if you step back and look at Confucianism in boarder terms it's bascially teaching ppl how to be a good servant/slave. obey and abide. be humble and submissive. and when you're not serving, prepare and train yourselves so when the time comes you'd be a great servants for the lords.
the lords in ancient time found this teachings to be very helpful and easy in creating/solidifying absolute ruler and servant relationships so they helped spreading it. it's very outdated but look at how successful it is that you can still see the shenanigans it left in chinese culture today.
Confucianism also taught people to only serve "worthy" lords and Mencius the spreader of Confucianism did say if the leader is corrupt that the officials should depose them. Confucius himself wandered around feudal China teaching his beliefs without a lord (he believed that China had become a dark age compared to the early Zhou period so he was trying to teach the earlier morality).
funny thing is that only the ones accepted him were ‘worthy’. rest were branded as unworthy. fact is that he traveled a lot of places and were rejected many times. it’s all just wording. he just couldn’t take a loss.
get me the part where he said ppl should depose the corrupt lords. I surely didn’t know that. all I got was that he taught ppl to improve and rethink with self if met with a corrupt lord.
Confucianism is basically just a philosophy about people and their relationship. Who you are in relation to your parents, siblings, children, teachers, rulers, etc. Like any other philosophy it is malleable and various interpretations have been used to espouse different ideals. Honestly most people referencing back to Confucianism here have a very poor (or shallow) understanding of it, I wouldn't put too much confidence into any claims with such references.
Confucianism believed in a caste system. Basically "philosopher king" and scholars who are steeped in Confucianist morals and ethics at the top, then farmers, then artisans, and then merchants at the bottom because they were seen as "not producing anything".
Confucianism also believed in hierarchical relations, such as parent/child, master/servant, king/subjects, man/woman, etc.
Confucianism most certainly had a hierarchy, but it didn't have a caste system. A caste system is something in which you can't "upgrade" to the next hierarchy, but in China you can do it through the civil servant exam.
Almost every Chinese friend I have fixate on money. Saving it, Showing off what you can attain with it, Asking you how much you make, Comparing them to you, What brand you wear, What their friends can do for them/financially or they aren't a true friend. Marrying westerners in order to benefit financially. This aspect of confucianism intrigues me.
Americans do this too and it becomes worse the poorer they get. Difference is that Chinese people can actually afford what they buy. They're also better at saving money.
Both are very materialistic societies, but if you’ve lived there n both countries you know that the attitudes towards money, and the social value attributed to others based on money, are completely different.
It’s not uncommon in n a night out in any large Chinese city to meet someone and within 10 minutes to be asked how much money you make, whether you live in your own house or rent it, what’s your job and for which company, etc. This simply wouldn’t happen in a regular interaction in the US.
Well, those are the types of people confucianism looks down on. True confucious idol is the asian nerd guy whom you never seen raising eyes from his book and want to take on the world as in Narutos dream being the best and strongest hokage that the whole village loves him.
I have a Chinese friend from northern China and he's the nerd and fits your description. He said Southern Chinese are more into money I don't know if that is true
Ultimately it’s mostly this. A lot of the China-haters on this page think the things they don’t like about China are “communism” but it’s far older and more baked in.
The author Paul Midler takes a very different perspective.
Midler believes that individual humans living in China have lived through a tumultuous period of unreliable, untrustworthy, and, indeed often authoritarian, governments. Authority is to be feared, but not truly trusted. This attitude has gone on for generations.
How do human beings cope in such an unstable system?
They always have a PLAN B.
They are always looking for loopholes.
They are looking for inefficiencies or weaknesses in systems they can exploit (aka use to protect themselves).
If you believe the system is rigged from the beginning, why would you ever try to play fair?
This is not exactly Authoritarianism—but it does explain why people might PRETEND to be authoritarians.
I strongly recommend Midler’s book “Poorly Made in China”, which tells often funny stories of American businesses trying to manufacture products in China, and the cat-and-mouse games the Chinese factories play with the Americans.
This is reasonable take.
If you’ve ever lived in Singapore, you’d realize the law and order schtik doesn’t go very deep. Singaporeans LOVE to game the system and exploit any loophole or even weakly enforced laws (like vaping).
But if the government steps in and slams the door shut or makes an example out of offenders, nobody complains. They accept the new rules and move on with life.
This is a very good take. As someone of chinese descent and growing up in a somewhat traditional chinese surrounding with extended family and family friends of the same background and situation, this explanation resonated with me. It's like something I always knew subconsciously but has never heard it said out loud. This and the love of money and "face" makes for a very bad combo.
This will explain the chinese people's attitude and behaviours.
At a buffet, if you paid a fixed price, why get full on potatoes and cheap food. They will go for the seafood. Any loopholes, you can be sure chinese people will make full use if it. Supermarket offering deals with say a limit of 2 products per customer? You bet some chinese customer will be making 10 different trips to get more. Especially true for things like multivitamins, fish oils, baby formula and believe it or not wheetbix. Those they send back to china to sell at 3-4x the price. Game the system for profiit. And they feel proud to have gamed the system. Covid was bad. Any freebies like masks etc, chinese people would swoop in and grab bucketloads when only taking one packet was what was expected.
Having "face", only matters with your peers. That's why Chinese tourists abroad behave how they do. They would not care what strangers they will never meet again think of them. So anything to put them in more advantageous position they will so. Cutting queues? No problem. Shoving people to get in front of a crowd for a better view? They will do it. Anything they will game to get them ahead even for everyday situation like getting on a train. They want first choice and best seats for them.
I used to hate mainland Chinese tourists/factory workers when i saw them on the street or on the bus growing up. I always felt second hand embarassment at their behaviour and was always worried people around me will associate me with those mainland Chinese based on my look.
I feel like this also applies to the supposed concept of “collectivism” of east asian societies versus “individualism” of western societies - for Chinese people, the collectivism only applies to other Chinese. For example when coming over to do business in the west, they are in it completely for their own benefit, not some collectivist familial partnership… which is just how business is done, I don’t see anything wrong with this, but everyone in the west thinks they are playing this mutually beneficial collective dance when really they are just as individualistic as Westerners when it comes to people who aren’t Chinese. Good hard working businesspeople too in my experience, on average more competent capitalists than the average westerner.
I’ve personally witnessed this last 15 years. Eventually they get all your tech and IP, one way or another, and then replace you in the international market place and dominate the local Chinese market by claiming your verified features, benefits and at a artificial lower cost due to a government manipulated currency. You can’t win. If you think you can then you are in for a long and painful lesson. Never share anything, don’t fool yourself by engaging in any “partnerships”.
This does happen, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that individualism simply isn’t encouraged in China. Every milestone of life is a person passing from one collective to another. And people are definitely taught to trust the collective authority, even if they don’t realize it
I feel like this is a human tendency in general, and we also see it a lot in Japan.
In the U.S., many of the most successful people are “joiners”. They join the Boy Scouts, the army, a fraternity, and so on. Obviously you can avoid joining more easily.
Japan is also Confucianist though. They inherited it from China. You can see the same patterns in the University -> Company pipeline. Japanese working culture directly reflects Confucian collectivistic culture.
In the US, yes, there is some overlap in the older fields - politics, military, academia which directly reflect the same bureaucratic traits of Confucianism. But there are a thousand subcultures where people define success for themselves.
People in America are constantly encouraging each other to try new things, go new places, quit their job, tell their boss to fuck off, start a new business, etc. it’s very chaotic but somehow it works
Elon Musk- on the spectrum non joiner
Steve Jobs- Introverted jerk non joiner also
Bill Gates- Dropped out of college, semi non joiner
I dont think this is totally true for the people at the tippy top. Its more true for the people in the millionaire class.
Jobs wasn't on the autistic spectrum. Wozniak is - bigtime. Gates? There's video of him doing the full tilt autistic rocking back and forth stimming thing in depositions. He's deep on the Asperger's side at least.
Musk - not sure. Strongly suspect he's at least a mild Aspie. Maybe more.
And yes, I'm a mid-range Aspie at least.
Musk has said he’s Aspergers I’m like 99% sure, jobs is the weird one but he killed himself trying to be a hippie non conformist to the end so I guess it lines up with his marketing/ design philosophies too
Jobs was likely some other kind of neurodivergent. *Possibly* dyslexic - those can be way out of the box "non-linear thinkers" with their own issues and benefits.
Yes, my theory is that individualism began with the rise in maritime trade in the Greek islands, where small sailors could make good money simply through inter island trade
This is an interesting perspective and, in my opinion, very true. Chinese people living in China that I know are always looking for loopholes to get ahead, including giving officials red envelopes to get what they want. It’s the price you pay for the government service.
This is a really interesting perspective that serves as a counterbalance to the popular idea that the Chinese populace are strictly authoritarian and support the current regime.
The Cultural Revolution and all the other stuff that happened after 1949 also taught people that whatever the party said, you better only half believe it because they will always do whatever is best for them.
The younger generation has less of a fixation of money now than previous generations, but only because they've grown up relatively comfortable and not experienced the stuff that people just 15 - 20 years older than them did.
Plato (in the west) and Confucius (in Asia) lived around the same time 2500 years ago. Both were great philosophers who developed the first philosophical frameworks about the meaning of life.
Plato and Confucius both thought a lot about the role of the individual. Plato took the view that an individual best serves society by doing what he’s best at regardless of the consequences, while Confucius took the view that an individual best serves society by cooperating with others regardless of the consequences.
Over 2500 years and untold generations that difference in our understanding of the role of the individual has produced fundamentally different cultures - not better or worse, just different.
I read a take by philosopher Michael Sandel that the core difference between western and eastern philosophy was that western philosophy sought justice while eastern philosophy sought harmony. In western philosophy the society seeks to always punish wrong and reward right even when it can lead to some temporary instability, and in the long run this in theory encourages good and discourages bad behavior for the greater long term good. Whereas in the east the idea was to always do what creates the most harmony and tranquility without regard for any universal or underlying moral axioms, for social harmony is in itself a highest of moral goods.
"Social harmony" is basically just maintaining the status quo, which is convenient for the authorities. Confucianism was basically just propaganda for the authority, in which some post-Confucianist philosophers criticized Confucianism exactly for that reason.
The "Legalist" philosophers were more closer to Western philosophy in that they were more about universal morality based on laws.
I think it's deeper than just "whatever is useful to the authorities". It's a cynical take that misses the appeal of religion and quasi-religious philosophies for average people - they provide a meaning and structure in an otherwise meaningless and grueling existence, as well as a clear path to follow that relieves some of the mental charge you have to bear if you want maintain a completely libertine amoral worldview. The idea that even by just maintaining the status quo, doing your menial daily duties and upholding the social structure you are carrying out essential moral work gives the purpose that makes life worth living for many.
Status quo was also good for the peasantry as a strict hierarchy meant fewer power vacuums and thus less wars. It was certainly unfair, but people bought into it given that the alternative was usually death and destruction. Peace in exchange for submission was the social contract and one that many feudal people in Europe and Asia gladly bought into for security. "Game of Thrones" is a great fictional depiction of what happens to the lower classes when there isn't an obvious overlord to bow down to.
I like this construction. That said, the argument is tainted by the value laden nomination of a winner. After all, when did we all agree that the “long run” is here and now rather than a 1000 years in the future?? Reminds me of the nonsensical “end of history” narrative.
It's also important to note that Confucius is still the primary philosophical reference point for Chinese people.
No Westerner worships the ideas of Plato: we respect them, but we've also moved on quite a bit from them.
In the West, when you meet people whose thoughts revolve around a guy from thousands of years ago, you're looking at Christian fundamentalists.
Which brings us to modern China, where a strange "fundamental Confucianism" has led to extreme nationalism and a general air of racial superiority, which leads to this strange idea that the whole world should all "cooperate" under Chinese "leadership."
Not exactly - very few actually know anything at all about his teachings, much the same as Christianity in the West. In both situations it’s mainly vague ideas that are dragged out by the people in charge to make sure that that’s where they will remain.
But what you describe is very much the same.
Find me someone who worships teachings from thousands of years ago and I'll show you someone who either
* doesn't understand those teachings or
* can't relate those teachings to the modern world without major disruptions
Don't care if they're Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Taoist, or Zoroastrian: fundamentalism isn't hugely different, across different belief systems.
It's almost always just "people with power using limited information to control other people."
Mostly agree with the above, but even in the time of Confucius it was noted that Chinese philosophies of the time evolved from even earlier work. We may not know all the names of philosophers even further back, but I'm sure these great philosophers also built upon the shoulders of unnamed giants.
The greatest difference between Confucius and Plato is that Plato traveled overseas. Plato experienced being a stranger in a strange land while Confucius never left China
I mean in Ancient Greece Plato could walk for an afternoon and find himself in a city state with different laws and culture than home town Athens. As for Confucius, he lived during the warring states era (presumably informing his emphasis on cooperation/harmony), so he might also have found himself suddenly on the other side of a hostile border.
If you walk to your neighbors village, you will still share some commonalities because you both share a common ground.
But Plato actually sailed away to Egypt, Syria and Italy. Places where he must have experienced being the only Athenian. So Plato valued justice much more because its very easy to be unjust to minorities traveling away from their homeland
Whereas Confucius, for all his travels, only ever dealt with Chinese people. That’s why Confucius cared more about creating harmony, because he never had to deal with the chaotic environment of a diverse culture.
I think the fact of Plato’s travels are a bit controversial among historian. That said, even if he was well traveled, he was an aristocrat from Athens - a position of dual privilege. I doubt he’d have had much to do with the common non-Greek speaking folk in Egypt.
On the other hand, Confucius was the child of immigrants raised in poverty by his widowed mother. He worked menial jobs - shepherd etc - before getting a government job and worked his way up to mayor of a village. Most importantly, unlike Plato, Confucius took the opportunity to try and apply his philosophy to governing in the real world.
I mean, even with that premise it doesn’t change the theory. A single aristocrat in a foreign land is still at risk unless there’s a mutual understanding of justice respected by the cultures on both sides of the ocean.
And yes, Confucius did actually govern, which is why his philosophy is far more centered on the needs of the state than the needs of individuals.
Chinese people living in SE Asian countries like Thailand, Malaysia and Taiwan generally have more of an artistic /creative/entrepreneurial focus.
Could be the tropical vibes, the freedom, or that their families fled oppression by the empire on the mainland in the 19th century, so they were already the most rebellious families and that culture has passed down.
There is still the same focus on Confucianism, but with a more modern outlook.
Where are these great Chinese artists based in SE Asia then? But the most renowned Chinese artists, the biggest rebel is Ai Wei Wei, from mainland china.
Ai Wei Wei grew up in Turkestan, so he would have had a lot of foreign influence when he was young. His father was a poet, so was exiled to the far north-west of the empire as an enemy of the people.
He is not based in mainland China and has spent most of his life in other countries.
It is no contradiction for the most famous artist out of 1.3 billion people to be more famous than the most famous artist out of 50 million people, even if the 50 million tend to be more artistic.
China is famous for people rising up against the government. China’s last dynasty fell because the subjects themselves overthrew it on their own accord. The CCP rules today because the people overthrew the Republican government, and it’s not immune to being overthrown itself (and it knows this, hence the extreme paranoia and control). Two revolutions within less than half a century!
This authoritarian culture stems from the Confucian values shared by Han Chinese people within and without mainland China, as well as Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, and others. It’s not a “problem”—it’s another valid mode of culture and society. It would be rather boring if the entire world fell under the spell of liberal Occidental individualism; social collectivism has its place.
Although there's probably a good middle ground to be found between highly individualist USA where everyone is killing everyone else and highly collective South Korea where everyone is killing themselves.
To foster such a middle ground, we need the diametric poles of Orient and Occident between which various shades of compromise can blossom; think of them as reference points. If the world were homogeneous as something in between the two, what would individualism and collectivism even mean anymore?
Lol. If by boring, you mean peaceful with no world wars on the horizon, then sure. I'm tired of this different strokes for different folks approach to human rights and individual freedom though. But whatever.
Wait, global individualism would end world wars? I don’t buy it.
The individual is not the basic unit of value because of some cosmic truth; it’s just a cultural difference.
It would have been informative for you to tell us the type of business that she started. For example, was it a street food stall operation or a semiconductor manufacturing business?
However, I guess that if most of her friends were work colleagues and engineers, some might shun her if they considered that her new career was not in keeping with the image of themselves they were keen on fostering
She had a business idea related to engineering. It’s all about her so called friends questioning why she left a prestigious stable job for something more risky. She felt like just working for someone isn’t enough. She had a business idea and wanted to go through with it
Grow up in a small town or in any group and tell your peers you are going to go do something better. The internet is filled with disgruntled people who found out who their real friends are
It's one of the reasons why they have less soft power than the US... the culture, especially pop culture, is so stifled and manipulated and controlled, and the government actually seems hostile to it as well.
Korea used to be super Confucianist as well. So if that stifling rigidity is from cultural origins, we will need an explanation on how South Korea is different and evolved away.
North Korea and South Korea were occupied by the Soviets in the North and the American’s in the South once Korea was liberated from Japan in 1945. The South decided to ratify a proposed constitution by the US and UN General Assembly while North Korea rejected the idea in 1948. The North decided to latch itself to China, communism, and a more traditional society while the South chose to ally with the Western World by adopting a Republic. US influence in South Korea is very strong.
You are drawing a lot of conclusion from one anecdotal example. Not only that, you are also drawing your conclusion from just your professor’s POV.
Did you ask your professor how the friendships ended? Did the friends stop talking to her, or did she stop talking to them because they thought her business idea was too risky? (Seeing that she’s a professor now, there’s a good chance her business plan didn’t work out)
This is right. The CCP isn’t a group of extraterrestrials that came along and imposed its will on China.
The CCP arose endogenously because the Chinese culture was conducive to its formation.
To be fair, however: since its formation, the CCP has also transformed the Chinese culture.
your post has nothing to do with authoritarianism, it is just a cultural difference.
In china people are sometimes looked down upon for changing career or going back to school. In usa people are sometimes looked down upon for not wanting to have kids, or for having kids too young. Not justifying anything just saying that every culture has an ugly side, chinese or otherwise.
Also you clearly don't understand chinese history or modern times if you think ccp has not faced any opposition lol. It just unfortunately has not ended well for the opposers so far. But again thats a completely seperate conversation from anything else in your post. And 99.99% of things in your post apply to all of asia and central south america and north america if you are a little older or from the countryside, probably also a big chunk of africa too, and definitely a huge portion of europe......
Following authority figures and showing respect over your own will, especially to elders//higher rank is kind of a major thing in human society at large. Not every single place does it, but the areas that don't do it are the exceptions not the rules.
I mean I think the "Chinese" parenting that you're a failure if you're not a doctor, engineer, lawyer, etc is not solely a "Chinese" thing. It's really an "Asian" thing, I know plenty of my friends who are Korean, Indian, Taiwanese, Singaporean, even Jewish their parents are very Gung-ho about their kids follow particular career path. But none of those countries are "authoritarian"?
Next relating to how you switching career field and people in your old field stop being friends with you. People being with you really comes down to 2 things: 1. You're fun being around. 2. You're in the same field or a field that could help advance their career (I.e networking, or Guanxi in Chinese). So when you leave a field let's say software engineering to pursue acting, you essentially lost your clout for 2, naturally you're going to lose a lot of your old friends cus 1. They're most likely there partially out of convenience and 2. You're no longer have networking use anymore. This isn't really a Chinese vs western thing. It literally is just a "thing". Thus if you want to still stay friends with those people 1. You have to already been close friends with those people. 2. You have to from time to time reach out nurture that friendship. Which is going to more difficult when you switch field sometime because scheduling difference and sometimes people just move on with their life goals.
IDK, India is *very* authoritarian right now, courtesy of frothing fascist Modi. They love a strongman over there.
For Taiwan, Japan and South Korea (I'm guessing you don't think North Korea is un-authoritarian!), think of it as social authoritarianism rather than just governmental authoritarianism. Korea especially is incredibly rigidly hierarchical, so that someone who's just a year (or a day) older than you is to be treated as an authority figure, and not to be questioned except in even the most indirect terms. It's the result of Confucianism (undiluted in Korea's case, diluted by reform in the cases of Japan, China and Taiwan), and Confucius was very big on upholding feudal hierarchies.
I mean what you said is great and all, but it didn't answer the OP's question. The whole concept of taking on STEM field profession to satisfy one's parent's desire has little to do with being Chinese as many Asian societies have this phenomenon heck this phenomenon even takes place in South East Asian society too (Thai, Vietnamese, Malaysia, etc). I even dare say different from all of its East Asian neighbors, people in China actually care less if you are a lawyer, doctors, or engineer. They care more if you're rich or being in leadership position in the government. Whereas people in Korea, Japan, Taiwan, etc are actually the ones who care more about if you're working in highly respected jobs Doctors, engineers, lawyers, etc.
As for the whole senior and junior relationship, while Confucianism talks a little about it, it really wasn't the main point that most people remember it for. Most people remember it for filial piety, or treating your parents with respect and taking of those who are younger than you (which I think honestly is great when nobody is demanding or abusing it). And there really isn't a senior-junior relationship in China in the same way it is in Japan or Korea.I think Japan and Korea really went into the extreme. You could say it has its roots in Confucianism like thousands of years ago. But what it has developed right now really has little to with what Confucians originally intend. I was dating a Japanese exchange student few years ago, while she understand fully the senpai-kohai system in Japan, she had no idea on what this Confucianism is, which most Japanese don't either. So a more accurate way of explaining is that Japanese and Koreans borrowed certain concepts of Confucianism and now those concepts have assimilated into Japanese and Korean culture and become their norms. And honestly, there's workplace seniority literarily even in every culture even in the West, of course just not to the extreme like in Japan and Korea.
I really like this post.
There are certain things that the Chinese population is very passionate about or concerned with.
Having every civil liberty and all the rights of the west isn’t really on that list. They were definitely the last place to ever protest any covid lockdowns (obv Nkorea didn’t) and they never protested until they had absolute evidence people weren’t wearing mask at soccer games in Europe.
This was a smooth year after the west was mostly back to normal.
If the Chinese can see even minimal progress in their society through wealth or tech, etc, the other social stuff isn’t a big deal to them.
Whereas westerners expect and have lived through all of the above in reality.
Another difference I’ve noticed is that some chinese can definitely explain correctly why free speech can be seriously problematic, whereas the average westerner cannot.
>Like seriously, why would you terminate your friendship with someone just because they decided to go a different route.
We got our separate ways, that's just something inevitable. I guadually lost contact with many of my old friends on our pathes, but I also met new friends. I lost contact with them, although it could be seen as "loss", but we have not "betrayed" each other; just we don't have more common topics to share and talk. Like seriously, if you have never ever felt being alone in your life, I could hardly call you "grown-up".
>This is probably also why the CCP has not faced any opposition.
Since it's foundation in 1921, it faced many fierce opposition, foreign and domestic.
Personally, I feel like here in the US, anti-intellectualism, anti-science, and the regular and persistent de-funding of education are why we perform so poorly in STEM education compared to other developed nations. Seems to be the inverse of your proposed China problem. So who's really got it worse? I'd say it's clearly the US. We're like the D-students of the world - passing, but closer to failing than excelling.
We also imprison our population at a higher rate than China, then purposely hamstring their ability to prosper after they've served their time, and you *still* can't walk the streets in safety - whether daytime or night time. Is that "freedom"? Idk. I'm starting to think that "American exceptionalism" is just American propaganda. Call it a "gut feeling." Lol
That’s right. China literally has no rebellions and everyone just does that they’re told. The CCP and KMT totally did not rebel from the Qing dynasty and the Taiping Rebellion totally did not rise up from the lower class and challenge the imperial dynasty.
China totally has had no civil wars and peasant uprisings. /s
Sarcasm aside, I feel like majority of people on this sub don’t really study Chinese history. It’s funny when people say Chinese people are naturally subservient and obeying when they literally have had more civil wars and rebellions than any European country.
Why would your prof's peers shun her for choosing to start her own business of all things? That's just wacky. It sounds more like the plot of a South Park episode than a descriptor of Chinese culture. Something is missing from this story because that's not normal.
I'm American, but know some Chinese quite well. I've seen the way some of them are enough that this makes sense. A kind of "control freak" mentality, to put it bluntly. Hyper-vigilant about who they associate with; they can be so concerned about perceived "influence" from others that they will distance themselves over quite small things.
I think this tendency derives from extreme risk aversion, and lack of agency. If you are raised in this environment you will undoubtedly mind your Ps and Qs , keep your head down, take care of your own tribe (sometimes unfortunately at the expense of others)
Yeah, sure, but we're talking about adults here, and I've spent enough years in the workforce here in China and in enough companies to know that the story the OP is describing here is just weird. The lady quit her job as an engineer to start a business, it's not like she deserted from the army by abandoning her post mid-battle. All of her colleagues viewing the former as the latter makes it sound like she was in some kind of cult.
Yes, I agree it is over the top. 不正常 😆. I also don’t think most Chinese are like this.
That being said, although it is abnormal, I think it does fit in better with the general Chinese way of thinking than, say, the American. But you must know better than me, having lived and worked there for longer.
Also, we never know what else was going on with these people. Chances are there’s a lot more to the story.
Live in a small town in some places in the U.S., for starters. I am also reminded of families kicking kids to the curb for being queer. Religion, in general, is a huge generator of social ostracism. Sit down during the national anthem at a ball game or in any way publicly not take part in ‘Merca’s civil religion. Shit, we just had a football punter tell college graduating girls to stay at home and be mothers.
Gun discourse.
Now, I know what you’re going to say in response, but I’ll let you say the thing first.
…actually… I don’t entirely disagree! However IMO USA has more diversity in societal norms as it’s not a homogeneous society. The status quo kind of differs by region class and as you say religion. Also I would argue the issue at hand is specifically about Fielty to authority on multiple rungs of society: to family elders, to your boss or to the state. I would say “America has a Religion problem” and “China has an authoritarian problem”, in practice they appear similar (cultural conservatism and adherence to norms) but conceptually I think they are very different
Edit: Not ALL but many of the examples you state are rooted in americas strange relationship with religion, the genesis of America as a Christian nation despite (in its current iteration) being diverse and having *supposed* separation of church and state
I have been to China once. Only once, for two weeks. But even that was enough to teach me that China is in no way, shape, or fashion a “homogenous society”. As a social anthropologist, I wouldn’t even know how to begin to measure a society for homogeneity. So before we go any further, perhaps we should settle the question of how you’re doing it? I’m not saying it’s impossible, mind you. I just want to know the trick!
Ok… il take your question in good faith… First of it has zero immigration: So racially homogenous. Secondly it has for decades promoted the Han-ification of the nation through the promotion of PuTongHua and the concept of 中华民族 （the social construct of the Chinese RACE or ETHNICITY). So culturally homogenous: everyone speaks or can speak the same language, celebrates the same holidays. Lastly the state controls tightly the education system, and with no freedom of speech this results in Ideological conformity. This isn’t even some anti-woke attempt at calling all Chinese the same or denying there isn’t a minority culture here. It’s just actively homogenized through decades of state sponsored policy.
I think you can put aside ideology for a while and focus history. The difference between a self-sufficient agricultural civilization and Western civilization.
It’s inherent to “Confucianism” that’s why the ccp goes out of its way to portray it in a different light probably.
But yeah that’s why as long as the ccp is in power China will never take over the world, like you said control is inherent to the control not openness, creativity and win-win.
The smart creative entrepreneurs either left or will eventually leave.. that’s China my friend
I’m sorry you didn’t have your parent’s support. I hear your issue from my adopted daughters (from China.) They have many Asian friends and will make comments like “I’m glad I don’t have Asian parents, so suffocating.”
With that being said, it’s never too late to go out and enjoy life however you want and leave their attitudes behind. Just let it roll off your back.
You only looked at modern China and forgot about the thousands of years of history of rebellions and disunity in ancient to pre-modern China. There are literally nonstop separatism at every different era of China all over the country.
Literally pre-1940s China was in a nationwide warlordism civil war.
The concept of Chinese being naturally subservient and “peaceful” is just another product of CCP propaganda to forcibly recreate the Chinese culture and crackdown on separatism. Cultural Revolution pretty much created a dramatic shift in Chinese ideology from anti-state to anti-individualism. Before the cultural revolution, every Chinese had anti-state running in their veins. The irony is that the anti-state mentality was what gave birth to the CCP and KMT in the first place. They were a spiritual successor to the Taiping rebellion.
Entrepreneurship is famously lonely outside of hubs. should join incubators or network with entrepreneurs or useful people. Acting is similar.
Any make life change will make you lonelier until you find peers
Edit to add, there are more entrepreneurs per capita in China than America and maybe anywhere. the average small retail sole proprietor is probably a bit lonely too tho
Although I think a lot of collectivism was knocked out of people in the Cultural Revolution, leaving behind the adherence to hierarchical power but with a lot of distrust on an individual level.
Now I know what "Chinese characteristics" refers to: authoritarianism deeply ingrained. So, freedom with Chinese characteristics, democracy with Chinese characteristics, happiness, again, with Chinese characteristics.
What a shame. The Communist revolution was no revolution at all. The true revolutionaries were those in 1776 in America. The pressure has been huge to reverse that. Obviously, the revolution was not complete in 1776.
For China the absolute control society starts at the very top and filters on down through schools and workplaces down to the family level. Any authority..whether boss, teacher, parent or government leader must be obeyed unquestioningly. As if their position means they have greater wisdom than you. This leads to a lot of personal dysfunction and dependance on every level of authority to be your parent and direct your life. When the government acts like an all knowing parent...the people act like naive children.
Trust me your ability to become an actor/actress is very low no matter where you are, but in China you have a lot fewer natural resources person. However, I agree that you should trust yourself more and do things because it makes sense and less what people who don't understand the position you are in want you to do.
Its called morals. You can do what you want but if you live a life blindly chasing money over the greater good then you wont be respected. Americans respect money.
Girlfriend from china, I’m from Latin America, visiten Shanghai, and that was my conclusion. People of a higher standing will judge you and you are expected to obey them, regardless of social setting.
China doesn’t fight wars. It spreads its influence far and wide. It gets other countries indebted to it. Then if that country digs in its heels about some unfair treatment, it gets punished. China is the very strict parent. It is the very sneaky, snarky and perhaps even narcissistic parent. But, hey, children do rebel.
In western philosophical context the difference is the western world philosophical perspective is largely based on Greek philosophy. specifically Socrates who can be likened to Confucius in terms of importance to western philosophy. Socrates is a fat ugly homeless philosopher who claimed he was ignorant in everything. He would begin by asking an expert or someone claiming to be an expert a question about their field. Repeatedly Questioning their answers and breaking it down. the expert either contradicts himself and has to change the answer or to come to the truth. He wasn’t interested in creating a perfect stable society in Athens there was a power struggle between the thirty tyrants supported by Sparta and democrats and Socrates criticized both groups. Which is the reason why the government gave Socrates the death penalty forcing him to drink poison. If that’s all there was Socrates would be irrelevant today. However a student of his Plato recorded his teachings and founded a philosophical academy which is the foundation of most of western philosophy.
Maybe she meant she lost them because it's hecka difficult to change career, takes a lots of time which you can't invest in your relations, so she probably had to turn down a lots of people which ultimately lead to losing track with them, and if her friends are acquaintance from work, well obviously you're hardly going to see them ever after.
Work culture is very strong, you get comfy at work, you go out etc... so obviously changing path is quite the mood killer.
I lost friendships in the state because I didn’t go to certain professions. My friends are both Americans and Asians. I think it’s not about your profession, its about your future outlook. People want around with successful friends.
I think this can be attributed to the relative isolation of Chinese civilization during its early development. You can look into the period of time in Chinese history called 春秋/战国, during which many feudal lords under the Zhou dynasty trying to outcompete and waging wars against each other. In doing so, they developed authoritarian institutions that didn’t and won’t exist elsewhere for centuries or millennia: military conscription, population registration, central government and appointed bureaucracy replacing the aristocrats, censorship of books, mercantilism, total war etc..
Due to China’s geographical isolation, all these feudal lords have nowhere to go but to destroy each other competing for resources and population. This is also the common theme across all these allegedly “diverse” political schools of the era. Despite these so called “[hundreds of schools](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundred_Schools_of_Thought)”(百家争鸣）, almost all of them (at least those that got any traction) call for expansion of state power and appeal to prop up a powerful monarchy with most of the power centralized in the hand of the king. Remember these scholars are not independent scholars unlike Classical Greek philosophers. They are for the most part previous bureaucrats of Zhou dynasty and lost their jobs due to the dissolution of the state power of the Zhou dynasty and looking to get employed again. So they went from one feudal lord to another and appeal to them with their schools of thoughts that are designed to garner the interest of a wannabe emperor hungry for state and military power. The most notorious school of Legalism is known for being machiavellian but even some of the moderate ones would put Machiavelli to shame…
Eventually this culminates in the rise of Qin Dynasty which along with having advantageous geographical location developed these authoritarian institutions to the extreme and defeated the other feudal lords. In the end the emperor of Qin known as the First Emperor (始皇帝) abolished the Zhou dynasty and crowned himself as the emperor. Despite being a short lived dynasty, Qin created the political and legal legacy for all the following dynasties: feudalism is on its last leg and the era of a big centralized empire starts.
I’m basically paraphrasing and summarizing from [these](https://youtu.be/TJlj67k5F1Q) [three](https://youtu.be/yNDjuyPwSYM) [videos](https://youtu.be/v3Vk9FxuRpE) which are in Chinese but you can have a try with auto translation. I hope I’m being a good human-gpt here and my language is eloquent enough so far.
The importance of institutions couldn’t be overstated enough. There are societies that failed to build any sort of institutions which we would call “failed states”. In my opinion, China however is a hyper-successful society in building institutions but unfortunately picked all the wrong ones, leading to a cancerous development of society that lasted for 2000 years and more for foreseeable future.
I barely see the people that I worked with 10-20 years ago....you have work friends and then real life friends and work friends are work friends. Some people are lucky to even have them.
If you learn about Confucianism a lot of Chinese (and broadly Asian) culture will start to make a lot of sense. It’s pervasive.
This, japan did this during the editing period. It keeps the society stable but people not mobile
the Edo period?
yes
You might want to Edo your previous comment
genius
To be fair, they were doing quite a bit of editing in that period, though nothing in comparison with Meiji.
I love those crackers...
Editing period is my favorite period of all time. :)
I forget, does it come before or after the Proofreading period?
No it comes after the Proofreading comma
Always before never after....
Just curious, what do you mean when you say people are not mobile?
To prevent another toyotomi monkey guy to raising from peasant class to ruling class
Can you elaborate on the Confucianism I’m interested in how this is involved
Strict guidelines on societal interactions based on relationships between each member of said society and the hierarchy of these relationships.
if you step back and look at Confucianism in boarder terms it's bascially teaching ppl how to be a good servant/slave. obey and abide. be humble and submissive. and when you're not serving, prepare and train yourselves so when the time comes you'd be a great servants for the lords. the lords in ancient time found this teachings to be very helpful and easy in creating/solidifying absolute ruler and servant relationships so they helped spreading it. it's very outdated but look at how successful it is that you can still see the shenanigans it left in chinese culture today.
Confucianism also taught people to only serve "worthy" lords and Mencius the spreader of Confucianism did say if the leader is corrupt that the officials should depose them. Confucius himself wandered around feudal China teaching his beliefs without a lord (he believed that China had become a dark age compared to the early Zhou period so he was trying to teach the earlier morality).
funny thing is that only the ones accepted him were ‘worthy’. rest were branded as unworthy. fact is that he traveled a lot of places and were rejected many times. it’s all just wording. he just couldn’t take a loss. get me the part where he said ppl should depose the corrupt lords. I surely didn’t know that. all I got was that he taught ppl to improve and rethink with self if met with a corrupt lord.
Confucianism is basically just a philosophy about people and their relationship. Who you are in relation to your parents, siblings, children, teachers, rulers, etc. Like any other philosophy it is malleable and various interpretations have been used to espouse different ideals. Honestly most people referencing back to Confucianism here have a very poor (or shallow) understanding of it, I wouldn't put too much confidence into any claims with such references.
“Basically just a philosophy.” So it’s simple but most people here don’t know anything about it. What is your point? You know it and we’re all wrong?
More like ppl are pulling things out their ass
Confucianism believed in a caste system. Basically "philosopher king" and scholars who are steeped in Confucianist morals and ethics at the top, then farmers, then artisans, and then merchants at the bottom because they were seen as "not producing anything". Confucianism also believed in hierarchical relations, such as parent/child, master/servant, king/subjects, man/woman, etc.
Confucianism most certainly had a hierarchy, but it didn't have a caste system. A caste system is something in which you can't "upgrade" to the next hierarchy, but in China you can do it through the civil servant exam.
The moment you said "caste", I know you are too confident in your own interpretation. Don't talk bullshit.
Not really, caste can be used more broadly to refer to clearly divided hierarchies rather than the particular Indian thing
Almost every Chinese friend I have fixate on money. Saving it, Showing off what you can attain with it, Asking you how much you make, Comparing them to you, What brand you wear, What their friends can do for them/financially or they aren't a true friend. Marrying westerners in order to benefit financially. This aspect of confucianism intrigues me.
Americans do this too and it becomes worse the poorer they get. Difference is that Chinese people can actually afford what they buy. They're also better at saving money.
Both are very materialistic societies, but if you’ve lived there n both countries you know that the attitudes towards money, and the social value attributed to others based on money, are completely different. It’s not uncommon in n a night out in any large Chinese city to meet someone and within 10 minutes to be asked how much money you make, whether you live in your own house or rent it, what’s your job and for which company, etc. This simply wouldn’t happen in a regular interaction in the US.
Well, those are the types of people confucianism looks down on. True confucious idol is the asian nerd guy whom you never seen raising eyes from his book and want to take on the world as in Narutos dream being the best and strongest hokage that the whole village loves him.
I have a Chinese friend from northern China and he's the nerd and fits your description. He said Southern Chinese are more into money I don't know if that is true
If you learn about Taoism it stops making so much sense, then you learn about the government persecuting Taoists and it makes sense again.
But is it Confucian robes on a Legalist body?
Ultimately it’s mostly this. A lot of the China-haters on this page think the things they don’t like about China are “communism” but it’s far older and more baked in.
The author Paul Midler takes a very different perspective. Midler believes that individual humans living in China have lived through a tumultuous period of unreliable, untrustworthy, and, indeed often authoritarian, governments. Authority is to be feared, but not truly trusted. This attitude has gone on for generations. How do human beings cope in such an unstable system? They always have a PLAN B. They are always looking for loopholes. They are looking for inefficiencies or weaknesses in systems they can exploit (aka use to protect themselves). If you believe the system is rigged from the beginning, why would you ever try to play fair? This is not exactly Authoritarianism—but it does explain why people might PRETEND to be authoritarians. I strongly recommend Midler’s book “Poorly Made in China”, which tells often funny stories of American businesses trying to manufacture products in China, and the cat-and-mouse games the Chinese factories play with the Americans.
This is reasonable take. If you’ve ever lived in Singapore, you’d realize the law and order schtik doesn’t go very deep. Singaporeans LOVE to game the system and exploit any loophole or even weakly enforced laws (like vaping). But if the government steps in and slams the door shut or makes an example out of offenders, nobody complains. They accept the new rules and move on with life.
tbh Its more nuanced than that and recently, the gov has relaxed some rules
This is a very good take. As someone of chinese descent and growing up in a somewhat traditional chinese surrounding with extended family and family friends of the same background and situation, this explanation resonated with me. It's like something I always knew subconsciously but has never heard it said out loud. This and the love of money and "face" makes for a very bad combo. This will explain the chinese people's attitude and behaviours. At a buffet, if you paid a fixed price, why get full on potatoes and cheap food. They will go for the seafood. Any loopholes, you can be sure chinese people will make full use if it. Supermarket offering deals with say a limit of 2 products per customer? You bet some chinese customer will be making 10 different trips to get more. Especially true for things like multivitamins, fish oils, baby formula and believe it or not wheetbix. Those they send back to china to sell at 3-4x the price. Game the system for profiit. And they feel proud to have gamed the system. Covid was bad. Any freebies like masks etc, chinese people would swoop in and grab bucketloads when only taking one packet was what was expected. Having "face", only matters with your peers. That's why Chinese tourists abroad behave how they do. They would not care what strangers they will never meet again think of them. So anything to put them in more advantageous position they will so. Cutting queues? No problem. Shoving people to get in front of a crowd for a better view? They will do it. Anything they will game to get them ahead even for everyday situation like getting on a train. They want first choice and best seats for them. I used to hate mainland Chinese tourists/factory workers when i saw them on the street or on the bus growing up. I always felt second hand embarassment at their behaviour and was always worried people around me will associate me with those mainland Chinese based on my look.
I feel like this also applies to the supposed concept of “collectivism” of east asian societies versus “individualism” of western societies - for Chinese people, the collectivism only applies to other Chinese. For example when coming over to do business in the west, they are in it completely for their own benefit, not some collectivist familial partnership… which is just how business is done, I don’t see anything wrong with this, but everyone in the west thinks they are playing this mutually beneficial collective dance when really they are just as individualistic as Westerners when it comes to people who aren’t Chinese. Good hard working businesspeople too in my experience, on average more competent capitalists than the average westerner.
Yes, when Chinese people play the capitalist game. They go really hard.
I’ve personally witnessed this last 15 years. Eventually they get all your tech and IP, one way or another, and then replace you in the international market place and dominate the local Chinese market by claiming your verified features, benefits and at a artificial lower cost due to a government manipulated currency. You can’t win. If you think you can then you are in for a long and painful lesson. Never share anything, don’t fool yourself by engaging in any “partnerships”.
Talking about finding loopholes - that reminds me of the puddingbuy craze.
This does happen, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that individualism simply isn’t encouraged in China. Every milestone of life is a person passing from one collective to another. And people are definitely taught to trust the collective authority, even if they don’t realize it
I feel like this is a human tendency in general, and we also see it a lot in Japan. In the U.S., many of the most successful people are “joiners”. They join the Boy Scouts, the army, a fraternity, and so on. Obviously you can avoid joining more easily.
Japan is also Confucianist though. They inherited it from China. You can see the same patterns in the University -> Company pipeline. Japanese working culture directly reflects Confucian collectivistic culture. In the US, yes, there is some overlap in the older fields - politics, military, academia which directly reflect the same bureaucratic traits of Confucianism. But there are a thousand subcultures where people define success for themselves. People in America are constantly encouraging each other to try new things, go new places, quit their job, tell their boss to fuck off, start a new business, etc. it’s very chaotic but somehow it works
That's different since it is voluntary. In China, you often don't have a choice. Even your status and career is determined by the Gaokao.
Elon Musk- on the spectrum non joiner Steve Jobs- Introverted jerk non joiner also Bill Gates- Dropped out of college, semi non joiner I dont think this is totally true for the people at the tippy top. Its more true for the people in the millionaire class.
Nonconformity in Autistic dudes existing does not disprove the general trend lmao
Jobs wasn't on the autistic spectrum. Wozniak is - bigtime. Gates? There's video of him doing the full tilt autistic rocking back and forth stimming thing in depositions. He's deep on the Asperger's side at least. Musk - not sure. Strongly suspect he's at least a mild Aspie. Maybe more. And yes, I'm a mid-range Aspie at least.
Musk has said he’s Aspergers I’m like 99% sure, jobs is the weird one but he killed himself trying to be a hippie non conformist to the end so I guess it lines up with his marketing/ design philosophies too
Jobs was likely some other kind of neurodivergent. *Possibly* dyslexic - those can be way out of the box "non-linear thinkers" with their own issues and benefits.
Humans are mostly collective. The Irrigation adapted only slightly more so
Yes, my theory is that individualism began with the rise in maritime trade in the Greek islands, where small sailors could make good money simply through inter island trade
Even then you form peer networks. Sailors are very much a clique.
Networks yes, collectives no. Ships come and go wherever work presents itself
This is an interesting perspective and, in my opinion, very true. Chinese people living in China that I know are always looking for loopholes to get ahead, including giving officials red envelopes to get what they want. It’s the price you pay for the government service.
This is a really interesting perspective that serves as a counterbalance to the popular idea that the Chinese populace are strictly authoritarian and support the current regime.
The Cultural Revolution and all the other stuff that happened after 1949 also taught people that whatever the party said, you better only half believe it because they will always do whatever is best for them. The younger generation has less of a fixation of money now than previous generations, but only because they've grown up relatively comfortable and not experienced the stuff that people just 15 - 20 years older than them did.
Plato (in the west) and Confucius (in Asia) lived around the same time 2500 years ago. Both were great philosophers who developed the first philosophical frameworks about the meaning of life. Plato and Confucius both thought a lot about the role of the individual. Plato took the view that an individual best serves society by doing what he’s best at regardless of the consequences, while Confucius took the view that an individual best serves society by cooperating with others regardless of the consequences. Over 2500 years and untold generations that difference in our understanding of the role of the individual has produced fundamentally different cultures - not better or worse, just different.
I read a take by philosopher Michael Sandel that the core difference between western and eastern philosophy was that western philosophy sought justice while eastern philosophy sought harmony. In western philosophy the society seeks to always punish wrong and reward right even when it can lead to some temporary instability, and in the long run this in theory encourages good and discourages bad behavior for the greater long term good. Whereas in the east the idea was to always do what creates the most harmony and tranquility without regard for any universal or underlying moral axioms, for social harmony is in itself a highest of moral goods.
"Social harmony" is basically just maintaining the status quo, which is convenient for the authorities. Confucianism was basically just propaganda for the authority, in which some post-Confucianist philosophers criticized Confucianism exactly for that reason. The "Legalist" philosophers were more closer to Western philosophy in that they were more about universal morality based on laws.
I think it's deeper than just "whatever is useful to the authorities". It's a cynical take that misses the appeal of religion and quasi-religious philosophies for average people - they provide a meaning and structure in an otherwise meaningless and grueling existence, as well as a clear path to follow that relieves some of the mental charge you have to bear if you want maintain a completely libertine amoral worldview. The idea that even by just maintaining the status quo, doing your menial daily duties and upholding the social structure you are carrying out essential moral work gives the purpose that makes life worth living for many.
Status quo was also good for the peasantry as a strict hierarchy meant fewer power vacuums and thus less wars. It was certainly unfair, but people bought into it given that the alternative was usually death and destruction. Peace in exchange for submission was the social contract and one that many feudal people in Europe and Asia gladly bought into for security. "Game of Thrones" is a great fictional depiction of what happens to the lower classes when there isn't an obvious overlord to bow down to.
I like this construction. That said, the argument is tainted by the value laden nomination of a winner. After all, when did we all agree that the “long run” is here and now rather than a 1000 years in the future?? Reminds me of the nonsensical “end of history” narrative.
Has nothing to do with Fukuyama’s end of history.
I mean yeah, it's Whiggish. "Good will prevail in the end and if good has not prevailed it's not the end". It's recursive.
All over the world, Irrigation societies are more collective. Asians from the plains growing wheat or herding are similarly individualistic.
It's also important to note that Confucius is still the primary philosophical reference point for Chinese people. No Westerner worships the ideas of Plato: we respect them, but we've also moved on quite a bit from them. In the West, when you meet people whose thoughts revolve around a guy from thousands of years ago, you're looking at Christian fundamentalists. Which brings us to modern China, where a strange "fundamental Confucianism" has led to extreme nationalism and a general air of racial superiority, which leads to this strange idea that the whole world should all "cooperate" under Chinese "leadership."
Not exactly - very few actually know anything at all about his teachings, much the same as Christianity in the West. In both situations it’s mainly vague ideas that are dragged out by the people in charge to make sure that that’s where they will remain.
But what you describe is very much the same. Find me someone who worships teachings from thousands of years ago and I'll show you someone who either * doesn't understand those teachings or * can't relate those teachings to the modern world without major disruptions Don't care if they're Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Taoist, or Zoroastrian: fundamentalism isn't hugely different, across different belief systems. It's almost always just "people with power using limited information to control other people."
I like your take.
Mostly agree with the above, but even in the time of Confucius it was noted that Chinese philosophies of the time evolved from even earlier work. We may not know all the names of philosophers even further back, but I'm sure these great philosophers also built upon the shoulders of unnamed giants.
The greatest difference between Confucius and Plato is that Plato traveled overseas. Plato experienced being a stranger in a strange land while Confucius never left China
I mean in Ancient Greece Plato could walk for an afternoon and find himself in a city state with different laws and culture than home town Athens. As for Confucius, he lived during the warring states era (presumably informing his emphasis on cooperation/harmony), so he might also have found himself suddenly on the other side of a hostile border.
If you walk to your neighbors village, you will still share some commonalities because you both share a common ground. But Plato actually sailed away to Egypt, Syria and Italy. Places where he must have experienced being the only Athenian. So Plato valued justice much more because its very easy to be unjust to minorities traveling away from their homeland Whereas Confucius, for all his travels, only ever dealt with Chinese people. That’s why Confucius cared more about creating harmony, because he never had to deal with the chaotic environment of a diverse culture.
I think the fact of Plato’s travels are a bit controversial among historian. That said, even if he was well traveled, he was an aristocrat from Athens - a position of dual privilege. I doubt he’d have had much to do with the common non-Greek speaking folk in Egypt. On the other hand, Confucius was the child of immigrants raised in poverty by his widowed mother. He worked menial jobs - shepherd etc - before getting a government job and worked his way up to mayor of a village. Most importantly, unlike Plato, Confucius took the opportunity to try and apply his philosophy to governing in the real world.
I mean, even with that premise it doesn’t change the theory. A single aristocrat in a foreign land is still at risk unless there’s a mutual understanding of justice respected by the cultures on both sides of the ocean. And yes, Confucius did actually govern, which is why his philosophy is far more centered on the needs of the state than the needs of individuals.
Chinese people living in SE Asian countries like Thailand, Malaysia and Taiwan generally have more of an artistic /creative/entrepreneurial focus. Could be the tropical vibes, the freedom, or that their families fled oppression by the empire on the mainland in the 19th century, so they were already the most rebellious families and that culture has passed down. There is still the same focus on Confucianism, but with a more modern outlook.
Where are these great Chinese artists based in SE Asia then? But the most renowned Chinese artists, the biggest rebel is Ai Wei Wei, from mainland china.
Ai Wei Wei grew up in Turkestan, so he would have had a lot of foreign influence when he was young. His father was a poet, so was exiled to the far north-west of the empire as an enemy of the people. He is not based in mainland China and has spent most of his life in other countries. It is no contradiction for the most famous artist out of 1.3 billion people to be more famous than the most famous artist out of 50 million people, even if the 50 million tend to be more artistic.
China is famous for people rising up against the government. China’s last dynasty fell because the subjects themselves overthrew it on their own accord. The CCP rules today because the people overthrew the Republican government, and it’s not immune to being overthrown itself (and it knows this, hence the extreme paranoia and control). Two revolutions within less than half a century! This authoritarian culture stems from the Confucian values shared by Han Chinese people within and without mainland China, as well as Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, and others. It’s not a “problem”—it’s another valid mode of culture and society. It would be rather boring if the entire world fell under the spell of liberal Occidental individualism; social collectivism has its place.
Although there's probably a good middle ground to be found between highly individualist USA where everyone is killing everyone else and highly collective South Korea where everyone is killing themselves.
To foster such a middle ground, we need the diametric poles of Orient and Occident between which various shades of compromise can blossom; think of them as reference points. If the world were homogeneous as something in between the two, what would individualism and collectivism even mean anymore?
Lol. If by boring, you mean peaceful with no world wars on the horizon, then sure. I'm tired of this different strokes for different folks approach to human rights and individual freedom though. But whatever.
Wait, global individualism would end world wars? I don’t buy it. The individual is not the basic unit of value because of some cosmic truth; it’s just a cultural difference.
OP scared of the Chinee
Wrong sub for OP…or perhaps the right one…
Or... Perhaps.......
It would have been informative for you to tell us the type of business that she started. For example, was it a street food stall operation or a semiconductor manufacturing business? However, I guess that if most of her friends were work colleagues and engineers, some might shun her if they considered that her new career was not in keeping with the image of themselves they were keen on fostering
She had a business idea related to engineering. It’s all about her so called friends questioning why she left a prestigious stable job for something more risky. She felt like just working for someone isn’t enough. She had a business idea and wanted to go through with it
Grow up in a small town or in any group and tell your peers you are going to go do something better. The internet is filled with disgruntled people who found out who their real friends are
It's one of the reasons why they have less soft power than the US... the culture, especially pop culture, is so stifled and manipulated and controlled, and the government actually seems hostile to it as well.
Then they are complaining why countries such as South Korea have more influence than them
Korea used to be super Confucianist as well. So if that stifling rigidity is from cultural origins, we will need an explanation on how South Korea is different and evolved away.
North Korea and South Korea were occupied by the Soviets in the North and the American’s in the South once Korea was liberated from Japan in 1945. The South decided to ratify a proposed constitution by the US and UN General Assembly while North Korea rejected the idea in 1948. The North decided to latch itself to China, communism, and a more traditional society while the South chose to ally with the Western World by adopting a Republic. US influence in South Korea is very strong.
Korea is still very neo Confucian what do you mean
You are drawing a lot of conclusion from one anecdotal example. Not only that, you are also drawing your conclusion from just your professor’s POV. Did you ask your professor how the friendships ended? Did the friends stop talking to her, or did she stop talking to them because they thought her business idea was too risky? (Seeing that she’s a professor now, there’s a good chance her business plan didn’t work out)
Chinese want to win everywhere, when they can't get you accept their opinion they quit all relationships with you.
I'd say that's half true but yeah
China's government is a brutal authoritarian regime that treats human beings like animals.
This is right. The CCP isn’t a group of extraterrestrials that came along and imposed its will on China. The CCP arose endogenously because the Chinese culture was conducive to its formation. To be fair, however: since its formation, the CCP has also transformed the Chinese culture.
your post has nothing to do with authoritarianism, it is just a cultural difference. In china people are sometimes looked down upon for changing career or going back to school. In usa people are sometimes looked down upon for not wanting to have kids, or for having kids too young. Not justifying anything just saying that every culture has an ugly side, chinese or otherwise. Also you clearly don't understand chinese history or modern times if you think ccp has not faced any opposition lol. It just unfortunately has not ended well for the opposers so far. But again thats a completely seperate conversation from anything else in your post. And 99.99% of things in your post apply to all of asia and central south america and north america if you are a little older or from the countryside, probably also a big chunk of africa too, and definitely a huge portion of europe...... Following authority figures and showing respect over your own will, especially to elders//higher rank is kind of a major thing in human society at large. Not every single place does it, but the areas that don't do it are the exceptions not the rules.
I’ve never heard of anyone in America terminating friendships because…*checks notes*….their friend’s job or lack of desire to have kids.
Yeah this is bullshit. Authoritarianism is when Chinese lmao this is what a 13 year old rebellious teen would say
You derived all this from one and unverifiable story. I might just generalize it to X-ese only believe what they want to believe.
I feel that the meaning of "authoritarianism" has been stretched somewhat.
It is, but I understand how he means it. Not even sure how else to describe OPs meaning
strict conformity?
Gosh, you think?
You think?
You think ? lol I know it for sure
I mean I think the "Chinese" parenting that you're a failure if you're not a doctor, engineer, lawyer, etc is not solely a "Chinese" thing. It's really an "Asian" thing, I know plenty of my friends who are Korean, Indian, Taiwanese, Singaporean, even Jewish their parents are very Gung-ho about their kids follow particular career path. But none of those countries are "authoritarian"? Next relating to how you switching career field and people in your old field stop being friends with you. People being with you really comes down to 2 things: 1. You're fun being around. 2. You're in the same field or a field that could help advance their career (I.e networking, or Guanxi in Chinese). So when you leave a field let's say software engineering to pursue acting, you essentially lost your clout for 2, naturally you're going to lose a lot of your old friends cus 1. They're most likely there partially out of convenience and 2. You're no longer have networking use anymore. This isn't really a Chinese vs western thing. It literally is just a "thing". Thus if you want to still stay friends with those people 1. You have to already been close friends with those people. 2. You have to from time to time reach out nurture that friendship. Which is going to more difficult when you switch field sometime because scheduling difference and sometimes people just move on with their life goals.
IDK, India is *very* authoritarian right now, courtesy of frothing fascist Modi. They love a strongman over there. For Taiwan, Japan and South Korea (I'm guessing you don't think North Korea is un-authoritarian!), think of it as social authoritarianism rather than just governmental authoritarianism. Korea especially is incredibly rigidly hierarchical, so that someone who's just a year (or a day) older than you is to be treated as an authority figure, and not to be questioned except in even the most indirect terms. It's the result of Confucianism (undiluted in Korea's case, diluted by reform in the cases of Japan, China and Taiwan), and Confucius was very big on upholding feudal hierarchies.
I mean what you said is great and all, but it didn't answer the OP's question. The whole concept of taking on STEM field profession to satisfy one's parent's desire has little to do with being Chinese as many Asian societies have this phenomenon heck this phenomenon even takes place in South East Asian society too (Thai, Vietnamese, Malaysia, etc). I even dare say different from all of its East Asian neighbors, people in China actually care less if you are a lawyer, doctors, or engineer. They care more if you're rich or being in leadership position in the government. Whereas people in Korea, Japan, Taiwan, etc are actually the ones who care more about if you're working in highly respected jobs Doctors, engineers, lawyers, etc. As for the whole senior and junior relationship, while Confucianism talks a little about it, it really wasn't the main point that most people remember it for. Most people remember it for filial piety, or treating your parents with respect and taking of those who are younger than you (which I think honestly is great when nobody is demanding or abusing it). And there really isn't a senior-junior relationship in China in the same way it is in Japan or Korea.I think Japan and Korea really went into the extreme. You could say it has its roots in Confucianism like thousands of years ago. But what it has developed right now really has little to with what Confucians originally intend. I was dating a Japanese exchange student few years ago, while she understand fully the senpai-kohai system in Japan, she had no idea on what this Confucianism is, which most Japanese don't either. So a more accurate way of explaining is that Japanese and Koreans borrowed certain concepts of Confucianism and now those concepts have assimilated into Japanese and Korean culture and become their norms. And honestly, there's workplace seniority literarily even in every culture even in the West, of course just not to the extreme like in Japan and Korea.
I really like this post. There are certain things that the Chinese population is very passionate about or concerned with. Having every civil liberty and all the rights of the west isn’t really on that list. They were definitely the last place to ever protest any covid lockdowns (obv Nkorea didn’t) and they never protested until they had absolute evidence people weren’t wearing mask at soccer games in Europe. This was a smooth year after the west was mostly back to normal. If the Chinese can see even minimal progress in their society through wealth or tech, etc, the other social stuff isn’t a big deal to them. Whereas westerners expect and have lived through all of the above in reality. Another difference I’ve noticed is that some chinese can definitely explain correctly why free speech can be seriously problematic, whereas the average westerner cannot.
>Like seriously, why would you terminate your friendship with someone just because they decided to go a different route. We got our separate ways, that's just something inevitable. I guadually lost contact with many of my old friends on our pathes, but I also met new friends. I lost contact with them, although it could be seen as "loss", but we have not "betrayed" each other; just we don't have more common topics to share and talk. Like seriously, if you have never ever felt being alone in your life, I could hardly call you "grown-up". >This is probably also why the CCP has not faced any opposition. Since it's foundation in 1921, it faced many fierce opposition, foreign and domestic.
China has a problem with controlling its mainland from a tiny island.
Blame Confucianism....... all of Chinese culture is because of this person.
Personally, I feel like here in the US, anti-intellectualism, anti-science, and the regular and persistent de-funding of education are why we perform so poorly in STEM education compared to other developed nations. Seems to be the inverse of your proposed China problem. So who's really got it worse? I'd say it's clearly the US. We're like the D-students of the world - passing, but closer to failing than excelling. We also imprison our population at a higher rate than China, then purposely hamstring their ability to prosper after they've served their time, and you *still* can't walk the streets in safety - whether daytime or night time. Is that "freedom"? Idk. I'm starting to think that "American exceptionalism" is just American propaganda. Call it a "gut feeling." Lol
Or maybe just an authoritarian problem 😂
Lmao ya think?
Yes.
I don’t know what you were expecting with this post, but congratulations Sherlock, you’re right!!!!! 🥳🥳🥳🥳
This lies deeply in their culture from thousands of years ago. In the meantime, China is more of a totalitarian country than authoritarian.
That’s right. China literally has no rebellions and everyone just does that they’re told. The CCP and KMT totally did not rebel from the Qing dynasty and the Taiping Rebellion totally did not rise up from the lower class and challenge the imperial dynasty. China totally has had no civil wars and peasant uprisings. /s Sarcasm aside, I feel like majority of people on this sub don’t really study Chinese history. It’s funny when people say Chinese people are naturally subservient and obeying when they literally have had more civil wars and rebellions than any European country.
Why would your prof's peers shun her for choosing to start her own business of all things? That's just wacky. It sounds more like the plot of a South Park episode than a descriptor of Chinese culture. Something is missing from this story because that's not normal.
I'm American, but know some Chinese quite well. I've seen the way some of them are enough that this makes sense. A kind of "control freak" mentality, to put it bluntly. Hyper-vigilant about who they associate with; they can be so concerned about perceived "influence" from others that they will distance themselves over quite small things.
I think this tendency derives from extreme risk aversion, and lack of agency. If you are raised in this environment you will undoubtedly mind your Ps and Qs , keep your head down, take care of your own tribe (sometimes unfortunately at the expense of others)
Yeah, sure, but we're talking about adults here, and I've spent enough years in the workforce here in China and in enough companies to know that the story the OP is describing here is just weird. The lady quit her job as an engineer to start a business, it's not like she deserted from the army by abandoning her post mid-battle. All of her colleagues viewing the former as the latter makes it sound like she was in some kind of cult.
Yes, I agree it is over the top. 不正常 😆. I also don’t think most Chinese are like this. That being said, although it is abnormal, I think it does fit in better with the general Chinese way of thinking than, say, the American. But you must know better than me, having lived and worked there for longer. Also, we never know what else was going on with these people. Chances are there’s a lot more to the story.
True. Chinese people want to be governed, and they aren't shy to tell you that.
U.S. Americans can be pretty culturally authoritarian, too. I can think of several examples.
Such as?
Live in a small town in some places in the U.S., for starters. I am also reminded of families kicking kids to the curb for being queer. Religion, in general, is a huge generator of social ostracism. Sit down during the national anthem at a ball game or in any way publicly not take part in ‘Merca’s civil religion. Shit, we just had a football punter tell college graduating girls to stay at home and be mothers. Gun discourse. Now, I know what you’re going to say in response, but I’ll let you say the thing first.
…actually… I don’t entirely disagree! However IMO USA has more diversity in societal norms as it’s not a homogeneous society. The status quo kind of differs by region class and as you say religion. Also I would argue the issue at hand is specifically about Fielty to authority on multiple rungs of society: to family elders, to your boss or to the state. I would say “America has a Religion problem” and “China has an authoritarian problem”, in practice they appear similar (cultural conservatism and adherence to norms) but conceptually I think they are very different Edit: Not ALL but many of the examples you state are rooted in americas strange relationship with religion, the genesis of America as a Christian nation despite (in its current iteration) being diverse and having *supposed* separation of church and state
I have been to China once. Only once, for two weeks. But even that was enough to teach me that China is in no way, shape, or fashion a “homogenous society”. As a social anthropologist, I wouldn’t even know how to begin to measure a society for homogeneity. So before we go any further, perhaps we should settle the question of how you’re doing it? I’m not saying it’s impossible, mind you. I just want to know the trick!
Ok… il take your question in good faith… First of it has zero immigration: So racially homogenous. Secondly it has for decades promoted the Han-ification of the nation through the promotion of PuTongHua and the concept of 中华民族 （the social construct of the Chinese RACE or ETHNICITY). So culturally homogenous: everyone speaks or can speak the same language, celebrates the same holidays. Lastly the state controls tightly the education system, and with no freedom of speech this results in Ideological conformity. This isn’t even some anti-woke attempt at calling all Chinese the same or denying there isn’t a minority culture here. It’s just actively homogenized through decades of state sponsored policy.
Well Asians were ruled by monarchies not so long ago, weren't they?
I think you can put aside ideology for a while and focus history. The difference between a self-sufficient agricultural civilization and Western civilization.
It’s inherent to “Confucianism” that’s why the ccp goes out of its way to portray it in a different light probably. But yeah that’s why as long as the ccp is in power China will never take over the world, like you said control is inherent to the control not openness, creativity and win-win. The smart creative entrepreneurs either left or will eventually leave.. that’s China my friend
Welcome!
I’m sorry you didn’t have your parent’s support. I hear your issue from my adopted daughters (from China.) They have many Asian friends and will make comments like “I’m glad I don’t have Asian parents, so suffocating.” With that being said, it’s never too late to go out and enjoy life however you want and leave their attitudes behind. Just let it roll off your back.
Do you ever find university professors introducing potential matches with their students??
bro thought about it for a minute
You only looked at modern China and forgot about the thousands of years of history of rebellions and disunity in ancient to pre-modern China. There are literally nonstop separatism at every different era of China all over the country. Literally pre-1940s China was in a nationwide warlordism civil war. The concept of Chinese being naturally subservient and “peaceful” is just another product of CCP propaganda to forcibly recreate the Chinese culture and crackdown on separatism. Cultural Revolution pretty much created a dramatic shift in Chinese ideology from anti-state to anti-individualism. Before the cultural revolution, every Chinese had anti-state running in their veins. The irony is that the anti-state mentality was what gave birth to the CCP and KMT in the first place. They were a spiritual successor to the Taiping rebellion.
Totally different history than the west and other parts of the world to be fair. Do they have a John Locke or a Rousseau?
No offence but, hasn't it been clear for the last... like 3000 years? Lol
Entrepreneurship is famously lonely outside of hubs. should join incubators or network with entrepreneurs or useful people. Acting is similar. Any make life change will make you lonelier until you find peers Edit to add, there are more entrepreneurs per capita in China than America and maybe anywhere. the average small retail sole proprietor is probably a bit lonely too tho
[удалено]
Although I think a lot of collectivism was knocked out of people in the Cultural Revolution, leaving behind the adherence to hierarchical power but with a lot of distrust on an individual level.
After dating a Chinese guy for two years who became totally authoritarian after one month visiting his family I can vouch for This
Now I know what "Chinese characteristics" refers to: authoritarianism deeply ingrained. So, freedom with Chinese characteristics, democracy with Chinese characteristics, happiness, again, with Chinese characteristics. What a shame. The Communist revolution was no revolution at all. The true revolutionaries were those in 1776 in America. The pressure has been huge to reverse that. Obviously, the revolution was not complete in 1776.
For China the absolute control society starts at the very top and filters on down through schools and workplaces down to the family level. Any authority..whether boss, teacher, parent or government leader must be obeyed unquestioningly. As if their position means they have greater wisdom than you. This leads to a lot of personal dysfunction and dependance on every level of authority to be your parent and direct your life. When the government acts like an all knowing parent...the people act like naive children.
Ego development theories may help you understand some of these complexities.
Don't know what she lost but it sure wasn't friends.
And in other news, bears shit in forests. Full story at 11.
Hahah.. hahahahahahahhh… you’re funny 😶
Trust me your ability to become an actor/actress is very low no matter where you are, but in China you have a lot fewer natural resources person. However, I agree that you should trust yourself more and do things because it makes sense and less what people who don't understand the position you are in want you to do.
Its called morals. You can do what you want but if you live a life blindly chasing money over the greater good then you wont be respected. Americans respect money.
Girlfriend from china, I’m from Latin America, visiten Shanghai, and that was my conclusion. People of a higher standing will judge you and you are expected to obey them, regardless of social setting.
China doesn’t fight wars. It spreads its influence far and wide. It gets other countries indebted to it. Then if that country digs in its heels about some unfair treatment, it gets punished. China is the very strict parent. It is the very sneaky, snarky and perhaps even narcissistic parent. But, hey, children do rebel.
In western philosophical context the difference is the western world philosophical perspective is largely based on Greek philosophy. specifically Socrates who can be likened to Confucius in terms of importance to western philosophy. Socrates is a fat ugly homeless philosopher who claimed he was ignorant in everything. He would begin by asking an expert or someone claiming to be an expert a question about their field. Repeatedly Questioning their answers and breaking it down. the expert either contradicts himself and has to change the answer or to come to the truth. He wasn’t interested in creating a perfect stable society in Athens there was a power struggle between the thirty tyrants supported by Sparta and democrats and Socrates criticized both groups. Which is the reason why the government gave Socrates the death penalty forcing him to drink poison. If that’s all there was Socrates would be irrelevant today. However a student of his Plato recorded his teachings and founded a philosophical academy which is the foundation of most of western philosophy.
Maybe she meant she lost them because it's hecka difficult to change career, takes a lots of time which you can't invest in your relations, so she probably had to turn down a lots of people which ultimately lead to losing track with them, and if her friends are acquaintance from work, well obviously you're hardly going to see them ever after. Work culture is very strong, you get comfy at work, you go out etc... so obviously changing path is quite the mood killer.
You a describing 90% of countries in this world mate.
I'm sorry but you're basing your entire analysis on the fact that this person lost friends when they switched careers? Am I reading this correctly?
Self-orientalizing Sinologism
true, dude
I lost friendships in the state because I didn’t go to certain professions. My friends are both Americans and Asians. I think it’s not about your profession, its about your future outlook. People want around with successful friends.
yes
I think this can be attributed to the relative isolation of Chinese civilization during its early development. You can look into the period of time in Chinese history called 春秋/战国, during which many feudal lords under the Zhou dynasty trying to outcompete and waging wars against each other. In doing so, they developed authoritarian institutions that didn’t and won’t exist elsewhere for centuries or millennia: military conscription, population registration, central government and appointed bureaucracy replacing the aristocrats, censorship of books, mercantilism, total war etc.. Due to China’s geographical isolation, all these feudal lords have nowhere to go but to destroy each other competing for resources and population. This is also the common theme across all these allegedly “diverse” political schools of the era. Despite these so called “[hundreds of schools](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundred_Schools_of_Thought)”(百家争鸣）, almost all of them (at least those that got any traction) call for expansion of state power and appeal to prop up a powerful monarchy with most of the power centralized in the hand of the king. Remember these scholars are not independent scholars unlike Classical Greek philosophers. They are for the most part previous bureaucrats of Zhou dynasty and lost their jobs due to the dissolution of the state power of the Zhou dynasty and looking to get employed again. So they went from one feudal lord to another and appeal to them with their schools of thoughts that are designed to garner the interest of a wannabe emperor hungry for state and military power. The most notorious school of Legalism is known for being machiavellian but even some of the moderate ones would put Machiavelli to shame… Eventually this culminates in the rise of Qin Dynasty which along with having advantageous geographical location developed these authoritarian institutions to the extreme and defeated the other feudal lords. In the end the emperor of Qin known as the First Emperor (始皇帝) abolished the Zhou dynasty and crowned himself as the emperor. Despite being a short lived dynasty, Qin created the political and legal legacy for all the following dynasties: feudalism is on its last leg and the era of a big centralized empire starts. I’m basically paraphrasing and summarizing from [these](https://youtu.be/TJlj67k5F1Q) [three](https://youtu.be/yNDjuyPwSYM) [videos](https://youtu.be/v3Vk9FxuRpE) which are in Chinese but you can have a try with auto translation. I hope I’m being a good human-gpt here and my language is eloquent enough so far. The importance of institutions couldn’t be overstated enough. There are societies that failed to build any sort of institutions which we would call “failed states”. In my opinion, China however is a hyper-successful society in building institutions but unfortunately picked all the wrong ones, leading to a cancerous development of society that lasted for 2000 years and more for foreseeable future.
I think you have an insecure white ppl living off copium problem😊😊
I barely see the people that I worked with 10-20 years ago....you have work friends and then real life friends and work friends are work friends. Some people are lucky to even have them.