8 ms·

To Many Chinese, America Was Like ‘Heaven.’ Now They’re Not So Sure

68 points by cfarm 7y ago

siedes 7y ago
Maybe it's a good thing. Moving away from seeing America as an economic goldrush where everyone can come and "get theirs", and more toward a place where people actually live in. This is my home, not an all you can eat buffet. If America cannot take care of its own poor and suffering, what are we doing trying to take care of the entire world?
- intopieces 7y ago
  Prosperity is not a zero-sum game whereby more Chinese success in America means less success for the native born. The is nativist/nationalist myopia. A waning respect for America illustrates that America has failed to make the case for western values to the Chinese people — open democracy, religious and cultural tolerance, etc — and we risk losing ground in other areas of the world (The African continent, for example).
  - snaky 7y ago
    > Europeans, along with Canadians and Mexicans, are the most skeptical that the U.S. government respects Americans’ freedoms. Majorities in Spain, Mexico, Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, France and Canada all say that the U.S. fails to respect the rights of its people. https://www.pewglobal.org/2018/10/01/americas-international-image-continues-to-suffer/ https://www.pewglobal.org/2018/10/01/americas-international-...
  - frozenport 7y ago
    Perhaps there is a disconnect between Chinese people believe and what they are allowed to express? For example, they may be allowed to express their pro-American views through consumer purchases but cannot express them in political terms due aggressive government censorship and repression?
  - whiddershins 7y ago
    How can we possibly make the case for Western values credibly when so many people in high profile positions in Academia, Politics, and Media openly call for abolishing them?
  - Arbalest 7y ago
    It isn't zero sum, technically. But in the world of investing, in order to get the gains that people are always gunning for, someone else has to lose. Otherwise no one could ever get more than however much the GDP grows at, assuming no population growth. I don't see how this is any different.
  - anthuman 7y ago
    Prosperity may not be a zero-sum game, but prosperity is a meaningless metric without understanding its association to power. Power is a zero sum game. During the 1800s both britain and the US became very prosperous. Unfortunately, our prosperity outstripped britain's prosperity and that power differential ultimately spelled the end for the british empire. Also, stop using "western values". It's an oft used propaganda nonsense hardly any intelligent person believes. Since when are "open democracy", "religious and cultural tolerance", etc "western values"? What about racism, genocide, nuking cities full of civilians? Human experimentation, rape of the environment, gluttony? Lets hope china doesn't adopt "western values" since the world doesn't need more of what happened to libya, iraq, syria, etc ( not to mention exterminating continents full of people ). Nativist/nationalist myopia is certainly a bad thing. But so is the pathetic globalist hippie myopia. As for the african continent, what they need is more nationalism. After all, nationalism is what made britain, france, US, germany, south korea, japan, china, etc wealthy and prosperous. What african countries need is are strong and stable governments willing to sacrifice for the good of their nations. Sadly, this means kicking out european parasites destabilizing their countries, it means getting rid of european bankers controlling their banking systems, it means taking control over their natural resources from european countries. Sadly, if any african country tried to take control over their destiny, europe would destroy the nation via sanctions, funding terrorists, etc.
  - deogeo 7y ago
    > Prosperity is not a zero-sum game But in many cases it's close to it. A company that reduces its expenses by 5% will eventually bankrupt its competitor that wasn't able to do so (all else being equal). A 5% contribution to efficiency allows it to take over 100% of another company's market. The success of a company is in a very large part determined by its competition - more competition means starting a new company is harder.
- gigatexal 7y ago
  In a few years hopefully we will have a different administration and will open our borders again to all especially those from countries where the regimes are oppressive like that of President Ping of China. I would welcome a liberal immigration policy. Talent is the next oil and America if it wants to stay vibrant and dominant in the world needs to be a place where the best of the best come — but not only the best, everyone else is welcome, too, because you never know what a good education and opportunity will do for an ambitious kid. Immigrants often start foundational companies that go on to employ you and me. But this administration is so xenophobic it is hurting America’s ability to be the melting pot of culture and ideas. Just as Facebook is having a hard time convincing top talent to join it I worry about America not being a place that the next Satya Nadella wants to immigrate to.
  - Fjolsvith 7y ago
    America actually has a pretty liberal immigration policy. The crackdown is on people who do not use the immigration system.
    - macintux 7y ago
      I’ll believe the crackdown is strictly about illegal immigration when our First Lady is shown the door.
      - sanxiyn 7y ago
        Why would First Lady be shown the door? Isn't marriage visa legal? I am in favor of prosecuting past visa violations but don't see the problem with current status.
        macintux 7y ago
        https://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/melania-trump-immigration-donald-226648 https://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/melania-trump-immigra...
    - gigatexal 7y ago
- closeparen 7y ago
  Chinese immigrants are not coming here to live on welfare, but to participate in the economy. That increased economic activity creates wealth with which we can help our own poor.
  - peter303 7y ago
    But they bring their parents which they often put on SSI ($800 a month) and other freebies. Trump immigration proposals would end this, but unlikely to pas.
    - Thorrez 7y ago
      Aren't they only eligible for SSI if they've worked in the US for 10 years?
- fellellor 7y ago
  You are not "taking care of the world". These people are not going there to be taken care of. They are there to exploit economic opportunities, for which they also make their own substantial contribution. Now that increased competition may create scarcity for natives, so you want to skew the market to favor yourself. Now I'm not saying that is wrong, but the absence of laws favoring native citizens shouldn't be framed as some great philanthropic sacrifice either.
- VvR-Ox 7y ago
  This is a typical hypothesis of the nazis in germany. The truth is somewhat more complex because it's our own governments who don't take care about their people despite having the money and the power. E.g. in germany the taxes for the richest got cut more and more over the last decade or so until there are some of those who don't pay anything at all. There is companies like Google, Facebook, Starbucks, Ikea etc. who nearly don't pay any taxes in countries like germany. On the other hand the citizens are forced to do labor without meaning and/or without enough wages to survive old age. If you have to retire in germany you are screwed if you had the wrong job nowadays - you see the retired collecting bottles and waste in the streets because they don't have enough for a good life anymore. If our governments would take care of the people which they definitely could we'd have more than enough to share with the people who have to flee our guns and bombs we sold to their enemies before (to give the earnings to the richest again).
- arcticbull 7y ago
  Sorry, America doesn’t want to take care of its own. There’s more than enough money around, more than enough space, more than enough resources. There’s no will. Not collectively, anyways. That’s got nothing to do with immigrants. Me first, mine second, community last, “the other” coming to treat America as an all you can eat buffet of social services is the enemy. Which is crazy because America doesn’t really, uh, have social services. Which I think was the point of your post.
AFascistWorld 7y ago
The officials and rich are always the smarter and informed ones, just look at where they put their families and wealth at, watch what they do rather than what they say.
- wrong_variable 7y ago
  Agreed, but having been to America - I think the assumptions made are slowly collapsing. The main assumption being that USA will protect your wealth much more than then the Chinese state, but I think that is changing ( for the better ). If suddenly Chinese HNWI are forced to redistribute their wealth among americans, they might realize its better to just have stayed in China.
  - AFascistWorld 7y ago
    >Chinese HNWI are forced to redistribute their wealth among americans I don't see that happen, but I'm seeing average minds are controlled more and more thoroughly with the assistance of modern tech, while the "woke" ones are rushing to America to give birth even if border officers told them they can no longer obtain US citizenship coz Trump said this or that. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2hBtXdaYsQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2hBtXdaYsQ
- alaskamiller 7y ago
  Vancouver, Melbourne, Silicon Valley
- elevenoh 7y ago
  >smarter? no >politically informed? yes. Many - guised in pretence - are playing a political/regulatory/economic zero-sum navigation game. ;)
siedes 7y ago
I respectfully disagree that waning respect for America in this context illustrates what you say it does. Chinese culture is fundamentally opposed to American culture, and those things you mention, open democracy, religious and cultural tolerance, etc. are expressions of American culture. What nations like China and various others respect about America is money, and how to make a lot of it even at the expense of American people and industry, all while laughing at how we live our lives and making a mockery of us. As a person of Asian descent and having lived amongst other non-American groups, I can say most do not want to live like Americans at all and often spit on "western values". They love our money but they don't give a damn about our democracy and cultural tolerance. Hate to say it, but it's for the most part accurate.
- homarp 7y ago
  but isn't that the first generation only ?
- mycall 7y ago
  If they spit on our western values, what do they love and embrace instead (aside from money)? I would think there are many universal values shared which is why our peoples are quite compatible.
- sho 7y ago
  > Hate to say it, but it's for the most part accurate I hate to say it too, but statements such as yours, filled with sweeping generalisations, oversimplifications and us-vs-them outgroup nonsense like they want to "spit on our values" usually turn out to be very very far from accurate, and indeed say more about the speaker than the subject at hand. Chip on your shoulder much? I'd like to think - and have generally observed - that 99% of people from anywhere are not in fact greedy sociopaths, but instead decent people trying to live good lives inside their own cultural and economic context.
  - siedes 7y ago
    For the good of the world, I hope you are right. I admit I did get a bit too passioniate in the earlier post.
ETHisso2017 7y ago
The love-hate relationship illustrated in the article has been around since at least 1999, when the US bombed the Chinese Embassy in Yugoslavia.
- Scoundreller 7y ago
  Just to be clear for everyone, you mean the one in Serbia. The former Yugoslavia footprint has several Chinese embassies.
  - Mediterraneo10 7y ago
    In 1999, there was only one Yugoslavia around: after the departure of the other republics, Serbia and Montenegro maintained the name "Federal Republic of Yugoslavia" for their country. The OP was correct in saying that the Chinese embassy in Yugoslavia was bombed. (Only later did they change the name to "Serbia and Montenegro", and it was only then that the name "Yugoslavia" disappeared.)
- onetimemanytime 7y ago
  One of Clinton's advisers (name escapes me) has written that from their basement the Serbian army was receiving instructions. When presented the evidence, China kinda shut up. maybe they didn't want to have their involvement be known or whatever. I don't think US bombed it by mistake
- anthuman 7y ago
  It started much earlier than that. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yangtze_Patrol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yangtze_Patrol And people forget that some of the largest mass lynchings were against the chinese. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_massacre_of_1871 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_massacre_of_1871 And the only anti-immigration bill to target a specific ethnic group was once again directed against the chinese. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Exclusion_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Exclusion_Act
ydb 7y ago
As an individual in a society, I am no more than an ant who serves her queen. Yet, each ant has a purpose, however small, to maintain the health and well-being of the colony. An ant lost is a tragedy, a colony lost is another step towards extinction. This is not the reality we live in. We are less than proverbial ants, we are grains of sand beat back ceaselessly into the past. We disintegrate, we stagnate; but for every tiny piece of sand extinguished, thousands more are borne out of the granite slabs of time. I admire the Chinese for awaking to the artificial construction of American exceptionalism. I only wish each nation's citizenry could use that same looking glass to peer within.
namelosw 7y ago
Personally, I want to keep myself neutral as a Chinese. But I think I can provide some interesting perspective from China, according to the order of timeline. I'm by no mean historian so errors and non-seriousness are expected, you can think of this as an OverSimplified[0] cartoon on Youtube: 0. China was a 3rd world communist country after WW2. 1. The Korean war broke out, USSR ordered China to strike back to maintain the iron curtain. China also worried about the border so it joined the war. The result of the war is basically a draw, but the border and iron curtain was 'saved'. 2. After the Korean war, China's self-confident increased, and sort of complaining USSR's control. Then these two countries start to hate each other. 3. Vietnam war, China also joined because of the alliance relationship. This time the North won. 4. Meanwhile, Nixon visited China. Since China was one of the promising countries could weaken the iron curtain. 5. 'Reform and Opening' started in China. 6. After the Vietnam war, Vietnam became very powerful. There was quite a risk Vietnam could unify the Indochina. China was in the middle of the USSR and Vietnam. This became embarrassing after China and USSR hated each other, and the USSR was keeping investing in Vietnam. Then there was another war broke out between China and Vietnam. Both of the countries claimed they were self-defending. There was also no winner, but Vietnam seems less dangerous in China's perspective. 7. Japan grows really fast in the 80s. China was just started to grow after the opening policy and found the importance of the economy growing. 8. After that, the US feels threatened, there were some economic sanctions going on. There was an essay 'The Japan That Can Say No' from Sony co-founder. But eventually, it seems Japan said yes for most of the time. 9. The Gulf War. The US almost beat Iraq in no time, and Iraq was actually pretty powerful at that time. According to the rumor, this made the Chinese military pretty shocked. After the Korean and Vietnam war, China was kind of self-overrated and reduced a lot of military margin in order to grow the economy. 10. According to 8 and 9, the US shaped a very powerful image to China, and China also realized it's not wise to like Japan which always be the 'yes man' or omitting the military advancement. So the competing mindset was already formed pretty early. But there was also "闷声发大财" according to the president Jiang at that time, which basically means don't let other people notice you while you are growing fast. Another interesting thing is about cultural defense. Korean TV series and K-pop was very popular in China, but the first Korean TV series was introduced by official TV Channel. There was some theory believe the US and Japan culture are very influential and hard to replace, so China tried to guide people to consume Korean (and also Thailand, etc, since Asian culture are easy to introduce) culture instead of from the US and Japan. And then in recent years, Korean TW series and K-pop is largely replaced by Chinese own products, which seems pretty similar. [0] https://www.youtube.com/user/Webzwithaz https://www.youtube.com/user/Webzwithaz
sanxiyn 7y ago
This is great. America never was a heaven. Before, people had false belief. Now, they have true belief. That is to be celebrated.
- chii 7y ago
  The Chinese word for America is "Měiguó", or literally "the beautiful country". To the common immigrant, it was sold as a country of opportunity and wealth.
  - luckylion 7y ago
    Is that beautiful as in "the landscape is beautiful" or as in "your life there will be beautiful"?
    - yorwba 7y ago
      It's just a phonetic loan (A-mei-rica) represented by a character with positive associations (they could also have chosen e.g. 没国 "without country", but that would've been impolite). Best not to read too much into it. England is called the country of heroes, France the country of law, Germany the country of virtue... people rarely pay attention to the literal meaning.
      - genghizkhan 7y ago
        Curiously, what is India called?
        yorwba 7y ago
        The word for India has been around for much longer, Wiktionary has an extensive section on the etymology: https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E5%8D%B0%E5%BA%A6#Chinese https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E5%8D%B0%E5%BA%A6#Chinese
    - AFascistWorld 7y ago
      Historically, going abroad means wealth and status, marrying whites ("ocean people") too, those who return with immense wealth and fanfare reinforce this notion, and it just so happens that the transliteration of "me" was the Chinese word "mei".
onetimemanytime 7y ago
For most Chinese, as long as they have their needs met, probably their system of government is fine. Some may know no better (historically the world wasn't democratic) and others might rationalize with "just don't insult the leaders /state and you're fine. Small price to pay"
ycombonator 7y ago
Another Chinese Regime sponsored psyop article.
zeristor 7y ago
Doesn’t this boil down to China having developing country status, being allowed to block imports? The issue being with China being so large, there are millions of people still quite, poor despite China being such a large industrial power, so there is some justification to it still being a developing country. I imagine the rules were written for smaller homogenous countries. Things work best when trade goes both ways.
- VvR-Ox 7y ago
  1. Basically every country can block imports and exports 2. Why does that make China a developing country? 3. That is the stuff we hear about here in the west. The truth is that never before so many people in China were so wealthy - millions got out of poverty a short time ago and there is some huge development going on. 4. The big orange shithead aka POTUS started the thing with the trade war (of course he does - he's still a bully)
  - deogeo 7y ago
    > 4. The big orange shithead aka POTUS started the thing with the trade war (of course he does - he's still a bully) China was heavily protectionist long before Trump, so it's very puzzling why so many believe he started it.
    - thrower123 7y ago
      People are startlingly ignorant, and the media has a vested interest in keeping them that way. China's default historical position has been protectionist to the point of exclusion, except when they have been coerced by war to open their markets.
baybal2 7y ago
It is a very interesting article to discuss, yet it sunk to page 3 so fast...

68 points by cfarm 7y ago

Maybe it's a good thing. Moving away from seeing America as an economic goldrush where everyone can come and "get theirs", and more toward a place where people actually live in. This is my home, not an all you can eat buffet. If America cannot take care of its own poor and suffering, what are we doing trying to take care of the entire world?

intopieces 7y ago
Prosperity is not a zero-sum game whereby more Chinese success in America means less success for the native born. The is nativist/nationalist myopia. A waning respect for America illustrates that America has failed to make the case for western values to the Chinese people — open democracy, religious and cultural tolerance, etc — and we risk losing ground in other areas of the world (The African continent, for example).
- snaky 7y ago
  > Europeans, along with Canadians and Mexicans, are the most skeptical that the U.S. government respects Americans’ freedoms. Majorities in Spain, Mexico, Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, France and Canada all say that the U.S. fails to respect the rights of its people. https://www.pewglobal.org/2018/10/01/americas-international-image-continues-to-suffer/ https://www.pewglobal.org/2018/10/01/americas-international-...
- frozenport 7y ago
  Perhaps there is a disconnect between Chinese people believe and what they are allowed to express? For example, they may be allowed to express their pro-American views through consumer purchases but cannot express them in political terms due aggressive government censorship and repression?
- whiddershins 7y ago
  How can we possibly make the case for Western values credibly when so many people in high profile positions in Academia, Politics, and Media openly call for abolishing them?
- Arbalest 7y ago
  It isn't zero sum, technically. But in the world of investing, in order to get the gains that people are always gunning for, someone else has to lose. Otherwise no one could ever get more than however much the GDP grows at, assuming no population growth. I don't see how this is any different.
- anthuman 7y ago
  Prosperity may not be a zero-sum game, but prosperity is a meaningless metric without understanding its association to power. Power is a zero sum game. During the 1800s both britain and the US became very prosperous. Unfortunately, our prosperity outstripped britain's prosperity and that power differential ultimately spelled the end for the british empire. Also, stop using "western values". It's an oft used propaganda nonsense hardly any intelligent person believes. Since when are "open democracy", "religious and cultural tolerance", etc "western values"? What about racism, genocide, nuking cities full of civilians? Human experimentation, rape of the environment, gluttony? Lets hope china doesn't adopt "western values" since the world doesn't need more of what happened to libya, iraq, syria, etc ( not to mention exterminating continents full of people ). Nativist/nationalist myopia is certainly a bad thing. But so is the pathetic globalist hippie myopia. As for the african continent, what they need is more nationalism. After all, nationalism is what made britain, france, US, germany, south korea, japan, china, etc wealthy and prosperous. What african countries need is are strong and stable governments willing to sacrifice for the good of their nations. Sadly, this means kicking out european parasites destabilizing their countries, it means getting rid of european bankers controlling their banking systems, it means taking control over their natural resources from european countries. Sadly, if any african country tried to take control over their destiny, europe would destroy the nation via sanctions, funding terrorists, etc.
- deogeo 7y ago
  > Prosperity is not a zero-sum game But in many cases it's close to it. A company that reduces its expenses by 5% will eventually bankrupt its competitor that wasn't able to do so (all else being equal). A 5% contribution to efficiency allows it to take over 100% of another company's market. The success of a company is in a very large part determined by its competition - more competition means starting a new company is harder.
gigatexal 7y ago
In a few years hopefully we will have a different administration and will open our borders again to all especially those from countries where the regimes are oppressive like that of President Ping of China. I would welcome a liberal immigration policy. Talent is the next oil and America if it wants to stay vibrant and dominant in the world needs to be a place where the best of the best come — but not only the best, everyone else is welcome, too, because you never know what a good education and opportunity will do for an ambitious kid. Immigrants often start foundational companies that go on to employ you and me. But this administration is so xenophobic it is hurting America’s ability to be the melting pot of culture and ideas. Just as Facebook is having a hard time convincing top talent to join it I worry about America not being a place that the next Satya Nadella wants to immigrate to.
- Fjolsvith 7y ago
  America actually has a pretty liberal immigration policy. The crackdown is on people who do not use the immigration system.
  - macintux 7y ago
    I’ll believe the crackdown is strictly about illegal immigration when our First Lady is shown the door.
    - sanxiyn 7y ago
      Why would First Lady be shown the door? Isn't marriage visa legal? I am in favor of prosecuting past visa violations but don't see the problem with current status.
      - macintux 7y ago
        https://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/melania-trump-immigration-donald-226648 https://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/melania-trump-immigra...
  - gigatexal 7y ago
closeparen 7y ago
Chinese immigrants are not coming here to live on welfare, but to participate in the economy. That increased economic activity creates wealth with which we can help our own poor.
- peter303 7y ago
  But they bring their parents which they often put on SSI ($800 a month) and other freebies. Trump immigration proposals would end this, but unlikely to pas.
  - Thorrez 7y ago
    Aren't they only eligible for SSI if they've worked in the US for 10 years?
fellellor 7y ago
You are not "taking care of the world". These people are not going there to be taken care of. They are there to exploit economic opportunities, for which they also make their own substantial contribution. Now that increased competition may create scarcity for natives, so you want to skew the market to favor yourself. Now I'm not saying that is wrong, but the absence of laws favoring native citizens shouldn't be framed as some great philanthropic sacrifice either.
VvR-Ox 7y ago
This is a typical hypothesis of the nazis in germany. The truth is somewhat more complex because it's our own governments who don't take care about their people despite having the money and the power. E.g. in germany the taxes for the richest got cut more and more over the last decade or so until there are some of those who don't pay anything at all. There is companies like Google, Facebook, Starbucks, Ikea etc. who nearly don't pay any taxes in countries like germany. On the other hand the citizens are forced to do labor without meaning and/or without enough wages to survive old age. If you have to retire in germany you are screwed if you had the wrong job nowadays - you see the retired collecting bottles and waste in the streets because they don't have enough for a good life anymore. If our governments would take care of the people which they definitely could we'd have more than enough to share with the people who have to flee our guns and bombs we sold to their enemies before (to give the earnings to the richest again).
arcticbull 7y ago
Sorry, America doesn’t want to take care of its own. There’s more than enough money around, more than enough space, more than enough resources. There’s no will. Not collectively, anyways. That’s got nothing to do with immigrants. Me first, mine second, community last, “the other” coming to treat America as an all you can eat buffet of social services is the enemy. Which is crazy because America doesn’t really, uh, have social services. Which I think was the point of your post.

AFascistWorld 7y ago

The officials and rich are always the smarter and informed ones, just look at where they put their families and wealth at, watch what they do rather than what they say.

wrong_variable 7y ago
Agreed, but having been to America - I think the assumptions made are slowly collapsing. The main assumption being that USA will protect your wealth much more than then the Chinese state, but I think that is changing ( for the better ). If suddenly Chinese HNWI are forced to redistribute their wealth among americans, they might realize its better to just have stayed in China.
- AFascistWorld 7y ago
  >Chinese HNWI are forced to redistribute their wealth among americans I don't see that happen, but I'm seeing average minds are controlled more and more thoroughly with the assistance of modern tech, while the "woke" ones are rushing to America to give birth even if border officers told them they can no longer obtain US citizenship coz Trump said this or that. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2hBtXdaYsQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2hBtXdaYsQ
alaskamiller 7y ago
Vancouver, Melbourne, Silicon Valley
elevenoh 7y ago
>smarter? no >politically informed? yes. Many - guised in pretence - are playing a political/regulatory/economic zero-sum navigation game. ;)

siedes 7y ago

I respectfully disagree that waning respect for America in this context illustrates what you say it does. Chinese culture is fundamentally opposed to American culture, and those things you mention, open democracy, religious and cultural tolerance, etc. are expressions of American culture. What nations like China and various others respect about America is money, and how to make a lot of it even at the expense of American people and industry, all while laughing at how we live our lives and making a mockery of us. As a person of Asian descent and having lived amongst other non-American groups, I can say most do not want to live like Americans at all and often spit on "western values". They love our money but they don't give a damn about our democracy and cultural tolerance. Hate to say it, but it's for the most part accurate.

homarp 7y ago
but isn't that the first generation only ?
mycall 7y ago
If they spit on our western values, what do they love and embrace instead (aside from money)? I would think there are many universal values shared which is why our peoples are quite compatible.
sho 7y ago
> Hate to say it, but it's for the most part accurate I hate to say it too, but statements such as yours, filled with sweeping generalisations, oversimplifications and us-vs-them outgroup nonsense like they want to "spit on our values" usually turn out to be very very far from accurate, and indeed say more about the speaker than the subject at hand. Chip on your shoulder much? I'd like to think - and have generally observed - that 99% of people from anywhere are not in fact greedy sociopaths, but instead decent people trying to live good lives inside their own cultural and economic context.
- siedes 7y ago
  For the good of the world, I hope you are right. I admit I did get a bit too passioniate in the earlier post.

ETHisso2017 7y ago

The love-hate relationship illustrated in the article has been around since at least 1999, when the US bombed the Chinese Embassy in Yugoslavia.

Scoundreller 7y ago
Just to be clear for everyone, you mean the one in Serbia. The former Yugoslavia footprint has several Chinese embassies.
- Mediterraneo10 7y ago
  In 1999, there was only one Yugoslavia around: after the departure of the other republics, Serbia and Montenegro maintained the name "Federal Republic of Yugoslavia" for their country. The OP was correct in saying that the Chinese embassy in Yugoslavia was bombed. (Only later did they change the name to "Serbia and Montenegro", and it was only then that the name "Yugoslavia" disappeared.)
onetimemanytime 7y ago
One of Clinton's advisers (name escapes me) has written that from their basement the Serbian army was receiving instructions. When presented the evidence, China kinda shut up. maybe they didn't want to have their involvement be known or whatever. I don't think US bombed it by mistake
anthuman 7y ago
It started much earlier than that. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yangtze_Patrol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yangtze_Patrol And people forget that some of the largest mass lynchings were against the chinese. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_massacre_of_1871 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_massacre_of_1871 And the only anti-immigration bill to target a specific ethnic group was once again directed against the chinese. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Exclusion_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Exclusion_Act

ydb 7y ago

As an individual in a society, I am no more than an ant who serves her queen. Yet, each ant has a purpose, however small, to maintain the health and well-being of the colony. An ant lost is a tragedy, a colony lost is another step towards extinction. This is not the reality we live in. We are less than proverbial ants, we are grains of sand beat back ceaselessly into the past. We disintegrate, we stagnate; but for every tiny piece of sand extinguished, thousands more are borne out of the granite slabs of time. I admire the Chinese for awaking to the artificial construction of American exceptionalism. I only wish each nation's citizenry could use that same looking glass to peer within.

namelosw 7y ago

Personally, I want to keep myself neutral as a Chinese. But I think I can provide some interesting perspective from China, according to the order of timeline. I'm by no mean historian so errors and non-seriousness are expected, you can think of this as an OverSimplified[0] cartoon on Youtube: 0. China was a 3rd world communist country after WW2. 1. The Korean war broke out, USSR ordered China to strike back to maintain the iron curtain. China also worried about the border so it joined the war. The result of the war is basically a draw, but the border and iron curtain was 'saved'. 2. After the Korean war, China's self-confident increased, and sort of complaining USSR's control. Then these two countries start to hate each other. 3. Vietnam war, China also joined because of the alliance relationship. This time the North won. 4. Meanwhile, Nixon visited China. Since China was one of the promising countries could weaken the iron curtain. 5. 'Reform and Opening' started in China. 6. After the Vietnam war, Vietnam became very powerful. There was quite a risk Vietnam could unify the Indochina. China was in the middle of the USSR and Vietnam. This became embarrassing after China and USSR hated each other, and the USSR was keeping investing in Vietnam. Then there was another war broke out between China and Vietnam. Both of the countries claimed they were self-defending. There was also no winner, but Vietnam seems less dangerous in China's perspective. 7. Japan grows really fast in the 80s. China was just started to grow after the opening policy and found the importance of the economy growing. 8. After that, the US feels threatened, there were some economic sanctions going on. There was an essay 'The Japan That Can Say No' from Sony co-founder. But eventually, it seems Japan said yes for most of the time. 9. The Gulf War. The US almost beat Iraq in no time, and Iraq was actually pretty powerful at that time. According to the rumor, this made the Chinese military pretty shocked. After the Korean and Vietnam war, China was kind of self-overrated and reduced a lot of military margin in order to grow the economy. 10. According to 8 and 9, the US shaped a very powerful image to China, and China also realized it's not wise to like Japan which always be the 'yes man' or omitting the military advancement. So the competing mindset was already formed pretty early. But there was also "闷声发大财" according to the president Jiang at that time, which basically means don't let other people notice you while you are growing fast. Another interesting thing is about cultural defense. Korean TV series and K-pop was very popular in China, but the first Korean TV series was introduced by official TV Channel. There was some theory believe the US and Japan culture are very influential and hard to replace, so China tried to guide people to consume Korean (and also Thailand, etc, since Asian culture are easy to introduce) culture instead of from the US and Japan. And then in recent years, Korean TW series and K-pop is largely replaced by Chinese own products, which seems pretty similar. [0] https://www.youtube.com/user/Webzwithaz https://www.youtube.com/user/Webzwithaz

sanxiyn 7y ago

This is great. America never was a heaven. Before, people had false belief. Now, they have true belief. That is to be celebrated.

chii 7y ago
The Chinese word for America is "Měiguó", or literally "the beautiful country". To the common immigrant, it was sold as a country of opportunity and wealth.
- luckylion 7y ago
  Is that beautiful as in "the landscape is beautiful" or as in "your life there will be beautiful"?
  - yorwba 7y ago
    It's just a phonetic loan (A-mei-rica) represented by a character with positive associations (they could also have chosen e.g. 没国 "without country", but that would've been impolite). Best not to read too much into it. England is called the country of heroes, France the country of law, Germany the country of virtue... people rarely pay attention to the literal meaning.
    - genghizkhan 7y ago
      Curiously, what is India called?
      - yorwba 7y ago
        The word for India has been around for much longer, Wiktionary has an extensive section on the etymology: https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E5%8D%B0%E5%BA%A6#Chinese https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E5%8D%B0%E5%BA%A6#Chinese
  - AFascistWorld 7y ago
    Historically, going abroad means wealth and status, marrying whites ("ocean people") too, those who return with immense wealth and fanfare reinforce this notion, and it just so happens that the transliteration of "me" was the Chinese word "mei".

onetimemanytime 7y ago

For most Chinese, as long as they have their needs met, probably their system of government is fine. Some may know no better (historically the world wasn't democratic) and others might rationalize with "just don't insult the leaders /state and you're fine. Small price to pay"

ycombonator 7y ago

Another Chinese Regime sponsored psyop article.

zeristor 7y ago

Doesn’t this boil down to China having developing country status, being allowed to block imports? The issue being with China being so large, there are millions of people still quite, poor despite China being such a large industrial power, so there is some justification to it still being a developing country. I imagine the rules were written for smaller homogenous countries. Things work best when trade goes both ways.

VvR-Ox 7y ago
1. Basically every country can block imports and exports 2. Why does that make China a developing country? 3. That is the stuff we hear about here in the west. The truth is that never before so many people in China were so wealthy - millions got out of poverty a short time ago and there is some huge development going on. 4. The big orange shithead aka POTUS started the thing with the trade war (of course he does - he's still a bully)
- deogeo 7y ago
  > 4. The big orange shithead aka POTUS started the thing with the trade war (of course he does - he's still a bully) China was heavily protectionist long before Trump, so it's very puzzling why so many believe he started it.
  - thrower123 7y ago
    People are startlingly ignorant, and the media has a vested interest in keeping them that way. China's default historical position has been protectionist to the point of exclusion, except when they have been coerced by war to open their markets.

baybal2 7y ago

It is a very interesting article to discuss, yet it sunk to page 3 so fast...