
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Oceanbound posted:Really? Here in Hong Kong even the most vehement anti-communist government, pro-democracy activists are adamant that Diaoyu belongs to China. In fact they even landed a few guys on the island recently, and are planning to again (the HK government is so far not allowing their boat to leave). The most anti-China paper (apple daily) characterises the activists as heroes. I was referring to the first bit of what I quoted. Fall Sick and Die's post is an excellent summary of the average Chinese person's views on the current island dispute.
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Sep 18, 2012 22:42
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Warcabbit posted:Far as I can tell, Pro-PRC and Adrastus are actually pretty much right here. Even if the Japanese government were to apologize again the PRC still would not let go of this extremely useful political football. It is used frequently to distract the Chinese people from their real, government-created problems.
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Sep 18, 2012 22:50
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It is not correct to say that Japan has never apologized. It is acceptable to dispute the sincerity of these apologies, however. Wikipedia has a decent summary. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_war_apology_statements_issued_by_Japan EDIT: My personal perspective is that China has no business demanding an apology until they apologize for the invasion of Vietnam in 1979.
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Sep 18, 2012 23:44
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Pro-PRC Laowai posted:The Vietnam invasion in 1979 - it was short, it was targetted, there were not crazy war crimes and it was more or less strictly military-related. It was meant to distract the people at a time of political vulnerability and resulted in many thousands of meaningless deaths. It was completely inexcusable. My point still stands. Hell, Mao caused more suffering for the Chinese people than the Japanese did. It's silly to stand on this apology platform because every country has things they should apologize for but fail to do so.
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Sep 19, 2012 00:18
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Pro-PRC Laowai posted:Not every country does amazingly horrible poo poo that made even the nazis cringe. Yeah, but China directly supported Pol Pot, who was objectively worse than Hitler in every way. You don't really have outs here, the Chinese Communist Party is in no position to be demanding apologies from anybody.
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Sep 19, 2012 02:34
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Pro-PRC Laowai posted:US supported Pol Pot directly as well. Certain right-wing elements did, but mostly in small ways. China was a direct and open ally of the Khmer Rouge, trading guns for food that should have gone into the mouths of starving Cambodians. In any case this is a red herring at best, and support for my argument at worst: every country has done terrible things that they haven't apologized for.
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Sep 19, 2012 02:47
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PrezCamachoo posted:And finally - and this is controversial and I'm sure people are going to get mad about what I'm going to say here - The PRC and KMT governments have never shied from straight up making poo poo up about Japanese war crimes in their wartime and post war propaganda. Making them out to be many times worse than they actually were. Unfortunately, a few extreme right wingers in Japan interpret Chinese lies about Japanese war crimes as evidence that they never happened at all. Which is sad because those people get all the media attention in China when the vast majority of Japanese society has already taken responsibility for the crimes in question. This is pretty accurate. I wonder how many of the people bashing Japan in this thread have actually, you know, been to Japan and asked the average person about it? They are generally pacifists these days. One woman cried as she told me that her government gave some small help to the United States' war effort in the Middle East.
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Sep 19, 2012 02:52
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BRShooter posted:Your precious loving Glorious Nippon Hey you're certainly posting in good faith! 
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Sep 20, 2012 22:23
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MothraAttack posted:Except, you know, in sheer number of victims and countries invaded in every objectively measurable way. What the hell? Hitler had an achievable vision, as evil as it was. If executed properly it would have resulted in vast benefits for the German people as he defined them (white, Aryan). Part of the terror of World War II was that he almost succeeded. Despite his failure, Germany is a powerful and successful country today. Pol Pot was a bully. Like Mao, he only thought of himself. His plan was to eventually rule the world by trading food to China for weapons. To do this he starved millions of his own countrymen and impoverished the rest. He emptied the cities and moved everyone to the countryside. He killed anyone with glasses, as they were seen as a sign of intelligence, a negative quality. The only people that benefited were Pol Pot and a handful of his cronies. Literally everyone else in his country (and many in Vietnam) suffered or died. When he started claiming large portions of Vietnam and instigating border conflicts, Vietnam marched in and took him out quickly and easily. China later used this as pretext to invade Vietnam, but lost to Vietnam's reserve army. Very embarrassing! Pol Pot never had a snowball's chance in hell, yet he killed millions in pursuit of his insane vision. Go to Cambodia today, and you'll notice that just about everyone is thirty years old or younger. It's sad as hell.
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Oct 1, 2012 03:48
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GuestBob posted:Common conversation I have with teachers and students: I think your standard conversation is clever and funny, but (assuming you're a teacher) don't you realize that your job is seen as a professional one and given respect by a great deal of Chinese? Why do they have to prove themselves to you by giving you some ridiculous level of prestige and money before you'll "properly" learn their language?
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Oct 1, 2012 08:44
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: Did you come to China to study Chinese?
: No.
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As I type this I am sitting in my apartment in Wuhan, China. This is my second year teaching here, and it is the second university I've taught at. Last year I taught at a graduate school, the second best one in this city of millions. I've also taught at an experimental high school (think college prep for smart/rich kids whose parents want them to study abroad) and a more standard middle school. I am well-respected here. Teachers ask me for advice on how to better teach their students. Parents of students bring me gifts and ask them to tutor their children. Students regularly invite me to meals and want to be my friend, and not just to get better grades. I get paid many times the salary of local bi-lingual native Chinese teachers, who, frankly, are better at their jobs than I am. My friend, who has been here for several years, has started a chain of kindergartens that is just now taking off. He is very much a leader, and well-respected among locals. Do not make comparisons between Korea and China and expect them to be true. I have heard, and often, that Korean and Japanese foreign teachers are English monkeys. I believe it, but that mentality is rare in China. People here genuinely want to know you. You are interesting as a person to them. EDIT: Also I've gotta say that very few foreigners would be up to the task of leading an English department at any big school here. Bilingual Chinese natives with educational backgrounds who know how to get things done in this relationship-based society are much more capable, generally speaking.
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Oct 1, 2012 09:02
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Do you mean foreigners without college degrees? That would explain the things you believe about English-teaching jobs in China. EDIT: Yes, my friend does have the right to live here. NaanViolence fucked around with this message at 09:31 on Oct 1, 2012 |
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Oct 1, 2012 09:27
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They still have jobs that pay a lot better than their Chinese counterparts, do they not?
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Oct 1, 2012 09:32
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It is as I expected, you have a hugely inflated sense of entitlement. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. Just imagine yourself in the shoes of a capable native-born teacher, fluent in both English and Chinese. You have a university degree in teaching. Hell, you probably have a master's degree in teaching! This foreigner comes in with a B.A. in History or Psychology or some other such thing, his only relevant qualification being that he speaks English natively. He is given a wage larger than yours in addition to a pretty nice apartment, for free. I am not citing hypotheticals or rare cases, this regularly happens. He probably only has to work 15-20 hours a week, and he gets 30-40 days off for Spring Festival, as well as breaks for various other holidays. If he misses class for whatever reason he's usually given a pass. Again, this is typical in my two years of experience actually teaching in the country I am talking about. I have many friends from many Chinese cities in similar situations. This is white privilege at its finest, and you can't even be arsed to learn their language "properly?" It's really no wonder that we aren't respected more when many teachers have attitudes like yours. EDIT: Not to mention that the vast majority of schools will also pay for your international round-trip airfare as well as paying you during the summers that you don't work, if you work for the same school for multiple years in a row. NaanViolence fucked around with this message at 09:50 on Oct 1, 2012 |
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Oct 1, 2012 09:47
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LimburgLimbo posted:Then you've been lucky enough not to run into the really broken ones. Seconding this, owing to how easy it is to get these sorts of jobs and how cushy they are a significant number of expats take this route and end up as womanizers/drug addicts/drunks.
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Oct 1, 2012 11:34
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GuestBob posted:Foolish Westerners! Of course, the correct path reflects the ancient wisdom of the Dao: the balance of yin and yang. If you take too much of one thing, simply take more of another until you are once again in a state of harmony. You make no sense. I moved to a country where getting opiates on the regular is pretty goddamned hard. If I were an addict, as you seem to be suggesting, why would I do that? You're just bitter that I called you out on your giant entitlement complex. NaanViolence fucked around with this message at 04:00 on Oct 2, 2012 |
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Oct 2, 2012 03:50
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hitension posted:Here's a far more fun topic than the previous one: How long do you all think it will take for China to transition to democracy? Or do you think it will go on doing its own thing forever? I hope it's not too soon. If China became truly democratic tomorrow the very next day they'd go to war with Japan.
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Oct 2, 2012 04:15
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Arglebargle III posted:Absolutely this. I remind my Chinese coworkers and friends "我是成年人." or "I am an adult" so often that it's become a running joke. But I've explained it to them and I think they get it. Chinese people, especially Chinese people who work with foreigners a lot, are so used to foreigners being clueless and helpless that it's hard to blame them sometimes. This, this, a thousand times this. I don't like to play the game of "I'm a better expat than you," but his experiences match mine very well and I sometimes feel like some ignorant expats who can't or won't do much by themselves have poisoned the well for others who are more willing to take risks and learn. EDIT: Oh jeez this thread went to poo poo in the period between the post I quoted and now, I'm just going to drop this because it's going nowhere. NaanViolence fucked around with this message at 03:58 on Oct 4, 2012 |
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Oct 4, 2012 03:18
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It's also National Week here, so they could just be using the Diaoyu Islands thing as a fill-in for the usual holiday sales and propaganda. It'll be interesting to see if this continues into next week. I think many people are forgetting that in addition to the islands dispute this is also the most rah-rah flag-waving week in the Chinese year.
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Oct 5, 2012 02:59
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I think this was brought up before, Baby Huey, but what do you consider to be a sufficient educational background to start talking about China? You've said that no expat is qualified, and you also attacked one forums poster for daring to make statements based on "poverty tourism." It seems like you've read one (admittedly important) book and are now trying to moderate this discussion. If this is not the case, please enlighten me.
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Oct 7, 2012 04:41
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Many of my college students here in China are unaware that they will soon have new leadership.
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Oct 30, 2012 07:52
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Pro-PRC Laowai posted:It's also quite literally impossible to move up without being corrupt. When my students get too jingoistic regarding things like the Diaoyu Islands, Xinjiang, Tibet, or Taiwan I just remind them that China will always play second fiddle to countries that have the rule of law, and there's nothing they can do about it until their systemic corruption is fixed. Most of them suddenly become very sad because they suspect what I'm saying is true.
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Feb 28, 2013 15:43
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Jeoh posted:Most people agree that the Great Leap Forward death toll was between 18 and 35 million, no idea where you're getting the 60 from. According to the Wikipedia article at the very least, estimates do range from 30 to 60 million. It's a little bit problematic because each estimate has its own idea of how to calculate "extra" deaths: some give China a handicap for being a poor, third-world country during that period.
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Mar 12, 2013 17:16
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Pro-PRC Laowai posted:Unfortunately they rely on stats that were sketchy to begin with, revised by Deng's crew when demonizing Mao was the "in thing", and use hilarious grasps to try and get the biggest number possible. Seriously, using the same standards you can easily make the claim that millions died in the US because of the depression. You are 20% right and 80% wrong. Take, for example, this book written by experts in the field: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao:_The_Unknown_Story "Sinologist Stuart Schram, in a review of the book, noted that "the exact figure... has been estimated by well-informed writers at between 40 and 70 million"" "In his 2010 book Mao's Great Famine, Hong Kong based historian Frank Dikötter, who has had access to newly opened local archives, places the death toll for the Great Leap Forward at 45 million, and describes it as "one of the most deadly mass killings of human history."" You don't get to just disagree with published works by respected authors because "sketchy stats." EDIT: Mao also told everyone to start killing sparrows. Not surprisingly, this resulted in a plague of insects. The Party still calls it a natural disaster. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_sparrow_campaign NaanViolence fucked around with this message at 07:35 on Mar 13, 2013 |
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Mar 13, 2013 07:30
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Modest Mao posted:You forget that the party itself had many actors and that there was, you know, an actual climate induced famine going on. This is unsupportable because a large chunk of this famine (who knows exactly how large?) was caused by Mao's campaign to kill all the sparrows. It's also really hard to give Mao the benefit of the doubt when he followed the Great Leap Forward with the Cultural Revolution because he was unhappy that his power was taken away after his first screw-up.
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Mar 13, 2013 15:49
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Pro-PRC Laowai posted:Sino-Soviet split is becoming obvious and China is increasingly out in the cold. USSR just reneged on helping with nukes. The USSR conscientiously and intelligently stopped assisting China with nuclear technology after Mao openly said something to the effect of "who cares how many Chinese die, we can always make more." Reneged is not the correct word to use here.
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Mar 14, 2013 05:21
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Arakan posted:Does anything even happen to restaurants that "fail" inspection or whatever? A fine maybe? There's so many places I've eaten at with the red This concerns me too. Wuhan is filled with such restaurants. On an ABC scale they don't even get Bs, they get Cs with a frowny face.
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Mar 17, 2013 13:46
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on the wall from whoever's been by to inspect them but it doesn't seem like anyone gives a poo poo.
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The CCP has recently been very effective at redirecting internal political anger toward harmless boogeymen such as Japan. Given the intensity of anti-Japanese rhetoric that we are seeing starting in pre-school, this could continue to work for a long time. EDIT: Great post by Arglebargle, my experiences here in China lead me to agree 100%. NaanViolence fucked around with this message at 05:11 on Mar 18, 2013 |
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Mar 18, 2013 05:07
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GuestBob posted:If I remember rightly, that was lauded by "netizens" as an example of restraint because the official only had one mistress. But how many homes did he buy for her? And did she have access to fine Hong Kong milk powder? Netizens demand human flesh search!
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Mar 18, 2013 05:18
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pentyne posted:As the economic climate worsens do you think they'll ratchet up the nationalism to try and deflect criticism from the increasingly unworkable political system. All they can really do to keep control is beat the war drums and put on shows of strength. Any attempt at actual force projection would be a monumental disaster. If they continue to keep educating people in increasing numbers then nationalism will have diminishing returns. I've taught at bad colleges and good colleges, and even students at the bad colleges are significantly less likely to be blindly jingoistic than the general population.
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Mar 19, 2013 13:02
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Throatwarbler posted:Sinica addresses this in their Q&A ep a few weeks ago, they don't generally talk about Tibet or Xinjiang because dumb laowais who want to talk about that poo poo are invariable ignorant ideologues who really just want to stir up trouble. This is the correct decision. I support their decision not to talk about these topics, but "invariable" is not the correct word to use here. There are intelligent, knowledgable laowai who discuss these things.
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Apr 16, 2013 05:06
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Modus Operandi posted:I don't think people who want to discuss Tibet/Xinjiang are all troublemakers either but it does bring out the dickheads and culture warriors en masse. It's like horn of Gondor for idiots. I see your point, but I don't tend to care because it's an issue that needs to be brought up whenever possible so that Han Chinese can get over their ignorance about the subject. What their government is doing is wrong and in my classes I always make sure that the students at least understand my perspective and the logic behind it. EDIT: I see from subsequent posts that you're talking about those whose only knowledge of China is the Great Wall and the oppression of Tibet. I have to say that we agree in these cases. NaanViolence fucked around with this message at 09:46 on Apr 22, 2013 |
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Apr 22, 2013 09:34
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Skeleton Jelly posted:I'd appreciate if people sticked to the poo poo mentioned in the OP, not everyone here speaks Chinese and it's annoying as gently caress when people just thrown in Chinese phrases in the middle of an English language discussion about Chinese affairs with no explanation. When it's just three characters it's fine, three seconds will get you a passable translation out of Google Translate.
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Apr 23, 2013 05:14
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Vladimir Putin posted:Natural sex rations at birth are not 1:1. However, natural sex ratios in the population should be appx. 1:1. Why? Statitically speaking, more boys are born than girls, something like 1:1.03. No one knows why this is, scientifically--it could have to do with the Y chromosome being lighter as someone mentioned. But as life progresses, the extra .03 of boys dies out naturally because boys are typically more reckless and therefore more prone to life threatening activities, keeping the population at about 1:1. In my college child development class the textbook stated that the ratio is actually around 1.1:1 at conception. More males are miscarried than females, however, which puts the rate closer to 1:1 at birth. By the time a generation hits 20 the ratio will be around 0.85:1 because of the aforementioned reckless activities by males.
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May 13, 2013 13:14
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dilbertschalter posted:http://populationpyramid.net/ The 0.85 number is a theoretical one. Of course it never happens that way in the real world because of the influence of culture.
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May 14, 2013 09:19
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