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The chinese want this. They have no problem understanding the logic of: There are so many people in China, how are we otherwise going to prevent crimes. It's th

by hkon 10y ago

The chinese want this. They have no problem understanding the logic of: There are so many people in China, how are we otherwise going to prevent crimes. It's the same explanation for everything bad that the government over there does. I have talked to dozens of chinese people about this, always same answers.

smallnamespace 10y ago
Have you ever considered the possibility that China's society and norms differ markedly from what you're used to, and that they might have a point? Sounds pretty presumptuous for a person who's (I assume) never lived in China to claim that they know what's good for the Chinese better than the Chinese themselves do. In particular, political elites and bureacratic, centralized government arise exactly because high populations densities and large populations lead to conflicts that require specialized decisionmakers to resolve. That's why scattered bands of hunter gatherers don't create formal governments, but cities and large countries do.
- hkon 10y ago
  As westerners we honor free speech and we do not like censorship. We do not like torture or political imprisonment. I was offering my experience in discussing these issues with chinese people of whom I know a lot. Part of my point was to bring forth the fact that stuff we automatically think of as bad, is pretty much a non-issue for the chinese, because to them it makes sense. Human rights, democracy and free speech is better than oppression.
  - smallnamespace 10y ago
    Do you think that the Chinese people you talk to are wrong then, and that the Chinese should wholeheartedly adopt Western values, or that people in each society should find solutions that make sense in terms of their own historical development and cultural norms? I'd like to remind you that the track record of simply imposing a formal Western model of governance (with a written Constitution, laws, elections, the whole shebang) on societies that are used to other ways of doing things hasn't tended worked out very well -- e.g. Iraq or Afghanistan.
    - hkon 10y ago
      Yes, I think they are wrong. I understand your point, but not your intention. Cultures are different. Some cultures are better than others. I think western culture is the best and I would like everyone to experience the same freedoms we do.
      - smallnamespace 10y ago
        > I think western culture is the best I thought that Westerners finally agreed that cultural imperialism is bad? Yet here you are proclaiming the superiority of Western culture over all other cultures. It's wrong to judge another culture without having lived in it yourself for some time. I don't even mean this on a just moral level, but simply on a practical one -- if you've never lived somewhere, how do you know if their society works well or not? It's very easy to get incorrect impressions from news or talking to people.
        hkon 10y ago
        Of course we can judge, we even have some standardized criterias to use. Adherence to the basic human rights as laid out by the UN. I would say any society who adheres the closest to the human rights is the best. The further away, the lower rank it has. I don't have to live somewhere for an extended period of time to make judgements based on established "best practises" for human societies.
        smallnamespace 10y ago
        Human rights is largely a Western idea [1] and the UN was founded, dominated, and run largely by Western nations (Russia is sort of half-way between East and West in that sense), so your argument reduces to 'any society that best adheres to Western political and social norms is the best'. You may even be correct that Western norms are objectively the best way to run a society. It just seems to me that you're remarkably unwilling to analyze or challenge your own cultural biases and assumptions even a little bit, even though that careful, rational analysis is very much part of Western culture. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights#16th.E2.80.9318th_century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights#16th.E2.80.9318th...

by hkon 10y ago

smallnamespace 10y ago

Have you ever considered the possibility that China's society and norms differ markedly from what you're used to, and that they might have a point? Sounds pretty presumptuous for a person who's (I assume) never lived in China to claim that they know what's good for the Chinese better than the Chinese themselves do. In particular, political elites and bureacratic, centralized government arise exactly because high populations densities and large populations lead to conflicts that require specialized decisionmakers to resolve. That's why scattered bands of hunter gatherers don't create formal governments, but cities and large countries do.

hkon 10y ago
As westerners we honor free speech and we do not like censorship. We do not like torture or political imprisonment. I was offering my experience in discussing these issues with chinese people of whom I know a lot. Part of my point was to bring forth the fact that stuff we automatically think of as bad, is pretty much a non-issue for the chinese, because to them it makes sense. Human rights, democracy and free speech is better than oppression.
- smallnamespace 10y ago
  Do you think that the Chinese people you talk to are wrong then, and that the Chinese should wholeheartedly adopt Western values, or that people in each society should find solutions that make sense in terms of their own historical development and cultural norms? I'd like to remind you that the track record of simply imposing a formal Western model of governance (with a written Constitution, laws, elections, the whole shebang) on societies that are used to other ways of doing things hasn't tended worked out very well -- e.g. Iraq or Afghanistan.
  - hkon 10y ago
    Yes, I think they are wrong. I understand your point, but not your intention. Cultures are different. Some cultures are better than others. I think western culture is the best and I would like everyone to experience the same freedoms we do.
    - smallnamespace 10y ago
      > I think western culture is the best I thought that Westerners finally agreed that cultural imperialism is bad? Yet here you are proclaiming the superiority of Western culture over all other cultures. It's wrong to judge another culture without having lived in it yourself for some time. I don't even mean this on a just moral level, but simply on a practical one -- if you've never lived somewhere, how do you know if their society works well or not? It's very easy to get incorrect impressions from news or talking to people.
      - hkon 10y ago
        Of course we can judge, we even have some standardized criterias to use. Adherence to the basic human rights as laid out by the UN. I would say any society who adheres the closest to the human rights is the best. The further away, the lower rank it has. I don't have to live somewhere for an extended period of time to make judgements based on established "best practises" for human societies.
        smallnamespace 10y ago
        Human rights is largely a Western idea [1] and the UN was founded, dominated, and run largely by Western nations (Russia is sort of half-way between East and West in that sense), so your argument reduces to 'any society that best adheres to Western political and social norms is the best'. You may even be correct that Western norms are objectively the best way to run a society. It just seems to me that you're remarkably unwilling to analyze or challenge your own cultural biases and assumptions even a little bit, even though that careful, rational analysis is very much part of Western culture. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights#16th.E2.80.9318th_century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights#16th.E2.80.9318th...