Americans don't Understand Chinese and Chinese don't Understand Americans

Because watching the Stros now is more depressing than D&D checking back in hear.

 

Yes I am ethnically Chinese and am proud of Chinese history and culture. Im proud to be an American by birth and by citizenship. None of that means that I can’t criticize either country and just because I explain why Chinese think the way they do doesn’t mean I agree with the what they all do and especially what the government does. It would be no more different that when I’ve explained to non-Americans why we invaded Iraq, elected Trump and have lax gun laws compared to their countries. Doesn’t mean I agree with those things but I will try o explain to others why America is the way it is.

I acknowledge and have brought up myself many of the things you mention. The PRC has done many horrible things and Xi is making things worse. That doesn’t wipe out or deny the history that China was carved up foreign powers and that the UK got HK because they fought a war to sell drugs to China. That would be like saying that 9/11 shouldn’t matter since the US invaded Iraq On a faulty premises. History matters.

At the risk of turning this into another Trump thread if you’re counting on Trump to defeat the PRC you’re sadly mistaking. Trumps rhetoric is exactly what I’m talking about it’s simultaneously arrogant and ignorant most of the time. It is the type of stuff that gets people riled up but ends up doing little or makes things worse. What is worse though than Trump’s bombastic rhetoric though is his odd and misplaced fawning over Xi “I know Xi, he’s very smart and we get along great..” even more dangerous though is that Trump has already sold out to the PRC. He pulled sanctions from ZTE even though they were sanctioned for security issues. He tweeted to he did it to save Chinese jobs. Coincidently the same week the PRC granted several copyrights in Ivanka Trump products and invested half a million in a trump branded project in Indonesia. Trump also pulled back sanctions on Huawei.

Under Trump the rhetoric is tougher but we’re losing more to the PRC. The trade deficit has increased, US farmers have to be bailed out and manufacturing growth is stagnating.

 

I can’t speak to what your experience is but while yes the censorship is pervasive it isn’t that difficult to get around. Using VPN you could access Facebook and YouTube and many other sites that are banned. Clutchfans wasn’t banned and to answer another poster’s question I don’t think the content on it was censored. I doubt the PRC would bother letting Clutchfans through and then internally censoring content when they could just ban it outright. Anyway we can see that it isn’t banned or censored in the PRC as we see Chinese posters responding to posts very critical of the PRC and Xi jinxing.

The great firewall though isn’t the only way the PRC shapes thought. Why you might not be seeing a lot of Chinese going into FB or other foreign websites is that there are Chinese equivalents such as WeChat and Youku. Given the choice most people will follow media in their native language.

You also have to consider how big the population is in the PRC so yes there are many Chinese who don’t follow or are aware about things in country but there are hundreds of millions who are. There are more than enough Chinese who are aware of what’s going on in the rest of the World.

I agree with much of that. Things have gotten much more repressive under Xi and the PRC is bruising a very sophisticated surveillance state. I also agree that the PRC is expanding its global reach and starting to use its power to bully neighbors. I’ve spoken to many in countries like Vietnam and Malaysia that are very concerned about PRC expansion. Regarding stealing business secrets and other unsavory practices I’ve dealt with those first hand and I’ve categorized trips to Beijing ad being like a constant ripoff.

As far as China being the biggest threat to freedom in the world I agree there are many problems and under Xi getting worse but there is still a lot of uncertainty and I don’t think anyone can tell you what will exactly happen to the PRC. From the outside Xi’s rule looks solid but there is resentment towards him in the PRC and he knows he can’t stamp it all out. The Winnie the Pooh meme that many here are using now is only so because there are people in the PRC who made it a meme and continue it.

Even accepting that the PRC is a global threat is more reason why we should be understanding them rather than just falling into simplistic sloganeering. For example continuing to portray this as a war of western capitalism versus communism completely mischaracertizes the conflict. Especially since the PRC is using capitalistic means to combat us. I’ve said this before that yes the PRC plays the long game and so should the US. How to counter the PRC isn’t through threats and insults. Frankly that doesn’t work on most countries as it just strengthens nationalism.

Barring all of that neither is or the Chinese are going away. It has been brought up by many that we’re in a Thucydides trap and like ancient Athens and Sparta are doomed to conflict. That war devastated classical Greece but a war between the US and the PRC has the potential to devastate the World.

 

That is very difficult to say. There are many things going on now between the US and the PRC and within the PRC internally that are driving things. There have been protests in HK pretty much since the handover and if Morey had posted something like this on social media ten years ago the reaction might not have been as severe. Issues where the Chinese see their territorial integrity at stake will always be a touchy issue, the extreme reaction of not just criticizing Morey but banning the whole NBA is unusual. My guess is that the Trade War and timing following PRC 70th anniversary are exacerbating it.

 

Following the PRC backing down some in this issue shows that there are ways to defeat or at least deal with the Chinese. Understanding that the Chinese value group dynamics direct confrontation that the kind that most Americans are calling for doesn't work with Chinese. The Chinese interpret it as not just a disagreement but disrespectful. On the other hand working within a group removes the Chinese argument that this is just one party being rude and disrespectful since many other parties are also opposed to them. This strategy worked before with other issues such as China's currency manipulation.

Another strategy is understanding how much the PRC craves status on the World stage. This is why it was very important to for them to get in the WTO and also to host the Olympics. I'm not surprised the PRC started to back down once they got a sense that the Beijing Winter Olympics was threatened. If I was he NBA I would push the argument that if the PRC insist on banning the NBA over politics then the USOC shouldn't participate in the Beijing Olympics or FIBA play games in the PRC. I would also consider going to the WTO and argue that a ban on the NBA for this reason is an economic sanction and goes against WTO rules. While the PRC, or the US, haven't always followed the WTO rulings they have before and especially if the PRC feels this situation is getting out of hand even for them this could be a face saving measure.