China has a different culture. One reason that western people having protesting culture because of historically authoritarians are less powerful and less cruel than the eastern ones. Take the 'nine familial exterminations'[0] as an example.
It will most likely become a totally different cyberpunk society, with modern cities and massive surveillance coexist, instead of being another US.
The difference being that China's culture, for the most part, is okay with the surveillance state. There's protests for sure, and places Hong Kong (an ex-British colony) are not okay with it, but most Chinese citizens are aware of the censorship and don't care.
I think what's happening more is that westerners are projecting their own culture and philosophies onto the population. Americans are especially passionate about free-speech and they assume that Chinese citizen's share that, hence all the doom prophesying like your comment.
There's a massive cultural shift though, at lease from where I stand (Europe). US kinda like the idea of free speech. China doesn't. I had chat with Chinese people that went all anxious after they started to emit the slightest critic about their country. USA are probably tapping into everything since 20 years but so far it didn't turn into a way to shut off or kill people.
I mean, the problem is that there's a bit of a cultural difference between Americans circa-Industrial Revolution, and the Chinese now. So saying that the Chinese will stand up and protest isn't necessarily true. I don't want to speak for all Chinese, but from what I've read -- please correct me if I'm wrong -- is that there is more of a culture of deference to authority in China. Compare this to Americans, who have a history and pride in rebelling against authority. Now, you might point to China's communist revolution, but realize that with this government came the need for them to propagandize and popularize a love and respect for the government in control, much more so than in the U.S. So back to my original point, protest culture isn't as much of a thing there as it is here, because there's more of a sense of working for the collective good (economic growth of China).
So I'm hoping that there will by outcry, but I think it is unfortunately less likely than it would be in the U.S. due to Chinese culture. I'd also like to here some local insight as well, and I hope I'm proved wrong because it would be awesome if there was a public outcry.
The issue is that protest is allowed and encouraged in the west. Its actually necessary for the system. Instability is central to the west. It grows and changes with change.
Those in China see this and are horrified. To them, freedom and instability equal bloodshed and violence. Any rights should be given up to ensure the safety of one's family. If you have no freedom as a child you will be happier as your mother and father will look over you. teenage rebellion is also not encouraged culturally for example.
It's interesting to understand the CCP mind set. It explains the almost non sensical criticism of "freedoms" often heard. As most westerner don't understand China, similarly most mainland Chinese don't understand the west.
As far as I understand, public unrest is one of the greatest fears of Chinese leadership, hence tight control and censorship. That may speak volumes about the willingness of their public to take control along with protesting (as opposed to the West where protest is seen as a safety valve and therefore encouraged in proscribed forms).
In most of the USA outside of San Francisco, authoritarianism is frowned upon. In China and SF, the government is more free to tell people how to speak and live. It's a cultural difference.
This is a common (and racist) but incorrect generalization about Chinese culture. Look up the history of China and you will find millennia of successful rebellions against authority percieved as having lost a "mandate." Contrast that to Europe or America.
The thing I think is really important but often falsely confused with a lack of willingness to protest is a general distaste for the sort of personalized politics prevalent in the West. Chinese political participation in the US is lower than average. It seems like the culture in that sense is more focused on success economically and academically.
It's important to remember that the only reason the Communists have managed to last so long is because of their "support" from the start of the farmers, i.e., not killing and stealing from them like the KMT. As soon as that support is lost en masse, we will see another percieved experation of a mandate and another revolution in a long series of revolutions. What that will mean for the Chinese or whether that will mean more democracy we will have to wait and see.
You’re completely ignoring the fact that protest and speech are exactly how things change in a free democratic society. Try that in China and you’re likely to find yourself in a “re-education” (concentration) camp. It’s not apples to apples comparing the US to China in terms of human rights and civil society... China is truly an authoritarian regime.
The problem is,the ideas of the Chinese people are actually backlash against the Western hostility. Why do the Chinese people care about backlash when the Westerners don't care about it at all?
Are the Chinese people less equal than the Westerners because their government is more dictating?
It’s a biased sample, but most Chinese people I have had such conversations with deeply fear and hate their government. However, there is some really weird cultural interactions from a western perspective.
What’s generally overlooked is how much stability is lost in such a repressive environment. Being the 1,000th person to riot is dangerous, being the 100 millionth is not. So, things can rapidly switch from everything seeming to be ok to total chaos almost overnight.
Why should it be the least bit difficult to imagine that the average Chinese citizen is not remarkably concerned about their government's curtailment of civil liberties?
Cultural differences between China and the Western world are not insignificant. The average Chinese citizenry might not feel particularly oppressed, or be receptive to western views of authoritarianism.
I've made the acquaintance of many Chinese nationals throughout my professional and academic life, and in my experience their views on such topics as authoritarianism, the role of the individual in society, the significance of individuality, egalitarianism, civil disobedience and civil liberties ( among other things ) tend to differ widely from their western counterparts. Although I'm aware it's dangerous to make assumptions, I do presume that there is some bias in my observations here. The Chinese nationals I am exposed to might be more likely to hold ( or at very least be exposed to and familiar with ) cosmopolitain, westernised views than their countrymen due to having had encountered them living in the western world.
I don't doubt that there are a very large number of people in the Chinese diaspora with widely divergent and pro-Western views, but in my experience they have been a small minority.
Because America is a Democracy. Non violent protests changed people's minds and those people ultimately decide the laws. Won't work in China. China is totalitarian. The government gets what it wants regardless of public opinion. And it will squash any opinion it doesn't like before it spreads.
China is not a dystopia. China has abandoned Communism and adopted a Capitalist economic system with Socialist policies, like Europe and the US, and as a result it is entering what European-Americans consider 19th/20th Century standards of living. The Chinese don't want to accept that they have been living and dying for a lie (Communism), the US doesn't want to admit China is not a failed state.
Chinese citizens have similar civil rights to those of 19th Century European-Americans. Americans have only been able to circumvent "cop immunity" since Monroe v. Pape (1961) and Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents (1971). Americans can take such civil rights lawsuits to a bench of regular people, but Europeans must still take such accusations to prosecutors' golfing buddies (judges), if at all. Its almost impossible to convince a jury; convincing a judge is even harder. Chinese and Europeans have similar civil rights protections, in other words.
China and Europe both have freedom of speech guarantees. In China, just like Europe, you have freedom of speech until you say something a prosecutor or cop doesn't like. (The rationalization of this aspect is dizzying.) Most of Europe has traditionally banned political parties they don't agree with; for example, the Communist Party has traditionally been banned in post-WW2 Europe (Germany, most notably), just like China has banned non-Communist parties in practice. Note the US never banned the Communist Party; it only castigated its members in public shaming ceremonies. (California banned display of red flags in the 1920s, but this was overturned in Stromberg v. California in 1931, around the time Hitler rose to power.)
China is a democracy reminiscent of 19th Century European-American democracies. The United States Senate was not always directly elected, just like the National People's Congress. And the United States President and European Union President are still not directly elected, just like the Chinese President and Premier. China is like the US and sometimes allows recall elections (technically); Europe does not. Neither Europe nor China allow what Americans consider to be ballot initiatives (where the people vote on the proposal). Neither China nor Europe elect very many government officers; in the US not only are sheriffs, prosecutors, clerks and treasurers often elected, but sometimes even judges are (for example in California).
Time, CBS News and the Huffington Post are not representative of all Westerners, nor is the Chinese Communist Party representative of all China. American media corporations are just trying to punish China for kicking them out of China. For which I say Good for China.
From what I understand, there is much more dissent in China than is communicated in the West. We get a picture of a controlled society, and that may well be what the powers want it to be like, but in practice there is widespread dissent, both under the radar and in the form of open and large protests and strikes.
Not sure as in having done research, that's what I picked up from news reports.
Still even if, its not like people in China feel threatened or even abused. Like I said, everyday life is almost completely unaffected. The occasional political rant on social media gets deleted sure, which people are annoyed by, but there are no consequences to that unless you really push for it, which brings us back to activism.
- the Chinese culture will never be the same as the US, and
- Chinese opinion is not a single blob,
but I think “oriental” countries like Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan show that they could be persuaded (let’s not use “educated” here) to be:
- less aggressive to neighbors, and
- not trying to dominate, to overthrow world order by exporting authoritarianism and censorship.
And regarding swaying opinions, I agree that it happens elsewhere as well (just as Trump was swaying opinions with Twitter and Facebook before he was banned), but I would take a public discourse anytime.
I think the reality is that the largest group on the planet is in China and lives under this authoritarian paradigm or whatever it is exactly.
There is good reason to expect China's global influence to continue to increase. HK is basically a front line.
If you look at countries like Australia you can see that this style of government is already starting to spread in some ways.
The US population is only 23% the size of China's yet the US has much more territorial and resource control globally.
My concern is that Chinese people will eventually not want to tolerate this disparity in resource control anymore.
At the moment the Chinese military is not capable of doing anything about it as far as I know.
However, if that changes, it is unlikely that the US will cede control voluntarily. In that case there would be a war.
However, since war involves mass killing, and people do not do that without some moral justification, people will need to find this ethical cause. What scares me about the protests is that "freedom" is the type of cause that people will commit mass murder for.
I think that the people who might push for a war do not really care about freedom or anything other than money and they do not respect human life.
I think it may be necessary to find non-violent ways to integrate Eastern and Western cultures and logistical controls in order to avoid a war. So I believe that should be a national security priority.
It will most likely become a totally different cyberpunk society, with modern cities and massive surveillance coexist, instead of being another US.
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