What do you make of the following features of the Opening Ceremony? Continue reading »
The Olympics Demonstrate China’s “Soft Power”: on Baloney and Silliness.
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The evolution of political activisms according to (misused) Gresham’s law
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How do the Chinese really feel about Japan, the new Yomiuri/Xinhua Survey
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Besides, a new survey on this topic was discussed in Yomiuri Shimbun, August 4, 2008.
“Only about one-third of Japanese think the relationship between Japan and China is good in contrast to nearly 70 percent of Chinese who view the relationship positively, according to a survey conducted jointly by The Yomiuri Shimbun and a weekly magazine published by Xinhua News Agency.” Continue reading »
(Letter) How fast China can catch up the US in GDP? It may be faster than you think.
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If we assume the relative paces of the underlining economic numbers remain the same, China will catch up the US in 2019. That’s scenario #1. The key underlining economic numbers are: nominal GDP growth and currency exchange rate. Continue reading »
Why are the Chinese so upset II: Being an internationalist
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Your suggestions of overcoming East-West misunderstanding with multiculturalism (Alice Poon), attention to individual choices, within-group differences (Wu Di) and between-group commonality (Daniel) remind me of the Foreword written by former Japanese ambassador to the United Nations Hatano Yoshio for Nitobe Inazo’s well-known book “Bushido: The Soul of Japan” (Kodansha, 1998 edition). Continue reading »
The value of public opinion does not depend on its correctness per se
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- 民意被过滤比民意非理性更可怕 The filtering of public opinion is scarier than irrational public opinions
- 民意考核官员,怎么考 Use public opinion to evaluate job performances of government officials, how?
- 网络民调不能代替现实征询民意 Internet based public opinion survey is no substitute for in person inquires
Hopefully, such translations would give readers a stronger sense of (often quite lively and sometimes idealistic) discussions of politics, democracy, etc. in the Chinese media.
Continue reading »
Why are the Chinese so upset about the Western human rights activists and advocate journalists? Do not violate my Chinese feelings, or, rather, sensibilities.
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Why are the Chinese viscerally sickened by the following scenes from the Western media? Continue reading »
Moving on without closure: The hardiness and resilience of the Chinese society
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Parents of children killed in collapsed school buildings in the Sichuan earthquake have been offered cash settlements, relaxing of the birth quota and pensions by the local government. In exchange, they are pressured to sign a contract to give up demand for investigations into official negligence and corruption associated with the collapsed schools. Some parents have relented and signed the contract, while others have refused.
A while ago at the collective funeral for the victims at one of the schools with a large casualty, the grieving parents’ pain was so profound that some bite on their fingers and wrote their children’s names with a wish of a “good journey” in their blood on a piece of white cloth. The pain of losing a child can never be compensated with money. My discussion will focus on a cross-cultural understanding on the money in question. Is it correct to label the Chinese authorities’ offer to the grieving parents “hush money”, or even “compensation”? Continue reading »
What would the Chinese government do or fail to do for the Chinese to revoke their loyalty and support?
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How would you explain the disparity between the Chinese attitudes toward their country on the one hand and their individual lives on the other? What do you make of it?
The data suggest that the Chinese personal/individual lives have been decoupled from China ‘s national life to a significant degree. Continue reading »
(Letter) Where does China fit in the West’s understanding of the world?
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“China feels very turbulent” – Part 2
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The turbulence in China’s larger social environment, at root, has been caused by imbalanced development in Chinese society.
On the one hand, the laobaixing in China remain the most hard-working and good-natured anywhere. Just as I described before, waiters making 800 RMB can peacefully coexist with senior white-collar workers making tens of thousands of RMB per month. I’ve carefully watched their every action, and you can tell that they truly treasure this work despite its poor pay, and you can imagine how much less they must’ve made in their home villages.
“China feels very turbulent” – Part 1
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Last year, I ran into my ex-girlfriend on MSN Messenger. She was pregnant, and without much meaning I reminded her to be careful with her baby’s health. Just ordinary topics, like a reminder that she should try to breast-feed after birth. I don’t know why, but she suddenly responded sharply: “Don’t think that our life in China is worse than yours. Our classmates are all doing great; if we wanted to go overseas and play, we could. You should just stay in America; there are so many people going overseas these days, even if you came back, you wouldn’t have an advantage.” She continued, in great detail and color, to brag her happy life with her husband. I calmly told her, I never felt I had any sort of advantage over you, and China’s future has plenty of hope.
Chinese Exceptionalism -义理和人情
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Notes:
1. My English translation of the key terms (义理, 人情, 隐忍) might be a bit off. Suggestions are welcome.
2. If you disagree, please trash, ridicule, tear it apart or ignore. Don’t worry about me committing suicide out of shame. Continue reading »
(Letter) “China is such a threat to the U.S”??
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“China is such a threat to the U.S…we must be extremely careful of what they get their hands on…China and other non U.S. friendly countries will do practically anything to steal our knowledge for our weapons and military equipment.”
Notwithstanding that she has certain valid points I was still offended. I responded:
“I must admit that I take offense at the prejudiced statement because not only is my family Chinese, Chinese foreign policy for 5,000 years has been one of nonintervention & nonaggression (with a few exceptions). I realize that China does not take a Western style proactive approach to certain “hot” international issues, yet China on the other hand doesn’t directly interfere with other countries through military intimidation & conflict. China, like many other countries, has its own way of doing things and just because it is not the American way does not make them a threat.
China definitely does pose a serious geopolitical challenge, but calling China a ‘non U.S. friendly country’ is cold war thinking and detrimental to building a harmonious international community. Just because an individual is an American doesn’t give that person the right to demonize other strong countries which do not cower before America’s violent foreign policy. The world would be a much better place if countries spent more time mutually controlling and sharing technology through recognized international bodies, rather than demonizing each other and creating a world of fear and hate.”
It just bothers me that people always demonize China as a rouge state without ethics or values. I fully understand that the CCP has its share of corruption and violation of human/civil rights. I understand that China is building up its military and engages in constant espionage. I also understand that China does not share many American values. For example, the American values of…
Foreign policy: forcing poor countries to accept democracy and capitalism through military invasion.
Politics: politicians waste their time fighting amongst each other and waste the people’s money. Chinese politicians do the same but without the media coverage.
Military: China’s military personnel are usually only deployed for disaster relief
Diet/Food: gradual obesity through over consumption of over processed unnatural foods.
I am having a hard time deciding where my exact values stand because I share both American and Chinese values. Am I wrong by taking such a stand? Due to the fact that my ancestors were on the Mayflower should I take a more patriotic stand? How do you draw the line between where your values/ideology stands with statements like above?
minipost-Carnegie Endowment calls for rethink on rising China
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Why are most of the advertising models in China Caucasian?
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Continue reading »
Personally, I see no point in not printing Chinese text on China’s official uniforms. But for this post, I will purposely play the role of a “CCP apologist” and try to put these things in positive terms. 😉 Besides, I will explain two frequently used Chinese phrases and hopefully cast some light on a particular aspect of the Chinese culture.
The Chinese Olympic Journey
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Two recent Western comments on the Chinese preparation for the Beijing Olympics caught my eye. 1. According to James Fallows, the Chinese authorities’ tightening of control over the situation was defeating their own purpose of impressing their audience – the West, especially its media. 2. Meanwhile, Richard Spencer at the Daily Times started to wonder aloud over his fish pond in his Hutong residence who the games’ intended audience really was. Could it be that the Olympics were designed as a reward for the hardworking Chinese, instead of a “coming out party” to entertain foreigners? My first reaction was Spencer had a more astute grasp on the Chinese psyche. Then I realized both comments could be right, but apply to different stages of the Chinese experience with the Olympics.
Continue reading »
The art of PR: lying without technical falsehood
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Amnesty International would like to make clear that it was not involved in the dissemination of a series of images that have been circulating on the web in relation to the Beijing Olympics. Amnesty International’s global website address is www.amnesty.org
The statement is not untrue per se. But some details were conveniently left out:
- Amnesty International commissioned TBWA\Paris to produce those photos
- It further granted permission to TBWA\Paris to run the ads once and enter them in the Cannes
- The visuals were not final versions, and Amnesty International knew the wrong web address was a minor error
In response to Marc (who wrote in #189 “What Does It Mean to Chinese”)
“However, the reason that I brought up house church vs. Three-Self church initially has a lot to do with nationalism. You see, Three-Self church was started by some nationalistic Chinese Christians in the early 1900’s (way before communist took over power in China). Hence they called themselves Three-Self (meaning self-governing, self teaching, self supporting). They hated Western Christians in China then. They teamed up with communist government later in the 1950’s to start persecuting other Chinese Christians who didn’t see things their way. That’s when house church Christians started to emerge. Anyway, the whole conflict started out with nationalism.”
I am glad that you put Christianity in China in historical perspectives, but your interpretion of important, complicated historical events is a bit oversimplified and biased. Still, you are right, the Three-Self Patriotic Movement was initiated by patriotic Chinese Christians and endorsed by the government, not “created” by the government as the PBS article claims to be (http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/china_705/history/china.html, a companion piece to Frontline/World Jesus in China).
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