It's a way to turn any action into a question. It could be a more casual and informal, more endearing /soft way of questioning something (depending on the actual emotional tone you say it with, if course) .
There was a period when foreigners, especially English-speaking white foreigners, were treated effusively in China, elevated above all Chinese people and often far above the natural social place these folks had back in their own countries. They got better jobs, better job situations and benefits, and Chinese people in general gave them respect and admiration based on their whiteness and exotic Westerness alone.
Then China opened up to the world at ever increasing pace, Chinese people became more sophisticated, and an entire generation of previously-fêted foreigners lost their elevated place in society. They crashed back to earth and drifted back to the social positions they always would have had based on their personal abilities and talents.
Laowhy and Serpentza lived through the tail part of that shift. The good and easy time they'd had in China soon ended, they were barely making ends meet, and soon had to leave. They became deeply bitter, and attributed that natural change in society to the CPC ruining the good times for everyone, not just themselves. Thereafter they fell in with various anti-China crowds within and without China, and also found just how lucrative anti-China videos are on yt.
So it's a combination of both a personal sense of being wronged, plus the good grift, that resulted in their channels and stance today. They were always grifters at heart, the change in money merely changed the nature of their content.
Also, why is the talk only about tritium and carbon-14 in this report, ignoring 64 other elements present in the water that potentially contain harmful effects. The IAEA report states they only investigated these two elements by Japan's request, it does not imply that there are no other elements they can or should also investigate, just they didn't because they weren't requested to.
Haha, exactly, I agree with your message and how it was worded :) I was just adding some nuance.
As a non-CPC-hating Chinese American living in the West, I'm fairly aware of how these tactic are used, alas. The thing is, there is a kernel of truth there--even when distorted and used for dishonest purposes to smear the CPC--such that to dismiss it altogether, would make one's counterargument ring false as well. This kernel of truth lies behind anti-CPC sentiments within China itself, along with Chinese liberals yearning to live in capitalistic freedom, with naive people imagining the West is a utopia, etc etc. I think it's good to acknowledge it where possible, in its historic context.
As for how these stories are depicted in China, things were fairly repressed up til the 90s, then increasingly discussed, the history taught, scholarly articles written, etc. I can't speak for much beyond that, as I do not live in China, though I get a window into it due to being bilingual via Chinese media and social media. To go by all the recent pop culture dramas and movies, it's not a time that most people want to dwell upon. Both far away in the past, and yet not quite far away enough for completely open dissection.
I want to mention, people whose family were dragged through the culture revolution, etc., CAN have legitimate concerns and trauma. They aren't just wrong, things WERE scary.
My grandparents on both sides had ran away from their farmer families in their teens to join the Long March, eventually all made contributions to the Party (e.g. once, my grandma served as a spy behind Japanese lines in a village, then when she had to escape back to safer grounds, traveling outside hiding in sheds in winter, wearing just a shirt, she'd lost her baby to miscarriage). They all attained fairly high ranks, were known to have done exemplary work. During the culture revolution, they were accused of being far Right for various quite often arbitrary reasons. My grandfather's family had been farmers who owned a few small pieces of land (5 mu), and even though he had ran away at 19 and never went back, he was deemed bourgeoisie no matter what he'd accomplished. They locked him in a dark cow shed for 2 years, with handcuffs so tight the scars went to his wristbone, and his kids were allowed to visit once per month. My other grandparents had similar stories. Some years later, all of them were released, reinstated. Some received formal apologies from the Party.
My parents grew up during the Culture revolution. They witnessed their parents in various stages of lock up, but were still full of fervor, voluntarily went to the rural villages among the first wave of educated youth following Mao's call, and neither were granted party affiliation due to "tainted family background." Years later, this continued to pop in random ways, subverting their career trajectory. This was through to the end of the 80s to early 90s.
My grandparents remained loyal to the Party until they died. They forgave the bad stuff. But if they didn't, if other members of my family had differing thoughts and feelings as result, those are a legitimate response to what had happened. They're part of the complex history of new China. There are people who are alive now who still have memories. Sometimes, when the repression gets higher, even for seemingly legitimate reasons, some people have ptsd.
The CPC isn't an angel, and it made mistakes and people got hurt. The difference is, if we want to discuss material conditions, we should probably focus on: has the CPC changed since that time? Has it improved the lot of the Chinese people? Does it clearly demonstrate that it intends to continue to serve the interests of the people, promote equality and common prosperity and all the good things? So long as these remain true, the CPC is worthy to be supported, and held to high account. And not by pretending terrible things didn't happen either, or that 60 years is all that long ago and everyone should all be fine now.
This "underlying trend of things" is the dao, by the way :) Daoist philosophy and worldview, and Confucian philosophy and worldview--in addition to an awareness of history--still deeply underly Chinese thought and society. The way Judeo-Christian philosophy underlying the West. It's part of what accounts for the "with Chinese characteristics".
Of course China is authoritarian. It's an iteration of the "dictatorship of the proletariat." Lol.
To be more serious. Every single citizen of a country will have lots of complaints about their own country, even those who think most things are working ok. By sheer nature of living somewhere, you become intimately aware of its problems and weaknesses, and wants to see certain changes and improvements. Does this mean they dislike the country as a whole? Or love another country more than their own? No.
The CPC is enjoying an unprecedented high approval rating due to being a highly efficient government capable of implementing long-term plans to improvement the country. Many people have witnessed those changes with their own eyes, lived through them personally, and mostly approved of the results.
In addition, a part of the CPC's mission is to protect and revive China and Chinese culture, which it has done so by alleviating poverty, strengthening the economy and the military, and enhancing China's influence and reputation in the world. Not every single Chinese person is a socialist or at all interested in politics, but a great majority (even including overseas Chinese) DO resonate with that mission, with seeing how the country has improved, how traditional cultural elements are being preserved and incorporated with modern elements in creative ways in all forms of media, architecture, art works, ways of life, all the scientific achievements, etc.
Yes, there is censorship and an element of authoritarian control. Moreso in the past, and a little more relaxed in the present, but it's definitely there. Arguably, the Chinese people is more familiar, even comfortable, with an authoritarian government (how else does one keep a vast country with huge population together throughout the thousands of years). However, because the government is vested with more power in general, the people have higher expectation for it to perform and to take care of everyone. It's part of the Confucian social contract that hides deep in the structure of society. That being the case, when people fall through the cracks in various ways, they blame the government personally for failing them, more than a typical Western person would in a similar situation.
Also, the government makes policies primarily based on what benefits the society overall, and not the individual (by this, I do not mean ethnic minorities or classes of people, who are protected as part of a harmonious society; but the concept of individualism itself). If you're an individual who happens to not conform with what is considered to be socially beneficial, or who wants to be disruptive in some way (and it may even be a perfectly acceptable type of disruption in the West), you would feel the boot of repression upon your neck.
With 1.4 billion people, even tiny percentage of unhappy people is tens of millions of unhappy people. Each have their own story, and justification, and many grievances are valid. Because no government is ever so perfect as to take the best care of every single person, no government is entirely free of corruption or negligence or ineptitude. The CPC has made mistakes that massively affected some people's lives for the worse. It has also dramatically improved things in other ways. For some people, the two did not even out. For others, they imagine the West to be a shining beacon that is far better, more free, where people can truly make money and live a good life. Simultaneously, a current trend is for Chinese netizens to say they never realized how great their own country is and how much they love it, until they broke through the Great Firewall via VPN and started to see how the outside is doing.
Overall, the only way to determine how a country's government is doing is to analyze vast statistics, and in comparison with other governments. In that light, the CPC's numbers are pretty good, but there are always room for improvement.
Unfortunately, the separatist government on Taiwan has a 40% core base who firmly believe that the USA, Japan, and South Korea will definitely come help them fight the PLA. In fact, they rely upon it, because in actuality they themselves are NOT joining the army, which is having difficulties with recruitment. But they sure believe that the US with its awesome navy will crush the PLAN, since the mainland is practically falling apart in some type of 1970s communist dystopia.
While there may have been legitimate reasons for these folks' reluctance to change their life and become a part of the mainland--many of which could probably have been addressed and negotiated if everyone were calm and relations were frequent and friendly as they were 15 years ago--they are also the product of intense anti-mainland propaganda that includes rewritten history books and rampant media misinformation.
So yeah, that's why these things always work so well. First they have a whole system of information warfare that salts the ground, and then they use people's genuine hopes and wishes against them, and even though everyone knows they're being used, they still believe they can get what they want as a result of being used.
At that point of wealth you aren't thinking about spending money as an individual, or even an individual family (even including hangers on and staff). You are essentially a representative of a power that parallels governments, with worldwide reach, and will think along those lines. You want to implement worldwide policies, dictate the tides of capitalism, play with your own regime change politics, break the barriers of old age, gene manipulation, and get the process started on astro-mining and colonizing Mars.
It seems like your standard to have "a positive impression of China" is only if it's somehow perfect and free from problems. Sure, the country has got issues. Like all countries do. And it's got a ton of positive points too, more than many countries in the world in fact. The world is a harsh place full of problems.
Item 6 is downright offensive. How "bad" are the rude people in any culture? Pretty bad. But do they represent the whole culture, even discounting the better-educated younger generation? No. There is high culture, the educated class, the warm hearted "real" people who may not have the most polished manners. There are normalized standard of politeness that everyone enjoys and upholds.
Why not consider how well the the Ugly American Tourist trope reflect the US as a whole. The infamous drunken Brits on all-night bashes trope, the Australian bogans trope. All kinds of folks from poorer countries who are "cheap" out of habit trope. And so on.
I notice that as well, but the ones I come across seem to me more like classic conservatives (more isolationist and/or anti-atlanticist, strong military for defense but also our country should mind our own business, etc.) While we disagree on many core values, they seem reasonably rationale and factual, and have a solid grasp on international geopolitics. Versus the insane incoherence--well, more like "will say anything outrageous to satisfy a riled up base"--of rightwing populism.
I contribute that less to a deliberately created pipeline, though, than the natural result of the complete suppression of a genuine left in this country. With communism equated to Nazism since elementary school, most people will avoid lefty-sounding talking points and titles and then have only one direction to go when they look for alternatives to the mainstream narrative. And the YouTube algorithm picks that up in its big data.
I think you can do it using boost right now..
I really need a "hide read post" option 😺
Was not expecting 济公 here along with the Marxists xD
To be fair they are parliamentarian and have been for centuries.
But, the parliament is literally staffed by aristocrats and other types of ruling elite, so....
有没有 have or not have 时间 time 陪我 accompany me/accommodate me 聊聊天 chat a bit
It's a way to turn any action into a question. It could be a more casual and informal, more endearing /soft way of questioning something (depending on the actual emotional tone you say it with, if course) .
看没看过？have...seen it? 吃没吃过？have... eaten it? 玩没玩过？have ... played it? 读没读过？have ... read it?
是不是 （很好玩）？isn't it (fun)? 好不好 isn't it good? 看不看xyz--do (you/we/they) wanna watch xyz? 知不知道xyz--do...know xyz?
Etc.
To sound less like a robot, here's my suggested rewrite for you ;D
你好，我叫xxx，我正在学汉语。你好吗？你会说普通话吗？有没有时间陪我聊聊天？
Etc.
I can't do americanized Chinese food I confess, I'm not American enough for that ;D
There was a period when foreigners, especially English-speaking white foreigners, were treated effusively in China, elevated above all Chinese people and often far above the natural social place these folks had back in their own countries. They got better jobs, better job situations and benefits, and Chinese people in general gave them respect and admiration based on their whiteness and exotic Westerness alone.
Then China opened up to the world at ever increasing pace, Chinese people became more sophisticated, and an entire generation of previously-fêted foreigners lost their elevated place in society. They crashed back to earth and drifted back to the social positions they always would have had based on their personal abilities and talents.
Laowhy and Serpentza lived through the tail part of that shift. The good and easy time they'd had in China soon ended, they were barely making ends meet, and soon had to leave. They became deeply bitter, and attributed that natural change in society to the CPC ruining the good times for everyone, not just themselves. Thereafter they fell in with various anti-China crowds within and without China, and also found just how lucrative anti-China videos are on yt.
So it's a combination of both a personal sense of being wronged, plus the good grift, that resulted in their channels and stance today. They were always grifters at heart, the change in money merely changed the nature of their content.
Also, why is the talk only about tritium and carbon-14 in this report, ignoring 64 other elements present in the water that potentially contain harmful effects. The IAEA report states they only investigated these two elements by Japan's request, it does not imply that there are no other elements they can or should also investigate, just they didn't because they weren't requested to.
Haha, exactly, I agree with your message and how it was worded :) I was just adding some nuance.
As a non-CPC-hating Chinese American living in the West, I'm fairly aware of how these tactic are used, alas. The thing is, there is a kernel of truth there--even when distorted and used for dishonest purposes to smear the CPC--such that to dismiss it altogether, would make one's counterargument ring false as well. This kernel of truth lies behind anti-CPC sentiments within China itself, along with Chinese liberals yearning to live in capitalistic freedom, with naive people imagining the West is a utopia, etc etc. I think it's good to acknowledge it where possible, in its historic context.
As for how these stories are depicted in China, things were fairly repressed up til the 90s, then increasingly discussed, the history taught, scholarly articles written, etc. I can't speak for much beyond that, as I do not live in China, though I get a window into it due to being bilingual via Chinese media and social media. To go by all the recent pop culture dramas and movies, it's not a time that most people want to dwell upon. Both far away in the past, and yet not quite far away enough for completely open dissection.
I want to mention, people whose family were dragged through the culture revolution, etc., CAN have legitimate concerns and trauma. They aren't just wrong, things WERE scary.
My grandparents on both sides had ran away from their farmer families in their teens to join the Long March, eventually all made contributions to the Party (e.g. once, my grandma served as a spy behind Japanese lines in a village, then when she had to escape back to safer grounds, traveling outside hiding in sheds in winter, wearing just a shirt, she'd lost her baby to miscarriage). They all attained fairly high ranks, were known to have done exemplary work. During the culture revolution, they were accused of being far Right for various quite often arbitrary reasons. My grandfather's family had been farmers who owned a few small pieces of land (5 mu), and even though he had ran away at 19 and never went back, he was deemed bourgeoisie no matter what he'd accomplished. They locked him in a dark cow shed for 2 years, with handcuffs so tight the scars went to his wristbone, and his kids were allowed to visit once per month. My other grandparents had similar stories. Some years later, all of them were released, reinstated. Some received formal apologies from the Party.
My parents grew up during the Culture revolution. They witnessed their parents in various stages of lock up, but were still full of fervor, voluntarily went to the rural villages among the first wave of educated youth following Mao's call, and neither were granted party affiliation due to "tainted family background." Years later, this continued to pop in random ways, subverting their career trajectory. This was through to the end of the 80s to early 90s.
My grandparents remained loyal to the Party until they died. They forgave the bad stuff. But if they didn't, if other members of my family had differing thoughts and feelings as result, those are a legitimate response to what had happened. They're part of the complex history of new China. There are people who are alive now who still have memories. Sometimes, when the repression gets higher, even for seemingly legitimate reasons, some people have ptsd.
The CPC isn't an angel, and it made mistakes and people got hurt. The difference is, if we want to discuss material conditions, we should probably focus on: has the CPC changed since that time? Has it improved the lot of the Chinese people? Does it clearly demonstrate that it intends to continue to serve the interests of the people, promote equality and common prosperity and all the good things? So long as these remain true, the CPC is worthy to be supported, and held to high account. And not by pretending terrible things didn't happen either, or that 60 years is all that long ago and everyone should all be fine now.
This "underlying trend of things" is the dao, by the way :) Daoist philosophy and worldview, and Confucian philosophy and worldview--in addition to an awareness of history--still deeply underly Chinese thought and society. The way Judeo-Christian philosophy underlying the West. It's part of what accounts for the "with Chinese characteristics".
Of course China is authoritarian. It's an iteration of the "dictatorship of the proletariat." Lol.
To be more serious. Every single citizen of a country will have lots of complaints about their own country, even those who think most things are working ok. By sheer nature of living somewhere, you become intimately aware of its problems and weaknesses, and wants to see certain changes and improvements. Does this mean they dislike the country as a whole? Or love another country more than their own? No.
The CPC is enjoying an unprecedented high approval rating due to being a highly efficient government capable of implementing long-term plans to improvement the country. Many people have witnessed those changes with their own eyes, lived through them personally, and mostly approved of the results.
In addition, a part of the CPC's mission is to protect and revive China and Chinese culture, which it has done so by alleviating poverty, strengthening the economy and the military, and enhancing China's influence and reputation in the world. Not every single Chinese person is a socialist or at all interested in politics, but a great majority (even including overseas Chinese) DO resonate with that mission, with seeing how the country has improved, how traditional cultural elements are being preserved and incorporated with modern elements in creative ways in all forms of media, architecture, art works, ways of life, all the scientific achievements, etc.
Yes, there is censorship and an element of authoritarian control. Moreso in the past, and a little more relaxed in the present, but it's definitely there. Arguably, the Chinese people is more familiar, even comfortable, with an authoritarian government (how else does one keep a vast country with huge population together throughout the thousands of years). However, because the government is vested with more power in general, the people have higher expectation for it to perform and to take care of everyone. It's part of the Confucian social contract that hides deep in the structure of society. That being the case, when people fall through the cracks in various ways, they blame the government personally for failing them, more than a typical Western person would in a similar situation.
Also, the government makes policies primarily based on what benefits the society overall, and not the individual (by this, I do not mean ethnic minorities or classes of people, who are protected as part of a harmonious society; but the concept of individualism itself). If you're an individual who happens to not conform with what is considered to be socially beneficial, or who wants to be disruptive in some way (and it may even be a perfectly acceptable type of disruption in the West), you would feel the boot of repression upon your neck.
With 1.4 billion people, even tiny percentage of unhappy people is tens of millions of unhappy people. Each have their own story, and justification, and many grievances are valid. Because no government is ever so perfect as to take the best care of every single person, no government is entirely free of corruption or negligence or ineptitude. The CPC has made mistakes that massively affected some people's lives for the worse. It has also dramatically improved things in other ways. For some people, the two did not even out. For others, they imagine the West to be a shining beacon that is far better, more free, where people can truly make money and live a good life. Simultaneously, a current trend is for Chinese netizens to say they never realized how great their own country is and how much they love it, until they broke through the Great Firewall via VPN and started to see how the outside is doing.
Overall, the only way to determine how a country's government is doing is to analyze vast statistics, and in comparison with other governments. In that light, the CPC's numbers are pretty good, but there are always room for improvement.
Unfortunately, the separatist government on Taiwan has a 40% core base who firmly believe that the USA, Japan, and South Korea will definitely come help them fight the PLA. In fact, they rely upon it, because in actuality they themselves are NOT joining the army, which is having difficulties with recruitment. But they sure believe that the US with its awesome navy will crush the PLAN, since the mainland is practically falling apart in some type of 1970s communist dystopia.
While there may have been legitimate reasons for these folks' reluctance to change their life and become a part of the mainland--many of which could probably have been addressed and negotiated if everyone were calm and relations were frequent and friendly as they were 15 years ago--they are also the product of intense anti-mainland propaganda that includes rewritten history books and rampant media misinformation.
So yeah, that's why these things always work so well. First they have a whole system of information warfare that salts the ground, and then they use people's genuine hopes and wishes against them, and even though everyone knows they're being used, they still believe they can get what they want as a result of being used.
At that point of wealth you aren't thinking about spending money as an individual, or even an individual family (even including hangers on and staff). You are essentially a representative of a power that parallels governments, with worldwide reach, and will think along those lines. You want to implement worldwide policies, dictate the tides of capitalism, play with your own regime change politics, break the barriers of old age, gene manipulation, and get the process started on astro-mining and colonizing Mars.
It seems like your standard to have "a positive impression of China" is only if it's somehow perfect and free from problems. Sure, the country has got issues. Like all countries do. And it's got a ton of positive points too, more than many countries in the world in fact. The world is a harsh place full of problems.
Item 6 is downright offensive. How "bad" are the rude people in any culture? Pretty bad. But do they represent the whole culture, even discounting the better-educated younger generation? No. There is high culture, the educated class, the warm hearted "real" people who may not have the most polished manners. There are normalized standard of politeness that everyone enjoys and upholds.
Why not consider how well the the Ugly American Tourist trope reflect the US as a whole. The infamous drunken Brits on all-night bashes trope, the Australian bogans trope. All kinds of folks from poorer countries who are "cheap" out of habit trope. And so on.
Apparently, it can go on and unchanged for another 70 years ;/
I notice that as well, but the ones I come across seem to me more like classic conservatives (more isolationist and/or anti-atlanticist, strong military for defense but also our country should mind our own business, etc.) While we disagree on many core values, they seem reasonably rationale and factual, and have a solid grasp on international geopolitics. Versus the insane incoherence--well, more like "will say anything outrageous to satisfy a riled up base"--of rightwing populism.
I contribute that less to a deliberately created pipeline, though, than the natural result of the complete suppression of a genuine left in this country. With communism equated to Nazism since elementary school, most people will avoid lefty-sounding talking points and titles and then have only one direction to go when they look for alternatives to the mainstream narrative. And the YouTube algorithm picks that up in its big data.
iQiyi, mango TV, for TV shows. Lots of them are free to watch on YouTube with English subtitles. Or translated on Viki.
Bilibili for YouTube-like content.