Biased Chinese

On the first day of March, the world woke up immediately drown into the news of the death of Ali Khamenei and US attack on Iran. Trump continued wielding his knife and stabbed the people of his same kind from the back with smug. Obviously he didn’t realize that it’s easy to start it but hard to end like his crisp Venezela blitz. Personally, I shared the joy with my Iranian friend who’s living abroad, but I understand the people inside her country probably hold a more complicated feeling and more pragmatical concerns. So you may wonder what’s China’s attitudes? In sum, china can provide money to the current Iranian regime, but not military protection. As the world knows, China is the biggest buyer for Iranian oil, and indeed China financially benefits a lot due to American sanction to Iran. If you were China, why on earth would you give it up? Dude, you can think by your toe. Even a dumbass can do a correct math here. So, China will continue doing this business as long as it’s making profit. Again, who else won’t ? Trump’s attack made a huge cost from America’s budget, I wonder how long can he even the number on his accounting book as the war drags on.

There’s famous phrase on politics in ancient china, around 300 BC, Zhuangzi, a representative of Daoism gave the insight about his current society as follows: 窃钩者诛 窃国者侯 (Here is one who steals a hook - he is put to death for it: here is another who steals a state - he becomes its prince.)That’s the reason why people despise the politics. Over three thousand years till now, we still see it’s proven true. I feel that it’s from the same idea that there originated a phrase from the USA that“If you owe your bank ten thousand dollars, you have a problem. But if you owe the bank ten million dollars, the bank has a problem” We’ve seen the rehearsal in 2008, “too big to fail’, what do you think? Burying your head into the sand won’t solve the problem, 18 years later, it comes up in a more furious way. The problem is straight away: how do you deal with Trump? I have been keeping an eye on the case of Epstein since 2019 when he died in the jail. I believe a lot of people already smelled the rat at the moment. But unfortunately then, boom, the covid came, the world changed.

Unsurprisingly, the first fire of 2026 was lit up by the USA. On the third of January, I believe, most people’s attention worldwide was given to Venezuela, since their dictator-president Nicolas Madura was snatched up by the the US task force from pentagon and transferred to New York City over night. It is a huge slap in the face to China indeed because on the same day in the afternoon, before Maduro was kidnapped to the US, he just met Chinese special envoy. We common Chinese don’t know what they were talking about, but we do realize that Chinese government lost on this game. And the oil deal between the Chinese government and Venezuela was unsurprisingly over. But personally, I’m happy for Venezuela people, and I assure you a lot of Chinese people feel this way. What else can you do when a dictator is down, celebrate of course. The sun will continue to rise and fall, the earth will continue spinning. Nobody is irreplaceable. Especially we don’t give a single fuck to a dictator. A week later, people’s attention switched to manifestation in Iran, another country of oil and dictator. The world paused to see if Trump would really take his words into action under his smug vibe from Venezuela. But it turned out just bluffing in the end. What Trump really fooled is the Iranian people who summoned up courage to stand up to their vicious government and lost their life. Till this moment I write, Iranian people are still fighting and suffering. But the media spotlight has already moved on to Greenland on 16th January when Trump threatened to use force to invade Greenland and tried to back down the Europe by his beloved tarif. And the European Union finally realized that if you continue to ignore this retard in order to keep your dignity, then this stupid head with the most power in the world would take your decent silence as an agreement. So the lesson is that if you know you fight with a pig, you should be ready to smear your body with shit, any hesitation is stupid. France got this lesson hard, but finally it jumped into the battlefield.

If you know anything about Chinese YinYangBaGua, you’d know that the year of 2026 is a year of Fire, which usually means violence and war. So when I saw the PLA (People’s Liberation Army)’s action on Taiwan the day before the New Year’s Eve, I took it seriously. Immediately I messaged my Taiwanese friend to think about a plan B. She asked me in return, why don’t you mainlanders resist, I told her that people who resisted had been in jail. The work of propaganda over 5 years has shown its effect now on the net, you can only see nationalists’ feverish support. And what’s worse, I can tell you this, if the war breaks out tomorrow, most mainlanders won’t be surprised at all, which means, sadly, people are mentally prepared, or in another word, accept it.

I’ve always been thinking about the question since I entered university : what’s wrong with China ? I read a lot of peoples viewpoints, Chinese and foreigners, dead and alive, and I also asked some in person. But I’ve never got a clear answer on it. At least not clear enough for me. Because a clearly defined problem comes up with a clear solution trajectory, which I haven’t seen in any of them. But one thing that I’m sure is that this problem of China can only be solved by local Chinese people who still count China as their home. Chinese people who’s thinking about this question like me are pretty aware of the current image of China, such as the outrage burst out towards Shein’s first permanent physical store opened up in Paris on November fifth. Unlike other fast fashion, Shein was unanimously viewed as the lowest brand, a lot of French I know never hide their disdain on Shein, and on the same kind of brand like Temu. Me, as a Chinese studying in Paris, I totally get why they think like that, and I don’t want defend Shein and Temu at all even though they break into the world market for the first time as Chinese brands from mainland. I don’t feel proud of them, neither do I feel shame. As a foreigner living in Paris over two years, I’m impressed by the eco-fever here in the Europe which I believe is out of good initiative, a sense of mission. But I have to say, they don’t see the real problem which divides them. The gap between the rich and the poor goes to extreme after the Covid. Why can’t you simply see it. People lining up to the opening of Shein in Paris, being accused of buying Shein trash could only feel the hypocrisy of their accusers on the other side of the streets, mainly from bourgeoise class, with good education or good family background, manifesting for the ecology. Both of the sides is the victim of this capitalism whose outcomes are predicted long time ago. I don’t have a solution for you because China’s mode is definitely not the answer. But I hope you can understand why some Chinese business feel the hypocrisy of Europeans’ reactions towards Shein or Temu. They would simply say it’s not them who create so many poor without choice in your country. Just be aware. Understanding is the first step for solution.

Don’t ask a Chinese what’s your dream, instead, you should ask them what’s your fear. Because being able to and being allowed to pursue your dream is such a privilege that only applies to a small number in China. In reality, most is driven by fear. To a Chinese, to fully realize their fear and overcome it is such a big step in their life. Such a step demands courage, which is a rare trait even among all the human beings. So, to figure out, of which the Chinese people is fear, can give you brighter insight than asking their dream, which is always secondary. For example, on the last day of October, when people in the democratic countries were enjoying the Halloween with spooky or funny costumes, the most sighted costume in every street in the major cities of China was the police uniform, especially in Shanghai, the setting of police car was full fledged in every major gathering spot . Policeman would stop anyone in whatever costume using the same language like, ‘Halloween is a western holiday which is not for China, we don’t celebrate it, go undress yourself right now’. Then the cosplayer would be quote ‘accompanied' by the police to remove their make up. Can you imagine it? On the street of China, what scares people most is not the sight of a devil or monster, but the Chinese policeman. At the same time, our general secretary, Xi Jingping was watching G-dragon’s show in APEC’s banquet with typical unreadable expression on his face. If you know that South Korea’s entertainment industry has been banned over a decade in China, you would understand how Chinese were amused when seeing such a view on the social media.

You should make it personal, whatever it is. This is the latest lesson that Chinese people showed on their action to Chinese government. It can apply to your world as well. Ditch those five w journalistic neutral crap. Every action is initiated by a person, not an institution, nor a company, nor an organization. If you read a news but in the end you don’t find a single person accountable, you’re just fooled by the so-called journalist. The fall of traditional media is often lamented by those soft elites who’s indulged in their good old days of privilege. I don’t like TikTok and all those short videos, neither do I use them. But I am happy to see those traditional media being rejected by the trend of the world.So imagine when traditional media disappeared, what’s next ? Here’s the case of China, which allows you have a preview. On September 3rd, Reuters accidentally captured and broadcast on live the the conversation between Putin and Xi Jinping walking on the red carpet towards the stage in the forbidden city. Their small chat is about age, as both of them are in their 70s. And they’re joking that with nowadays’ technology, they could live up to 150 years. If they were just two normal grandpa talking on the bench in the garden downstairs your apartment. You’d laugh it out and maybe feel a little pity about these two ignorant old men. But, we all know who they are, we made it personal, at least, on Chinese side, Chinese people dig up an ads of a military hospital in Beijing around 7 years ago, which is about promoting their research on extending the leaders’ life into 150 years old. The blatant ads was took off within a week, as it irritated the non-leaders mass majority. But you can find a clue why Xi Jing pin pinpointed the exact number of 150 in his small chat.

What’s the color for August? In China, I can guarantee you, it’s red. Because historically Japan announced its surrender at mid-august in WWII, ending its invading and colonization in China. Also, the army of Chinese Communist Party , called The people’s Liberation army usually celebrates its anniversary on August first . It’s a month of force and victory. Coincidentally, we did see several interesting fights during this month in China Mainland, starting from August 5th. A school bullying in Jiangyou, a city in Sichuan province, triggered a mass protest in the streets, ending up curfew collaborated by the police and the liberation army. This is a rare scene you could see in China. The last time you can imagine such a view should be in 1989, on the Tiananmen Square. You may wonder why this school bullying made such a difference ? The answer is the image, a short video showing the parents of the victim bend their knees to the ground at the feet of the chief of the police, begging him to give justice to their daughter, and the highlight is, the mother is a mute and the father is disabled. Such a family combination could be viewed as the weakest group in the Chinese society. So in Chinese people’s eyes, the whole family was bullied by this privileged authoritarian system. The gesture to bent their knees at the feet of the power is utmost submissive sign, they’re begging, and they have no defense, but the police and the government shows no mercy only the usual indifference that most Chinese were used to see in common case. This crossed the line. The bottom line of Chinese people’s moral standard. Or, let’s say in another way, it’s how blatantly that they showed in public that they don’t care like the image presenting the parents kneel down at the feet of the chief of the police. And common Chinese people realized that privilege and injustice in such a view which made them surround the government building and protest in the downtown streets. What hyped this protest was coincidentally in the neighbor city, the capital of Sichuan province, Chengdu was holding the World Games 2025, you know China, such a disgrace, a slap in the face. So the government wants to crack it down fast. They did, over night, they beat up everyone in the streets, arrested several and sent them away by camion for pigs. You heard it right, the protesters were standing in the camion, usually for shipping pigs. If you read George Orwell, animal farm, you would understand how sarcastic this view is.

July 2025. It’s been almost two years since I left China. But I have never been able to distance myself from the Chinese society due to the Internet and the social media. Or more profoundly speaking, since I’m a Chinese, I only care about what’s happening in China. It relates to my interest, my identity, my link to collective memory, thus my relationship with my fellow Chinese. It’s our story, I don’t wanna privileged foreigners or domestic dictator control the narrative, yeah, I can’t help messing up with them. So let me share you my personal Monthly China, on what’s happening and how do we common Chinese feel about it.To summarize July 2025 in China, I would use one word: Indignation. If you check the dictionary: indignation means anger or annoyance provoked by what is perceived as unfair treatment.The funny thing here is that you can see unfair treatment fairly befall on the head of Chinese average person. July started from Kindergarten in Gansu, over 200 children were poisoned by addictive used to colorize their steamed bun. Honestly, I was not surprised at all by this kind of news, food security is never secure in China, which is sort of common sense. But this piece of news keeps bugging on my social media because the local government was so used to cover it up than do their job. So the news like parents of the poisoned children got arrested or their social media got shut down kept alive until a man dressed up as a woman doing free hooker and got laid with more than 1600 Chinese guys in Nanking.The news of Uncle red occupied the headline in the second week of July because of the hilarious absurdity. Videos and voice record of this suspected gay lied to straight men of every kind, assuring them that he has a vagina went viral. He single-handedly proved to all Chinese women who still have princess dream how stupid and horny their husband or husband-to-be are. It sounds vulgar, but a lot of women just realize that they /the Chinese guy just need a hole. So uncle red simply proved that an asshole also counts. This is a huge slap to Chinese patriarchal society. I can’t help laughing the whole day, and spread that news to my international friends who has Asian fever. While I’m writing, my Portuguese friend told me that this Uncle red outfit has evolved into some funny foreplay between couples on TikTok. Sending gift as watermelon or half bottle of oil, you can only get the punchline if you share the collective memory of Chinese people.

Today, April 10th, BBC China just posted an interview on Chinese’s People responses towards Trump’s Tariffs. None of the interviewees are really worried, to be honest, so am I. I’ll explain it to you as a Chinese myself, and I hope this episode would reach some decision-makers who’re hesitating and tortured by the anxiety and uncertainty. First of all, I want to mention something interesting about the interview on BBC’s Youtube Channel, the first review showed in the comments section got more that 2000 likes. Surprising, it’s a quote from Chinese classical literature, an essay written by Su Sun a thousand years ago. It’s an essay on how the sates of Qing defeated the rest six sates altogether and established the first unified empire in China’s history . The name of this essay is called ‘On the six fallen states’. And the quote on the comments section is as follows: Cut five cities today, then ten cities tomorrow, only for a calm sleep overnight. Starting to look at the four realms, the Qin soldiers had already reach our boarder. However, our land is limited, but the desire of the Qin is insatiable. I bet every Chinese would laugh when reading this review. That’s why the moment that Trump threaten to raise 50% more tariffs on China. I instantly preview Chinese government’s answer like most Chinese intellectual would. In the current situation, China, Europe, Canada, and other counties with similar status in term of economic strength are the six states in the essay, and the US is the Qin empire. Do you know what’s the conclusion from the essay ? Why six states were defeated by one state? Su Xun put it directly because each of the six was eager to bribe and lobby Qin not to invade them rather than find alliance among the six and fight direct with Qin to erase the harassment for good. So you could imagine that China would continue to counter back if Trump keeps his strategy unchanged. Interestingly enough, I found this quote was also used four years ago by some Chinese as a comment on US government’s forcing TikTok sales. It’s kind of the same mentality, so I’ll save my words on it.

It takes me a while to realise that: I hate my cousin. But it takes me years to say this out loud to my friends and eventually to confess it to my parents. When I use the word « hate », I mean I don’t wish anything best to this person. It may sound mental, but it’s a kind of feeling that if her life’s successful, it would prove my life’s wrong. Perhaps this is my most deeply rooted bias. But now, I summon up curage to recognise this fact that: I don’t like her.I’m sharing my story, because I want you to have a glimpse on what’s real Chinese family like. As Tolstoy said, Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. My unhappy family represents one type of Chinese characteristic unhappiness : the ideological conflict. I always think in my mind that I wouldn’t dislike her that much if she hadn’t worked for the Chinese communist party. I would be more tolerant to her if she hadn’t believed and defended the propaganda made up by that totalitarian regime. In normal life, she would just be a boring person in my eyes, not my type, that’s all. She doesn’t worth my attention at all. But due to the fact that we’re family, my father and her mother forced us to be looked like close sisters. She took it granted to meddle in my life since I never speak up for myself in that depressive Chinese feudalistic family culture. I was abused by the violence in the name of « for your own good » since the moment I didn’t even have a memory. [When you’re dragged into a war you’re not prepared, you’re the underdog at the start.If you never realise it’s a war you need to fight for your life, you’re already devoured.] For your own good, repeat this phrase to your Chinese friend, they’ll explain to you why. It took me almost ten years to get out of this shit, it’s too traumatising to recall, so I save my words on this side point. My real point is as follows: Well, to understand family ideological conflict, I have to give you a crash course on Chinese working system. When I say, someone works for the Chinese communist party, I mean he is either working for public institution or state-owned enterprise. Public institution means jurisdiction, administration, execution plus army, state-owned enterprise is literally how the name tells. One thing different from your understanding of SOE in China is that one major task for those state companies is political task. And employee in state enterprise could all of a sudden be sent to work for public institution, they use the jargon « borrow », like I was borrowed from this unit to that unit because as a whole it’s communist system. That’s why you see CEO of one enterprise overnight become a minister, that can happen in China. If you read the book Red Roulette by Desmond Shum published in 2021, you’ll know how this system functions at the highest level. So my cousin works in one district level SOE, her mother works in the same district-level public institution, her father works in national level SOE. That’s in my eyes a family 100% work for Chinese Communist Party. There are some features that you can tell them apart from common Chinese. They use Huawei They call Xijinping « Xi DaDa » They watch CCTV everydayThey check XUEXIQiangguo Application as a daily basis as they have quota on it (episode 16 if you wanna get more info)Often time, they prefer to speak dialect than mandarinThey are basically xenophobe, a chauvinist insideThey believe foreign force theory

I’ve been mean to read this book for a long time, but due to the censorship in China and busy life, I’ve never had the chance. Then this year, I stumbled across this book when my office was planning to move place and clearing the bookshelf, a colleague from Russia handed this book to me, said « it’s a really nice one, do you wanna keep it ?» Do you see, every elements in the scene is interesting. The reading is intriguing and the ideas inspiring. I feel inclined to agree on the point that the world’s civilizations are going to head for a unification, as I am a Chinese, it’s probably conveyed in my DNA as ancient memory loaded by repeated trials and success. Sometimes, I felt the author is quite cynical and pessimistic as typical historian in my stereotype. However, one thing I am sure is that Mr. Harari’s major area is definitely not Chinese civilisation because I can tell his narration is accurate but text-book like, which means he’s not so into it, therefore the telling is flat. Hereby, somehow, I just wanna fill this gap as a Chinese reader, who finished reading the original text, and who has been living in modern China for over 30 years. I’m just a common higher education graduate, and I just feel I have broader perspective to offer on the issue he’s discussing in the book. And I’m please to be rectified by any intellectual who’s specialised in this area. But again, I haven’t seen any recognised-Chinese hold kinda optimistic view in my knowledge. So I made my step as nobody, but simply a Chinese myself. My writing was triggered by this paragraph in the book: Thus European right-wing parties which oppose muslim immigration usually take care to avoid racial terminology.Instead, they tend to argue that western culture, as it has evolved in Europe, is characterised by democratic values, tolerance, and gender quality, whereas Muslin culture, which evolved in the middle east, is characterised by hierarchical politics, fanaticism, and misogyny. It may sound out of thin air, but I get my following idea from what I’ve just read.I think, the biggest difference between China and the rest of the world is that China is not a religious country. Most Chinese will feel comfortable to say to your face« I don’t believe in God, I’m atheist » not only because of the short ruling of Communist Party of China over 70 years, moreover, before communist, before Qing Dynasty, before Ming Dynasty, over the 3000 year imperial ruling, we worship « heaven » which is not a human-like God, it’s natural law. We wish the mother nature always be our side, let us go with the wind. That’s why you hear a lot of Chinese wish good luck every year. Luck, « yun » . We beg the heaven when there is drought or flood because we thought we did sth wrong and mother nature was angry. We wanna the luck back, we wanna it be our side. See we’re actually very of scientific respect at the burgeoning era.

Do you think China will become democracy?Recently, more than one asked me this question. By answering them, I find my own belief as well. But before answering this question, I need make it clear for someone who bought the saying that China is democratic. I don’t know how far away you live, or how stupid you are. But I use my Chinese nationality and my 30 years life swear to God, there is no such thing as democracy in current china since the establishment of the Chinese government by Chinese communist party. It’s in a state quo better than North Korea, but worse than Russia, and right this moment closing to Russia, period. One thing interesting is that all the people who asked me the question are young in their 20s. They are the Z generation in Europe and I’m the millennia from mainland China, and surprisingly, we get along very-well. And recently I got some feedback and I just realised that I’m probably a unique Chinese. Unique in the way of my thinking, which surprised a lot of my foreign friends. But I promise you I’m not the only one. It’s my chance that I become the representative to talk to you. And it’s your chance as well to hear the voice of the new generation of Chinese rising for sure because we outnumber the old generation in China in terms of energy, intelligence, experience, and life span. I found a lot of you western people really has truly limited experience or zero experience on China. You really don’t know us, American might be better, but the channel of your way to know China already biased you a lot. Because most of your Channel were led by Communist party whether you noticed it or not.

I have to tell you something from a Chinese perspective, a sensation that a lot of Chinese people in the mainland are sharing at this moment, and I leave this message in June 2024, in case our worry comes true. The sensation is that « we’re going to invade Taiwan soon » . There are two things underneath this phrase: 1. the percentage is high, I mean, the chance of invading Taiwan is big now in our eyes 2. The time is very short, in the past, we’d talking about it like « some day » « one day », you got the feeling? A bit chill, like talking sth not related to the stake. Now we’re nervous, and we’re wondering the exact moment for planning our daily life.This is no exaggeration. It’s the inner voice of many quote middle-class Chinese. Most middle class have shut up right now on Chinese social media. If you’ve listened my episode on Chinese Cultural revolution, you’ll understand why. And they are watching the extreme-nationalists taking the lead, and societal conflicts accelerating day by day with abhorrent news pop out in WeChat shortly and then deleted.Have you heard of a book called « The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II » written by Iris Zhang. The book recorded the accurate atrocity committed by Japanese army during Nanjing Massacre. I don’t recommend any weak-willpower to read. It’s traumatising. And the author took herself after the book. But what left me a great impression is the documentation and analysis of Japan’s propaganda education before invading China. A whole generation since elementary school had been quote « educated » that Chinese people were not human, every Japanese people serve their life for the rejuvenation of Japanese empire. I think German people are bit familiar with this storytelling. That’s how Nazi treat Jews. Every time I talked about propaganda in China, my western friends always responded that yeah, they have the same issue as well, propaganda is everywhere, there’s no real freedom of speech in their countries neither. Both a British and a French, a master and a phd, majored in social science and science. I was a little disappointed to see, even them, they don’t understand. China is another level. It’s not comparable. There is no equivalent in your world now. Every time they said it, I wish they could exchange life with a Chinese one day. Like I would never say that to a North Korean, I would never say I understand their life. It somehow gives me a feeling of irrespect or indifference.

In this episode, I’m going to tell you something sneaky. It’s bad, the value within is distorted, it’s simply sneaky, and no Chinese would tell you foreigners for the sake of decency. It’s bad again, but it’s damn useful. So I’ll play the bad guy here to let you know, in the hope that you can make good friends with the right Chinese you imagined. First how many Chinese overseas? Let me quote a mainland report to you: Generally speaking , there are approximately 60 millions Chinese living overseas in 2022. And here are the top 10 countries for their destination: No. 10 Peru 1.3 millionNo.9 Philippine 1.35 millionNo.8 Australia 1.4millionNo.7 Myanmar 1.63 millionNo.6 Canada 1.77millionNo.5 Singapore 2.98millionNo.4 America 5 millionNo.3 Malasia 7.4 millionNo.2 Thailand 10 millionNo.1 Indonesia over 10 millionAlright, here begins my theory, again, it’s simply personal biased with no scientific ground but my own pure experience. I’m just a young woman living my whole life in mainland China, and I’ve just been to Europe over six month. But when I was in China, I’ve already had experience dealing with foreigners from almost all the continents. And here in Europe, I sort of working and living in an environment of little UN. So it could be useful for a group of foreign friends I guess. Okay, first thing first: classI mean marxisme term: classMost Chinese you meet overseas are either from the bottom or the top, which means either they’re extremely poor or extremely rich. And most of them are from Guangdong province, the Provence sits just near east sea of China. The extremely poor, they don’t need apply for visa stuff, they just swim. I’m joking, they are, you know, the main force for stowaway. I feel sorry for them, it’s the damn surviving issue here. The extremely rich, you need be careful here, my dear subscribers, they’re 99% related with Chinese Communist Party, in a good way, or in a bad way. A number of the family of Chinese Communist Party themselves live overseas and stay in low-profile. It doesn’t need any investigation for you to ask where does their money come from. Are you sure you wanna get involved? It’s more dangerous than you think.Imagine the film GOD father, and double or triplet the violence.

In my last episode on Cultural Revolution, I’ve given my conclusion that a cyber cultural revolution is currently unfolding in China. It could be viewed as my personal observation or prediction. And here I am, Why do I say so?First, I have to ask you: Have you ever been attacked on the net? Seriously, like tens of thousands people commenting on your post, and most of the comments is personal judgement on you with a lot of fowl words or disdain. It’s a cyber battlefield where you versus let’s say 5000. Have you won that war before? If you don’t have that experience, it would be a little hard for you to really understand what I’m going to explain. Luckily, I just came across that experience last month by accident. And I feel extremely lucky that I’ve experienced it when I’m abroad, which means I’m not in China. It’s a totally stranger social media, and I’ve done a good job on my personal information. Namely, once I delete the social media app, I’m all good. By the way, the app is called little red book. By sheer coincident, when I began to think about this cultural revolution topic, one of my post got attacked. What did I say? A very personal opinion after I randomly seeing so many people mocked that the world is a fancy sham. « The world is a fancy sham » is kinda of popular view on Chinese social media, I don’t wanna spend too much time on it. Basically it’s related with Chinese working environment where the state-owned enterprise bred a rotted worldview. So I posted a few words on my unobtrusive account, something like « no the world is not a fancy sham. Your worldview has no impact on the world, rather it influences your choice towards the world. So be careful, you should see the world more.» But I think it’s my attack on Chinese over fifty which got me backfired. Because I put it at first « if one over fifty years old is still saying the world is a fancy sham, he/she hasn’t see the real world » On reflection, I just realised that in China one over fifty are exactly those born or grew up in Cultural Revolution. The thing surprised me is that they are also active on social media. To give you a brief picture. This post got around 123,000 impression, within which I got 6000 attacks, 2000 supports. So I send this feedback to my friend who did media with me before in China, to understand the audience, and user image of Little Red Book. For the audience we mean to grab: 94% stay silence, 4.4% again us, 1.6% for us. In conclusion, the enemy is triple of us, but the real audience we want is that 94% silent one. I repeat once more. I’m very lucky for this case. Let me show you another one, to show you, for real what happened in China, last week, a vlogger name « Hu Cheng Feng » was doing live on his bilibili account, a Chinese platform close to Youtube. And somehow, one audience just asked him a question which ended his whole career.

What’s the current Chinese culture? It’s a combination of Patriarchal Confucius with Totalitarian Orwellian system. Yes, you’re right. There is no such thing as human rights in China because the totalitarian collectivism prevails. You benefit when you are in the great number, but you lose all when you belong to the small number. And your fate is like drawing lottery, 99% of Chinese have the turn to be the small number one day. Women are still be treated as the tool for sex or for baby. Living in the city makes your life as women better, but deep down, in the end, your means are the same like those living in the village. Well-educated women are still struggling in the city with layers of ceilings visible in every industry. Man will have privilege but they pay the price with being ass kisser to their superior if they wanna climb the ladder, this is the only way. Because deep down, Confucius means, everyone is born unequal, there is a rank to maintain. So people show respect to the higher rank, but also reveal disdain to lower rank. Namely, it’s a pathetic society which breeds hatred and mistrust. A world I would’t recommend you to live in right now. But again, Pay attention, I empathise once more, hereby I just mean the current Chinese culture led by Chinese community party under it’s regime over 70 years. China has a very long history, there are a lot of things which are the gem of my culture, which I really love to share with you, which I think could contribute to make a better world for all. Just unfortunately, for now, we Chinese are still presenting you the wrong thing, because we have a wrong representative towards the world now. In the next episode, I’ll give you my analysis. But I think you’ve already guessed my answer. Yes, cultural revolution is possible to happen again in China, actually it has already begun. But it is coming back in a new form under this new age with Internet. China is going through a cyber cultural revolution right now. Fear has already spread among Chinese in the mainland. The red guards are coming back and attacking people who speak right now. It’s coming back in a subtle but also vital way to impact Chinese near future, which could have a spillover effect towards the rest of the world if bad luck.

There was a time when every Chinese admitted that Cultural Revolution is a mistake, an abhorrent period in our Morden history. This consensus was already reached in 1980s and 1990s China. At least when I was a student, what I read in my history textbook, it was literally recorded as a « mistake ». As teenage students, teenage like me, took this idea for granted. Whenever we talked about « cultural revolution » Our first feedback would be like « That is wrong, of course »But in recent years, the narrative has changed. The word « mistake » was corrected into « exploration », it was described as « ten years of exploration ». You can tell the difference, right? So I don’t wanna explain more about it. Last week, with Netflix releasing its newly make TV series « Three body problem », Chinese people began a wave of discussion online, mainly out of the Great Fire Wall, namely on twitter. People were lamenting about how the history of Cultural Revolution was obscured right now. And no joking guys, we are worrying about the revival of it now. The rumour that Xi wants to start another Cultural Revolution emerged around 2018 according to my memory. At that time, it was still regarded as a very ridiculous opinion, including me at that time held a huge doubt on it.

First, I presume that you know, there are two Tik Toks in this world. A Chinese version called « Dou Yin », then another international version called « tik tok ». They are the same, but due to different audience, and the existence of Great Fire Wall, bytedance, its mother company, separated the business. And, I also presume that you know the real boss of Tik Tok is not that cute Singaporean you saw on TV in the American Congress, it’s a skinny average-looking Chinese man called Zhang Yiming. With these two premises, I’ll lead you to Tik Tok’s story from the beginning in China. Let’s start from 2011, it’s the real time when short video rose up in China, and Doyin was just one of them, and at the time  no one really cared short video in general. Because at the beginning, it was mainly used among villagers to spread funny videos about their countryside life. I hate to say it, but to be honest, it was viewed as « low culture » compared with the Louvre you know. Very low, actually, near to vulgar, because most Chinese villagers don’t get education, and the village life in China is totally another story than your imagination. However, if you remember, we have the data that, there is currently 900 million peasants in China. In terms of population, they won. And that’s why short video took up within Chinese territory. I know in Europe and America, that’s not how you started. 

If you have never heard about CCTV, that’s fine. Don’t take it as the camera in front of your door. It’s an acronyme for China Central Television, namely the propaganda machine for Chinese Communist Party. Every day from 7 to 7:30 PM, the TVs across China turn into the same screen. This phenomenon still goes until today even though like the trend worldwide, people watch less and less TV. You think the influence is backing down. Nope propaganda catches up the age of AI. There’s an app called Xuexi qiangguo, which means « Learn to be a strong country » literally translated, reading the introduction on the app store, it’s designed to teach Xi Jinping thought. And you know what, every public official, or those working in state-owned enterprise must download it, watch, read sth on the app everyday. There’s quota for them, which means they must finish how many minutes quote,« studying », on it every day. In my eyes, it’s a blatant forced brainwashing app. Btw, it was developed by Alibaba. I know Alibaba was also forced to do so. I have a relative who works for government. I mean it’s quite common that almost within every Chinese family, there would be party member. According to latest data, there are 98 million Chinese Communist Party Member.  But don’t worry, 99% of them is fake. Most of the time, it’s a just a job for living, no one really buy it for real.However, with the rising of this app, some people really fell into it. Like my relative, when I told her the news about Wagner Rebellion the day when you know, the tanks heading to Moscow. She was surprised and said « I need check on the Xuexi qiang app, why I didn’t see the news this morning ». I was like, rolling my eyes, and speechless. After the Covid, the news is finally dead in China. I can’t explain so much to you here, because I still haven’t reached the point that I really wanna drive home. In short, to suppress waves of complaints and challenges during the lockdown, Chinese government had shut down every possible channel to spread quote, the « news » they don’t want. And people have already found out that as well. So, during the breakout of the white paper movement, namely the protest against the lockdown policy, most of the news were rushing out of China, mainly to the platforms of twitter and YouTube, then were being redirected back to China through person to person message. That is to say, Chinese people are firstly sending the news to outer platform, and then people on the platform send it back, in this roundabout way, they escape the censorship and cyber police ID tracking, to get their news being seen. Now, here comes to the climax. On twitter, there’s an account call « Mr Li is not your teacher ». He has 1,6 million followers. And somehow, his platform becomes this news distribution center, cause too many people are sending him the news from China everyday, so he keeps reposting. Then he found it’s too many, thus this year he created a YouTube channel call « flake news », here flake means to refer a novel written by Fangfang during the Covid, to broadcast Chinese news everyday like what CCTV does. 

« Some foreigners who’re into minding others’ business, recently poked hands towards our affairs. China, first of all, doesn’t stir up revolution in other countries, secondly we don’t contribute to famine and poverty, thirdly, we don’t mind your business. Period. »This is the speech given by Xi Jinping in 2009 Mexico when he met local Chinese community. The first time that Joe Biden met Xi Jinping is in 2011 in my hometown. I’m 31, and people like me can tell what’s a person like by talking over just one meal, as old as Joe Biden, I bet he’s already got to know this young man from head to toe. Before leaving China, my last job got very close to him, but I turned around and traded this « honor »quote, for 300 dollars. I joked with my friend, that he worths 300 dollars from my side from then on.To get a common Chinese middle-aged man is easy. Basically you’d be a prostitute if you want to get along with them. It sounds radical, I know. But that’s the reason why you don’t get along with them now. Think about it. Just suddenly you figure out they didn’t treat you as dude as they claimed by words, then you snapped up. I know it sounds stupid to mention « love » in this discussion, but I have to tell you that’s the root problem for Chinese, including Xi. Most Chinese families don’t know what is  « love », what’s worse, they replace the sense of love by the sense of control. If you have any Chinese friends, you’ll more or less feel it. Millions of family tragedy can be summarised as the tugs-of-war between « controlling » and « being controlled ». If you stick to this order, you’d be praised as « filial piety » , a misunderstood version of love over China’s  thousand years history. And then let’s put it into larger picture, it’s the binary of « ruling » and « being ruled », this non-republic, feudalistic political thought is still underling China’s governing system, and the kind. It’s a backward civilisation, I say it as a Chinese myself. 

Looking back, I think it’s kind of fate that the first week I entered into the biggest media group in my city, I read Carrie Gracie’s report on Xi’s power grabbing game with Bo Xilai in 2017. It’s a really long article, called « The murder in the Lucky Holiday Hotel ». It was quite fascinating while I was reading, as a post graduate student majored in English Literature who entered her journalist dream as an intern working for an bilingual magazine. I just earned what I wanted. But that afternoon, when I finished reading that report, my dream as journalist collapsed. I don’t blame it because later that week when I attended a meeting in replace of my editor in chief who was up for other work, my dream was totally erased as I was seeing, listening, and taking notes sitting beside the Chief of the News Agency of the whole media group. The scene was like, outside, I composed very well, expression controlled, a master of fake, like a young innocent straight-A student new comer, inside I was like, « what the fuck » shock and correcting, protesting over the 2 hours meeting. My whole world-view was bit of shattered after the meeting, but I kept composed my self and reported everything I noted on the conference to the editor-in-chief. After the reporting, the editor told me « You know what you’ve heard is quite sensitive, right? It’s not supposed to tell outsiders » I responded naturally « Yes, of course, I understand » Then I was dismissed. That was my first week working in China’s media group. Btw, it’s a shame for BBC to lose Carrie Gracie, and shame on BBC who’s not giving equal payment. You British are really messing up yourself hard.As a former media worker, I know the red line very well, hereby the red line means some subject or topic on reporting , if you touch it in China, you’d be in warning, in detain, in jail, or disappear. Being a true journalist in China is life-threatening, that’s why there’s no investigative journalist in China, because your life is not your own, your parents, you friends all count on you. For the current journalist situation, I can only tell you that those you see look like journalists are sort of permitted to be so. Permitted by Who? The family of Zhao. The family of Zhao is the phrase that Chinese people made to indicate the several ruling communist families in China, in which Xi Jinping is included. If you search it on Github, yeah, the website for programmers sharing codes, you can find the name list of the family of Zhao. Yeah, one of Chinese programmers who really has the balls did that. The family of Zhao is originated from a short novel written by a famous Chinese writer in 1920s called LuXun. Within the story, Mr. Zhao was an obnoxious and arrogant landlord who reprimanded a peasant who claimed himself also named Zhao, saying « You don’t deserve to be the family of Zhao » Thus at a time those Chinese who defended communist party got backfired by commentators on the social media with the same script like « yo man wake up, you don’t deserve to be the family of Zhao »See, Chinese people are not stupid. We have a plan B, plan B to look for who’s going to be taken account when things need to be cleared. The fear is gradually crawling back to the one who spread it. So how much do Chinese know about Xi? I’d say he’s quite typical middle-aged Chinese man with low self-esteem and full of wrong ideas because of his poor experience in teenage. I draw my conclusion first from the recording of his speech you’re going to hear, and I’ll explain later

Last Saturday on January 13th, Taiwan had witnessed the coming of its fourth democratically elected president. I count it the way I see after the term of Li Denghui. A bitter truth for me, as Chinese mainlander, is that the Tiananmen Square protest in China was one big drive for the democratic reform in Taiwan. What we have failed on this side, they succeeded in replace. And I suddenly have an intuition that if we mainlander had succeeded in 1989, perhaps Taiwan was already a province of China today. No offence, to Taiwanese, I totally understand their stance now. I’m just a little bit jealous. But I do, as I present you a mindset as mainlander, I do have a different opinion on Taiwan’s justification on being a nation because I think Taiwan is in all way of Chinese identity, except politically aspect. At least, the national palace museum in Taibei says this idea to me. If they really wanna cut off, at least they should vacant their national museum and return all the contents to Beijing. I’m just joking. And in a way, im’ showing you, putting aside the propaganda, why Chinese find it absurd about the independence of Taiwan. And if you really count it as a nation, it would be a relatively new one, with less than 20 years of history. That's why China is eager to reunify it before time tempers the general subconsciousness.So what’s the current effect of Taiwan presidential election to mainland Chinese? Similar to that of American, we are both impressed by their fully democratic process. I know some of you American use the example of Taiwan’s election to mock your owns (representative precincts). As a Chinese, I'd say that if one day I could choose, I indeed prefer Taiwan’s way of election to that of America’s.You’ve already known your bug, but you’re not allowed to change. Don’t you feel a sort of authoritarian inside, American? I’m joking. No offence.Back to Chinese, in fact, most Chinese who really care Taiwan’s issue had already felt that Lai QingDe (the newly elected) would win before the campaign. And the rest who doesn’t care were actually torn by the stocks market in China, which plummeted several days in a straight, triggering outrage among most common stocks buyers who accused finally that the exchange was a lie made by the government. Some wrote protesting script on the floor, and some left a punch of fist mark on the bronze bull in front of the exchange. And recently, people in China have somehow reached the consensus that Chinese economy is falling, more and more people are losing confidence to China’s economic outlook, and also losing the trust to statistics provided by Chinese government. This is actually a bad news for Taiwan, you know, when the economy is unsolvable, a war would be used to shift the blame.

In general, China is exclusive to foreigners, up until now, only 72000 foreign immigrates living in China. Compared to the size of this country’s population, it counts for nothing. And there are two major places that are mainly chosen by foreigners to settle down in China. One is Guangdong province, the other is Yunnan province. The capital of Guangdong is called Guangzhou, which is also a hub for African people who unprecedentedly built a community on the ground in this city, and slowly they could become the first foreign immigrates that would truly integrate themselves into China. In my personal impression on foreigners in China, African people speak the best Chinese in general with perfect pronunciation and some with authentic accent of different Chinese regions. And they are easier to get along thanks to their innocent nature from an almost heritage-free continent. In China, I’ve met African people doing different jobs, businessman, dancer, DJ, consultant, photographer, writer, and so on because I have a friend who’s working as analyst on China-Africa relationship in Beijing. My friend is a British white woman, and she had some genius idea of establishing herself as the unique white who mediates between Chinese and African. You’ll understand later why I said so. To understand China-Africa relationship, you need first to figure out whether Chinese are racists. In general, compared with America and Europe, the answer is NO. Chinese are not racial, however, Chinese are snobbish. That is to say, they would not despise you because of your skin colour, but later on when they gradually get to know you, they’ll treat you by your wealth. And the illusion left by the history which still prime the Chinese people inland who has never met a foreigner before his/her life, is that foreigners are rich. This impression dates back to Opium War, when the West invaded the China in Qing Dynasty. Thus, generally speaking, when you arrive in China as a foreign stranger, you’d be well received with some privilege. This is the first stage.Then, the prejudice came into being when Chinese have recognised the hierarchy made by the UN: namely, the underdeveloped country, the developing country, developed country.So Chinese begin to understand not every foreigner is rich.Snobbery, it’s a kind of human nature right? Yeah, deep down, Chinese people are snobbish. They treat you well, not because you’re white, but of the impression that the white are rich. They don’t respect you, not because you’re black, but of the impression that the black are poor. You’ll come across this kind of prejudice when you meet Chinese people grew up in cities who knows a little, and just a little, sort of half-educated.Unfortunately, the number of them is not small. This is the second stage. The third stage is due to the pragmatical nature of Chinese. Neo-colonisation, or whatever you call it, is true in a way to define China’s posture in Africa now. And I asked a graphic designer from Benim, how do they view the Chinese over his place. Both of us agreed that both of sides are clear that Chinese want African resources, and African want Chinese speed. So this is purely business. If you view it from this perspective, you’ll understand why Chinese feel ridiculous when the political or moral opinions intrude in the discussion. Business only understands one langue.

Hi there, happy new year! And today I’m going to introduce you a group of Chinese patients who could be your future best friend from China.They have a clinically diagnosed disease called political depression. Symptoms include a depressed or irritable mood for most of the day along with thoughts and feelings of sadness, emptiness or hopelessness. And most importantly, the loss of the thoughts and feelings of control over one’s destiny. The perception that work, education, imagination and perseverance do not matter and that there is a ceiling on one’s possibilities. This is a quote from Huffpost by Dr. Robert Lusson. And in my own words, it’s a feeling you find out you live in prison, that’s it. I’ve been through this political depression twice. The first time happened quite subtly.That’s a long period after I read the Animal Farm by George Orwell when I was a sophomore in college in 2012. The second time happened quite lately in the October of 2022, when the video clip caught the former president Hujingtao was escorted out of the two sessions in front of the whole country, that’s the moment that I confirmed with the voice in my head « it’s truly over »I’ve met friends who have the same political depression and I was the one reversely comfort them with the philosophy of carpe diem. Chinese people are inclined to be long-term viewers, so I drag my friends’ sight back to look at today, just today. I felt relieved that they’re good and lived on their own philosophy of life when I left China.And I saw a lot of Chinese overseas who also suffered from this depression but they had got rid of it by breaking the prison physically like me. However, deep down, my mind keep telling me it’s not over yet. Let me tell you this way…Five years ago, when my American friend asked me why not to immigrate, my answer was like directly without thinking « they should leave, not me, it’s my land »Have I changed my thought now? Not really. Let me tell you a secret, I was and I am still, always right about the political trend in China. Yes, I leave, right now. But it doesn’t mean I leave for good. I’m finding myself a shelter before the storm.Save the theoretical system analysis by loads of experts or what. I’ve sensed it and it’s close. People like me can see the trend, but no one can predict the exact accident that will trigger the fall. What China needs is an accident that no one knows in what forms, by which sides, because the Chinese system is big and full of bugs, errors, failures, and defects. Imagine you are driving an old car with every gadget got its problem, your mindset would be like drive it as far as it can go, and then dump it when it’s done, you wouldn’t think about repairing at all. It would be quite a show for outsiders, but not a surprise for those who have been there. What I care is what’s next. Things after this accident. My hope lies in there. To all my political depressed buddies, stick to our vision, and think about the next. During my twenties, I couldn’t be a journalist nor a lawyer because of the circumstance of my country. Sometimes I lamented about the bad timing of my generation. But nowadays, I have a strong intuition that that’s because we have something more important to do, we’ll be the ones to create the environment that allows Chinese people do what they want to do, namely, Freedom. You pain, then you gain. Lately, I got to know the difference between « Ego »and « confidence ». Ego is something purely about yourself. But confidence is sth beyond. Those who suffered political depression are actually the ones who care about the others. They are actually the hope. Lastly, I’d like to share one of my favorite quotes by Toni Morrison: « If you are free, you need to free somebody else. If you have some power, then your job is to empower somebody else. »

Let me put it straight. I’m fine with Tibetan, Uighur Muslims, democracy activists and pro-independence Taiwanese, but I, as an educated mainlander, just can’t accept you western media included Falun Gong with them, even , to my surprise, The Economist did so. I can only accept that it is an organisation that goes against the Chinese communist party. And I fine with the idea that enemy’s enemy is a friend. But it can’t justify what it is. And you’d better not categorise it with the rest of the democracy activists. To be bold, in my eyes, it’s kind of humiliation and it only discredit any initiatives you mean to convey democratic message. Because Falun Gong is something in Chinese people’s eyes, put aside the political stance, it is sth unscientific. And due to your lack of Chinese culture (just admit it, you westerners don’t care, and don’t know), you thought it is something like prosecuted pilgrimage of Mayflower. But no, it is actually 3K. It is theologically and medically groundless even from a Chinese perspective. Therefore, it is simply awkward for me to see this cult received such benevolence by mistakes. And somehow it takes the voice to represent Chinese culture in some westerners’ eyes. I have no words but one « bizarre ». I’m pretty sure some westerners who know Chinese culture have smelled the rat long time ago. Come on, as long as you think with your common sense. That’s the only thing I ask, use your common sense please. Then you’ll understand the damage of taking this group with Tibetan, Uighur, or Taiwanese. I can accept that they are victims of political prosecution, and they can sue the communist party and get their compensation. And that’s all. Don’t move further. You can’t understand just how ridiculous in the eyes of common Chinese mainlander when you fiercely defend Falun Gong and promote democracy together. It simply discredit anything you said. Read after me, it simply discredit anything you said.

When I was 7 years old, my village was turned into blocks of residential buildings on the original spot. And somehow I remember my grandma has told me in her casual chat that our community was built by prisoners. When I was a kid, I barely remember anything in my childhood, but this remark stay in my head all the time till now. As a kid, I had justified the fact to myself like, they were in prison, so they were bad people, and making use of their labor was a punishment, also a compensation to the society, it’s pretty fair. I can’t guarantee you how many Chinese people still carry on my childish point of view, but I think, some of them still do.The last time that I heard about the forced labor was the news covered in Xinjiang: the re-education camp. I think I began to noticed it around 2015. And I remember when I was in middle school, there was a social unrest happened in Xinjiang which made people like me who lived in the neighbour province scared to go out alone. There was a fear of ouighours at the time, rumours were like they were chopping people’s hands off by their machete and I also heard that liberation army were sent to their place. Looking back, the fear was spread by the conflict happened in 2009, July 5th. From then on, I hardly heard any news out of the Xin Jiang anymore. So I think the control must begin from that time around. I had two impressions about ouighours. One was their advantage, one was their disadvantage. When I was in high school, I always noticed there were a couples of ouighours pickpockets around the street corner. I’ve seen them stealing before. They also stole my friend’s phone and my phone at the same spot. The thing is, we all knew, even if they were detained by the police for the stealing, due to their ethnic minority identity, the police can do nothing but giving a verbal education and release them. Somehow, the street corner thief disappeared when I was sophomore in college, that 2012. Then when I worked, I noticed some unobtrusive detail about ouighours, which explained why I saw so many ouighour thieves before. When I worked as a teacher, I’ve met two students from Xinjiang. And I was informed by casual chat that the consultant who signed contract with the student from Xijiang was warned by the superior rather than getting a bonus. Just because there is rule that you don’t recruit student from Xinjiang. And when I asked why, nobody knew. It’s just a rule, and pretty harsh one issued from the bureau of education department. It’s a red line. Then I find out that ouighour cannot move freely within our country like the rest of the common people. Somehow there are a lot of restriction on them that most people simply don’t know. Then the news of re-education camp came out from foreign news agency of course.And the last thing I’ve noticed is that Xinjiang, which used to be called a province in my old memory, this last over 5 years it was called « Xinjiang Production Military camp » if translated from the propaganda’s term. This means something but no one really ask about it in China. Most people I know from Xinjiang are actually Han people who moved in as kid, and I have to say, they are benefiters and I didn’t want dig in their backgrounds as my intuition told me then I couldn’t befriend with them So my conclusion is, most Chinese, or you can call Han people barely know what’s really happened in this region, if the entire Chinese is barred behind the Great fire wall, then within this secluded world, Xinjiang got a one more bar within the bar, secluded it from the rest of the China.

This week in mainland China, most people are discussing one short video popped out on Nov, 15th. A young couple from Zhengzhou, Henan province were beat up by the guards of Sunac China Holding limited when they were reclaiming the promotional bonus promised by the developer before. Every element in this news is actually not new at all in China. The reason why this couple got so much attention is that they are simply banal. In other words, they are the average of the average, an epitome of common Chinese young couple.So, what’s a common Chinese young couple like?Liang liang and Liju, these two people both grew up in poor villages from the same province. They went into low quality Specialty training college after high school, which was already the best that could be afforded by their families. From then on, they had to earn their living on their own. So the two got to know each other in the campus during their preparation to upgrade their educational certificates from Specialty to Undergraduate. Like every campus romance, they fell in love and got married when they graduated from the college. Then they began to work and made a monthly salary around 4000 RMB (560$) each, and 10,000 RMB (1400$) altogether. The last step, they bought an apartment in 2021 with a mortgage of 7500 (1050$) every month in order to settle down in the city. Their path of life is the perfect example of what traditional parents expect from their kids. And you know China, a lot of kids follow their parents’ order.In other words, couples like Liangliang and Liju are the most obedient civilian under Chinese Communist regime, they did what the ruling class exactly expected likes tens of millions of people do in China, and most of them are young. Too young and too naive, I can’t help recalling the remark left by the ex-ex-leader of China, Jiang Deming who died two years ago.

According to the data published in 2020, the number of Chinese people who were born after the year of 1990 is around 520 million, accounting for 37% of China’s population. They together are forming a new reality in this country.And I am one of them. I was born in 1992, the crucial year that the old communist party leader Deng Xiaoping compromised and gave a final call on the Reform and Opening-Up policy.But, firstly, let’s rewind. Three years ago, in 1989, Chinese people were very close to a chance of rebuilding a democratic society after heinous Cultural Revolution and its unbearable economic consequence.At the moment, they were like « fuck it all, I’ve had enough », desperate economically and mentally, they walked onto the street. This is how I understand this event.And here’s my tip for you when communicating with China’s youth. The first thing you need to do is to separate Chinese young people into two groups: those who knows the Tiananmen protest in 1989, and those who doesn’t. You would have totally opposite impression on Chinese young people if you’re lucky enough to come across both of the types.Unfortunately I feel like 80% of them don’t know what happened in that year. This is my personal guess about the segmentation based on my experience, which is of course totally subjective. But I can give you two funny examples about the situation in mainland.I used to work in China’s media industry, and there is a rule within that still goes on till today. Every year around June 4th (the anniversary of Tiananmen 1989), normally a month in advance, all the media would turn to the mode of vigilance. That is to say, the comments section of every article will be closed, and everything posted with a hint of reminding the event will be detected shortly by backstage national security police and the account will be shut down. Every media is trying the best not to get involved with anything with it, or else, the staff or the chief of the staff will lose their jobs. This action has been taken since the year of 1989. A new generation has grown under this seamless administrative implementation over the past 30 years. The irony comes when people have already forgotten about it, however, this action itself still keeps on reminding them what it is for.

If you mean to do business in China, or if you have been doing so, after this episode, please correct me if you can.Let’s start from the most recent case.On November 3rd, 2023 (yeah, it occurred just last week) a financial company in Shanghai took a steel manufacturer in Jiangsu into the court under Jiangsu jurisdiction, and sued it for 10 billion RMB compensation. And the reason? The company in Shanghai found heavy pollution on the land brought from the manufacturer in 2016. Sounds simple, right?What makes this case interesting is that: first, 10 billion, it’s the largest lawsuit since the establishment of PRC in 1949; second, the plaintiff and defendant of this case are both state-owned enterprise, and more, the company in Shanghai is in charge of the core financial centre called Lujiazui, and it sued,along side the steel manufacturer, other 4 environmental investigation centres in Jiangsu provinceSo basically, you can regard it as a lawsuit between two neighbour provinces. Or in Chinese communist jargon, it’s a case between one unit against another five units, which is rare. Because they’re from the same family in the eyes of Chinese people and taking it into court is something that’s just never happened before. If you don’t understand what I’m saying. That means you’re taking it as a business affair.Let’s think into the box. Imagine you’re sitting in the office of this Jiangsu steel manufacturer as a secretary, and the following would be the conversation you have with your leader ( yeah we Chinese call the boss leader, and there’s a reason for it, I let you some time to think)

Once my British friend asked me “What do you think of the idea of unification?” She was asking me about “Taiwan issue”. And I answered “Of course, there will be unification because we are of the same culture and history, but the problem is, by which side to be unified; personally, I, as mainlander, prefer to be unified by Taiwan, you know what I mean” She answered “ I see”. She is one of my best friends so she got me instantly. But when I put the similar answer on Quora, someone commented below my response, accusing me a fake Chinese as a Chinese himself.I was speechless because I didn’t know how to prove I was a Chinese who was born and lived all the time in China, and never been abroad before. By the way, now I am not, I am not in China, so I dear to speak for myself, and you can hear me right now. I don’t need to prove myself, that’s a stupid ask, and more stupid if one really answer it. But one thing that I am sure based on the population of my country, is that I am not unique enough to be the only one who has a different voice in 1.4 billion people. I remember, in 2019, I used VPN to project the presidential debate in Taiwan on my TV screen (Yeah, in Mao’s age, my behavior is definitely a traiter). And I clearly remember that I celebrated with a glass of beer when CaiYingwen won because I was betting on her victory before the election. So I remember the good feeling that I was right. Then a month later, the Covid came. Everything changed, and I hardly payed attention to Taiwan the days after, except two moments.One is when I heard the news that Taiwan is agreed to move TSMC from its land into US. “Not wise, my pal” That’s my inner comments.For your reference, TSMC is a manufacturer for chips, and it’s kind of monopoly in its field. In other words, China can replicate everything else in Taiwan if really one day it conquered the land, but not this one. And Taiwan’s economic status is heavily relied on it, especially during this era of AI. “You should keep it as your shield rather than hand the hostage to your rescuer. Then they got no reason to rescue you or you may get a ruthless rescuer without the fear of any collateral damage.” In each scenario, it looks bad to me. Me, again, probably not a typical mindset for Chinese mainlander. Another moment is when Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan. Somehow, the government’s propaganda put too much weight at that time that Chinese people got an illusion that the government would really shoot down Pelosi’s plane if she landed on Taiwan, then the World War Three begins. So that night, almost all the Chinese were watching the live streaming of Pelosi’s flight. But I was having a quite relaxing and funny day on that day. I was filtering with a cute guy from HongKong. And I found he was also watching the live-streaming as he didn’t answer my message. So afterwards, he said, yeah he was watching it, and he was frustrated that China didn’t really shoot down the plane. I was half joking and half testing , I said “Isn’t it better not to have war?” He said, it’s just rather humiliating. Then I got the conclusion in my mind: he was a fake Hongkonger. “Why did you buy the propaganda as mainlanders did? And you feel humiliated? Such a typical corky chauvinist mainlander mindset. Didn’t you just lose your Hongkong to mainland a year before.Standing with the big power doesn’t empower you, sucker” That’s again, my inner voice. Anyway, after that, my romantic bubble evaporated all of a sudden. Despite he’s good-looking, I just can’t stand what’s in his brain.

Love you, love your dog. Lock you, lock your money. This is the overall conclusion of my 30 years life in China. After going through abusive childhood, traumatic exams-oriented selection system, patriarchal Confucius, ideological propaganda, cyber police, and the last end barrier I found is, unexpectedly, a bank card. If you ask me how far away are Chinese people from the world, I’d say a bank card away. Before leading to my point, here I need to give you some unobtrusive facts which is vital in analyzing China’s financial status quoFirst, 600 million people earn less than 137 dollars a month in China till 2021 , this data is announced by China’s ex-premier during a national conference in Pandemic era. Unfortunately, the day after I put down this sentence, the news came out that the ex-premier was dead from a heart attack shortly after his retire from the seat, which caused quite a surprise and some rumor you can imagine. Second, the majority of Chinese people don’t have access to a credit card, not mention to visa or master card. That is to say, all their money is kept in Chinese banks, and fixed in the circulation of domestic market.Third, Chinese people can’t exchange foreign currency as they like it. And the exchange rate is manipulated by Bank of China, which is different from the global market, in case some carried foreign cash back from the travelling. Thus, to get a foreign bank account is a privilege for those who have enough money (for example, to open a Citibank account in China requires at least 100k USD deposit), or enough knowledge (for example, studying abroad) to do so. And privilege is called privilege because it always belongs to the 1%. Most Chinese people’s assets is therefore locked, and nailed in the geographic zone of China despite the globalisation. This invisible lock is, for now, the most powerful tool I’ve seen to enslave the mass. Or I should say, money is invented for this purpose but people somehow forget about it because it exists so long in our history that we take it for granted. For more detail, please check Debt: The first 5000 years by David Graeber.Now let’s get to China’s real estate bubble.Western media are fanning up this apocalyptic scene, as I remember, since 2007. And the latest warning was in August, when US president Joe Biden said, “China is a ticking time bomb”, I got it instantly what he referred to and I laughed. In case you don’t have the background information: Evergrand and Country Garden are two property giants in China, and respectively the former is in debt of 300billion USD, the later 200 billion USD. Yes, they’re a tip of iceberg, and yes, there will be ripple effect, and correct, real estate contributes a quarter of China’s GDP. You’re right, it looks gloom and doom. But only in WESTERN perpective. China is not United States nor United Kingdom. Imagine you blaming a Chinese toddler for not being able to recite Shakespeare. Who’s is really mad here. Personally, the reason,I think, that makes US so mad, is because most of the debt that those property companies own are from the US. In other words, the 1% in the US don’t earn enough profit and worse they don’t get their money back. This is understandable, right? I also wish my borrower dead when he can’t return my money. But you know. “Too young too naive” is a comment given by ex-ex president of China, who died last year, and who was at the time very close to the US. This is a comment he gave to retort the journalist around the dispute on Hong Kong’s democracy. “Too young too naive” It hurts, but it is true in some way.

This week marks the turning point of China’s Zero-Covid policy.Overnight, the lockdown was lifted in major cities of China, to put it accurately, it happened on Wednesday. Yeah, no bluffing, it came overnight.The propaganda also made a U-turn this week. It began to downplay the severity of the virus (or you can say they finally admit it) which it has portrayed as a monster for three years. Propaganda is shameless. I hope you take this lesson from China’s experience. So we Chinese are kinda celebrating the end of this fucking lockdown in our WeChat group. You know when the happiness comes so fast, you become suspicious and doubt if it’s true. Do I deserve it? How could the happiness come so fast?That’s the mentality of most of the Chinese right now. Let’s call it collective “imposter syndrome”. At the same time, we’re not dumb, and we know we need to prepare to bear the brunt. Finally, we’re going to deal with this Covid individually. Many are hoarding medicines for fever or sore throat. It’s understandable and reasonable right? Just imagine, what else would you do? If you were Chinese and lived in China, you would do just like us, as a reasonable being. But personally, I admit that what happened in last two years also looks absurd and tragic to me. Moreover, I have to say I can’t explain to you why things happened like that even as a Chinese. Because information is deadly locked and you know China we don’t have such things as journalist here, and relying entirely on my experience and knowledge, I can only tell you that: I can’t explain and I feel sorry. Perhaps nobody could. I didn’t say last three years, because at the first year, in 2020 when you guys were in mess, China was in order and the lockdown hadn’t dropped on my head, I admit that I did feel a bit released. I hope you understand, that’s human nature. You know happiness is relative and it comes from comparison. Also by the way I have to tell you, a lot of people here do buy the theory that it’s the American army that spread the virus. Sorry. Again, propaganda is shameless.However, I know some people outside of China are amazed by this marshaling power, the power of locking over 20million people overnight in Shanghai, and kinda begin to do the research about it. They sort of become experts on China. For example, I came across this kind of guy five years ago. He’s from Netherland, and he wrote a paper on ChongQing mode. Basically he analyzed the political campaign in Chongqing, a key capital in southwest of China, led at the moment by Bo Xilai, who’s the competitor of the current president. And he kept asking my comments on his paper. I declined it several times. But in the end I send him a short note within my sincere opinions but full of F-words.How to say. The conclusion is : What he did really hurts my feeling as a Chinese. You need a bit of imagination to understand this. It's like. I was in jail, he didn’t save me out, instead he began to do the research on how solid the jail’s made. What do you expect from a prisoner? A five-star good comment? Personally speaking, I think this type of researchers are either naive or evil. In plain words, they’re either dumbass or badass. No matter which, I don’t like them.

I don’t like any China expert or you may call it sinologist whose Chinese sucks. I can’t help sneering every time I heard some foreigners talk about China and explain why china did this or did that, then I heard his spoken Chinese sounds like a moron....Honestly, I understand How difficult it is to learn Chinese. And I personally suspect that the current regime doesn’t want foreigners to fully master this language. Because I checked the Chinese textbook HSK, and I found even the highest level textbook looks like an elementary in my eyes, not mention to the Confucius academies who imbedded the propaganda within teaching. By the way I was a little surprised on how slow you guys found it out when I read the your media publicly criticized it. Because it’s such obvious, I thought you guys know that. So I could imagine how frustrated these students who painstakingly have learned so many years and would feel still hard to talk with native Chinese freely, or still remain on some shallow topics. And I understand why some talk people out of learning it. For example, I watched a French YouTube made by topido, and one of the reasons the you’ber made is that: You can’t get useful information by learning this language he explained: You learn at class something like “ Zhong Guo Da, Ri Ben Xiao ( China is big, Japan is small), then you graduate and read Chinese news paper still “Zhong Guo Da, Ri Ben Xiao”. See, You only got propaganda. I couldn’t help laughing and agreed with him. But I thought afterwards that his Chinese must be good because he wasn’t fooled. The logic is simple here. Language is for communication, when you find you can’t do it, you must realize sth is wrong. Apart from the education failure, there exists another big obstacle for Chinese leaner, that is, to keep the propaganda out of your study. Keep the propaganda out. That’s not easy, even for Chinese, it’s super hard as we have it everywhere. But things will evolve. I fell into the trap when I was a primary student, but soon after I found it out. (That’s another story) Anyway, if you wanna learn Chinese, you have to be intelligent, you have to be smart. And if you speak well, we Chinese will know you’re smart the moment you open your mouth, otherwise… You know…

Last weekend, a wave of protests, triggered by the fire in Ulumuqi, burst out in several cities of China, including Beijing, Shanghai, and Chengdu. Video clips recording these protests flooded on the Internet, outside the realm of China of course. At home, WeChat Accounts that spread them got frozen or sealed as warning, some protestors were (quote) “invited for tea talk” in the police station, and the question most frequently they’ve been asked is: Did you receive money from foreign force?