To clarify, I don't believe in the surface level propaganda thrown in China's way about "1984 dystopian society," "Mao killed 60 million people," "Xinjiang concentration camps" or things like that.
I'm curious about a few negative factors of China that have become widespread knowledge over the past decade or so by even the politically literate audience, and I want to learn how accurate these things are, how prevalent they are in today's society in China, and how much it would impact the day to day life of someone living in China.
-
Quality control, I have read stories about Chinese factories producing guns, steel, industrial goods, consumer goods, food products, far below acceptable or safe standards, leading to construction/infrastructure failure and severe health complications. There are also claims that smaller restaurants in China today still sometimes use very low quality ingredients that can result in serious health issues. How much of an issue is this?
-
Population issue. The Chinese population trend is going in a unfavorable direction right now, and there are reports of young people not wanting to have children because of cultural and cost reasons. How much of an issue is this, and will China end up like Korea and Japan in another decade or two?
-
Unemployment, it is a fact right now that Chinese people have a 20% unemployment issue due to an abundance of university graduates without sufficient jobs to match this supply. And this has caused internal competition to swell to unreasonable standards leading some people to straight up give up on their careers and become full time neets. Are there any positive trends or actions to resolve this issue?
-
Education. The education system sounds terrifying in China right now, children as young as elementary schoolers having to sleep only 6 hours a night to finish their homework from school and tutoring services. I have also read that after the government banned tutoring of core classroom subjects, illegal tutoring services have become a thing. I would laugh at how this would be the most asian issue ever if I wasn't so horrified by the situation. Is there any government effort to resolve this right now?
-
Nepotism. From what I have heard and read, using connections to obtain positions and resources in China is still very common. How bad is this, and are there any reforms or policies tackling it?
-
Mannerisms and emotional intelligence of the average person. There are frequent complaints about Chinese people being horrible tourists, being extremely rude, having the emotional maturity of a donut until at least the age of 30, and also taking advantage of anything free to disgusting levels (I have personally seen old Chinese ladies take out a container and fill it with ketchup from a restaurant where the condiments are self served). I understand the reasoning behind this, China in it's current iteration is a relatively new country, and the education received by different generations varies massively in quality, with only really Gen Z on average obtaining a level of education that is on par with western populations. I just want to ask how bad this is in day to day life, and if it is tolerable.
Thanks for reading my somewhat long post, I'd appreciate any response, you don't have to respond to all of my points, any point would be fine. I want to have a positive impression of China but these points are really bugging me right now.
I can't answer most of these, but on the 1st and the 6th:
1: The "Chinesium" is just a common trope amongst western nations that holds no real basis in reality. There isn't anything about China that causes things to be less effective or break more easily. The issue is "higher up" the chain, as companies producing products for profit will cut corners, and would much rather people blame "China" for the problem than the inherent contradictions of capitalism. I'm not saying there aren't shoddy products made in China, just that shoddy products are made everywhere due to the nature of capitalism favouring profit above all, including quality.
And as for restaurants, go to any small "hole in the wall" restaurant anywhere in the world and you'll find similar levels of poor quality control. Hell, a lot of multi-national companies will have terrible health and safety standards, so even a fast food or restaurant chain isn't exempt from this either.
6: This is another common trope in the west, anti-China sentiment is very common. But this is just confirmation bias. If people have an idea that Chinese tourists are "rude" and they see an asian tourist, they will assume they must be Chinese, because Chinese tourist == rude. They ignore all the Asian and Chinese tourists who aren't rude, because well, you're not going to remember an interaction with a random nobody, but you will remember an interaction with someone who ruins your day with their shitty attitude.
As for the old ladies being..."overly frugal" like that, it is important to remember that modern China is very young, only 70ish years old. And food insecurity was a common issue there in some places up until quite recently. If you have an older relative who grew up during the great depression (or your parents remember one), you'd probably see something similar. People who grew up in an environment where they didn't always know where their next meal was coming from will tend to be extremely obsessed with making sure they always have food, even if they are 50-60 years older and haven't had issues with food in that time.
And as far as emotional intelligence goes, this goes back to point #1. We're more likely to remember a rude or unpleasant person than a neutral one. So I'm sure there are plenty of people in China with the emotional intelligence of a doughnut, but there are also plenty who are much more emotionally aware than that. Same as with any country.
Basically, be very wary of anything trying to claim that "Chinese culture is like this" or "Chinese culture is like that" because they aren't a monolith. It's a nation of 1.4 Billion people. There are probably more "doughnut minds" in China than there are people in my entire country, but at the same time, there are probably more kind and decent people there than my entire country as well. The news isn't going to push an article about "regular people behaving normally." They push the exciting, the thing that gets clicks. Saying "Expert believes Chinese culture encourages bad behaviour." Is far more eye catching than "China is just a regular country with regular people."
Fair enough, with 1.4 billion people I guess you could find any subgroup with any number of negative characteristics that you want to see.
I guess besides keeping an open mind, it will be necessary for me to visit China myself in the future to gain a satisfying answer to some of these subjective questions. As there's really only so much I can do to sift through the overwhelming amount of biased information about China here in the west, even if I'm trying to maintain an objective research process.
Even with visiting a place, you'll only get a tourist's perspective of the places you visited, and not the whole country. I would heartily recommend traveling though, really helps you connect with other people from around the world and it is always a fantastic experience, even if you don't always have the best time.
But don't worry too much about being "objective" either. You're biased, I'm biased, everyone has their own biases. What's important is that you try to be aware of your biases and your blind spots and try to compensate for them (Which it sounds like you're absolutely doing). The most subjective analyses of a situation come from those who have convinced themselves that their own biased viewpoint is the only unbiased one.
Well said. I think it's ok to lean into our own perspectives and they can certainly be quite effective in understanding things in a potentially novel way. I'd still be wary against relativism though.
Oh for sure, I just meant that when trying to learn about things it is vital that we keep our own biases in mind. So for example, I'm an ML who is quite pro China, so if I see a story talking about something horrible happening there, my first thought is always "that's not true." But then, I'll go and investigate the claims made and look for evidence for and against. If it is really happening as described I'll then compare and contrast it to other nations, see if this is something other countries do, or if this really is a "uniquely Chinese evil" as the western press will usually try to present an event.
Of course, by the time I've done all that, the western media has had the time to release another dozen "China bad" stories, so I do tend to dismiss a lot of them without proper analysis, as they tend to be "wrong" (lying) so often that they just aren't credible anymore. That means they could release some story that happens to be true and is a very real problem that I could end up denying "off the cuff."
Ah fair enough, I hope my comment wasn't rude or condescending. The second part you mention is definitely true. I was talking to someone about why it's not ok to make medical transition or gender affirming care illegal for minors and the way they argues was very interesting.
They would jump from point to point, using all sorts of auxiliary hypothesis, some would be misinterpretations, others like, one instance of something happening, another to distrusting science because it can be wrong, thinking people with expertise in an area are actually the biases ones, etc.
I couldn't keep up with it. Some would get debunked but he would keep going. Then he would reiterate the thing we agreed wasn't true. It was exhausting. I did it to learn how he thought because I found it interesting but it isn't something I would do consistently or with the intention of changing peoples minds.
Your comment was fine! I just thought a bit of extra clarification would be helpful.
I think people have a tendency to want to be "right" rather than "correct." so rather than looking at things and trying to understand and change our view if necessary, we'll instead end up looking for things that confirm our existing opinions on something. If one thing is proven wrong, we can easily fall into the trap of just jumping to the next thing rather than considering if our position is wrong.
I like to use the guys who believe in Bigfoot to talk about this. The thing that would prove Bigfoot existing is...a real Bigfoot. Having one in a cage, or even hit by a truck or something. But instead, they just have mountains and mountains of blurry videos, photos and foot casts. If one is proven to be something else (or a hoax) they just jump to the next blurry bit of evidence and act like the previous one never existed.
Instead of going "What would be required to prove Bigfoot?" they just go "Bigfoot is real and there's lots of proof." They start with a position, then work backwards from it, instead of looking at evidence and forming an opinion based on that. You can try to convince them all day long that their evidence isn't enough, but they just refuse to get it. They're right. Bigfoot is real. And no amount of logic, reason or evidence can convince them otherwise. If one thing is proven wrong, they'll just jump to the next thing until whoever they're talking to just gets annoyed and stops talking to them, at which point they declare victory.
Hateful and fascist rhetoric absolutely loves this style of argument, which is why groups like anti-trans people will often use it. You probably saw the "We should trust the science on this and science says there is males and females only." and then when you present scientific studies that disprove that, they immediately jump to "Well you can't actually trust science at all, you're an idiot if you trust science."
Unfortunately, in this game, the only real winning move is not to play. You can't convince them that they are wrong, because they aren't looking at things in that mindset. They are approaching from a "I'm already right, and anything that agrees with me is just a bonus." You could disprove every single thing they say and they won't change their mind. You will make them look like an absolute idiot to any bystanders though.
(Sorry, comment kind of got away from me there, I didn't mean to write you an entire essay.)
For an 'objective' understanding, there would need to be a thorough systematic scientific analysis. The first of which wouldn't necessarily be enough, but which would improve through subsequent studies. It would need to be systematic because numbers and figures without sufficient context can be misleading.
You may have heard individuals claim that EVs are worse for the environment due to the nickel, cobalt, lithium, etc. While it is true that the procurement and refinement of the materials are awful ethically and environmentally, pointing at a point in the sequence of events a given thing encounters is not enough to make a meaningful conclusion. What is done is called a 'Life Cycle Analysis' where the material is tracked and understood at every point along the sequence. This can then be used as an evaluative standard against oil-derived fuels which have also been studied this way.
I don't know if there would be enough resources available from the interested parties to conduct something so thoroughly. Typically internal data or external data are combined and filtered to create some kind of approximation. This works well enough, but it's not something I would consider satisfying. In this area I am a layperson, I don't have a good way to understand what is in these reports properly in context and what they mean.
For a given molecular compound or protein, let's say in a cell, I can look at its metabolic properties, the DNA, the mRNA, how it may differ from organisms within the same species, across species, phyla, etc. This allows me to zoom in or zoom out so to speak and at any level have the appropriate context and tools to analyze it. If this is done piecemeal it becomes significantly harder, and much less accessible. Though certainly it can be done. The other thing is that there may be emergent or otherwise unknown confounding factors that slip between the cracks when the comparisons are not made holistically.
Can confirm, my grandma was born and raised during famines, I’ve never seen someone haggle so much over fast-food, that’s a good point to bring up tbh