Could Beijing be the worst Olympics ever?

[ohcrapitsnico]

So you guys are arguing big things while we suffer from fundamental ineffectiveness (You know the spelling of corruption?) and fundamental lack of law and order (can you spell police brutality?). So what is democracy? What is Beijing consciousness? What is Singaporean authoritarianism? All of them can't be applied here.

Instead of you spending your time complaining why don't you join the other Chinese in their rioting or start your own?

 

[Cutlass]

There was a guy on the news earlier said in a bike race in Bejing last year out of 40+ people starting an easy course, 8 were able to complete. And most of the dropouts were the worlds best bike racers. The pollution stopped them.

 

[Ecofarm]

Instead of you spending your time complaining why don't you join the other Chinese in their rioting or start your own?

I think Plarq makes a difference by making it clear to people here at CFC just how oppressive the CCP is. You know, he risks his ass here and he doesn't have to. He could just keep his mouth shut and follow the CCP rules. It's not very fair of you to belittle his risky reaching out.

 

[GenMarshall]

Last time I checked (Correct me if I am wrong Plarq) that he was part of one of those Special Administration areas in China (Hong Kong for example is in one of those Special Administration areas).

 

[ohcrapitsnico]

I think Plarq makes a difference by making it clear to people here at CFC just how oppressive the CCP is. You know, he risks his ass here and he doesn't have to. He could just keep his mouth shut and follow the CCP rules. It's not very fair of you to belittle his risky reaching out.

I fail to see what he brings to the table that we don't already know. All he does his ineffectually whine about crap and only makes me feel like there is less of a problem than there is because of it.

 

[Ecofarm]

We disagree.

 

[ohcrapitsnico]

We disagree.

Weren't you the one who denied that Muslims and animists were being massacred in Darfur?

You still are oblivious to the real suffering and injustice in the world.

 

[Ecofarm]

Weren't you the one who denied that Muslims and animists were being massacred in Darfur?

You still are oblivious to the real suffering and injustice in the world.

I didn't deny anything, I merely pointed out that Muslims were the ones in power and doing the majority of the killing. There is no modern genocide without muslims heavily involved, coincidence?

Regarding my obliviousness, I have read more, done more and lived in more places than you ever will. You're a child compared to me. Don't talk down to me, it makes you look stupid.

 

[chauism]

Again, which is more likely to have a bill of rights? Come on, use your brains.

I don't see how those rights are being well protected in US.

Not every authoritarian regime is evil. To tell you the truth, the leaders in China are fully aware that if they want to continue to have the power, they have to be sure to keep Chinese people happy or at least content. It is virtue to their own existence. Hu and Wen seem to gain most of people's support.

Well, so in a democracy with equal rights to suffrage, smart people have outvote ******s, right?

That is two different things unless you live in a country where most people are ******s.

As long as they are capable of making their own decisions responsibly, yes. Adults who are capable of running a household (not to talk about the results) fulfill that requirement.

Now are you saying there should be a requirement to vote?

It is too similar.

Any people who are not blinded by their ideology and had a good close look will tell you that they are just similar just on the outside, but different on the inside.

China bashing is not just a right-wing phenomenon. The New Republic, mostly left of center, ran a cover story last month with the headline, MEET THE NEW CHINA (SAME AS THE OLD). Inside, the magazine thundered that "our ultimate solidarity" should lie not with the "odious government" in Beijing but "the billion long-suffering men and women of the world's largest dictatorship."

Except that Chinese people (who, by the way, number 1.3 billion, not 1 billion) seem to disagree. About the same time as The New Republic hit the stands, the Pew Research Center released the findings of its 2008 Global Attitudes Survey. Of the 24 countries surveyed, the Chinese people expressed the highest level of support for the direction in which their country was heading, 86 percent. Nearly two out of three said that the Beijing government was doing a good job on issues that mattered to them. The survey questioned more than 3,212 Chinese, face to face, in 16 dialects across the country. And while Chinese might not always speak freely to pollsters, several indications suggest that these numbers express something real. Such polls have been done for years and the numbers approving of the Chinese government have risen as the economy has grown (which should be expected). Those polled did complain about corruption, environmental degradation and inflation. And these attitudes—general approval of the country's direction coupled with many specific criticisms—are also the ones reported by most scholars and journalists who have traveled in China.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/150460

Democracy can fail, but that is not to say you should not have democracy. What is needed is a strong government to uphold the rule of law with enough political resolve, but having checks and balances to ensure the people's rights are looked out for. It isn't easy, but what makes it more difficult than building a good society under authoritarianism? The fact that you can crush people in order to get your way? That does not make a good society.

And, like I said, which you seem to agree with, authoritarian tendencies is a self-fulfiling cultural prophecy. If you think you need it, you would need it. Enjoy your stay in the cell!

I never said that China should never have democracy, it is not right time yet. Within the Chinese government body it is becoming more and more democratic than you actually give them credits to. As you said before they don't have single mind even in the Poliburo. As for Check and Balance, China do have a legislative body called National People's Congress.

Although the membership of the NPC is still largely determined by the Communist Party of China, since the early 1990s it has moved away from its previous role as a symbolic but powerless rubber-stamp legislature, and has become a forum for mediating policy differences between different parts of the Party and the government. For the NPC to formally defeat a proposal put before them is a rare, but not non-existent event, and the NPC has been quite active in being the forum in which legislation is debated before being put to a vote.

National People's Congress Won't you say there are improvements in this?

In other words it is a good place to try and exploit people.

I don't know where you derive that from. Maybe the reason they want to stay have something to do with they actually enjoyed lifestyle here. The booming economy also caught their eyes.

You have no faith in education whatsoever, do you? And right now externalities are sadly rather neglected by the government, and the people suffer for it.

I have a lot of faith in education. That is one thing I admire Japan the most. However as I said, if it was for the mass, that bill will come in a much later time when people are fully educated about the environmental issue. So it is a good call for those educated few to decide it first.

Do Chinese people not believe their media at least to the same extent as Westerners?

Errr, they distrust the state media to a much greater extend. You will know if you even been to any Chinese forum. You will be laugh at if you actually believe whatever the state media has to say.

When people began rioting in Lhasa in March, Tang followed the news closely. As usual, he was receiving his information from American and European news sites, in addition to China’s official media. Like others his age, he has no hesitation about tunnelling under the government firewall, a vast infrastructure of digital filters and human censors which blocks politically objectionable content from reaching computers in China. Younger Chinese friends of mine regard the firewall as they would an officious lifeguard at a swimming pool—an occasional, largely irrelevant, intrusion.

To get around it, Tang detours through a proxy server—a digital way station overseas that connects a user with a blocked Web site. He watches television exclusively online, because he doesn’t have a TV in his room. Tang also receives foreign news clips from Chinese students abroad. (According to the Institute of International Education, the number of Chinese students in the United States—some sixty-seven thousand—has grown by nearly two-thirds in the past decade.) He’s baffled that foreigners might imagine that people of his generation are somehow unwise to the distortions of censorship.

“Because we are in such a system, we are always asking ourselves whether we are brainwashed,” he said. “We are always eager to get other information from different channels.” Then he added, “But when you are in a so-called free system you never think about whether you are brainwashed.”

Angry Youth

Of these, only Singapore is authoritarian. And the initial growth of South Korea has more to do with effective government alliance with business than authoritarianism per se.

They made the alliance with the business instead of its people. How would they be able to do that under a democratic system.

Well, the problem is the first two cannot be guaranteed without the third.

I don't think it is relevant at all. Democracy doesn't guarantee you anything beside political freedom, nor does authoritarianism guarantee you prosperity.
However in a more practical approach, the systems that Russian and China each have seem to be providing the things people care the most.

There is such thing as fear. And I care because of my human side. Don't you have one? Or have economics blinded you?

Now you are being hypocritical. For people who were actually the victims of those atrocity, they seem to be able to forget and forgive, and have no such fear that those will happen again, and applause the "same" government that caused them the suffering for what it has achieved. Why shouldn't you? Maybe it is because this government's success and popularity with its people both in and out of China of is threating you the very existence of your belief.

And I don't think the CCP is doing a marvellous job. The last I checked schools collapsed in the earthquake due to shoddy construction while government buildings still stood. Obviously, corruption (an offshoot of the Party patronage system in China) and lack of funding is affecting education in very real ways.

You made that it was Wen and Hu that ordered the those school headmasters to give the contact to the lowest bidder and use the rest of the money on something else. I admit that corruption at the local level are really high, but it is neither the interest of the central government. If what you say is true, why is it that PRC citizens, upon meeting such economic oppression (and they have plenty of that, especially in the industrial areas of the northeast and in the sweatshops of guangdong), go right to petitioning the central government? they actually view the central government as the means by which to alleviate corruption at the local and provincial levels.

That is if you want to ignore the millions of people being exploited in the name of accumulation of wealth for a select group of people. How admirable.

Last time I checked, it is the MNC(and mainly USA's) who are doing the exploiting, not the government. In case you don't know china's policies, the government is actually trying their best to narrow the gap between the rich and the poor. The new labor law that passed cause thousands manufacturers to close their operations just in Guangdong alone due to the increase (as much as 30%) of the labor cost and move to somewhere else such as Vietnam.

The Hong Kong system was more democratic under the UK than it is under China now.

Don't kid yourself. Ask anyone that is from HK beside myself to see if they agree with your statement. People in Hong Kong had very liberal economical freedom, but politically they never had any self-determination under the British rule. Look how many riots there was in the history of Hong Kong. It was not until 1990's, Governor Chris Patten introduced democratic reforms to the election process for the Legislative Council. And I think he did that mainly to piss Beijing off.

 

[ohcrapitsnico]

I didn't deny anything, I merely pointed out that Muslims were the ones in power and doing the majority of the killing. There is no modern genocide without muslims involved, coincidence?

Regarding my obliviousness, I have read more and lived in more places than you ever will. You're a child compared to me. Don't talk down to me, it makes you look stupid.

Even when Muslims are the victims? You even mentioned non-Muslim related genocides in that thread.

That's quite an assertion what makes you so sure? Regardless of how useful experience is that won't make up for your denial and lack of knowledge.

 

[Dann]

I think I understand what plarq was saying there. The issues that the outside world thinks that the Chinese should be fighting for - democracy, freedom of expression, human rights, religion etc. aren't really a concern here. Those things are still far and away at the moment and the typical Chinese will either laugh or feel insulted if somebody is convincing them that those are "inalienable rights". What a typical Chinese will be concerned about and are willing to fight for are the issues that hit closer to home - corruption, police brutality, the widening gap between the rich cities and the poor countryside (at least it's not yet as bad as mansions and slums side by side like elsewhere) etc.

 

[ohcrapitsnico]

I think I understand what plarq was saying there. The issues that the outside world thinks that the Chinese should be fighting for - democracy, freedom of expression, human rights, religion etc. aren't really a concern here. Those things are still far and away at the moment and the typical Chinese will either laugh or feel insulted if somebody is convincing them that those are "inalienable rights". What a typical Chinese will be concerned about and are willing to fight for are the issues that hit closer to home - corruption, police brutality, the widening gap between the rich cities and the poor countryside (at least it's not yet as bad as mansions and slums side by side like elsewhere) etc.

You're right and that's what they should be worried about. It certainly isn't as bad as India where the first billion dollar house is being constructed in Mumbai aside some of the poorest in the world.

 

[Ecofarm]

That's quite an assertion what makes you so sure?

BA
MSc International Environmental Science, Sweden
Phd (classes complete, but not dissertation) Interdisiplinary Ecology, US

US Army, Airborne Infantry ('89-94)

Lived in Europe and the US.

Studied in Kenya (months with subsistance agricultural villages lacking electricity and tap water). Travelled in Tanzania. Studied in Ecuador. I've lectured at the Kenya Institute of Organic Farming and Kenyatta Ag Tech.

I've spoke at environmental conferences in Europe and the US.

I've been married twice, but I wont get into personal details.

Compared to that, you are a child. Right? Don't talk down to me anymore.

 

[ohcrapitsnico]

BA
MSc International Environmental Science, Sweden
Phd (classes complete, but not dissertation) Interdisiplinary Ecology, US

US Army, Airborne Infantry ('89-94)

Lived in Europe and the US.

Studied in Kenya (months with subsistance agricultural villages lacking electricity and tap water). Travelled in Tanzania. Studied in Ecuador. I've lectured at the Kenya Institute of Organic Farming and Kenyatta Ag Tech.

I've spoke at environmental conferences in Europe and the US.

I've been married twice, but I wont get into personal details.

Compared to that, you are a child. Right? Don't talk down to me anymore.

Well all of that did not help you in realizing that not just Christians are being killed in Darfur. Darfur after all is historically Islamic.

 

[alex994]

I agree with Dann.

That's basically it. Liberal political reform isn't of the highest concern to the typical Chinese. Anything else is pretty much moot points.

Plus, I'm tired of having to respond to those massive posts at work

 

[chauism]

I think Plarq makes a difference by making it clear to people here at CFC just how oppressive the CCP is. You know, he risks his ass here and he doesn't have to. He could just keep his mouth shut and follow the CCP rules. It's not very fair of you to belittle his risky reaching out.

If what he said is true, and the CCP is a really repressive regime. Don't you think by now the internet police will already find where he is, and secret or regular police will be knocking on his door, and he will be sent to reform camp or whatever to reeducate him?

 

[Dann]

The internet police have bigger fish to fry. Much, much bigger fish. How many hits does CFC OT get from the mainland anyway? This place isn't worth their attention...

 

[plarq]

If what he said is true, and the CCP is a really repressive regime. Don't you think by now the internet police will already find where he is, and secret or regular police will be knocking on his door, and he will be sent to reform camp or whatever to reeducate him?

Remember police manpower was always lacking.

If they have such high efficiency that virtually monitors every bits on the Internet. There will be no Internet users here.

The Internet Police monitors larger sites and services. CFC just doesn't beep on their radar!--Even if CFC was black-listed, people would just got firewalled, not jailed.

 

[plarq]

The internet police have bigger fish to fry. Much, much bigger fish. How many hits does CFC OT get from the mainland anyway? This place isn't worth their attention...

Well, if they choose keyword censorship...

Edit:

Instead of you spending your time complaining why don't you join the other Chinese in their rioting or start your own?

You know? CCP already tried that, and look what we got. I need to find another way out, such as emigration.

 

[chauism]

This betrays your bias as irrational. The CCP doesn't give a crap about the people. Wake up. It's not by the people, of the people or for the people.

That is your assumption, but it is not agreed by most of the Chinese live in or outside of China unless your were talking about 30 years ago. I have some reference in one of reply here.

Besides, can you tell me a government is truly by the people, of the people and for the people? To the best, it is just a very nice campaign slogan.

I suppose you also think the Chinese people are not ready for the internet, so the CCP is doing them a favor by censoring it (as if that helps education!).

The censorship won't stop most of educated young people(who are the majority of the internet users in China) search whatever they want on the internet(I also have reference in the same post). The censorship is a paranoia the government has and the western country are not helping curing its paranoia at all with their hostile voice. BTW, China has the largest internet users of 210 Million. If you go to website "the global voice online", you will see there are a lot of people in China criticize some of the government's policies online in forums like this one(in Chinese though, GVO helps to translate most of them into english), and to your surprise most of the time those are not being censored at all. Constructive criticism will be welcomed by the Chinese government.
Globe Voice Online