Yeah, people when talking politely to their taxi driver, or any skilled trades worker really, would call them “师傅” as well. The term generally has a strong connotation of the traditional culture and all the types of works and environments that passed on knowledge via apprenticeships.
Well, the DPP has been advocating for more than a decade that Taiwan has nothing to do with China, or Chinese culture, not historically, not now. Even when the KMT were in power for decades, due to its own history of “fighting” against the CPC, they implemted full-on propaganda about how crappy Mainland China was, how horrific was the communist system there, how oppressive, how Mainlanders hate them and always only want to oppress the Taiwanese, etc. Etc.
Honestly the Taiwanese people are pretty innocent folks mostly, not very interested in political nuances, but after all these decades of propaganda from every single party, separatism is basically politically correctness there now. The constitution, along with the “ROC” name, alas, might as well just be a piece of paper
China also has a more efficient energy transfer system than elsewhere in the world, so the loss is a lot less than you would expect, lower than, for example, it would be in US.
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If that’s still the case, then PRC wouldn’t feel any urgency regarding Taiwan. But decades of anti-Mainland China public education - which included writing China out of Taiwanese history, so Taiwan seemingly popped out from nowhere as an island that birthed itself LOL - there are fewer and fewer ppl in Taiwan who believe they are Chinese. The current party in power is openly separatist and intensely propagandizes everything anti-China, so even mentioning the ROC as a concept these days has became politically incorrect. If they could change their constitution to cross out ROC and become the Republic of Taiwan instead, they would. But they dare not as yet.
Hence you’re seeing things like these where the PRC is stepping up efforts to emphasize everywhere they can, and in all their foreign policy interactions, that Taiwan is part of China etc. Etc.
Actually, they haven’t, lol.
The focus on one word has to do with how the CPC announces its policy. George Yeo has described interpreting the CPC’s policy announcement akin to interpreting the Catholic Church’s proclamations. Each year they announce their current updated position, and everyone (including all the party bureaucrats who will be executing policy, the Chinese ppl, media, etc.) compare the current version with last year’s version to see what is the change that is now being promoted by the central government. That is, the differences between the 2 texts IS the policy change xD
So, in fact, they are doing the right thing by this narrow focus on a word or two. What they are doing deliberately WRONG, though, is to interpret it only for their own fearmongering purpose.
In fact, the very vagueness and ambiguity of broadcasting policy this way is deliberate: doing so allows local officials to (1) implement policy changes in ways that fit local situations, and (2) have some creativity and flexibility in coming up with potential ways to implement the policy change.
So really, the CPC’s policy changes are always a direction to move toward, a general result aimed to be achieved, by a certain time line, without any specific steps as to how.
And in the specific case for Taiwan, (3) this is the CPC itself allowing themselves the ambiguity and flexibility to change policy on Taiwan depending on how things work out as this year goes on. All they’re saying is, things are going to change now so everyone, be prepared to change.
They may have omitted this word in the past but currently it is a reflection of a meaningful change in policy.
This change is a recognition that, only giving benefits to Taiwan (ECFA; allowing practically zero import tax of Taiwanese goods sold into mainland China; all kinds of respecting Taiwan’s one-sided political assertions at the expense of the mainland’s positions, etc.) without ANY teeth, is a bad policy that need to be updated.
What had worked to preserve peace 15 years ago no longer work, when the DPP is actively engaged in separation tactics, deliberate provocations (to the point of complete silliness–an incident ongoing right now, where Taiwanese coast guards caused the deaths of two mainland fishermen, with ongoing refusal to apologize, recognize any fault, outright lies that keep getting discovered in embarrassing ways a day or two after the lie , claiming no video evidence existed though the ship + 4 guards are all supposed video all incidents, refusal to give up the dead bodies or allowing the mainland to participate in examination/dissection for cause of death, etc.), and continuation of anti-China education in their public school system.
What this is not, however, is a sign of imminent invasion or whatever, which seems to be the main implication whenever Western media wrote about Taiwanese things. They deliberately fail to point out that there are like 100 steps the mainland can take, going from inconveniencing Taiwan to outright economically devastate Taiwan, before reaching any kind of hot conflict.
It used to be pretty interesting to read people’s questions with genuine attempts at answering. I paid the $5 to be able to post… Haven’t been back in years though
Sharing borders with China, they have culturally-held reservations /anger /fear /disgruntledness about China’s influence and effects reaching within their lands, and believes China had invaded them or ruled over them unfairly at various points from ancient times to the Vietnamese Communist era, etc etc. All the typical love-and-hate between lands that were side by side for thousands of years with endless cycles of good times and bad. Relationship status: it’s complicated.
So Vietnam geopolitically aims to find other great powers—USA in this case, USSR in the past, etc—to counter balance China. Simultaneously, they have been part of the sinosphere for centuries and does know the need and the how of working WITH China too.
This is a law in many places in USA. Unenforced, but still on the books
I only realized it’s NOT an armband after you pointed it out x)
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China is actually better at building and at building MORE due to having greater number of shipyards, skilled workers specific to the purpose, and general manufacturing capability. The MIC looking to make more bag = the 200x part, which is indeed an exaggeration. But 20x? 30x? Not unrealistic.
OK, here’s a couple more that are famous and great for touristic reasons of history /culture /good food /great landscape /etc
Xi’an (one of the ancient capitals of China, starting point of the traditional and new Silk Road), Guilin (every single time they show China in cartoon, with giant mountains and winding rivers, they’re basically showing here), Shenzhen (the new hyper modern high tech city), Guangzhou (old English name was Canton, as in Cantonese food), Suzhou and Hangzhou (historically famed for being chill and beautiful, lakes and canals etc), Hainandao (Chinese version of Hawaii), Nanjing (another ancient capital of China, lots of culture), Harbin (lots of Russian architecture here, and a FANTASTIC and huge ice sculpture show every year)
…sounds grim and surreal. Pretty sure I’ve read post-apocalyptic fiction with similar backgrounds :|
There was a period when foreigners, especially English-speaking white foreigners, were treated effusively in China, elevated above all Chinese people and often far above the natural social place these folks had back in their own countries. They got better jobs, better job situations and benefits, and Chinese people in general gave them respect and admiration based on their whiteness and exotic Westerness alone.
Then China opened up to the world at ever increasing pace, Chinese people became more sophisticated, and an entire generation of previously-fêted foreigners lost their elevated place in society. They crashed back to earth and drifted back to the social positions they always would have had based on their personal abilities and talents.
Laowhy and Serpentza lived through the tail part of that shift. The good and easy time they’d had in China soon ended, they were barely making ends meet, and soon had to leave. They became deeply bitter, and attributed that natural change in society to the CPC ruining the good times for everyone, not just themselves. Thereafter they fell in with various anti-China crowds within and without China, and also found just how lucrative anti-China videos are on yt.
So it’s a combination of both a personal sense of being wronged, plus the good grift, that resulted in their channels and stance today. They were always grifters at heart, the change in money merely changed the nature of their content.
Of course China is authoritarian. It’s an iteration of the “dictatorship of the proletariat.” Lol.
To be more serious. Every single citizen of a country will have lots of complaints about their own country, even those who think most things are working ok. By sheer nature of living somewhere, you become intimately aware of its problems and weaknesses, and wants to see certain changes and improvements. Does this mean they dislike the country as a whole? Or love another country more than their own? No.
The CPC is enjoying an unprecedented high approval rating due to being a highly efficient government capable of implementing long-term plans to improvement the country. Many people have witnessed those changes with their own eyes, lived through them personally, and mostly approved of the results.
In addition, a part of the CPC’s mission is to protect and revive China and Chinese culture, which it has done so by alleviating poverty, strengthening the economy and the military, and enhancing China’s influence and reputation in the world. Not every single Chinese person is a socialist or at all interested in politics, but a great majority (even including overseas Chinese) DO resonate with that mission, with seeing how the country has improved, how traditional cultural elements are being preserved and incorporated with modern elements in creative ways in all forms of media, architecture, art works, ways of life, all the scientific achievements, etc.
Yes, there is censorship and an element of authoritarian control. Moreso in the past, and a little more relaxed in the present, but it’s definitely there. Arguably, the Chinese people is more familiar, even comfortable, with an authoritarian government (how else does one keep a vast country with huge population together throughout the thousands of years). However, because the government is vested with more power in general, the people have higher expectation for it to perform and to take care of everyone. It’s part of the Confucian social contract that hides deep in the structure of society. That being the case, when people fall through the cracks in various ways, they blame the government personally for failing them, more than a typical Western person would in a similar situation.
Also, the government makes policies primarily based on what benefits the society overall, and not the individual (by this, I do not mean ethnic minorities or classes of people, who are protected as part of a harmonious society; but the concept of individualism itself). If you’re an individual who happens to not conform with what is considered to be socially beneficial, or who wants to be disruptive in some way (and it may even be a perfectly acceptable type of disruption in the West), you would feel the boot of repression upon your neck.
With 1.4 billion people, even tiny percentage of unhappy people is tens of millions of unhappy people. Each have their own story, and justification, and many grievances are valid. Because no government is ever so perfect as to take the best care of every single person, no government is entirely free of corruption or negligence or ineptitude. The CPC has made mistakes that massively affected some people’s lives for the worse. It has also dramatically improved things in other ways. For some people, the two did not even out. For others, they imagine the West to be a shining beacon that is far better, more free, where people can truly make money and live a good life. Simultaneously, a current trend is for Chinese netizens to say they never realized how great their own country is and how much they love it, until they broke through the Great Firewall via VPN and started to see how the outside is doing.
Overall, the only way to determine how a country’s government is doing is to analyze vast statistics, and in comparison with other governments. In that light, the CPC’s numbers are pretty good, but there are always room for improvement.
At that point of wealth you aren’t thinking about spending money as an individual, or even an individual family (even including hangers on and staff). You are essentially a representative of a power that parallels governments, with worldwide reach, and will think along those lines. You want to implement worldwide policies, dictate the tides of capitalism, play with your own regime change politics, break the barriers of old age, gene manipulation, and get the process started on astro-mining and colonizing Mars.
But undoubtedly this is NOT the vibe of how Mr. Li would have wanted it said to him 🤣