Not long ago, I freely expressed my thoughts on the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize result here. Something I left without any further discussion was the unknown impacts of cultural differences on freedom of speech revolution. It is way too deep to discuss.
However, it is not way too theoretical to observe in reality. Germany, a country widely accepted by most "righteous" nations in the world, refuses the possibility of coexistence, a theory widely accepted by most "righteous" nations in the world.
This fact doesn't give us any theory or law, but it says it is absolutely wrong to think one ideal can work in all cultures, in all geographic locations, and in all people.
Showing posts with label China. Show all posts
Showing posts with label China. Show all posts
Monday, October 18, 2010
Friday, October 8, 2010
Thoughts after Nobel Peace Prize 2010
Well, well, well. I thought I would never come back to this topic again after arguing with my WASP friends in the first two years of college, but here I am, sharing my little thought on China' human right issue.
I am a pro-U.S., pro-freedom person myself, and that is why I am here working in the U.S. and going after the so-called "American Dream". I HATE the dictatorship taking place in my motherland, ranging from the government, companies, to virtually anywhere in between. It is absolutely not a place for innovation, not a place for hoping rewarded after working hard, and not a place to know the truth.
It is why the whole world, led by the U.S., urges the system to change. It is why a Chinese criminal won the Nobel Peace Prize this year. The inevitable consequences of the Nobel Peace Prize is to encourage more and more people to fight for human rights, and that is what this organization wants to achieve. Good intention, but radically, it is to encourage Chinese people to start revolution, either a peaceful one or violent one, to start things over again, because let's face it, the current ruling party in China is too stable and too powerful to be willing to give away that power.
What does this mean? This means at least a whole generation is sacrificed for something we don't know whether we want. People say we are brain washed and then stop listening to us right here, or have that pre-assumption in their mind and ignore us with a smile. Well, what if I say, hey, we need to stop driving cars, eating steak, wearing cotton clothes, cutting power cores for about 10 - 20 years, and start over with cleaner energy and less aggressive demand, so our kids or grandchildren will have a MUCH better life.
Would anyone listen to me? No. Why? People are happy with where they are, and although everyone consciously knows what is better, hardly anybody is going to sacrifice for the possible better outcome for the kids. Civil rights succeeded, because the way most under-privileged people live at that time was no better than dying for a better future. Even that, not many people stood up for their rights. It is always those countable few who we commemorate for. RIP, Dr. MLK Jr., and Ms. Rosa Parks. Even after all those changes, can anybody say the U.S. is a country with racial equality? Can anyone say they didn't see any side effects of these changes? Can anyone say no other innocent people's benefits are sacrificed as a result? We are already the generation, which is supposed to see only the benefits. We are not listening to the generation, which sacrificed their own well being for all these anymore.
Back to China, people are way more satisfied and happy with their lives than those under-privileged people before the Civil Rights Movement, regardless if they live in urban, suburban or rural regions. Would multi-party system bring less political games and more specific beneficial policies? Would more human rights make them financially better off and happy in 5 to 10 years? Would the path to human rights take less than 5 to 10 years? If the answer is "no" or "maybe" for ANY question, it is not good enough for people to change.
What people know is, currently the economy is booming, lives are getting better, hopes are full and goals are clear. Life is good, isn't it? Granted, without enough human rights, more specifically, freedom of speech, (let's face it, every Chinese still has the right to live, has the right to own private property and has the right to feel safe and sound, among others), people will become the victim of political trades unnoticed. For example, people will be forced out of their home to make way for new development, although they are usually financially compensated for the "inconvenience", and people may die in an illegal coal mine, and all these may not see the news. Bad guys may not be punished or blamed. Wait, Ponzi Scheme does the same thing to people, right? Sure, people like Madoff get life sentence, and become celebrities in prison. Do victims get back what they lost? No.Will there be no more Ponzi Schemes in the future? No.
Eventually, people become victims for various reasons (I am not judging anything here, sorry), but the difference is, some of them get sympathy because their stories see the news, and some don't. Bad things will keep happening, and people lives will keep being irreversibly destroyed. Possibly only 1% people will be victimized in a "free" country, while 5% people will be victimized in a not so free country (numbers are purely fictional). That means nothing to regular people. What would? Between 99.99% and 100%, or between 0% and 0.01%.
By the way, I haven't said anything about culture yet. European countries and the U.S. are using different systems, and even among European countries, the system is different. Nuf' said. It is too difficult to say which one is the most suitable for China, or something completely unheard of, or just staying the same. This is too big and deep a topic and I am not going to discuss it here.
So, no guarantee for less political game more beneficial / encouraging policies, no guarantee for more happiness / financial well-being, no guarantee for not being irreversibly victimized, no guarantee for the length of revolution, and only guarantee for chaos. How is that better than keeping the current situation, where lives are *usually* full of hope, clear goal and most importantly, satisfaction?
I am not trying to agree with self-claimed artists, hippies, and other who can look through practicality and consider spiritual / ideological victory more important than anything else. Are you?
Surely, I can't say any of these in China if the government doesn't want me to. However, I won't need to, because most people share a similar view, so I don't need to spend all these time on arguing with friends for our ideological differences, but rather, we can spend time together on pirating DVDs for an enormous profit.
Nobel Peace Prize? You are just trying to encourage people to subvert when they don't necessarily want to.
I am a pro-U.S., pro-freedom person myself, and that is why I am here working in the U.S. and going after the so-called "American Dream". I HATE the dictatorship taking place in my motherland, ranging from the government, companies, to virtually anywhere in between. It is absolutely not a place for innovation, not a place for hoping rewarded after working hard, and not a place to know the truth.
It is why the whole world, led by the U.S., urges the system to change. It is why a Chinese criminal won the Nobel Peace Prize this year. The inevitable consequences of the Nobel Peace Prize is to encourage more and more people to fight for human rights, and that is what this organization wants to achieve. Good intention, but radically, it is to encourage Chinese people to start revolution, either a peaceful one or violent one, to start things over again, because let's face it, the current ruling party in China is too stable and too powerful to be willing to give away that power.
What does this mean? This means at least a whole generation is sacrificed for something we don't know whether we want. People say we are brain washed and then stop listening to us right here, or have that pre-assumption in their mind and ignore us with a smile. Well, what if I say, hey, we need to stop driving cars, eating steak, wearing cotton clothes, cutting power cores for about 10 - 20 years, and start over with cleaner energy and less aggressive demand, so our kids or grandchildren will have a MUCH better life.
Would anyone listen to me? No. Why? People are happy with where they are, and although everyone consciously knows what is better, hardly anybody is going to sacrifice for the possible better outcome for the kids. Civil rights succeeded, because the way most under-privileged people live at that time was no better than dying for a better future. Even that, not many people stood up for their rights. It is always those countable few who we commemorate for. RIP, Dr. MLK Jr., and Ms. Rosa Parks. Even after all those changes, can anybody say the U.S. is a country with racial equality? Can anyone say they didn't see any side effects of these changes? Can anyone say no other innocent people's benefits are sacrificed as a result? We are already the generation, which is supposed to see only the benefits. We are not listening to the generation, which sacrificed their own well being for all these anymore.
Back to China, people are way more satisfied and happy with their lives than those under-privileged people before the Civil Rights Movement, regardless if they live in urban, suburban or rural regions. Would multi-party system bring less political games and more specific beneficial policies? Would more human rights make them financially better off and happy in 5 to 10 years? Would the path to human rights take less than 5 to 10 years? If the answer is "no" or "maybe" for ANY question, it is not good enough for people to change.
What people know is, currently the economy is booming, lives are getting better, hopes are full and goals are clear. Life is good, isn't it? Granted, without enough human rights, more specifically, freedom of speech, (let's face it, every Chinese still has the right to live, has the right to own private property and has the right to feel safe and sound, among others), people will become the victim of political trades unnoticed. For example, people will be forced out of their home to make way for new development, although they are usually financially compensated for the "inconvenience", and people may die in an illegal coal mine, and all these may not see the news. Bad guys may not be punished or blamed. Wait, Ponzi Scheme does the same thing to people, right? Sure, people like Madoff get life sentence, and become celebrities in prison. Do victims get back what they lost? No.Will there be no more Ponzi Schemes in the future? No.
Eventually, people become victims for various reasons (I am not judging anything here, sorry), but the difference is, some of them get sympathy because their stories see the news, and some don't. Bad things will keep happening, and people lives will keep being irreversibly destroyed. Possibly only 1% people will be victimized in a "free" country, while 5% people will be victimized in a not so free country (numbers are purely fictional). That means nothing to regular people. What would? Between 99.99% and 100%, or between 0% and 0.01%.
By the way, I haven't said anything about culture yet. European countries and the U.S. are using different systems, and even among European countries, the system is different. Nuf' said. It is too difficult to say which one is the most suitable for China, or something completely unheard of, or just staying the same. This is too big and deep a topic and I am not going to discuss it here.
So, no guarantee for less political game more beneficial / encouraging policies, no guarantee for more happiness / financial well-being, no guarantee for not being irreversibly victimized, no guarantee for the length of revolution, and only guarantee for chaos. How is that better than keeping the current situation, where lives are *usually* full of hope, clear goal and most importantly, satisfaction?
I am not trying to agree with self-claimed artists, hippies, and other who can look through practicality and consider spiritual / ideological victory more important than anything else. Are you?
Surely, I can't say any of these in China if the government doesn't want me to. However, I won't need to, because most people share a similar view, so I don't need to spend all these time on arguing with friends for our ideological differences, but rather, we can spend time together on pirating DVDs for an enormous profit.
Nobel Peace Prize? You are just trying to encourage people to subvert when they don't necessarily want to.
Thursday, August 19, 2010
China overtakes Japan as the 2nd largest economy... in the 2nd Quarter
Saw this news today. First impression, Mao's wish finally comes true. 超英赶美，终于实现了，但是ironically, when we are in the position of 赶美，我们超的居然是日... 一个理论上被我们用了八年时间千万人民鲜血而“击败”的国家。Not sure whether I should be proud for the great achievement, which arrives about four decades behind Mao's schedule.
Jokes aside, I am proud of the global image of my homeland nowadays, and it is enhanced everyday. 3rd world brothers are depending on us, and 1st world countries feel threatened by us. Nice. However, the present situation is far from an achievement.
Most of the money comes from export. What does that mean? Low domestic demand, which implies low income. Low income means cheap labor, the product most investors are interested in. That will promote more export. Wait a sec. Do I see a loop? More and more export will make the number look better and better, and to keep this number, we have to keep income low, which will keep domestic demand low.
What if we finally decide to pay more to workers? Investors shift to SE Asia, and other 3rd world brothers. By that time, will we be able to pull up enough domestic demand to maintain the same employment level? Will our own brands expand enough to use other countries' cheap labors to benefit our own citizens' well being? Or we have to go back to the self-sustained economy, like in the good ol' Qing Dynasty?
What if we decide to keep the investors interested? 我的同胞们将继续在国内水深火热，even in big cities, like my hometown Beijing, people are spending the money equivalent to their salary in 60 years to buy the right to live in a small 3-bed 1-bath apartment for 70 years. Saving for retirement? Employed people need to live with their parents so they can eat and wear like a Gen Y'er. We are surviving only because our parents sacrificed their life style throughout their lives, and we are all only-child's. It is too disturbing to think what is going to happen when Gen Y'ers have no one's saving to eat up, but instead, have not one, but possibly two kids to raise.
People in small towns? Still fantasizing about the elite status they thought colleges would offer.
While everyone is intimidated, surprised or enlightened by Communism China's fast development and great achievement, I feel the seemingly successful path needs to undergo some desperate and hysterical change to keep being successful. Otherwise, it could only be good in numbers, but not people's lives. Even for option 1, the promising land doesn't seem so promising.
Dictatorship brings us GDP growth and competitiveness by dictating foreign currency, exchange rate, and foreign investments, but it also brings us the weird "lifestyle for GDP" scheme.
Good night, and good luck
Jokes aside, I am proud of the global image of my homeland nowadays, and it is enhanced everyday. 3rd world brothers are depending on us, and 1st world countries feel threatened by us. Nice. However, the present situation is far from an achievement.
Most of the money comes from export. What does that mean? Low domestic demand, which implies low income. Low income means cheap labor, the product most investors are interested in. That will promote more export. Wait a sec. Do I see a loop? More and more export will make the number look better and better, and to keep this number, we have to keep income low, which will keep domestic demand low.
What if we finally decide to pay more to workers? Investors shift to SE Asia, and other 3rd world brothers. By that time, will we be able to pull up enough domestic demand to maintain the same employment level? Will our own brands expand enough to use other countries' cheap labors to benefit our own citizens' well being? Or we have to go back to the self-sustained economy, like in the good ol' Qing Dynasty?
What if we decide to keep the investors interested? 我的同胞们将继续在国内水深火热，even in big cities, like my hometown Beijing, people are spending the money equivalent to their salary in 60 years to buy the right to live in a small 3-bed 1-bath apartment for 70 years. Saving for retirement? Employed people need to live with their parents so they can eat and wear like a Gen Y'er. We are surviving only because our parents sacrificed their life style throughout their lives, and we are all only-child's. It is too disturbing to think what is going to happen when Gen Y'ers have no one's saving to eat up, but instead, have not one, but possibly two kids to raise.
People in small towns? Still fantasizing about the elite status they thought colleges would offer.
While everyone is intimidated, surprised or enlightened by Communism China's fast development and great achievement, I feel the seemingly successful path needs to undergo some desperate and hysterical change to keep being successful. Otherwise, it could only be good in numbers, but not people's lives. Even for option 1, the promising land doesn't seem so promising.
Dictatorship brings us GDP growth and competitiveness by dictating foreign currency, exchange rate, and foreign investments, but it also brings us the weird "lifestyle for GDP" scheme.
Good night, and good luck
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