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Q: How far behind this country truly is in comparison to the West?
Excluding sheer numbers, they have yet to send someone to the moon, the wild capitalism in China is similar to that of the West in the early 20th century, no efficient tax collection and welfare, plenty of other examples.
I would say 60 years behind, again excluding sheer numbers because of course 1,4 billion people makes it impossible to compare.
You got it backwards.
They're 60 years into your future by average US/EU politician standard.
Shitty swarms from poop countries are coming, social welfare is going down, along with family structures, education, labor laws, internet freedom and all the rest.
China is the leading model of the brave new world as outlined by the current sociopaths in charge.
andy74rc:
Everybody should print out this post and hang it on top of the bed. Then copy/paste and send chain emails to everybody you know.
Ain't sarcastic....
You got it backwards.
They're 60 years into your future by average US/EU politician standard.
Shitty swarms from poop countries are coming, social welfare is going down, along with family structures, education, labor laws, internet freedom and all the rest.
China is the leading model of the brave new world as outlined by the current sociopaths in charge.
andy74rc:
Everybody should print out this post and hang it on top of the bed. Then copy/paste and send chain emails to everybody you know.
Ain't sarcastic....
Today I bought a new toilet seat for my apartment. The store had three kinds to choose from. No other nation could go from a hole in the floor to three kinds of toilet seats in such a short space of time. Technological advancement on an unprecedented scale.
nzteacher80:
Fluffy toilet seats creep me out. How do you sanitize that thing? What if one of your friends gets drunk on poker night and pisses on your fluffy toilet seat? You gotta throw that shit out. I'd prefer a clean cold arse rather than a warm and possibly unsanitary one.
Which West ? Traveling through Europe, North to South or West to East, you'll see large differences. East Coast China life level is on par with Eastern Europe, overall.
Well nobody else has a current Nobel Prize WInner in prison...
And Snowden, did accept a job with the NSA. Which is like saying "I'm shocked the CIA killed somebody," Intelligence is all about breaking rules. Always. It doesn't do rules. It's called cloak and dagger for a reason...
So yeah China is pretty far behind. A chinese guy won a Literature Prize, oh he isn't Chinese. Science, oh he fled, blah blah...Dali...Bad guy...THey are all in denial here.
The government and the elite are certainly on par with the best in the world. The population of about a billion of the "other people" are not doing so well.
The extravagance of what was so great with the Americas in the 50's - 70's has dwindled.
Equality is not far off.....Chinese are not "behind" .. I could go on and on...
so far behind you think you are first, think again!!!!!
personally .... I have a better life style here than I did at home, in Canada.... huge difference though is of course, I had clean air and green grass and a whole lot less concrete back home...decisions decisions.
royceH:
Yeah I agree with a little bit on that one, BHGAL.
Life here is pretty uncomplicated, no doubt. And the salary certainly goes a long way, especially if all you spend it on is food and beer.
If only there was something to do, someone to talk to about things that matter.
I don't really know how much longer I'll stay here. Do you have any exit plans?
Somehow or other it seems that hanging out in China is kind of dodging ones responsibilities.
BHGAL:
I have no exit plan... I do have some worries about old age here, and the potential for medical needs.
I just went to a doc today... no appointment....he sent me for an ultra sound scan..cost me 120 rmb...and I go back tomorrow for him to explain whatever they saw... early guesstimate by my wife and the piece of paper they gave me is .... no problem... so good news.......... I got no insurance here. but can get things done for a lot less than insurance costs.
couple young docs that speak English seemed more than happy to help.
When did they stop going to the toilet in the street in the western world?
In fact I imagine that even a thousand years ago they didn't actually go to the toilet right there in the street with all the people walking by.
But in China in 2015 they still do, even if there's a public convenience nearby.
What do you call that?
estern:
In Victorian Britiain, most people just went in a bucket then dumped it out on the street. There were open sewers running down the middle of the street. I know this lead to something called the "great stink of London" and all sorts of deaths from diseases etc... The proper sewer system was completed in 1866 ( I looked that up).
So you could say the Chinese are about 150 years behind, the difference being the Chinese do have sewer systems they just decide not to use them on a regular basis.
I read this earlier today......
https://thenanfang.com/women-smoke-drink-wear-sexy-clothing-will-raped-s...
and my first thought was how primitive and backwards that thinking is. It's like something you'd read about happening in some backwards country still basically like cavemen where women are stoned to death if they don't cover their face or something equally vile.
This was in Beijing, supposedly one of the more modern places in China.
Englteachted:
You need to be introduced to the Republican Party my friend.
As behind as a country that only integrated into the global economic order thirty years would be?
Actually I don't think China is doing too badly, all things considering. While it still has a long way to go, we should give credit for what has been achieved so far.
As for a man on the moon, why would they risk lives if it can be done remotely? You do know that China sent a lunar rover to the moon and already mapped the entire moon in high resolution as far back as 2010, don't you?
Stiggs:
I actually think China has done very well overall. If you compare what they had before to the situation now, most people would agree it's a huge improvement.
Depends on what you are looking at.
Education, work ethics, food safety, chances of surviving a heart attack.
It also depends on where you look. E.g. I would say that traveling from Guangdong Province to Hunan province is at least going 15 years back in time. Sure they have the same iPhone, but the mentality is so backwardsere...
What is the yardstick for measuring who is behind and who is ahead ?
Stiggs:
That's the thing, it's pretty subjective and probably comes down to your own values.
silverbutton1:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index
Saying China is "behind the West" assumes that China and the West (whatever "the West" means exactly... I guess we can assume we're talking about the usual European and North American countries like the United States, Canada, Australia, Britain, Germany, France, etc.) are going in the same direction. History doesn't have a start point, and end point, and a straight line between the two.
I don't think China is behind the West at all. They are different systems and they are going in different directions.
From memory, I think the only time China compared itself to the West was in 1958. Mao saw steel production as the main indicator of how advanced a country was, so he declared that China would make more steel than the Uk within 5 years, the US within 10 years and so on. And so the GLF was born. And what a disaster that was.
I think, apart from the usual status stuff such as Olympic medals etc, China has not really been in direct competition with the West to westernize itself.
I think they gave up on that in 1962. The cultures are different.
They did have a go at changing the culture too of course, but that did not go too well either.
Every culture is changing all the time. I don't thnk you can take a timeshot of one culture and compare it to another and say one is more advanced than the other. Advanced towards what?
To say one country is behind another requires a destination to be defined.
I don't think we can do that now. Humanity seems to have lost it's direction recently
andy74rc:
F**k yeah I can. When Barbarians broke into Rome, the level of civilization, for what civilization means, were very different. And everybody should know what followed for a millennia.
