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I miss the Internet in early-2000's China. Not as many sites were blocked and everyone was much more open-minded as the undereducated chauvinists did not yet ac

I miss the Internet in early-2000's China. Not as many sites were blocked and everyone was much more open-minded as the undereducated chauvinists did not yet acquire reliable Internet access. Nowadays everyone has a smartphone and it has enabled the chauvinists and other radicals to voice their opinions online, only this time they are actually emboldened by the nation which has risen in the last 30 years to become a serious competitor against the current superpower nation that is the US. China has achieved amazing progress thanks to market reforms and entrepreneurship but certain aspects are continuously regressing under Xi's term which will last for the forseeable future. Private sector confidence is at an all-time low due to state media editorials calling for more state control and boosting state-owned corporations. There has been more and more censorship orders aimed at reducing "Western influence" regardless of whether they are politics-related. More and more Chinese citizens are travelling abroad yet their beliefs in the "Chinese system" only gets re-affirmed by mistakenly thinking that China's success is completely dependent on authoritarianism. I don't agree with fervently supporting the current regime which is oppressive, brutal, antidemocratic, and still corrupt; nor do I agree with painting an entire nation and its people as some sort of evil reincarnate for the sake of a new Cold War. I don't have the knowledge or capability to offer a solution and I am just overall disappointed at the current state of affairs.

seanmcdirmid 8y ago
It was “different” back then. CNN was blocked in 2002 but New York Times wasn’t. One of the reasons I started reading the New York Times actually. The internet was much more open in 2008 than 2002 (neither nytimes or cnn or anything else major was blocked), but after the olympics China reversed course. Most major news sites are now blocked, but unlike 2002, CNN isn’t. Go figure. I think the high point of Chinese liberalization in recent history must have been the late 80s, but that is pre-internet.
- hangonhn 8y ago
  Wait, 1989 was not a good year for Chinese liberalization... I think the high point was really under Hu Jintao. The transition from Hu to Xi was a very tumultuous period. Xi, unlike his predecessors, had a very contentious transition and had to fend off numerous fractions inside the CCCP. After surviving that, based partly on the backing of the PLA (his father was a PLA general), he really, really consolidated power. He now has a path forward to be president for life. His ideas are now literally part of the Chinese constitution, elevating him to the same level as Mao. Liberalization is, in some ways, the opposite of centralization. Therefore, liberalization must be stemmed. Hu Jintao, on the other hand, didn't really have that much power. There was always Jiang and his fraction. When power is divested, liberalization is more likely.
  - ssnistfajen 8y ago
    Agreed that 2008-2012 was relatively much more liberal. Hosting the Olympics boosted China's confidence as a prosperous and prominent nation on the world stage. There were growing grass root movements against corruption and restrictive cultural policies. Technology tools available around that time were not sophisticated enough to effectively carry out censorship. Google had quit the Mainland Chinese market but most of their services were still accessible without VPNs (which were easily obtainable and almost always worked with minimal tweaks) via google.com.hk. Weibo was filled with great social commentary and critique. It got optimistic enough that some individuals hoped that Xi Jinping as the incoming president will actually carry out political liberalization. Obviously it did not take long for him to show his true colours.
  - seanmcdirmid 8y ago
    You have to understand the liberalization that led up to June 4th 1989 was pretty unprecedented. That it resulted in a horrible knee jerk is really sad. China was liberalizing at an unprecedented rate in the 80s, to the point that the government didn't immediately react when a bunch of students gathered in Tiananmen square to protest. That could not have happened in 2008 and definitely not 2012. Hu Jintao was not a reformer, not even close. Power was divested for sure, but the general direction of his reign was a show of opening before the olympics and then quick repression. Xi consolidated power, but did not "reverse course" on liberalization, it was already going in that direction.
- DenisM 8y ago
  >but after the olympics China reversed course This also happened in Russia 4 years and in Germany in 1936. It seems like the prestige of the upcoming games is holding the tide of authoritarian rule, which then surges unrestrained.
  - lostlogin 8y ago
    “Holding the games in China magnifies everything that is wrong with Olympic sports: the triumph of money, power and nationalism over amateurism, sportsmanship and international understanding.” I don’t think this quote relates to China alone. And more recently, Brazil seems to be taking some dangerous turns. https://isthmus.com/opinion/opinion/the-totalitarian-olympics/ https://isthmus.com/opinion/opinion/the-totalitarian-olympic...
sonnyblarney 8y ago
"More and more Chinese citizens are travelling abroad yet their beliefs in the "Chinese system" only gets re-affirmed by mistakenly thinking that China's success is completely dependent on authoritarianism." This is by far the scariest part. Even people who knowingly try to 'escape the system' still support it, as though 'the party = China'. I believe this problem exists a little bit in Europe where so many believe the EU = Europe, they use the terms interchangeably.
- baby 8y ago
  I think a lot of people (including me) want China to join the club of first world countries, not just economically, but also in terms of respect of human rights. How do you get there? By banning chinese products and heavily penalizing them? Or by inviting them to get their people richer and more educated? There's actually a very interesting kurzgesagt video on the subject: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvskMHn0sqQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvskMHn0sqQ
  - educationdata 8y ago
    "I think a lot of people (including me) want China to join the club of first world countries, not just economically, but also in terms of respect of human rights. " -- Really? A lot? I don't think so. My experience is Chinese middle class rarely care about human rights issues. Most of them are extremely cold blood. As long as their own family is not hurt, they don't care about human rights issues at all. As long as they can get rich and stay rich, they will praise the authoritarian regime.
    - lostlogin 8y ago
      I didn’t read baby’s comment as meaning a lot of Chinese people want better human rights in China, I read it as a lot of people everywhere want that.
      - baby 8y ago
        This is what I meant, thanks.
AndrewKemendo 8y ago
I miss the Internet in early-2000's China. Not as many sites were blocked and everyone was much more open-minded as the undereducated chauvinists did not yet acquire reliable Internet access This sentiment is just Eternal September for the Internet writ large. It also over-blows/cherry picks the "bad" activities on the internet. Those "undereducated chauvinists" pay for us techies to actually make a living through the internet because they use the services we build. Gotta take the bad with the good.
analyst74 8y ago
I mostly agree with your points and sentiment, although I do want to offer a few things I observed to compliment your post. China evolved from generally pro-west in the 1990s to mixed pro/anti western camps of today. The early pro-west stance were mostly driven by intellectuals who have seen the stark contrast between capitalist America and communist China. They worshiped everything American, both good and bad. You can still see the lingering effect of western worship in many aspects of Chinese society today. The pro-west stance is losing ground because people are no longer starving, and realized that they don't like to be treated as second class citizens, especially in their own country. Sometimes the backlash has swung the pendulum too far and caused some resentment towards foreigners. To end it in a brighter note, I think the populace of China is becoming more aware of nuances of things outside of China, thanks to large amount of Chinese people returning to the homeland after living abroad. This will help prevent the pendulum from swinging too far into nationalism/anti-foreigner nazi state.
- DenisM 8y ago
  > hey don't like to be treated as second class citizens, especially in their own country Which form did that take? Were there westerners living in China treating locals like second-class citizens?
  - analyst74 8y ago
    Some foreigners might have a little bit of superiority complex, but it's mostly coming from other Chinese treating foreigners better, due to foreign worship and in some cases institutional rules favoring foreigners, although the later is becoming rare. Just to give a few examples: - up until late 2000s, border customs dedicated extra manpower to make entering China easier for foreigners, while Chinese citizens returning home are stuck in long lines. - not sure about now, but for a period of time, foreigners get preferential treatment in the police system, as in, crimes against foreigners gets more attention, and foreigner committing crimes gets more lenient treatment. - foreigners sometimes get paid significantly more than locals, especially in the education system, this is still true today.
    - 8y ago
yurlungur 8y ago
Funny that I have the same feelings for aspects of the outside internet, such as "the old 4chan." But then I think that's like celebrating an echo chamber of sorts. Bigoted and stupid people (or people that I disagree with strongly) weren't invented by access to public platforms, they always existed.
showbufire 8y ago
Speaking as a Chinese working in the States >>> More and more Chinese citizens are travelling abroad yet their beliefs in the "Chinese system" only gets re-affirmed by mistakenly thinking that China's success is completely dependent on authoritarianism Not true, most of the well educated people won't have this simplified view of any political system. It's actually the reverse you see very common in the Western media, that China being a non-democratic nation, is an evil and destined to fail.
- shdh 8y ago
  Define well educated. I’ve met highly intelligent university students from China who did believe in the Chinese system and authoritarian regime. The west highlights the authoritarian nature of China, not the fact that it is non-democratic.
zozbot123 8y ago
The lesson of the "Chinese system" is that the average guy will happily support an arguably "oppressive, brutal, antidemocratic, and ... corrupt" government if it's the one option that keeps delivering continued economic growth and development-- there's very little use for being properly "democratic" when you lack the other prerequisites of strong growth. (To be sure, these do include things like a robust civil society, but 'civil society' can take many forms - and Chinese society isn't exactly known for its lack of guanxi!) Authoritarian governments are a dime a dozen outside the developed West (and this is with many of them being outwardly democratic), so there's no way that this is the 'key issue' that so many fans of 'Western values' want it to be. Like it or not, the Chinese leadership is definitely doing something right.
- blackstrips 8y ago
  It works until the gravy train stops then you have a problem. Democracy has many problems but it’s fairly robust vs discontent. Got a problem? Try to vote out the people you believe caused it. It keeps violent overthrows at bay - most of the time.
  - chillacy 8y ago
    Yea the most clever part about democracy is that the system builds political revolution right into it, so no matter who is in charge the system stays.
- ksec 8y ago
  I see it very differently, the lesson of Chinese System is that everyone will only work for this own interest. Especially the Chinese. And will be precisely why we have democracy in the first place. To balance the interest of all parties. Once the average guy no longer get the benefits from the Chinese System, they will, like any other system, revolt. Although I am not sure if this will happen in my life time.
  - zozbot123 8y ago
    "Everyone will only work for their own interest" when they're poor and underdeveloped, and especially when the stakes (becoming a fully-developed country vs. getting stuck in the middle-income trap like so many other places in the world) are so high. There's very little that's surprising about that. But to talk about "balancing the interests of all parties" is a distraction at present. Growing the pie is still the priority in people's minds, splitting it in a properly "balanced" way can happen later.
Tsubasachan 8y ago
And this is a problem how? The only people who get to decide what China does are the Chinese people themselves. If they are happy with it that's all that matters.

seanmcdirmid 8y ago

It was “different” back then. CNN was blocked in 2002 but New York Times wasn’t. One of the reasons I started reading the New York Times actually. The internet was much more open in 2008 than 2002 (neither nytimes or cnn or anything else major was blocked), but after the olympics China reversed course. Most major news sites are now blocked, but unlike 2002, CNN isn’t. Go figure. I think the high point of Chinese liberalization in recent history must have been the late 80s, but that is pre-internet.

hangonhn 8y ago
Wait, 1989 was not a good year for Chinese liberalization... I think the high point was really under Hu Jintao. The transition from Hu to Xi was a very tumultuous period. Xi, unlike his predecessors, had a very contentious transition and had to fend off numerous fractions inside the CCCP. After surviving that, based partly on the backing of the PLA (his father was a PLA general), he really, really consolidated power. He now has a path forward to be president for life. His ideas are now literally part of the Chinese constitution, elevating him to the same level as Mao. Liberalization is, in some ways, the opposite of centralization. Therefore, liberalization must be stemmed. Hu Jintao, on the other hand, didn't really have that much power. There was always Jiang and his fraction. When power is divested, liberalization is more likely.
- ssnistfajen 8y ago
  Agreed that 2008-2012 was relatively much more liberal. Hosting the Olympics boosted China's confidence as a prosperous and prominent nation on the world stage. There were growing grass root movements against corruption and restrictive cultural policies. Technology tools available around that time were not sophisticated enough to effectively carry out censorship. Google had quit the Mainland Chinese market but most of their services were still accessible without VPNs (which were easily obtainable and almost always worked with minimal tweaks) via google.com.hk. Weibo was filled with great social commentary and critique. It got optimistic enough that some individuals hoped that Xi Jinping as the incoming president will actually carry out political liberalization. Obviously it did not take long for him to show his true colours.
- seanmcdirmid 8y ago
  You have to understand the liberalization that led up to June 4th 1989 was pretty unprecedented. That it resulted in a horrible knee jerk is really sad. China was liberalizing at an unprecedented rate in the 80s, to the point that the government didn't immediately react when a bunch of students gathered in Tiananmen square to protest. That could not have happened in 2008 and definitely not 2012. Hu Jintao was not a reformer, not even close. Power was divested for sure, but the general direction of his reign was a show of opening before the olympics and then quick repression. Xi consolidated power, but did not "reverse course" on liberalization, it was already going in that direction.
DenisM 8y ago
>but after the olympics China reversed course This also happened in Russia 4 years and in Germany in 1936. It seems like the prestige of the upcoming games is holding the tide of authoritarian rule, which then surges unrestrained.
- lostlogin 8y ago
  “Holding the games in China magnifies everything that is wrong with Olympic sports: the triumph of money, power and nationalism over amateurism, sportsmanship and international understanding.” I don’t think this quote relates to China alone. And more recently, Brazil seems to be taking some dangerous turns. https://isthmus.com/opinion/opinion/the-totalitarian-olympics/ https://isthmus.com/opinion/opinion/the-totalitarian-olympic...

sonnyblarney 8y ago

"More and more Chinese citizens are travelling abroad yet their beliefs in the "Chinese system" only gets re-affirmed by mistakenly thinking that China's success is completely dependent on authoritarianism." This is by far the scariest part. Even people who knowingly try to 'escape the system' still support it, as though 'the party = China'. I believe this problem exists a little bit in Europe where so many believe the EU = Europe, they use the terms interchangeably.

baby 8y ago
I think a lot of people (including me) want China to join the club of first world countries, not just economically, but also in terms of respect of human rights. How do you get there? By banning chinese products and heavily penalizing them? Or by inviting them to get their people richer and more educated? There's actually a very interesting kurzgesagt video on the subject: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvskMHn0sqQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvskMHn0sqQ
- educationdata 8y ago
  "I think a lot of people (including me) want China to join the club of first world countries, not just economically, but also in terms of respect of human rights. " -- Really? A lot? I don't think so. My experience is Chinese middle class rarely care about human rights issues. Most of them are extremely cold blood. As long as their own family is not hurt, they don't care about human rights issues at all. As long as they can get rich and stay rich, they will praise the authoritarian regime.
  - lostlogin 8y ago
    I didn’t read baby’s comment as meaning a lot of Chinese people want better human rights in China, I read it as a lot of people everywhere want that.
    - baby 8y ago
      This is what I meant, thanks.

AndrewKemendo 8y ago

I miss the Internet in early-2000's China. Not as many sites were blocked and everyone was much more open-minded as the undereducated chauvinists did not yet acquire reliable Internet access This sentiment is just Eternal September for the Internet writ large. It also over-blows/cherry picks the "bad" activities on the internet. Those "undereducated chauvinists" pay for us techies to actually make a living through the internet because they use the services we build. Gotta take the bad with the good.

analyst74 8y ago

I mostly agree with your points and sentiment, although I do want to offer a few things I observed to compliment your post. China evolved from generally pro-west in the 1990s to mixed pro/anti western camps of today. The early pro-west stance were mostly driven by intellectuals who have seen the stark contrast between capitalist America and communist China. They worshiped everything American, both good and bad. You can still see the lingering effect of western worship in many aspects of Chinese society today. The pro-west stance is losing ground because people are no longer starving, and realized that they don't like to be treated as second class citizens, especially in their own country. Sometimes the backlash has swung the pendulum too far and caused some resentment towards foreigners. To end it in a brighter note, I think the populace of China is becoming more aware of nuances of things outside of China, thanks to large amount of Chinese people returning to the homeland after living abroad. This will help prevent the pendulum from swinging too far into nationalism/anti-foreigner nazi state.

DenisM 8y ago
> hey don't like to be treated as second class citizens, especially in their own country Which form did that take? Were there westerners living in China treating locals like second-class citizens?
- analyst74 8y ago
  Some foreigners might have a little bit of superiority complex, but it's mostly coming from other Chinese treating foreigners better, due to foreign worship and in some cases institutional rules favoring foreigners, although the later is becoming rare. Just to give a few examples: - up until late 2000s, border customs dedicated extra manpower to make entering China easier for foreigners, while Chinese citizens returning home are stuck in long lines. - not sure about now, but for a period of time, foreigners get preferential treatment in the police system, as in, crimes against foreigners gets more attention, and foreigner committing crimes gets more lenient treatment. - foreigners sometimes get paid significantly more than locals, especially in the education system, this is still true today.
  - 8y ago

yurlungur 8y ago

Funny that I have the same feelings for aspects of the outside internet, such as "the old 4chan." But then I think that's like celebrating an echo chamber of sorts. Bigoted and stupid people (or people that I disagree with strongly) weren't invented by access to public platforms, they always existed.

showbufire 8y ago

Speaking as a Chinese working in the States >>> More and more Chinese citizens are travelling abroad yet their beliefs in the "Chinese system" only gets re-affirmed by mistakenly thinking that China's success is completely dependent on authoritarianism Not true, most of the well educated people won't have this simplified view of any political system. It's actually the reverse you see very common in the Western media, that China being a non-democratic nation, is an evil and destined to fail.

shdh 8y ago
Define well educated. I’ve met highly intelligent university students from China who did believe in the Chinese system and authoritarian regime. The west highlights the authoritarian nature of China, not the fact that it is non-democratic.

zozbot123 8y ago

The lesson of the "Chinese system" is that the average guy will happily support an arguably "oppressive, brutal, antidemocratic, and ... corrupt" government if it's the one option that keeps delivering continued economic growth and development-- there's very little use for being properly "democratic" when you lack the other prerequisites of strong growth. (To be sure, these do include things like a robust civil society, but 'civil society' can take many forms - and Chinese society isn't exactly known for its lack of guanxi!) Authoritarian governments are a dime a dozen outside the developed West (and this is with many of them being outwardly democratic), so there's no way that this is the 'key issue' that so many fans of 'Western values' want it to be. Like it or not, the Chinese leadership is definitely doing something right.

blackstrips 8y ago
It works until the gravy train stops then you have a problem. Democracy has many problems but it’s fairly robust vs discontent. Got a problem? Try to vote out the people you believe caused it. It keeps violent overthrows at bay - most of the time.
- chillacy 8y ago
  Yea the most clever part about democracy is that the system builds political revolution right into it, so no matter who is in charge the system stays.
ksec 8y ago
I see it very differently, the lesson of Chinese System is that everyone will only work for this own interest. Especially the Chinese. And will be precisely why we have democracy in the first place. To balance the interest of all parties. Once the average guy no longer get the benefits from the Chinese System, they will, like any other system, revolt. Although I am not sure if this will happen in my life time.
- zozbot123 8y ago
  "Everyone will only work for their own interest" when they're poor and underdeveloped, and especially when the stakes (becoming a fully-developed country vs. getting stuck in the middle-income trap like so many other places in the world) are so high. There's very little that's surprising about that. But to talk about "balancing the interests of all parties" is a distraction at present. Growing the pie is still the priority in people's minds, splitting it in a properly "balanced" way can happen later.

Tsubasachan 8y ago

And this is a problem how? The only people who get to decide what China does are the Chinese people themselves. If they are happy with it that's all that matters.