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I’m leaving China

baldingsworld.com

31–40 of 219 posts

Re: I’m leaving China

#31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Got anything to back up those insults of yours? > the author himself didn’t reflect on anything in his time in China Patently and objectively false to anyone who read the article. It really makes me wonder what your motivations are for lying so blatantly.

> Patently and objectively false to anyone who read the article. It really makes me wonder what your motivations are for lying so blatantly. Wrong. He clearly didn’t, because he describes a caricature of a Chinese person, reminiscent of a Fu Manchu type character that is dishonest and untrustworthy. Your motivations were clearly revealed the moment you created a throwaway account my man.

> he describes a caricature of a Chinese person, reminiscent of a Fu Manchu type character

Explain where you think this happens.

> Your motivations were clearly revealed the moment you created a throwaway account my man.

Explain what you mean by this.

Careful, my account is older than yours!

Re: I’m leaving China

#32
post #19

can someone please summarize? a bit too long to read at the moment

The honest answer is no. It's information dense already.

It also includes lots of the authors personal opinions that I don't want to misstate.

Re: I’m leaving China

#33
I never thought quite as broadly as the author, but what he says is consistent with one thing I observed -- driving and pedestrian behavior.

In China drivers and pedestrians are both better and worse than those in the US. I found drivers and pedestrians both to be much more aware and had more agency about what they needed to to be safe.

Whereas in the US we assume a lot more that the rules of the road are going to be followed, and they are. In China you shouldn't assume that a given rule of the road is going to be adhered to, especially if there is any indication that it might not be (if that makes sense).

This results in the US looking a lot more ordered on the streets. But it also results in some situations in the US where it seems like people are brain dead. I personally prefer the US in this regard, but I was also raised in it.

Re: I’m leaving China

#34
post #22

Can anyone comment on the risks of posting such an essay while still living in China? Is this considered safely within the lines, a calculated risk, or something else? (Or has he already left China before posting the essay?)

The only risk is your blog getting blocked by the GFW, nothing else.

Re: I’m leaving China

#35

Speaking as someone essentially atheist (or at least, secular humanist), this entire piece is IMHO the strongest [secular] argument that can be made for Christianity's positive effect on Western values.

To the downvoters, there is actually some historic and sociological evidence supporting this notion:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3201031

> Recent research not only confirms the existence of substantial psychological variation around the globe but also highlights the peculiarity of populations that are Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich and Democratic (WEIRD). We propose that much of this variation arose as people psychologically adapted to differing kin-based institutions — the set of social norms governing descent, marriage, residence and related domains. We further propose that part of the variation in these institutions arose historically from the Catholic Church’s marriage and family policies, which contributed to the dissolution of Europe’s traditional kin-based institutions, leading eventually to the predominance of nuclear families and impersonal institutions. By combining data on 20 psychological outcomes with historical measures of both kinship and Church exposure, we find support for these ideas in a comprehensive array of analyses across countries, among European regions and between individuals with different cultural backgrounds.

Re: I’m leaving China

#36
post #22

Can anyone comment on the risks of posting such an essay while still living in China? Is this considered safely within the lines, a calculated risk, or something else? (Or has he already left China before posting the essay?)

The way to think about censorship and risk in China is to consider reach. This article is in English, and hosted on what appears to be the authors own blog. The chance of it being spread to any significant number of people in the Mainland is negligible. Suffice to say, I think he’s pretty safe. In case it’s relevant, I’ve been in and around China since 2004.

Re: I’m leaving China

#38
> A common one is when someone is run over by a car and pedestrians just step over the body until a family member finds the body. The video goes viral, prompts a week of hand wringing, and then censors step in to talk about Confucianism and how the economy is growing. There is no innate value given to human life as precious.

Re: I’m leaving China

#39
Contrast this: "I will use strong language about the authoritarian communist government but I do not want that in anyway to reflect upon the Chinese people."

With these sentences: "There is a complete and utter lack of respect for the individual or person in China. People do not have innate value as people simply because they exist. This leads most directly to a lack of respect for the law/rules/norms. One thing I began to realize over time is, while not German, how law, rule, and norm abiding Americans are with minimal fear of enforcement. in my experience laws/rules/norms are simply ignored. Lying is utterly common, but telling the truth revolutionary. There was no value system. There was no exogenously held right or wrong, only whether you made money. With apologies to a bastardized Dostoevsky, with money as God, all is permissible. For instance, something as simple as standing in line in many places can devolve into a knife fight given the utter lack of restraint in cutting that is so common. A common one is when someone is run over by a car and pedestrians just step over the body until a family member finds the body."

Re: I’m leaving China

#40

Speaking as someone essentially atheist (or at least, secular humanist), this entire piece is IMHO the strongest [secular] argument that can be made for Christianity's positive effect on Western values.

What positive effect has it had? I'm not trying to be combative but in history (and this was at a Catholic school) I was taught that most of the good parts of modern European political philosophy came only after it became less entangled with religion and came through the greater focus on rationality.
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