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Posts: 1142

Shifu

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Q: I got a harsh review...

I must be a pretty bad writer, cause I got this response to an article  I wrote called "I am not a Guest"

The use of quotes and name dropping in this so called article makes me pray to god i never meet you in real life and enter into a conversation about anything but the weather - but you would probably start talking about Baroclinic leaf shields and Orographic Precipitation. Such a self indulgent nonsensical barrage of arrogant vomit.

9 years 27 weeks ago in  Culture - China

 
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Governor

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Ouch! Do you have a link to your article?

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
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Emperor

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I don't know about your writing, but you are pretty ambiguous and vague with your post.

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
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Governor

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An article that you wrote for what?

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
Posts: 1142

Shifu

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
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I only read that single article (not 1 & 2), so I'll give you comments on here (partly based on what the other commentors wrote).

 

Yes, you did cherry-pick your history - both Chinese and 'Western'. Badly! Judeao-Christian crap?? Sorry, no, that's just what should be likely when you have relatively stable societies that have experienced wars and revolts. There's NO moral or religious direct connotations!!!

 

The use of 'name-dropping' is standard, nay required, practice in Chinese writing. In that regard, I think the commentor you were referring to was being quite harsh! I think the article was a little self-indulgent (obviously - you didn't need to post it!), certainly arrogant (not that that is necessarily a bad thing, as I'll express below), and obviously a bit of a barrage. However, it isn't "non-sensical" and while it's not vomit, it's certainly one person's opinion which other will disagree with.

 

The idea you, and Solzhenitsyn, express is one I totally agree with!  (and to do a name-drop of my own) I'm a firm believer in Plato's (or was it Socrates??) ideal of the Benevolent Philosopher King - the one at the top who cannot be bought, bribed, coerced, influenced, etc - and has the best interests of the empire/state at heart - and has 100% absolute power. There are, obviously, very few who fit that description... however, I think there's a bit of that in many of us - and as such, those who do have it (in which I include myself) DO have the 'right' to judge! We (all of us) should look around at our environment and ask the question "Is this the best it can be?"

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
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Shifu

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I have to agree with the harsh review. What you wrote is pretty damned awful. "We were raised,(like most if not all Western expats), in a proud western moral rational Judaeo-Christian culture and one that has time and time again proven it's superiority over the East." This a steaming turd of a sentence. It is grammatically incorrect and lacks correct punctuation. You clearly don't know how to use brackets within your writing. I don't know what is worse for the Chinese, their lack of representative governance or the fact that they have people like you teaching English here. You say that you belong to "...proud western moral rational Judaeo-Christian culture (sic)." What makes us proud? Is it the fact that our privileged place in the world is built upon the suffering, blood and anguish of the millions of people that we enslaved, stole from, murdered and subjugated throughout the era of colonialism? Are you proud because of where you were born? You didn't have any hand in it. You didn't actually do anything to be proud of. Your father squirted you into the belly of your mother in one particular geographical location and this makes you proud? Your view of the world is very simple. If ignorance is bliss then you must be very happy indeed.

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
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@rasinik: You have a wide-ranging knowledge, and it's sad that you don't attempt to put your valid points on the table with objectivity. At least you are honest in displaying your "Judeo-Christian" bias. I'd love to have the detailed historical knowledge you have of China, something I think my western history classes scrapped for more WWII discussions.. But since your knowledge of things like the boxer rebellion was probably taught to you by an equally biased history teacher, it's anyone's guess what the reality was. Sadly, that's another way that the "mystery" of China is propagated.

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
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funny how they can criticize western lapses in judgement and we criticize ourselves but dont criticize anything in our chinese history, nothing bad ever happens in china and we certainly want talk about it or publish it. what  a load of useless hypocrites. 

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
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The review is insulting without pointing out the problems in a precise way.

 

 

... But I can see where it comes from. You cherry pick what comfort you in the Chinese side. You do an apology of Judeo Christian culture while side-stepping things like the whole Middle Age and the ugly bits of Renaissance (religious wars on continental Europe ? pogroms ? Slave trade ?) it's hard to avoid bias, but in that text you link too, it reaches a ridiculous level. Europe history is a mirror of the best and the worst of the human psyche, like any other civilization. Ming Dynasty had free hospitals and some form of welfare schemes at some points...

 

The initial observations are valid, but your lecture of history is, sorry, ridiculously self-comforting. I think history is where answers are to be found, but you really have to drop the intellectual masturbation and look at European history more objectively : it's not pretty at all, no matter when you look. Granted, I don't think Asia is better.

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
Posts: 1142

Shifu

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-My thoughts-

Two wrongs do not make a right, pointing out the MANY failures of the west do not make the west the failure. The fact that we do not wear HanFu, write with Chinese Characters, or practice quackery and call it medicine are the reasons we are right. We are not only concerned with what was, but also what is.

-Accusations of intellectual snobbery-

Intellectual snobbery is the belief that the common people can't understand. I'd hardly post anything in public if I thought it was too hard for the common person, would I? Granted several other teachers I've met in Korea, and China have commented on the pervasive anti-intellectualism of the community of ESL expats.

-Jacques Barzun has mentioned the direct influence of Christianity on the concept of both universal human rights and general ideas of freedom, both individual and political. Since the vast majority of posters here are Westerners, I'm sorry, but you inherited this tradition even if it displeases you.

-My thesis is this...Chinese had to look outside their own culture (as did Japan) in order to have meaningful reform. Even Marxism is German-Jewish thought, hardly Chinese. Since China is a society with a inferiority complex, it can not decide how to treat foreigners, craving them, imitating them, excluding them, calling them barbarians, or killing them.  Often it engages in a mixture of this behavior at the same time.

coineineagh:

If you're gonna tout your Judeo-Christian values, at least get the terminology right. It's Judeo-Christo-Islamic thinking. Islam comes last chronologically, so fits well at the end. Islam has had far more influence on western thought than the minority of Jews in Europe. As the enemy from outside, they spurred Catholicism into massive conversion efforts, and were a major reason for colonizing the rest of the world, rather than just establishing trading posts. The entire renaissance can be attributed to the capture of a single muslim library in Spain, bringing the light of classical knowledge into the medieval darkness of the day. Islam was very different back then, where intellectuals collected knowledge, while Christianity was more like the paper-shreder that Islam is nowadays. As a final note, you make valid observations, and pride yourself on being right and China wrong, which may be true for a large part. But you colour your views through the lens of religious judgementalism, and it's an ugly colour. Every problem has a religious meaning for you, validating your world views. It's hypocritical to talk about reason and intellectualism when you have your self-justifying conclusion ready before you talk about the issues. I love to rant about the problems in China, mocking people for their bad culture, history and decisions. But since I'm not out to validate myself by putting others down, my rants will be better received. Mine is *constructive* criticism, at least *trying* to call attention to problems and solve them. Yours is just a be-like-me sales pitch. Christendom is NOT the cure-all for all the world's problems.

9 years 27 weeks ago
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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
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I won't repeat what's been already commented on, but your article shows that you are as narrow-minded as the people you self righteously denigrate.  It's just a fluff piece that caters to Nationalists and gives no real insight on why the West is "right".  I would not consider your article useful reading.

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
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Governor

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For anyone interested in reading the first two articles on this topic, here are the links:

 

Is china a safe place for Foreigners? By Chris Knight.

http://www.changchunlive.com/magazine/index.php/stories/vox-populi/364-opinion-by-chris-knight

 

Is China a safe place for foreigners Part II by David Puckett (in response to Chris Knight's article) 

 

http://www.changchunlive.com/magazine/index.php/stories/vox-populi/523-is-china-a-safe-place-for-foreigners-part-2

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
Posts: 1199

Shifu

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@ rasklnik. You simplify the world into ethnic and national groupings for the convenience of your argument. The world is far more complex than you would have us believe. Nationalism is a ploy of the rich and powerful of the world used to exploit the poor.  The borders between countries are the tools that are used in this age-old game and are nothing but arbitrary delineations made by men who are long since dead. Your take on life seems to amount to a pissing contest between the great nations of the world - hardly intellectual snobbery. I guess this is the sort of view formed in the education system of a country where you have to pledge allegiance to a colourful piece of cloth every morning.

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
Posts: 1199

Shifu

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It'd be easier to talk about this over a beer.

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9 years 27 weeks ago
 
Posts: 1142

Shifu

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At their best,the  North  Atlantic  states  establish  and  protect  an  enviable  way  of  life,  never  before  so  durably,  or  so  widely,
instantiated. Within them, individual liberties are secure; science is pushed forward, more quickly than at any other
point in man’s history; the humanistic arts are cultivated, or at least celebrated, studied, and enjoyed; and the stable
political environments they provide is conducive to the generation of levels of abundance and comfort unimaginable
outside of the West. It is not for nothing that the political form generally associated with all of this, constitutional
democracy, is today presumed to be the only legitimate political regime. It is, on the face of it, quite strange that we
are not willing to do more to protect it. Stranger still, Western elites tend, today, not only to depreciate the West’s
tremendous accomplishments; they frequently blame the West for problems that exist, problems that have always
existed, in distant hemispheres.

icnif77:

At their best,the  North  Atlantic  states  establish  and  protect  an  enviable  way  of  life, ...'falacy'!

 

http://www.globalresearch.ca/911-the-mother-of-all-big-lies/5400986

 

Read more on Prof Michel Chossudovsky, and please don't start slamming web site. My comment isn't about the web site.

9 years 26 weeks ago
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xinyuren:

You speak as a child who has a new toy.  "Look, everyone, my shiny new toy is the best!" The boy is too young to realize that his toy will get old.  It will fall apart, and it will go to the trash heap.  His friend will get a newer toy and say, "Look everyone...."

 

America is only 250 years old.  A blink of an eye.  Every system has it's lifespan.  You are fortunate to live in the period when America is relatively vibrant (though some say it is approaching twilight).  It's flame has been bright, but at the end of the day, it will end the same as other kingdoms.  You know, once upon the time, there was the Tang Dynasty.  It was among the brightest civilizations on earth at the time.  And it wasn't a democracy.

 

 Get off your high horse.  The enlightened, educated, free society you tout as the West may very well be the greatest society in history (maybe!).  But it's tremendous accomplishments will not be able to escape from it's inevitable demise it itself created. Says the dog to the lion, "in the end, we are both the same."

9 years 26 weeks ago
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coineineagh:

universities in the west are about controlling the direction of scientific inquiry, as researchers are forced to meet demands of their sponsors, and only a little purely intellectual investigation is tolerated, as it is viewed as a waste of sponsor's funding. the renaissance saw a far greater rate of scientific advancement.

9 years 26 weeks ago
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icnif77:

@xin: you should posted your comment as reply! 'Up' vote from my Treasury dept.

9 years 26 weeks ago
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Shining_brow:

Firstly, I get the impression you're the sort of person who will never actually concede that you may have made a mistake, or ever see that you might need to back away from a certain stance. I've been called a bulldog too.

 

Secondly, in some of your arguments, you're really debating apples to oranges. It's very difficult to really, honestly, compare the current age with almost any other time in history- and it's because of those changes that we have what we have (and can do).

 

You've effectively said that 'the West' has it far better than any other time in history - well, d'uh!!! When was the refrigerator invented? Lighting? Internet?? But, does that mean that Rome wasn't an awesome place to be at its height? Or Xi'an at it's height? Or any other leading place that hit the top in history?? As I said - apples to oranges!

Durability and expansiveness... again, please take into account the many other factors involved! Transport and communications not being the least...

 

"It is not for nothing that the political form generally associated with all of this, constitutional democracy, is today presumed to be the only legitimate political regime"

Hmmm - yeah, I've noticed that certain countries will go in and try to destabilise sovereign nations that have any other form of political system :( And, again, you're cherry-picking!!! Are you seriously going to suggest that the Monarchy system didn't encourage the arts? Or sciences? Patronisation of both is what brought us to where we are now - NOT democracy! (before you argue too much, democracy has caused a hell of a lot of wards and suppression too!!! - "Freedom of speech" has also meant "freedom to hate").

 

Surely, the best system in the world would be a 'Meritocracy'? Where rank, privilege, control, political power etc, is based on merit? Rather than the current system where control is based on wealth and popularity (and the ability to BS), behind closed doors. Or, given the technology we now have - Direct Democracy -put every major vote to the people, like a referendum... "do we invade Iraq? Yes or no?" Let the people decide (and, for those who say 'yes', THEY go fight... not the people who say 'no'... or the socio-economically disadvantaged who have little education, and no prospects, so join the military as a way to give themselves a chance).

 

I'm not against what has been achieved - but I'm not into cherry-picking the good bits, and ignoring the bad bits! And that's what you've done in your writings... (as well as exaggerate when making comparisons). As I said above - you colour the West as all glorious and as wonderful, and China as permanently evil and disgusting. So, yes, people are going to argue against you!

9 years 26 weeks ago
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nzteacher80:

China is bad. America is good. You choose to live in China. Strange. Judaeo- Christian morals are pretty foggy. The New Testament and The Old Testament are starkly different. The story of Passover is about how it's okay for God to be a racist baby murderer. The Bible tells us we should kill people that work on Sundays as well as killing homosexuals and witches. Moses approves of the killing of unarmed men and the rape and murder of women in Numbers 31:7-18.

9 years 26 weeks ago
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9 years 26 weeks ago
 
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A: In my personal experience, teaching certificates have varied in releva
A:In my personal experience, teaching certificates have varied in relevance depending on the context and location. Here's a breakdown of each aspect:a) Getting the teaching job: Teaching certificates can certainly enhance your chances of securing a teaching position, especially in formal educational settings such as schools and language institutions. Many employers prefer candidates who have undergone specific training in pedagogy and instructional techniques, which these certificates often provide. However, other factors such as experience, references, and the demand for teachers in a particular area also play significant roles in the hiring process.b) Getting a higher salary than your uncertified competitors: In some cases, holding a teaching certificate can indeed lead to a higher salary compared to uncertified competitors. Many educational institutions have structured salary scales that take into account factors such as level of education, years of experience, and additional certifications. Holding a teaching certificate may place you in a higher salary bracket or make you eligible for certain salary incentives or bonuses. However, this can vary widely depending on the specific policies of the institution or organization.c) Getting promotions: Teaching certificates can be beneficial for career advancement and securing promotions within the field of education. They demonstrate a commitment to professional development and mastery of teaching skills, which are qualities that many employers value when considering candidates for leadership positions or administrative roles. Additionally, some promotions may require specific certifications or qualifications, making holding a teaching certificate essential for advancement in certain cases.Regarding which certificate yields better results, it largely depends on the specific requirements of the job market and the educational context in which you intend to work. For example:A Postgraduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) is often highly regarded in formal school settings and can be advantageous for those seeking positions in primary or secondary education.Montessori certification is valuable for individuals interested in working in Montessori schools or implementing Montessori principles in their teaching approach.A Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) certificate is particularly relevant for those seeking to teach English to non-native speakers in international contexts or language schools.Ultimately, the best certificate for you will depend on your career goals, the specific requirements of the positions you're interested in, and the preferences of potential employers in your target job market. It's essential to research the requirements and preferences of employers in your desired field and tailor your qualifications accordingly. -- ruqaiya761