6 ms·

I made the same roundabout point below but I feared coming across sinophobic.

babyslothzoo 8y ago
I know. But acknowledging that some glorified voodoo like Traditional Chinese Medicine is singlehandedly driving many species to extinction is merely acknowledging a well known fact. Anyway, I lived in China for a while. The sale of endangered species is rampant and in open display all over the country. TCM is still a huge part of culture for much of the population, arguably more so than ever with the growing middle class. Even something as nonsensical as bear bile cough drops are as routine to many as something like taking Dayquil is to a westerner.
- droithomme 8y ago
  Your post is sinophobic and racist because it's not based in facts but rather on your desire to push a false narrative. Komodos are NOT used in TCM at all, ever, end of story. I'll pay you $150,000 for proof Komodos are being shipped to China for use in TCM. Accept or deny within 12 hrs of my post with your financial information and binding contractual agreement because if you fail to deliver proof you get to pay me $100,000. It's a fair wager since you are so incredibly confident the inane and vile racism you spout are facts. Put up or shut up. If you have proof I'll pay you and apologize and I'll even come to wherever you are and wash and detail your car. Accept? I don't know who is stealing Komodos. Based on the price it's probably not the redneck meth makers who keep pitbulls and mountain lions. I'd suspect Saudi Arabians and UAE and Kuwait folks who love to keep bad-ass animals. In their case the animal will have a comfy life but that doesn't mean it's what's best for the animal and it's probably not. edit: massive downvoting and flagging. Rather than a super easy $150,000 pay out if parent post can prove his extremist racist claims. Flagging and downvoting instead of proof. It's what I expected. The offer stands. And why does HN allow racism like parent post to stand when it can't even provide proof when are called out and highly incentivized to document their racist claims.
  - dang 8y ago
    I appreciate your desire to prevent HN from sinking into that kind of conflict, prejudice, and shaming—but breaking the site guidelines yourself is no way to go about it. We ban accounts that break the guidelines regardless of which side they're on, and actually regardless of whether they're right or not. Being right doesn't help; it actually makes it worse, because right flames burn more intensely than wrong ones. So can you please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html, follow the rules, and not post anything more like the above to this site?
- mikekchar 8y ago
  Keep in mind that Europeans have hunted species to extinction simply for hats. People are people. Where I live in Japan, the Japanese worlf is extinct (less than 100 years ago). The Japanese river otter is extinct (only about 15 years ago). The river eel (unagi) is going extinct and so the price at the restaurant has gone up like crazy (like about $60 for a single eel). Let me emphasize: everybody knows it is going extinct and yet they are still eating it. You've got blue fin tuna being sold at auction for $3 million for a single tuna -- because it is going extinct. And before you say, "Oh those pesky Japanese people don't care about the environment", these are the things I know about because I happen to live here. Before I moved the US removed quotas from Pacific salmon in retaliation for Canadian softwood lumber prices! The idea was to destroy the fish stocks so that the Canadian fishing industry would be hurt and they would agree to increase prices for softwood lumber. It took something like 10 years for the returning salmon counts on Vancouver island to recover. We (collectively) suck at this stuff. The more we point our fingers at those pesky Chinese or those pesky Japanese or those pesky Portuguese (don't get me started about the Grand Banks) or those pesky Americans, the more we abandon the idea that we need to work together.
  - crushcrashcrush 8y ago
    Many of the examples you cite are used as foods. It’s at least somewhat useful. Rinho horn, bear bile, etc is not functional in any way (except perhaps wealth signaling) and the sooner we shame the Chinese (and other cultures, including our own - big game hunting, hello!) the better the world will be.
    - yeukhon 8y ago
      I think you have a very negative view about the Chinese. Shame the Chinese? Excuse me?
      - crushcrashcrush 8y ago
        Would you shame someone who catcalls women? I’m shaming a culture who contributes to the distraction of endangered species. I don’t see the issue
- jrockway 8y ago
  > something as nonsensical as bear bile cough drops are as routine to many as something like taking Dayquil is to a westerner More and more studies I've read show that over-the-counter medicines often do nothing (the easy-to-sell sudafed replacement is the most obvious example), but we take them anyway. It's just as much nonsense as bear bile cough drops, just in a different form that seems normal to us. In the end, you're sick, and it doesn't make you get better or feel better. So nobody is really crazy here -- we are promised a cure, and really want one, so we try to believe because it's all we've got. Bear bile or phenylephrine... it's all the same.
  - tomrod 8y ago
    Most if not all OTC medicines I take seem to work. Perhaps you purchase brands with low quality?
    - Reelin 8y ago
      > Perhaps you purchase brands with low quality? In the US and EU, for pharmaceuticals, there is no such thing - these are very highly regulated markets in western countries. (Note: This statement does not apply to dietary supplements and other such un- or under- regulated items!)
    - astura 8y ago
      Specifically, many cold medicines aren't effective or the evidence of their effectiveness is lacking. https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/you-cant-beat-the-common-cold-and-thats-a-fact/ https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/you-cant-beat-the-common-co... https://www.cochrane.org/CD001831/ARI_over-the-counter-otc-medications-for-acute-cough-in-children-and-adults-in-community-settings https://www.cochrane.org/CD001831/ARI_over-the-counter-otc-m...
  - Reelin 8y ago
    > More and more studies I've read show that over-the-counter medicines often do nothing You make a fantastic claim but provide no evidence whatsoever. Counterpoint: diphenhydramine (aka Benadryl), ibprofan and other NSAIDs, clotrimazole and other antifungals, ... the list just keeps going. Admittedly, the Sudafed replacement (ie phenylephrine) is not nearly effective as the original (ie pseudoephedrine) for large segments of the population including myself. To that end, one of my favorite mock journal articles of all time is "A Simple and Convenient Synthesis of Pseudoephedrine From N-Methylamphetamine" (http://heterodoxy.cc/meowdocs/pseudo/pseudosynth.pdf http://heterodoxy.cc/meowdocs/pseudo/pseudosynth.pdf).

I know. But acknowledging that some glorified voodoo like Traditional Chinese Medicine is singlehandedly driving many species to extinction is merely acknowledging a well known fact. Anyway, I lived in China for a while. The sale of endangered species is rampant and in open display all over the country. TCM is still a huge part of culture for much of the population, arguably more so than ever with the growing middle class. Even something as nonsensical as bear bile cough drops are as routine to many as something like taking Dayquil is to a westerner.

droithomme 8y ago
Your post is sinophobic and racist because it's not based in facts but rather on your desire to push a false narrative. Komodos are NOT used in TCM at all, ever, end of story. I'll pay you $150,000 for proof Komodos are being shipped to China for use in TCM. Accept or deny within 12 hrs of my post with your financial information and binding contractual agreement because if you fail to deliver proof you get to pay me $100,000. It's a fair wager since you are so incredibly confident the inane and vile racism you spout are facts. Put up or shut up. If you have proof I'll pay you and apologize and I'll even come to wherever you are and wash and detail your car. Accept? I don't know who is stealing Komodos. Based on the price it's probably not the redneck meth makers who keep pitbulls and mountain lions. I'd suspect Saudi Arabians and UAE and Kuwait folks who love to keep bad-ass animals. In their case the animal will have a comfy life but that doesn't mean it's what's best for the animal and it's probably not. edit: massive downvoting and flagging. Rather than a super easy $150,000 pay out if parent post can prove his extremist racist claims. Flagging and downvoting instead of proof. It's what I expected. The offer stands. And why does HN allow racism like parent post to stand when it can't even provide proof when are called out and highly incentivized to document their racist claims.
- dang 8y ago
  I appreciate your desire to prevent HN from sinking into that kind of conflict, prejudice, and shaming—but breaking the site guidelines yourself is no way to go about it. We ban accounts that break the guidelines regardless of which side they're on, and actually regardless of whether they're right or not. Being right doesn't help; it actually makes it worse, because right flames burn more intensely than wrong ones. So can you please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html, follow the rules, and not post anything more like the above to this site?
mikekchar 8y ago
Keep in mind that Europeans have hunted species to extinction simply for hats. People are people. Where I live in Japan, the Japanese worlf is extinct (less than 100 years ago). The Japanese river otter is extinct (only about 15 years ago). The river eel (unagi) is going extinct and so the price at the restaurant has gone up like crazy (like about $60 for a single eel). Let me emphasize: everybody knows it is going extinct and yet they are still eating it. You've got blue fin tuna being sold at auction for $3 million for a single tuna -- because it is going extinct. And before you say, "Oh those pesky Japanese people don't care about the environment", these are the things I know about because I happen to live here. Before I moved the US removed quotas from Pacific salmon in retaliation for Canadian softwood lumber prices! The idea was to destroy the fish stocks so that the Canadian fishing industry would be hurt and they would agree to increase prices for softwood lumber. It took something like 10 years for the returning salmon counts on Vancouver island to recover. We (collectively) suck at this stuff. The more we point our fingers at those pesky Chinese or those pesky Japanese or those pesky Portuguese (don't get me started about the Grand Banks) or those pesky Americans, the more we abandon the idea that we need to work together.
- crushcrashcrush 8y ago
  Many of the examples you cite are used as foods. It’s at least somewhat useful. Rinho horn, bear bile, etc is not functional in any way (except perhaps wealth signaling) and the sooner we shame the Chinese (and other cultures, including our own - big game hunting, hello!) the better the world will be.
  - yeukhon 8y ago
    I think you have a very negative view about the Chinese. Shame the Chinese? Excuse me?
    - crushcrashcrush 8y ago
      Would you shame someone who catcalls women? I’m shaming a culture who contributes to the distraction of endangered species. I don’t see the issue
jrockway 8y ago
> something as nonsensical as bear bile cough drops are as routine to many as something like taking Dayquil is to a westerner More and more studies I've read show that over-the-counter medicines often do nothing (the easy-to-sell sudafed replacement is the most obvious example), but we take them anyway. It's just as much nonsense as bear bile cough drops, just in a different form that seems normal to us. In the end, you're sick, and it doesn't make you get better or feel better. So nobody is really crazy here -- we are promised a cure, and really want one, so we try to believe because it's all we've got. Bear bile or phenylephrine... it's all the same.
- tomrod 8y ago
  Most if not all OTC medicines I take seem to work. Perhaps you purchase brands with low quality?
  - Reelin 8y ago
    > Perhaps you purchase brands with low quality? In the US and EU, for pharmaceuticals, there is no such thing - these are very highly regulated markets in western countries. (Note: This statement does not apply to dietary supplements and other such un- or under- regulated items!)
  - astura 8y ago
    Specifically, many cold medicines aren't effective or the evidence of their effectiveness is lacking. https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/you-cant-beat-the-common-cold-and-thats-a-fact/ https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/you-cant-beat-the-common-co... https://www.cochrane.org/CD001831/ARI_over-the-counter-otc-medications-for-acute-cough-in-children-and-adults-in-community-settings https://www.cochrane.org/CD001831/ARI_over-the-counter-otc-m...
- Reelin 8y ago
  > More and more studies I've read show that over-the-counter medicines often do nothing You make a fantastic claim but provide no evidence whatsoever. Counterpoint: diphenhydramine (aka Benadryl), ibprofan and other NSAIDs, clotrimazole and other antifungals, ... the list just keeps going. Admittedly, the Sudafed replacement (ie phenylephrine) is not nearly effective as the original (ie pseudoephedrine) for large segments of the population including myself. To that end, one of my favorite mock journal articles of all time is "A Simple and Convenient Synthesis of Pseudoephedrine From N-Methylamphetamine" (http://heterodoxy.cc/meowdocs/pseudo/pseudosynth.pdf http://heterodoxy.cc/meowdocs/pseudo/pseudosynth.pdf).