Forces that are Incompatible with Authoritarian Rule...

[rogerluli]

Many China boosters here might be put off by the negative tone of the opening of this article... But please read further and I think by the end of it you'll tend to agree with it and hope things do turn out this way...

 

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columni...,4161271.column

[Richard & Li]

Pretty good article, although there are points that I do not completely agree with, it is mostly positive. Positive articles about China in the Western Press are few and far between.

 

Change cannot happen too rapidly in a country of 1.3 billion people without danger of undermining the societal infrastructure. That (IMHO) is part of what went wrong in the 1950's. Today, China is making remarkable progress.

 

I, for one, wish China and the Chinese the best.

[rogerluli]

I've thought for a long time now that poltical change in China will naturally occur as the country becomes richer, better educated, people see more choices of what to do with their lives, etc. But China is not just like the west in so many ways and has no history of a democratic type system so who can be sure...

 

As for the first part of the article it seems that no article or interview about China from western news sources can possibly begin without first going through the "abysmal human rights record" song and dance...Perhaps when the day comes that this can be dispensed with will be the time that China is accepted on an equal footing with the other developed nations...

[warpedbored]

I'm not saying it doesn't happen but I don't recall seeing any human rights abuses on any of my visits to China. People go about their everyday lives pretty much like they do here. People in Tibet are better off than they were under self government and it's none of our business anyway. I'm still trying to figure out just who it was that appointed the USA as the world police. We should leave China alone. They are changing at their own pace in their own way.

[rogerluli]

I'm still trying to figure out just who it was that appointed the USA as the world police.

 

Back when Reagan outspent the Soviet Union into bankruptcy on military hardware the US thought it was great... Now we are broke and the INSANE amount of $$$ continuing to be spent on the military goes on and on...

[jim_julian]

Gee from the title of this thread I thought it was going to be a discussion about Roger vs the Other Mods.

[IllinoisDave]

I read that when it was in the paper. I avoided posting it because so many here can't read the slightest hint of criticism of China without going on a rant about the evil press. I don't agree with much of what Chapman writes but I thought he had this about right.

 

He's basically saying that while China has it's warts on the political and human rights front (and it does whether we witness it first hand or not) there's much more to the country and the people if anyone takes the opportunity to find out. We're much more aware of that here than the vast majority of our fellow citizens because we've been there to experience it.

 

Folks here are fond of saying, and rightly so, that change/progress IS happening in China but can't be expected overnight. I think the same can be said of western attitudes (and not just in the US) that have been formed over decades of China's history. That history has included some pretty bad things but some pretty wonderful things as well. The bad things get most of the press. Sorry, that's just the way it works.

 

I think that will change over time as China continues to open up and outsiders learn more of what we've learned. But, like the incredible turnaround in China's economy over the last couple decades or so, that will take time.

Edited August 11, 2008 by IllinoisDave (see edit history)

[rogerluli]

Gee from the title of this thread I thought it was going to be a discussion about Roger vs the Other Mods.

 

Ya' just never know what to expect here Jim...

[rogerluli]

I avoided posting it because so many here can't read the slightest hint of criticism of China without going on a rant about the evil press.

 

I thought we worked all this out last time...

 

No one should feel constrained from posting because of what someone else may do/think/say...

 

If you have something you think is important about China then please post it no matter who's ox gets gored...

 

The MK is NOT an authoritarian regime...

[IllinoisDave]

I avoided posting it because so many here can't read the slightest hint of criticism of China without going on a rant about the evil press.

 

I thought we worked all this out last time...

 

No one should feel constrained from posting because of what someone else may do/think/say...

 

If you have something you think is important about China then please post it no matter who's ox gets gored...

 

The MK is NOT an authoritarian regime...

Thank you sir, may I have another?

[griz326]

>>>. . . change/progress IS happening in China but can't be expected overnight. I think the same can be said of western attitudes . . .

 

Perhaps change is happening in other western countries, but what I see fueling anti-Chinese sentiment in the USA is the realization among the comman man that we are slipping out of the #1 spot. Few are able to deal with the reality so hate comes easy.

 

It's easier to hate China for "stealing our jobs" than it is to hate Wal-Mart for giving away jobs that were once American jobs.

 

Keep in mind, no one acted to save the US steel industry in 1957 - the year it died...it's just the carcass did not turn cold for 20 years.

[Richard & Li]

I'm not saying it doesn't happen but I don't recall seeing any human rights abuses on any of my visits to China. People go about their everyday lives pretty much like they do here. People in Tibet are better off than they were under self government and it's none of our business anyway. I'm still trying to figure out just who it was that appointed the USA as the world police. We should leave China alone. They are changing at their own pace in their own way.

 

Ditto.

[rogerluli]

what I see fueling anti-Chinese sentiment in the USA is the realization among the comman man that we are slipping out of the #1 spot.

 

I agree completely... And unfortunately that common man doesn't know who's really to blame... So China and Chinese people are the easy target...

[Guest Rob & Jin]

I'm not saying it doesn't happen but I don't recall seeing any human rights abuses on any of my visits to China. People go about their everyday lives pretty much like they do here. People in Tibet are better off than they were under self government and it's none of our business anyway. I'm still trying to figure out just who it was that appointed the USA as the world police. We should leave China alone. They are changing at their own pace in their own way.

 

 

 

http://i33.tinypic.com/2h87i34.jpg

 

 

 

 

[C4Racer]

I will try not to be too politically, but the biggest problem I see is that American believes our form of government is the only proper form. Not quite sure why. I guess you see more coruption and less human rights in other forms of government. But, could you imagine trying to get 1.3 Billion people voting in their leaders. First, many Chinese just want to worry about everyday life and leave the politics to the politicians. During WWI and WWII we somehow came to be the big saviors recueing the world from terrible forms of government like Nazi Germany, Facist Italy and Imperialist Japan. Right after, as we feared Communist Russia wanted to rule the world we started to police the whole planet. Someone decided it was our duty to force our form of government on everyone else. The one thing we learned from WWII is that trying to stay out of world politics was a mistake, however we seem to have taken it to the opposite extreme. Seems to me the world would be better off if we just stayed home. Now just where did I hear of the concept of learning about other cultures, but not interfering with their form of government. Oh, yeah that was that corny show that may have had some very bad special effects, but some of the concepts were ahead of it's time and still are out in the future. One of these days we will learn to mind our own business.