"A man who won't cheat for a poke, don't want one bad enough".
You can never tell what a Chinaman is thinking. They are inscrutable.
The Chinese are more or the same as people the world over in most respects most of the time.
The old statistical truth still reins with them, too. Within group differences are greater than between group differences.
They love their families--mostly. Chinese New Year animosities, resentments, bitterness & fights can parallel ours at Thanksgiving & Christmas.
They love their country--at least their culture. Party members love the government or at least use it to climb the ladder of more power & success, if not corrupt money.
They prefer to be honorable yet individuals who fail to cheat when they can to advance themselves or their families are seen as terminally stupid.
A lot of them--probably a majority--really do believe that the Chinese culture is the center of everything and certainly the wisest, most deserving, etc. etc. etc.
Yet most also hate the totalitarian corruptocrats running things and would slit the throats of the rulers in a flash if given a chance they could survive.
Alcoholism is epidemic. Quality marriages are at least as rare there as here. Though it seems like even arranged marriages can turn out well when both parties work hard at it. They seem to be more stoic about marriage arrangements without Hollyweed type fantasies controlling that much of their thoughts & emotions in a marriage.
I would say that being human, they somewhat have similar values & the same values in some respects & contexts.
They used to ask me how I saw Chinese people vs American people as a psychologist. I'd say--mostly the same. Same fights. Same alcoholism. Same corruption. Same greed. Same arrogance. Same family dynamics in some respects.
That sometimes the cultural expressions of similar values might be different but that the underlying crap & the same underlying wonderful things were mostly quite similar.
While there, I took pride that the American political arena was not AS corrupt as the Chinese. And that the media were not AS controlled as that of the Chinese. I realized later, I was mostly exceedingly wrong on both counts
I do think that there are a higher percentage of evildoers in powerful positions there that will take ruthless advantage of an underling quicker than is mostly true in the USA.
Confucian ideals took a real hit under Mao. But the substrate is still there. Those ideals are not as robust as Christian ideals. They are not built on as solid a foundation with no supernatural underlying support.
Nevertheless, the Confucian ideals do serve to somewhat call the average person toward behaving honorably and with fairness toward all.
The Chinese do have a much more operative and strict handling of and response to authority. They are--on average--much less likely to not be compliant; to protest on the job; to rebel or throw a fit.
But even there, paradoxes abound. Tienanmen was a great example. But it took a huge groundswell to reach such levels. They are loathe to be the "duck that sticks its head up above the flock."
The heart of man--good & bad--is much the same the world over.
"A man who won't cheat for a poke, don't want one bad enough".
You can never tell what a Chinaman is thinking. They are inscrutable.
Thank you for your observations. I have known some native born Chinese and some who live in other countries but I have not been to the country. My former pastor was among those who helped the Tienanmen uprising. Very brave. He was and is also very authoritarian and egotistic for what that is worth.
The CCP blend the worst of Chinese “culture” with the full Marxist ideals and that is a bad combination. I guess my real concerns with my brother and everyone who could becalled China’s “Running Dogs” is that they aim to please the cruel, muderous dictatorship while ignoring the terrible human rights abuse. Sadly at the same time it seems, agree with anti-American thought. So many willing puppets for CCP for the sake of money or not to be “racist”. CCP is only smart for exploiting our stupidity.
The heart of man—good & bad—is much the same the world over.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
thanks for your whole comment, much appreciated.
and #707
But they are in a communist system which means they CANNOT give bad news to the boss, lest they lose their heads, so that results in coerced behavior which skews the curve and may give them the APPEARANCE of being utterly foreign at times. But that’s no different than the media and government here, who’s proclamations and pronouncements so often seem to make no sense and have no coherence at all.