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Q: Do Chinese know Lech Walesa?
Do Chinese know Vaclav Havel, Lech Walesa, Karol Wojitaya (John Paul II) and Solzhenistsyn and why these thinkers changed the 20th century. I say not, and they refuse to know them, preferring the endless sea of iphones and crass thoughts of madness. Granted, the sexual ravings of other posters will last longer than this...
Good one, Rasklnik. I think you know the answer.
Chinese students have heard of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, and Charles Darwin. They have learnt one or two sound bites about each of them (comparable in complexity to "Australia is a beautiful country with lots of sheep"), but have not considered what their ideas mean. They haven't heard of Spinoza or Hume, and I’m guessing that 20th Century anti-Communist political activists aren't in their textbooks.
Chinese people haven’t the slightest interest in the history and implications of thought. Grasping logical connections between concepts is bewildering for Chinese people, so forming an arch-awareness of how Western political thought relates to their present situation is a rather far-fetched notion.
By the way, I teach History of Western Thought at a university. My students are great (being 90% girls helps). They love hearing about things like ancient Greek society, and various philosophers' ideas about women, but once you venture into how political ideology has shaped the world they live in, they switch off.
This is the crowning achievement of Communist education. Students go blank faced when asked to comprehend anything related to ideology. They simply can’t grasp ideology as an objective concept. Though if the CCP is to convince students that what Karl Marx said represents the present state of China, I guess a degree of confusion is required.
I don't know, doubt it. I don't hold that against them though, I never heard of them myself.
Lord_hanson:
You are not alone Stiggs, I have never heard of them either.
iWolf:
I once labored through One Day in the Life of Ivan Somethingorother. Give it a miss.
gouxiong:
iWolf,
It was One day of Ivan Denisovich. Not a bad book. But if you are coming from Western Europe or not even being European I doubt you may like it. Also it's hard to really understand all connections and implications mentioned in the book.
No, because most of those guys you mention were real socialists/communists/democrats (except for John Paul Ii)!
ScotsAlan:
I doubt they get many mentions on Faux News.
Lech Walesa was a great union man, but he was a bit rubbish at being a President.
I remember when his Solidarity movement was in the news, the shipyard strikes and all that. It's amazing really, because that was a good 10-15 years before the internet appeared. People watched the news then. In the UK there was only three tv channels at the time. Come 6 o'clock, if the TV was on you were either watching thews the news on BBC1 or ITV, or you were watching a Cello Concerto on BBC2. We opted for the news.
We watched it because there was nothing else to watch.
And thinking about it, we were lucky. It was a sort of enforced education because there was no "easier" mutimedia alternative.
Good one, Rasklnik. I think you know the answer.
Chinese students have heard of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, and Charles Darwin. They have learnt one or two sound bites about each of them (comparable in complexity to "Australia is a beautiful country with lots of sheep"), but have not considered what their ideas mean. They haven't heard of Spinoza or Hume, and I’m guessing that 20th Century anti-Communist political activists aren't in their textbooks.
Chinese people haven’t the slightest interest in the history and implications of thought. Grasping logical connections between concepts is bewildering for Chinese people, so forming an arch-awareness of how Western political thought relates to their present situation is a rather far-fetched notion.
By the way, I teach History of Western Thought at a university. My students are great (being 90% girls helps). They love hearing about things like ancient Greek society, and various philosophers' ideas about women, but once you venture into how political ideology has shaped the world they live in, they switch off.
This is the crowning achievement of Communist education. Students go blank faced when asked to comprehend anything related to ideology. They simply can’t grasp ideology as an objective concept. Though if the CCP is to convince students that what Karl Marx said represents the present state of China, I guess a degree of confusion is required.
What Samsara said!
I'll also add, that of that list, I knew 2 straight off, and only cos you added the 'English' name did I get the third. The last (your first), I hadn't heard of til you mentioned him the other day, so I looked him up... and might download some stuff.
What I think is far more heinous is their lack of geography and history. After all, ideologies and personalities come and go, but history is (relatively) stable, as is world geography (give or take a few centuries). I gave a map of the world to my students, and all but 1 had mixed up the US and Canada!!! Now, I can appreciate some mix-ups in the world, even in Europe.. but that was just ridiculous! (and no-one had heard of the country of Taiwan 
) These are kids who are intending to study at overseas universities in a year or so!
Geographical history... sad that they have no idea about Prague - once the absolute centre of European culture... :( It's all friggin' Paris this, London that... LA and Washington...
Lord_hanson:
Yes, I find their lack of geographical knowledge frustrating .
gouxiong:
Actually I think a lot of Chinese does know Prague (as there is relatively famous song named 'Prague Square' - coming form relatively popular romantic serious) - they just usually do not know where the Prague is located.
There is of course very low level of knowledge about outside world but I would say it's a bit similar to situation in US. Majority of the people are also quite ignorant to the rest of the world.
The situation in Europe is quite unique what concerns of the average education level. Europe is just suffering from the fact that we are already for quite a while decentralized and therefore cannot reach the top (even German is way too small to compete with US and China).
On the account of unchangeable history so I am not exactly sure that the history is as stable as you describe it. Actually history as such probably is but the way how people are interpreting certain facts is changing. Also what concerns of the historical sources so it's a bit shaky - many leaders through out the history banned any other versions except of those which they presented (from ancient Persians, over the early Chinese dynasties, to Medieval Europe up to the modern times).
Shining_brow:
Knowing the name of something does not equate to knowing about something. I can certainly say the same about my 'knowledge' of many names I've heard of...
As for history - it's quite unlikely that events from more than 100 years ago are going to be re-written too much - except where there are current conflicts/divides.
More to the point, has Rand Paul ever heard of Lech Walesa?
I assume few people out of Central/Eastern Europe knows more than names. Vaclav Havel became famous in US at certain time. In his home country he became a star but his popularity more or less quickly disappeared as he got himself involved in a lot local skirmishes and 'dirty' his hands pretty quickly. There are still some people in Czechia who like him (some even worship him) but they are absolute minority.
I would also not call them really thinkers. Not commenting on the pope as I am not Christian but the rest were 'just' opposition politicians and the last one was a great and brave writer.
I would also dare to disagree that they really changed the 20th century.
What concerns of fall of iron curtain so it was not thanks to Havel and Walesa. It was because the USSR got themselves trapped and collapsed economically.
As a result countries like Cechia, Slovakia and Hungary became very very democratic (in Western point of view) with almost absolute freedom. As a drawback it brought the situation similar to earlier 'Wild West' - the approach till now is 'what is not banned is then allowed' not only in the law but also in society understanding and approach - this approach makes these countries to certain extent attractive for some young foreigner but a lot of has real problems with such approach and are leaving quickly.
What concerns of China then the situation becomes much more complex.
How many of expats in China ever heard about Shang Yang, Han Fei, Zou Yan, Wang Yangming and Lu Jiuyuan (just to mention several relatively famous)?
Probably very few. And these people are here in this country, some of them claiming to speak Chinese and having interest in China culture and history.
In this sense how could anyone blame Chinese for not knowing one Christian sect (catholics) leader name, two relatively unimportant politician of small and to the big extent not so important countries and one writer?
Many people know Monkey King but who knows anything about Wu Cheng'en to whom the book is attributed?
I think it's quite comparable and putting the blame on Chinese is a bit short sited - it's simply different environment and culture.
'Edit': 'Karol Wojtyla, Alex. Solzhenitsyn'
I was master of the crosswords
at younger age
.
I wonder if Chinese not knowing any of these people is any worse than the OP googling random " thinkers" to try and spark conversations to copy and paste the opening paragraphs of these peoples wikipedia pages in order to feel good about himself.
Even an avid reader would dread spending that much time only to gain eye rolls from fellow foreigners. Stop trying so hard man.
I personally dont like or trust anyone who has nothing to say except quotes.
Samsara:
Has it occurred to you, Mike, that other people know all sorts of things you don't?
Of course it hasn't.
mike695ca:
Apparently you spend more time reading 1st year college philosphy books trying to look smart on this site than actually reading this site. I have quite the record of admitting i dont know shit. Has it occurred to you, Samsara, that admitting you like your classes because its filled with girls makes you look unprofessional, creepy and pathetic?? Of course you havent.
Samsara:
Why, then, do you assume that someone being knowledgeable about or interested in something means they just googled it?
When you talk about cars, does that mean you just found out about them on google?
gouxiong:
Well, even though I know all these guys mentioned in original question I pretty agree with Mike's last comment about natural mistrust towards people using too many citation. Nevertheless I do not think it is original OP problem - he did not quote anyone. Just surprised that some people here believe that knowing or not knowing these names makes you better or worse ... It's a bit like saying that writers are better (or worse) than musicians. Everyone has own interests, abilities and skills.
Well, I just showed some young local women (about 22-24) photos of Fidel Castro and asked if they knew who he was.
Not a clue.
I asked my wife (mid 30's), she knows. Explained the other girls wont know because they were born after the Cuban/ Chinese fall out.
So yes, censorship does work.
Does it worry me that most Chinese will have no idea who the people mentioned in the OP are? Nope not at all.
What worries me is the dumbing down of society that has been going on in the west for years. It's starting to happen here too. That's not good.
You guys know what I mean by dumbing down. Wow, even reading the BBC these days ( if you can find an actual story and not a video clip) is like reading something aimed at twelve year olds.
People don't want knowledge these days. They want the latest iphone so they can watch stupid video clips and post photos of their latest chicken feet meal.
I only know of them because they were active during the time I was in high school and university. I enjoyed hearing about them and reading about them. They were pioneers in changing their countries.
Chinese are not about the past. They are about the present and the future as it effects their personal lives. I mention the name Obama in my class. They all immediately sound off saying his name in unison. When I ask them what they know of Obama, some might say "Yes, We Can!". And that Obama is the current US president and he is black. Outside of that, nothing. When I ask them what "Yes, we can" means and where it came from,the crickets come into the classroom with blank stares. I mention the name Xi JinPing. Again, they will chorus his name. When I ask them about any policies he has put into place or what he has accomplished, some might mention something about corruption being combatted. But, only on a superficial note. Ask them about Mao...he was China's first president and mixed reviews of his performance of being good or bad. But, nothing of substance.
jetfire9000:
@ Scots Alan. Depends on the age of the students. In a high school classroom with voting age students, yes you would get enough answers. In a university class, again, you'd get them. At least opinions. Anybody younger and most likely not. It's a question which incites interest only in accordance to its proximity to your life, and at younger ages the issue of politics looms far away. Now, the arguments Americans may give may differ widely however, simply because of a never ending campaign of misinformation within American politics. It's not only a problem of individual research, but also one stemming from a systematic defect in the politisphere which works to keep people uninformed and arguing about non existant issues. It has people making comparisons and classifications that widely miss the mark. The great reliance on negative ad campaigning is only one part of the problems of this great age of misinformation. Most media outlets are extremely guilty in this regard, left or right. In the end the "system" goes to ensure that every four years Americans only have a choice between a douche and a turd. That all being said I never have considered politics to be a good topic for a Chinese classroom. Discussions require a certain amount of divergence in opinion in order to take place.
