I suggest simply asking questions on lemmygrad.
The point of the book club should also be to help one another understand and learn. You aren’t teaching the others, you should all try to engage with the text and each others understanding.
Lastly, the more you read the better your comprehension will be. Consider if audiobooks or different formats might also help you understand better.
Not just infrastructure, payments are also convenient with Ali pay/WeChat pay. Everyone pays everything by phone, most haven’t used cash or card in years, although you can if you want. Apps are also ridiculously well designed and integrated, less visible as a foreigner, as much if it is obviously in Chinese and you have a language barrier. But you can really do anything you can imagine in WeChat. Alipay can also translate in miniapps. Say you are in a restaurant, you will scan a qr code on the table, can have a menu that you can automatically translate if you so chose. You also can order and pay through that menu on your phone.
Bureaucracy exists like everywhere else, but tends to be faster and more efficient in my experience. It’s not perfect, but the country does feel very different.
Also, it doesn’t depend that much on the city. I have been to most large cities in China, many small and medium sized ones too. I have also been to the countryside. The latter is more relaxed, but everywhere has technology and infrastructure. Basically all cities are serviced by train. Towns will all have bus systems that mean you can get anywhere in the country with public transportation.
Thanks for that
Orientalism definitely plays a role
Agreed, no system, group, or party is infallible. There are many genuine critiques that can and should be made.
Archived link/paywall bypass: https://archive.is/VbSPI
Also, you would think a region once plagued by unrest and terrorism (fomented by our favorite imperialist power of course), now stable and prospering would be cause for celebration? No? Also about NEV subsidies, isn’t this what all countries should be doing? Besides, the Global North has long subsidized industries when they chose to.
Related, China has become the number one scientific destination with the largest inflow of researchers outstripping the US, according to OECD data as reported (archive) by Science Business. I can’t cite the OECD data since it seems to be behind a paywall, but I believe you can find it here.
China also leads the world with nearly half of all applications for international patents (46.8%), trademarks (48.3%), and industrial designs (53.8%).
Japan’s science and technology ministry also conducted a study, as reported (archive) by Nikkei Asia, and found China leads the world in research papers. Both in quantity and quality.
A report by Clarivate substantiates this. This report also describes how China is not reliant with collaboration with the Global North for research, and that China is expanding research with Global South countries.
Despite all this, in the imperial core they still believe China can’t innovate. All while China is out-innovating the Global North.
I can confirm Lemmygrad is accessible. Hexbear is, but loads VERY slowly in my experience. No such issue for Lemmygrad.
By the way, the firewall varies slightly in different provinces. That being said Lemmygrad seems accessible everywhere.
ps: most sites are accessible. Only big American tech sites that don’t want to follow local law (Google, Facebook, etc.) are blocked. Many other websites are not blocked but just load really slowly. Not certain why, part of it may be the websites throttling IP address from China.
You will always be fighting an uphill battle in the academia of the imperial core. Global North historians in particular are on the front line of anti-socialist narratives. Of all disciples, the narratives of hustorians are probably the most powerful propaganda against radical though in the imperial core. Keep in mind that your professor is likely not sympathetic to leftwing thought, let alone socialism. This is compounded by the fact that even if they where, the structure of western academia makes it almost impossible to be a genuine Marxist that is critical of society. You won’t get grants, promotions, etc.
Just know that you did your best to inform them, and don’t waste your energy any further. Don’t expect that professor to listen to reason or to genuinely consider your sources. As soon as you are outside the imperial narrative, they dismiss your opinion and sources as fringe. Why? Well, if they engaged honestly, they would have to change their mind.
Try to concentrate your energy on anything that will produce results and benefit you and the mouvement. Read, stay healthy, educate yourself and others. Organize if you can.
Even today you can visit mosques with more than a thousand year of history in Chinese cities. They have a unique style, and are beautiful. The link in the article shows some historical examples of images. You could also tale the Xi’an great mosque as an example. It retains a historical design with both Chinese influences, and Islamic aspects. Minarets for example may look more like pagodas. This is not “tearing down Islam”, but is in fact the hisotry and tradition of Islam in China. As a matter of fact, China is one of the countries with the longest hisotry of Islam.
Besides what others have said, this expat.clearly has a. no more nuanced understanding than your average western armchair expert.
The point that China only cares about GDP growth is false and misinformed. China, in particular with Xi, has made a large shift to quality development. If you follow China this is clear as the official position and policy goal. This includes green development. In doing so they have thus far been quite successful.
All thr points on real estate are superficial conjecture on a complex issue. Just consider that GDP is effectively a mesure of transactions/investments/consumption. High GDP in the US coming from healthcare prices being inflated does not translate to growth or development. Likewise, a hot real estate market might be good for GDP, but it does not necessarily translate to development. We should recognize this, as does the Chinese government.
Not to say real estate in China is irrelevant, land sales is a major source of funds for local government. It has importamce and implications, none of which where reflected upon in the comment you quoted.
It just means we’ll see years, perhaps decades, of negative growth in China, increasingly authoritative measures taken by the government, more protests, more suppressed protests, more people with opinions disappearing, more brain drain, more kindergarten stabbings, more music with revolutionary themes removed. Year by year, things will be a little worse off than the year before. More people will give up and lie flat. The only movies in the cinemas will be about the Korean War, and the only things on TV will be anti-Japanese shows or wuxia palace dramas.
All of this is false and misleading. I cant go point by point, dont have the time. Just consider it is the US and EU with negative growth. (western) International organizations and financial companies project solid growth in China. There is increasing diversity and quality in Chinese cinema, even socially critical movies. There was one commenting on the challenges of rasing a kid these days, touching on house prices, education, and more. I could go on.
I would cite sources, but most of this is easy to find. If you are reading this I encourage you to read more about China.
What is the general area/field your diploma is in? I dont think thr Chinese government will let arbitrary people into China to set up a commune… However, you could consider continuing your education in China (presumably a master if you have a bachelor?). China has scholarship schemes that you can look into. Many have full tuition plus living stipend. Then, you will improve your skills and enable yourself to stay more easily subsequent to your studies, if you so chose.
Well, to be fair I didn’t add the link to the article by accident, so it is a bit confusing…
https://www.salon.com/2017/10/08/womens-labor-sex-work-and-u-s-military-bases-abroad/
Sorry, I forgot to add the link to the article hahaha
https://www.salon.com/2017/10/08/womens-labor-sex-work-and-u-s-military-bases-abroad/
I would suggest people get a profioe picture (pfp) if they are neutral as to getting one or not. Having a pfp makes you stand out and more memorable. Most frequent users have pfps.
Of course it is not required, and fine to not have one as well.
Economic growth itself is just a number, development is what matters. In addition and as a part of development I also specifically mentioned education and improvement of quality of life. You could add literacy, housing, levels of nourishment, and much, much more.
I won’t argue about history or its interpretations with you now. Just consider the path to development wealthy capitalist countries took, which involved slavery, colonialism, genocide, brutal worker suppression, and perhaps the worse working conditions in history during industrialisation.
You may attribute many horible things to communist countries. I might argue much of this is exaggerated by the media of the anti-comunist country you live in. Even if it is all true, developed capitalist countries did the same to themselves, and other peoples around the globe.
Then consider the development communist countries have had compared to undeveloped capitalist countries. People can have better lives, that is what matters.
Individuals in struggling societies don’t always atomize, many revolutions occurred due to degradation in conditions. When the cost of fighting for change is less than doing nothing you will fight, and you will fight with others, or else you will quickly fail and be forgotten.
Curious what your definition of facism is. With a few exceptions, communist inclined states have always lead to unprecedented economic development, education, improvement of quality of life, etc. If you take all cold war propaganda at face value, you can not deny the development seen in such states; when balanced by alleged atrocities, you see a stark contrast to colnialist nations that too committed atrocities but with little to show for it.
I find the surface level historical criticisms of communist states, even if applied at an equaly superficial level, is applied to capitalist states, you would find a staggering contradiction. Maybe you should read more. Add to your socioeconomic calculus the fact that no communist state benefited from the same starting point as colonizer countries, and try to be critical of this. Consider that none of these communist states had the benifits of colonization, and when compared to other developing countries did remarkably better.
The point is not about impact but intention. Evidently liberalism, for all its flaws, certainly has had a significant impact. The progressive forces 250 years ago where for the most part already proto socialists. Fundamentally liberalism has been reactionary, even in the case of feudalism and monarchy, liberalism has tended to air for maintaining monarchy; such as constitutional monarchies where one can find leberals having preference for this rather than republics. This can be observed in historical cases such as France where many liberals wished to maintain the monarchy, but the contradictions and progressive forces where too great. Rather than a progressive force, I would contend that liberalism tends to be reactionary to development and progressive forces. Today this can be seen in the liberal leaders of developing countries handicapping themselves and their sovereignty by maintaining economic relations to the benefit of the imperial core. See ECOWAS and ‘preserving democracy’ as of late.
Realize that China has not been increasing it’s military spending relative to GDP.
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.GD.ZS?locations=CN-US&start=1989
China does not have an expansive or aggressive posture. The US has about twice the spending as a share of GDP, with a larger nominal GDP. There is nuance to this, but China is absolutely not disproportionately or aggressively building up it’s military.