Posted on 09/03/2020 6:39:05 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
An old Cold War joke reports an international poll that asks the same question in every country: “Excuse me, what’s your opinion of the meat shortage?”
The Poles say, “What’s meat?”
The Chinese say, “What’s opinion?”
The Americans say, “What’s shortage?”
The Israelis say, “What’s excuse me?”
No Chinese has ever run a community school board, a Little League association, or a volunteer fire brigade. For the past 2,500 years, and probably the past 5,000, orders in China have flowed downward from the top, through a vertical hierarchy. Everyone in the U.S. has an opinion about politics–we have to choose our leaders and spend a lot of time thinkingi about it. Our opinion matters. Political opinions don’t have an practical value in China, so the practical Chinese don’t bother having them.
China is run by a self-selecting committee of bureaucrats cherrypicked from the top 1/10th of 1% of university entrance exam scores. I won’t live in such a system. If someone tried to replace our Constitution with that sort of elitist arrangement, I would take up arms against it. But it is a catastrophic error to underestimate the Chinese, and it is merely petulant to complain about how nasty the ChiComs are. China’s economy will grow this year while ours will shrink. China crushed the COVID-19 pandemic (no, it’s not fake news) while we’re still trying to figure out what to do about it.
China well may dominate Artificial Intelligence, the driver of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Its government will spend $1.2 trillion on tech investments during the next five years, dwarfing what we spend. We aren’t dealing with a bunch of Marxist ideologues, but with a 5,000-year-old civilization that now wants to turn outward and assimilate most of the world.
(Excerpt) Read more at pjmedia.com ...
I Like Chinese
Monty Python
The world today seems absolutely crackers
With nuclear bombs to blow us all sky high
There’s fools and idiots sitting on the trigger
It’s depressing, and it’s senseless, and that’s why
I like Chinese
I like Chinese
They only come up to your knees
Yet they’re always friendly and they’re ready to to please
I like Chinese
I like Chinese
There’s nine hundred million of them in the world today
You’d better learn to like them, that’s what I say
I like Chinese
I like Chinese
They come from a long way overseas
But they’re cute, and they’re cuddly, and they’re ready to please
I like Chinese food
The waiters never are rude
Think the many things they’ve done to impress
There’s maoism, taoism, I Ching and chess
So I like Chinese
I like Chinese
I like their tiny little trees
Their zen, their ping-pong, their ying and yang-eze
I like Chinese thought
The wisdom that Confusious taught
If Darwin is anything to shout about
The Chinese will survive us all without any doubt
So, I like Chinese
I like Chinese
They only come up to your knees
Yet they’re wise, and they’re witty, and they’re ready to please
All together now
*singing in Chinese*
I like Chinese
I like Chinese
Their food is guaranteed to please
A fourteen, a seven, a nine and lychees
I like Chinese
I like Chinese
I like their tiny little trees
Their zen, their ping-pong, their yin and yang-eze
I like Chinese
This isn’t true any more. Independent political thoughts are punished, but inventions can be and are highly rewarded.
It’s no wonder the Deep State loves the Chinese system - it is our system, with a permanent ruling class untroubled by the prospect of being removed by deplorables. :)
LBJ’s Best and Brightest failed miserably.
First of all, if you live under communism, you have no right to an opinion. As cancel culture shows us, once people are randomly criminalized for having an opinion other than the approved one, most people will self-edit their speech.
I once had an eye appointment and the eye doctor was not my regular one but a woman who also did eye exams at Fort Hood. She said the most frustrating thing for her was to give eye exams to Asian wives of soldiers because the women are raised not to have an opinion.
The eye doctor would put that big vision device in front of the patient’s face and ask ‘which one looks clearer - this or that?’ The Asian patient would say “They’re okay”.
“No,” she demanded, “This one or that one?”
“It’s fine really”.
“There’s no wrong answer here. Just tell me which one is clearer. This or that one?”
“They are both good”.
You can see how frustrating those exams must have been.
Inventions are not always rewarded. In fact, any innovation that could potentially challenge the strong grip of the authority of the government are punished.
A system which required a stranglehold on political thought will eventually choke out all thought. China is the perfect example of this. They thought they could reform their economy without reforming their political system, and are now finding out they can’t. So they have chosen to shift back to their state run economy model because they will protect their political power at all costs.
“China crushed the COVID-19 pandemic (no, it’s not fake news) while we’re still trying to figure out what to do about it.”
I’ve been reading little Oswald for a quarter century and he’s never made sense.
In terms of anything.
Here he doesn’t even understand his own premise.
“China crushed the COVID-19 pandemic (no, it’s not fake news)...”
Not fake news he assures us, but how can he know that?
The entire premise of his article is that there is no free speech in China. No one can have an opinion.
How can he possibly know?
I cant tell you how many ethnic Chinese immigrants I know (many who should know better - from Hong Kong and Singapore) who think just like this. They think Trump's bombastic manner and rude Tweets are far worse than anything Xi does, because Xi is part of the established order and represents the collective will of the elite, while Trump is someone who would never have been allowed to come to power under a Confucian system.
They are all voting for Biden - even against their economic interests. Their minds just cannot handle the disconnect between how Trump speaks, and how they think a leader should speak.
Exactly, this why what most western experts overestimate China, because all their data comes from China and they inexplicably never question the numbers.
That’s why I disputed the 5000 year history claim. It’s just another piece of Chinese propaganda that is almost never challenged.
Never accept Chinese claims. Like Secretary Pompeo said, when it comes to China, “distrust and verify”.
Thanks for your Quora link. It was a good summary.
There are only two ways China will surpass the West and the US.
1. If China becomes a nation based on the principles of natural law
2. If the West and the US devolve into 3rd world totalitarian sh**holes.
There’s nothing wrong about asking a question. Napoleon had many quotes.
“There’s nothing wrong about asking a question. Napoleon had many quotes.”
What?
RE: Seek and Find. I never thought you were an ignorant buffoon before.
That was a copy and paste from the article. Please redirect your ire at the writer of this piece.
Intellectuals who do not receive status and wealth, tend to become revolutionaries. Example: Karl Marx.
The way to preempt that tendency, and thus achieve stability, is to absorb the intellectuals into the system, and let them expend their ambitious tendencies in internal political intrigue, rather than organizing revolutions.
“That was a copy and paste from the article. Please redirect your ire at the writer of this piece”
Number two?
You didn’t put in any quotes.
I thought it was you.
Thanks. I’m glad it’s not you writing it.
Remember to put in quotes.
I’ve been reading “Spengler” since the 90’s, Asian Times. He never made sense.
The stable bureaucracy culture lets them plan far in the future without having an election that will completely reverse their plans every four years. Our system is inherently more susceptible and vulnerable to foreign political interference. Our foreign policy can potentially change radically every four years based on elections. The CCP/Chinese bureaucracy culture doesn’t have to worry about this.
Freegards
You should read Oswald Spengler. He makes sense.
RE: The stable bureaucracy culture lets them plan far in the future without having an election that will completely reverse their plans every four years.
It will also take MANY YEARS or a toppling of their bureaucracy to reverse the results of a bad and disastrous plan.
Very astute observation.
To call China “communist” is idiotic and ignorant.
The essence of communism is the prohibition of private property. China has taken to capitalism with a vengeance and has probably more billionaires than we have.
What China is is a single party dictatorship. And the party that calls itself “communist” is simply the latest incarnation of the traditional chinese dynasty with Xi Jinping as the latest emperor.
And it is true that most Chinese are apolitical. In a top down dictatorship politics doesn’t exist, so it’s a total waste of time to have a “political” opinion.
You work within the system, get to know the right people, keep your nose clean and make the best of things.
As for the leaders, they know that if they want to keep their dynasty going they better keep the masses relatively happy. They have a patriarchical attitude and are more grounded in reality than we are, which will serve them well in the long run.
As you say it’s been like that for 5000 years. Chinese are used to it.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.