For someone like me, who had never worked (i.e., made money) in a pure Chinese language environment prior to working for AM 1300, four years of KAZN forced some hard realities of the Chinese people into me, or, to be more precise and to put it mildly, the Chinese mentality. For me, after staying in the U.S. for 30 years, I was so far away from the Chinese culture that I was no longer able to imagine what kind of mental state that many Chinese people live under.
Working in the Chinese language station gave me a window to take a peek into that mental state, as the people working in the station and the audience were primarily those whose English was not good enough for them to enjoy the American culture via English language.
For readers who are not totally familiar with the Chinese culture, I must start the story with the state of the mind of those in China.
In China, all children from preschool years till the time of college graduation (as, in recent years, colleges no longer tolerate speech that is outside the strict lines drawn by the Communist Party, and have been using paid student spies and a heavy hand to make sure that professors and students do not make offensive statement to the Party, such as democracy, free speech, or property rights; in the 1980s, after K-12, which was pure brainwashing, certain degree of freedom was allowed in the colleges) are forced to recite an entire line of Party-fabricated Marxism (for instance, proletariat, which means wage earners according to Marx, are re-interpreted in China as what Marx called “lumpenproletariat,” which means outcasts, such as beggars, tricksters, and criminals), Leninism (for instance, Lenin’s book, when published in China, went through heavy editing to take out what the Chinese Communist Party did not like), and history (including both the world history and Chinese history, which are completely reinvented). For instance, during the Japanese invasion of China, Mao Zedong had a secret pact with the Japanese invaders so the Japanese could focus on the Nationalist’s troops, and allowed Mao to develop its own forces. In history books, the Communist Party becomes the one resisting the Japanese invasion, while the nationalists retreated into the mountains in the southwest. The tens of millions of people who were killed by Mao between 1949 and 1976 (all in peace time) were omitted in the Chinese history, while a Japanese massacre in Nanjing (1937) were exaggerated (to the impossible figure of 200,000) and hammered into the mind of the Chinese children. All evils of the Chinese are the faults of the foreigners lead by no other than the U.S., and supported by its running dogs like the Japanese. The Chinese Communist Party, which in fact has caused the evils, are always correct.
When I grew up, as the Party, lead by Hua Guofeng (chairman of the CCP from 1976 – 1981), started the economic revival, thought-control was loosened up. Even after Deng Xiaoping squeezed Hua Guofeng out of power, he tightened down speech quite a bit but still allowed limited freedom of speech, under his hand-picked manager Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang. For instance, in colleges, one of my classmate argued that China would be much better off if Japan had not attached the U.S., so it could occupy the entire China and do to China what it did in Taiwan and Manchuria. Certainly, what Japan did positively to Taiwan and Manchuria was not taught in schools.
I came to understand modern Japan and the Japanese people when I worked for Fujifilm, a Japanese company, for more than five years. Also, I traveled to Japan quite a few times. So, after visiting Japan, I would comment on my radio program about my impression of Japan. Many listeners people angrily called in. To them, any benign comment on Japan was unforgivable. Interestingly, much of this view was held not only by those who come from China, but also those from Taiwan. In fact, much of the mental state in China also exist in Taiwan, although the new generation, which grows up during the 25 years of democratic rule in Taiwan, is erasing that similarity.
One has to see such patriotic propaganda to believe its power. It is such propaganda that made the German people launching the WWII, and Japanese people attacking the Pearl Harbor, both unspeakably stupid undertakings. However, under the government monopoly and people’s patriotic fervor, the political leaders are almost compelled into suicidal endeavors. Today, China is expanding in all directions except Russia, as China believes that the shrinking Russian white population in the Asian part and the Chinese emigration into that part of Russia will take care of that problem in a few generations.
With that kind of patriotic propaganda, the Chinese people are indoctrinated to the hilt. The Chinese people believe that they are a historically great people, while they have been bullied by the foreign powers lead by the U.S. The Chinese territories, which used to cover Japan, Vietnam, and the Philippines, are taken away and should be reclaimed. However, the Chinese government notably ignored its treaties with Russia to formally secede more than 100 million square kilometers of disputed territories to Russia.
The Chinese people are uniquely great, with uniquely great characteristics, so the foreign beliefs, such as freedom, democracy, human rights, private property rights, and rule of law do not fit the Chinese uniquely great culture. At the same time, China is in fact a free, democratic country with better human rights and rule of law record than the foreigners. For example, the white Americans have fragrantly violated the human rights of the native Americans.
All criticism from abroad are vicious and designed to destroy China. (Of course, those living within the borders of China must support such a greatest party under the sun whole heartedly. Any dissent must be from the demented people, as the Chinese authority has increasing been sending these people to psychiatric wards. Certainly, that is not the main method of dealing with dissent. For the run of the mill critics, the Party would put them in jail on corruption, or tax evasion, charges.) To muffle criticism from abroad, the Chinese government forbid those critical of China from visiting China and only allow those who kowtow to its policies to enter China and “study” China. In time, countries like the U.S. would have a group of “Chinese experts” that are used to recite the Party lines.
China is a strong country, second only to the U.S. (in total GDP, whatever that means). It has a people with confidence in its ways of doing things, in its guiding theories, in its system (stated by Hu Jintao in 2012), and in its culture (added by Xi Jinping in 2014). So, when the international tribunal in the Hague ruled that the Chinese expansion to the Philippine waters were baseless, Li Keqiang, the Chinese Prime Minister, paid the Cambodia $600 million (USD) to have the Cambodia Prime Minister agree with its position in the South China Sea, as the Chinese media reported that 90 countries agreed with the Chinese government’s position. Two days later, Hun Sen, the Cambodia Prime minister, stated that he was on the side of Japan in the East China Sea dispute between Japan and China. (He was talking about the Senkaku Islands, or the Diaoyu Islands as they are known in China.)
Such a confident country has put all of its vice Chairmen in the military commission (highest ranking military men) of the last term in jail. It is increasingly blocking the Internet access of its people. It pays large number of Internet trolls to manufacture public voice over the Internet. If anyone has doubt about the power of such people, who were known in China as 50-cents (about 8 cents USD), which is the amount the government pays these people for putting up each post, he (or she) could visit my program recordings and read their offensive comments. The Chinese government has squeezed Google out of China because Google refused to work with the Chinese government in blocking the unwelcome voices.
China is a weak country, so environmental pollution is a worthwhile sacrifice to put food on everyone's table. Rampant food quality problems are also a price worth paying to put food on everyone’s table.
Chinese is a strong and rich country, so it could spend hundreds of billions (USD) to implement its new silk road, which basically pays to build transportation infrastructure in certain countries in exchange for their diplomatic support of China. These countries know that the loans are really grants. And China knows that, when the money stops, so would be the singing.
Chinese people is a weak people, so the government could not afford to pay for people's medical care or education, as the Chinese spendings in both the medical care and education ranked as share of GDP are at the bottom of the world.
The funniest of all, the Chinese is a great people with its cultural confidence and refuse all the western ideologies, such as democracy, free speech, the rule of law, and the private property rights. However, in the Constitution of the Chinese Communist Party, the first fundamental guiding theory for the CCP is Marxism (a western theory that promotes the elimination of exploitation, according to the Chinese interpretation, which is another convoluted mess that I am not going to delve into) and Leninism (another western theory that primarily consists the politburo-led governing system). Of course, there has to be some Chinese elements, so Mao's thoughts (e.g., killing three hundred million Chinese people is no big deal – as he said in Moscow on November 18, 1955) lead the way.
(... to be continued)
First published on July 20, 2016
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