Chinathread: Reinventing Licentiousness

The Something Awful Forums > Main > General Bullshit > Chinathread: Reinventing Licentiousness

Vaporware: May 22, 2004; Still not here yet.

Arven posted:

I'm on the third of the very long books after only a month (lots of time to read in quarantine), so it's actually hard for me to think of specifics now, but here goes-

For context, the books are about humanity's first contact with an alien civilization, so humanity is kind of treated as a singular entity and nationality isn't really ever a factor even though most of the main characters are Chinese.

Several times a book a character will be put solely in charge of solving huge problems that have world-altering ramifications. The whole of humanity always treats these characters as pariahs after not solving the impossible problem. Often it's not even that they didn't solve the problem, they just didn't solve it immediately. It's the equivalent of if the WHO put a single guy (not even a Doctor necessarily, just some guy that everyone agrees is smart) in charge of solving Corona, and then people start literally spitting on him in the street a week later because he hasn't fixed the problem yet.

Related to that, it's kind of subtle and in the background, but education is equated with intelligence. It's as if every level of degree you go up in higher education immediately unlocks another 20% of your brainpower.

Everything is zero-sum. Almost every interaction between humans and every interaction between humans and aliens is treated that way. The overarching plot of the series, the dark forest theory, is that the entire universe is a zero-sum game which causes all species to instantly annihilate each other as soon as they are aware of their existence.

Oh and another one- (Not too much of a spoiler)- at one point humanity is basically doomed, so a few surviving spaceships flee the solar system. Later humanity is no longer doomed, so humans on earth now see this as the ultimate betrayal and send out another ship solely for the purpose of destroying the ships that escaped. This happens a lot. People make a choice to survive that seems personally reasonable at the time, but then something that they couldn't foresee happens later that makes their choice irrelevant. Instead of taking into account the context of the original choice and forgiving them, they are punished harshly for making what is retroactively the wrong choice.

It could just be the author. The books are lauded though, and I really do enjoy them despite the cultural weirdness.

This is way back, but I knew the book's perspective was twisted and decided to read it anyways. It was baffling how many choices the characters make that don't make sense. The takeaway for me was backstab and go full cannibal asap because that's how you survive in space china. It was one of the most depressing books I've read. It was verging on a hate-read by the end.

My kids love the "fairy tales" though. Prince Needle-Eye is up there with Rothfuss' The Golden Screw as my kids favorite stories.

# ¿ May 8, 2020 17:25

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ Apr 25, 2024 17:16

Vaporware: May 22, 2004; Still not here yet.

One of my buddies on twitter said that HK is gonna be behind the firewall starting tonight. I thought the CCP was having a hard time with that effort, but apparently they just forced it through under emergency laws.

# ¿ May 21, 2020 13:53

Vaporware: May 22, 2004; Still not here yet.

I'd say a huge factor is air quality from China. Those new powerplants China built on the shore that basically vent straight into Korea and the yellow dust problems.

# ¿ Aug 20, 2021 17:41

Vaporware: May 22, 2004; Still not here yet.

5er posted:

Aww. I was hoping they were red bean in the center or something.

You can get them with cinnamon sugar or honey, which is the good variety.

# ¿ Sep 22, 2021 03:39

Vaporware: May 22, 2004; Still not here yet.

Robot is mooncake.

https://twitter.com/jq_trend/status/1437699107544461316

# ¿ Sep 23, 2021 11:13

Vaporware: May 22, 2004; Still not here yet.

Grand Fromage posted:

You can just replace french fries with X in that sentence.

Everyone's favorite game when trying something new in Korea is "Is it sweet?" and the answer is always yes.

Isn't this in response to the govt limiting salt content in food? It's like the low fat craze of the 90s. Replace ingredient Y with sugar

# ¿ Dec 2, 2021 00:02

Vaporware: May 22, 2004; Still not here yet.

Grand Fromage posted:

It does help keep housing fairly affordable since house values go down instead of up, but it's also lovely for the environment and Japanese construction tends to be really poor quality. "Earthquakes" is the common excuse but it's bullshit, plenty of places have earthquakes and also build good structures meant to last. Japanese construction is a huge industry, having lovely buildings that are replaced constantly is to some extent a racket they have going to keep the industry afloat.

Isn't the mob/Yakuza/triad big into the construction companies and subcontractors? Not a huge incentive to do better when people can be intimidated into shutting up

# ¿ Aug 19, 2022 23:27

Vaporware: May 22, 2004; Still not here yet.

Ah yes, giant spherical red bean doughnut, a staple of French breakfasts.

# ¿ Aug 21, 2022 12:27

Vaporware: May 22, 2004; Still not here yet.

thetoughestbean posted:

Chinese diplomats for Hirohito bingo

lol

Grand Fromage posted:

E: Found it. After the Qing's fourth invasion of Burma got rinsed, yet again, from the commander of the Burmese military.

"Comrades, unless we make peace, yet another invasion will come. And when we have defeated it, yet another will come. Our nation cannot go on just repelling invasion after invasion of the Chinese for we have other things to do. Let us stop the slaughter, and let their people and our people live in peace."

lmao

# ¿ Aug 24, 2022 13:33

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ Apr 25, 2024 17:16

Vaporware: May 22, 2004; Still not here yet.

Grand Fromage posted:

Whistling at night in Korea causes a snake to attack you.

what if you want to call your pet snake home during the day? do they have a special dance or something?

if they're anything like cats, the attacking part is normal, I'm curious about the calling them to you part

# ¿ Oct 3, 2022 18:07

The Something Awful Forums > Main > General Bullshit > Chinathread: Reinventing Licentiousness