So what you are saying is that we should not support Saudi Arabia? Or are you saying that we should just never promote democracy?
I think that the USA acts under the guise of "promoting democracy" to fulfill its own selfish interests. Don't get me wrong, it's perfectly fine for a country to act in its own interests, but for the USA to pretend to be acting for a greater good is deceptive and hypocritical. Why does the US denounce dictatorships while supporting other dictatorships? Why does the US express outrage over the lack of human rights in some countries while turning a blind eye to other countries? Why invade Iraq for developing WMDs while other countries like North Korea openly admit to developing WMDs? Why does the USA denounce China for their human rights violations but continue to trade with them and allow them to buy the US's debt while other countries with human rights violations experience a ban on all their import to the USA? And that's only the tip of the iceberg.
Ok, you do point out a lot of inconsistencies and those are questions people should think about. We all know North Korea is a bigger threat to poliferate WMD's to terrorists then Iraq was - so to me, it's not hypocritical - it's just plain was stupid and not in our self-interests. But I still don't understand what you're advocating? That we should be less hypocritical? Why? We shouldn't try to claim we're on the good side? Why not? Naturally, banning all imports on China is going to have a major negative impact on us as well - so we can't do that. No, we can't apply the same policy to all countries across the board - it's not only impractical, it's undesireable. Is that unfair? Yes - but you know what, the u.s. isn't responsible for Chinese tax-payers...it's to American ones. So again, I ask you, what are you proposing? What should the U.S. do?
Umm, because the world eventually catches on and our credibility goes down the toilet. Because as the strongest nation in the world, we should set an example. Because other countries won't listen to us when we ask them to disarm their nukes while we still have thousands of armed nukes. and because it's wrong. Because it's a lie. USA is fallible. We shouldn't delude ourselves. Exactly. On one hand, the US claims to act in the interests of justice and goodness. On the other hand, the US acts in the interests of itself and big business. First, stop lying. Second, stop lying. Third, stop lying. Lies prevent progress. We need to admit what is occuring is actually occuring in order to change it.
In Saudi, if I understand correctly, no matter how wealthy or intellectually acclaimed women can be, they are still secondary to men politically, if not in other aspects of the social stages. In China *today*, however, a person can literally rise from the bottom of the economical class through a combination of hard work, luck, and something else, to the top echelon of the social structure without much hindrance from the government. In essence, the concept of "class awareness" is a long forgotten political term in China. It's true CCP still controls the media, but many Chinese have learned to take the *official news* with a grain of salt, and occasionally, with bags of salt. So if you still want to stick to your view that Chinese are sort of locked within the confinement of their *classes*, just like the Saudi women, you cannot be more wrong. I don't understand why you are so obsessed with CCP's reference to Mandate of Heaven. IMO, it's just a label that they attach to those mission statements to remind the Chinese that they should not be taken lightly. Nothing more or less important than the rampant usages of "God bless America" or "God help us" in this country. Li Bai was a poet in Tang Dynasty, more precisely, a disgruntled, drunken poet whose contribution to Chinese political history is about as significant as that of Shakespear to Great Britain. Would Li Bai be censored if he were born today? Possibly, I don't know. But ask yourself would glynch be censored if this were the McCarthy era where Red Scare dominated nearly every soul in the 50's U.S.? CCP criticized itself profoundly on many horrible things it did domestically in Mao's era. The government is also making not so subtle adjustments in its policies in response to the outcries of the economical imbalances that are happening in China. Hmm, what point are you trying to make here? Last time I checked, CCP wasn't ruling China before, during, and right after the Sino-Japanese War. The reality is that in China today, economic status determines one's social and political status, just like the good ol' USA. A large percentage of the population are forming the (economic) middle class, and they are not as easily manipulated by their government as you would think. CCTVs are not the only media outlets in China. If you wonder why nobody in one of these CCTV's criticizes CCP, ask why nobody in a public relation video program from a large US corporation says anything bad about his/her own company. Sure, dogs chained to poles have all the reasons in the world laughing at the freedoms of the dogs restricted by the *Invisible Fences*.
You ask Martian Man how can the U.S. prevent countries like Iran from acquiring nukes when we ourselves have them. I ask you if you are comparing a country that calls for wiping another country off the face of the earth a country that should be allowed to acquire nukes. Yeah, in an ideal world, you'd be right, but unfortunately, we don't live in an ideal world. With countries like Iran out there, it would be foolish for the U.S. not to prevent these kinds of states from acquiring nukes. No, not foolish - dangerous.
That is a question that the Bush admistration should answer. I never defended nor supported the invasion.
You seem to view classes in some way that I don't intend. Forget that word. I'm sorry if introducing it has muddled the conversation. The point is that people make decisions on the basis of what inputs they recieve. By controling the media, the CCP can control what people want. This is the point. I'm not saying that people in China are equal to Saudi women, any more than by saying that two people who have brown eyes are clones. I'm saying that one can't trust the output of expressed desires as legitimate because the inputs are controled. let me repeat I'm saying that one can't trust the output of expressed desires as legitimate because the inputs are controled. Media control = mind control. Obviously it occurs in different increments, and things are better than they were, but the effects take at least a generation (and probably more) to work their way out, and the effect is still occuring. Even the most beautiful gold gilded cage is still a cage. I was unaware that the concept was aknowledged at all by the CCP. The reason I'm so obesessed with it is because it is a wonderful freaking idea. The mandate of heaven basically is the historical idea that rulers will be held responsable for being bad rulers by being deposed under the influence of the forces which control such things. It is therefore much more akin to the idea of "no taxation without representation" than a truism like "God save America". When Angevin kings raped the populations of Europe because they felt they had divine right, this premodern articulation of a very modern idea was holding Emperors accountable. Now the worm has turned. Under the CCP, this "natural accountability" is not present. My point is that is a regression. The idea here is that we learned from McCarthyism, and I would never try and rationalize McCarthyism they way you are CCP media control. Of course, even then, we never forcibly censored. People can and would still write and legaly distribute the Communist Manefesto. But my point is that the greatest Chinese poet of ever would be erased from history if born today. Some burocrat would decide that he was talking subversive talk, and order him censored. How many Li Bai's will never blossom into existance because some administrative decision decides that they aren't right thinking or subversive? What is the gang of four but an attempt to shift the blame of the Cultural Revolution from Mao and the CCP to four bad apples? They say "We made bad decisions when those other guys were here, but we are a new we. We've fixed all the problems. Trust Us." The closest I have ever heard anybody come to saying something bad about the current regieme and it's policies is by denouncing corruption among regional leaders, and then only in the vaguest terms. See Nikita Khrushchev, the cult of personality and the entirely unrelated Glasnost. Hello? The Long March? The End of The Qing Dynasty, and The Wuchang Uprising which created 1000 different regional warlords, allowing Japan to divide & conquor followed by the WWII Surrender and CCP taking the whole pie, which was followed by the cultural revolution and the introduction of the zombiesqe meme of "national unity" that seems to come from the mouth of every Chinese person I hear interviewed?
But Joe the Corporate Shill can quit his job and spend the rest of his life denouncing the corporation whom he worked for without being censored or thrown in jail. An American Army Soldier can end his term and spend the rest of his life telling everybody how evil the US Government is. I don't expect Hu Jintao to tell everybody what an @sshole he is, but I do expect people to be able to say it somewhere if they want to and not get thrown in jail or killed. Is the average Chinese citizen even allowed to take a vacation in the US without some special dispensation yet? I know that portions of Europe were only added to "acceptable foreign vacation locations" a couple of years ago.
Sorry if you took that personally, NewYorker. It was not meant to be. That was aimed at the supporters of Bush and his elective war. Keep D&D Civil.
Talking about controlling the mind of hoi polloi, I seem to recall not long ago over 90% of Americans believed Iraq had WMDs before the U.S. led coalition force invaded that country, similar percentage of Americans believed Saddam was involved in 9/11 attack. U.S. main stream media, essentially countrolled by government and big corporations, had very little oversight on that matter. The press isn't doing any investigative reporting, they just "report" on press releases. What the press does is sit there and wait for government agencies and corporations to send them information. Virtually all of the dissenters are continuously silenced by the Bush administration. I am not equating what you said to pot calling kettle black, but at least China is making progress, while U.S. is regressing. That's something for you to worry about. Show me what the original Chinese version of "Mandate of Heaven" is, ottoman. I suspect your mechanical translator is giving you inaccurate translation of the Chinese again. Those whose lives were ruined during that era would beg to differ. That's possible, but nothing is for sure. Have you ever seen me or other posters from China here shift the blame from Mao's CCP to Gang of Four when it comes to criticizing China's past? If yes, please list. If no, that's another example where the Chinese from Mainland China don't get brainwashed by CCP, as you would want people (including yourself) to believe. Are you saying CCP brought Japanese Imperial Army's conquering of China during the mid 1930s? The Qing Dynasty wasn't brought down by CCP. During the Long March, CCP was being chased by KMT all over China, it was barely surviving. On the other hand, Japanese surrender was NOT followed by CCP taking the whole pie, which in turn was NOT followed by the Cultural Revolution. Examine your knowledge of the history of China before posting uninformedly. Again, what is your point?
Well, the whistle-blowers in U.S. really don't have the luxury of living peacefully either, despite the existence of whistle-blower protection law. The average Chinese citizen is not allowed to take a vacation in U.S.? Do you know what you are talking about? For years, Chinese are granted passports to travel anywhere in the world. The problem lies with the U.S. Consulates and their visa policy, which restricts the entrance of ordinary Chinese into this country. It's Uncle Sam won't let them visit, Otto, not CCP.
I'm not going to respond to most of your stuff. It doesn't seem to be functionally productive. From my perspective it reminds me of the structurally sound but vacant conversations one can have with an "conversational A.I." like with E.L.I.Z.A. or A.L.I.C.E. or just pure misdirection. Your contemptuous assuming disdain here however has raised my hackles. I intended to provide you a contact address for primary source of my information, a professor of East Asian Studies at Washington University in St. Louis. Unfortunately he is dead. His name was Stanley Spector. Here is a list of scholarly papers, books, fellowships, and general honors he earned in his career. I assume that his resume was respectable enough for you. Of course his honors are not mine, and I certainly don’t claim access to his full breadth of knowledge much less a fraction of it. Furthermore, you might think I misunderstood what he was saying, or that I am confabulating, and I can not prove you wrong. The man is dead. I do not claim to be able to speak Chinese, but I assume that sufficiently scholarly journal articles and publications with reference to original source material are not beneath you. I have at one time or another read (with some blocks of ommission) English translations of each of the five classics and I have somewhere an English language copy of Shu Jing which Dr. Spector gave me for a final paper that contains many of his handwritten notes in the margins which I read several times. So the question turns to whether your sneer a bluff, or was your contempt backed by a genuinely superior understanding. If you are quite sure of yourself, repeat your challenge on this subject. I will spend a significant amount of time and effort locating sufficiently scholarly source material to make my case. This will, of course, take up to a couple of weeks. As a precondition for doing this work I do expect you to acknowledge your error if I provide a sufficient amount of documentation. If I delve into the literature and discover that I am in error, I will of course do the same.
I apologize, but such blatant factual errors bother me. After reading the Chinese media articles below do you still stand by the above? Approved Destination Status is determined by The Ministery of Foreign Affairs of the Peoples Republic of China. (Approved Destination Status was granted to most of the EU in early 2004.) [rquoter] http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-12/09/content_2312831.htm US group tour requires big deposit www.chinaview.cn 2004-12-09 11:25:33 BEIJING, Dec. 9 (Xinhuanet) -- The United States may open to Chinese group tours next year, but travelers will have to put down a substantial deposit before booking a trip to America. Group tourists will be required to pay travel agencies a deposit of about 100,000 yuan (US$12,000) before their trips, which is refundable after they return. China's National Tourism Administration and officials from the United States signed a memorandum of understanding on Monday in Washington that will facilitate Chinese group tourism to America. "The application procedures may be simplified if Chinese visitors can travel on an ADS (Approved Destination Status) visa," said Chen Suiqin, general manager of China Travel International's Shanghai office. Currently, Chinese individual visitors to the United States have to travel on different visas for either business, study or a family visit. Group tourism is not officially allowed at present. Chen said to avoid prolonged stays, authorities from both countries would be very cautious selecting trustworthy operators, take away their licenses if many problems occur, and travel companies will also be cautious when receiving customers. Peter Yu, vice manager of the outbound department of Shanghai FASCO, aid if Chinese group tours to the United States are approved, it means that tourists could gain official help from China's overseas authorities when they encounter problems. He doesn't expect the visa procedures to be simplified much, however. The number of people getting visas to visit America will not rise substantially, according to Yu. "The condition will still be very strict," the company official said. The tour packages, which could last at least 10 days, may include big US cities such as Washington, Los Angels and San Francisco, as well as famous attractions including Hollywood and Disneyland. The tours will probably be priced between 20,000 and 30,000 yuan, authorities said. [/rquoter] [rquoter] EU seeking China's approved destination status http://english.people.com.cn/200310/22/eng20031022_126584.shtml Italy, current holder of the European Union (EU) rotating presidency, hopes the Chinese Government will grant approved destination status (ADS) to all EU nations, said Giuseppe Galati, Vice-Minister of Production Activities of Italy. With long history, rich culture and beautiful scenery, EU nations would warmly welcome Chinese visitors, Galati said Tuesday in Beijing at the 15th session of the World Tourism Organization (WTO) General Assembly. He said EU nations were talking with the Chinese Government in the hope they could attract the growing numbers of Chinese outbound tourists as soon as possible. Galati said many EU nations, including Italy, had accelerated training of Chinese-speaking guides and restaurants were offering more Chinese cuisine. Last year, Germany became the first EU nation to gain ADS. The first Chinese tourist group set out for Germany on Feb. 15 this year. [/rquoter]
ADS, for I understand, is a mechanism by which the Chinese government intends to facilitate Chinese citizens who otherwise can't afford to travel abroad *individually*, through the works of travel agency. Here's your initial question: A conversational A.I. that I am, I didn't see your usages of singular verb "Is" and singular subject "average Chinese citizen" were actually referring to Chinese *collectively* or *in groups*. My apologize for not getting your poetic license. I guarantee if you are looking for something to bash CCP, there are plenty of topics you can dig out, which I may be even more outraged at CCP than you are. Restriction by CCP on Chinese to travel abroad on individual basis is not something you could find beef with. I'd agree with you if it were more than 15 years ago. Not the case any more. You don't have to believe one word I said, you can ask any Chinese in U.S. who's on visa which side poses the restriction on his/her travelling to U.S. From this related site: http://www.danwei.org/archives/001129.html
The problem I see with your posts on China is that you overly reply upon scholarly quotes, TV programs and internet searches. Being somewhat nerdish myself, I don't fault you on that. The thing is though, it would help your understanding of China tremondously if you actually have regular conversations with Chinese in your area. Frankly, I find some of your *facts* about China are laughable, no disrepect intended.
This is a wonderful example of backing down without backing down. You have yet to even see any of the scholarly articles of which I speak and already you feel qualified to dismiss them as laughable. I'm talking about going to the Rice University library to get source materiel. The average modern individual in China is about as qualified to discuss the Mandate of Heaven as is the average modern Italian to discuss the Rape of the Sabine Women. The proof of the eating is in the pudding. Either take a bite or say no thank you.
Ottoman; Wnes emailed me and wanted to apologize for not being able to continue the debate with you on this thread or end it on a sound note. Unfortunately he got the boot from Clutch BBS and won't be able to post. He didn't want to give you the impression that he was cutting and running because I think he enjoyed the discussion. I will be happy to relay a message to him if you want.
