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Q: What is your "Don't get me started on..." China topic?
The inability to make a plan. "We're going out for a company dinner tonight". "I'm sorry I can't go, I have plans". "But you have to go, it's a company dinner". "I can't, maybe if you told me severely days in advance instead of 1 hour I might have been able to make it". "But the bosses are expecting you to be there". "I don't care, I CAN'T GO" Awkward silence......
It happens time and time again. Drives me up the wall.
lewn:
This is done deliberately to see how important they are that you'll suddenly drop everything to eat with them. Shows their power.
andyinshenyang:
Yeah but most of us will just say "No, I've got plans", resulting in a massive face loss. Oh well..
expatlife26:
And that my friends is why i'm happy I don't work for trashy locals.
That would drive me up a wall. I'm very flexible when it comes to making plans, but I don't like when people try and impose changes on your plans to suit themselves. Pure selfishness.
estern:
@lewn
I know they do it deliberately, but that just makes it even more annoying. It's not just incompetence, they are going out of their way to make life difficult simply because they can.
In these situations I take great pleasure in not going, and not giving them the "face" they so pathetically crave.
lewn:
Yep I do exactly the same I say I've got plans even when I don't, just to deny them the face. 48 hours notice, no other way.
That's the best way to ask a question - don't include any details or examples.
Sinobear:
Don't get me started on your type of comment to my comment on it's thread!!!
Don't Thread On Me!
Education, without a doubt.
Plenty other stuff to choose from: income inequality, assholery, reckless driving, pollution, classism without class, consumption without consideration, disfunctional families, bullying, victim mentality, mercenary attitudes, unapologetic greed (esp. women), corruption, chengguang, animal cruelty, human cruelty, technological subversion, lack of creativity (for *honest* trade or service) and allround stupidity...
But education takes the cake. It makes the people as clueless as they are, and it's probably the root cause of all the other problems.
iWolf:
Assholery.....I think you invented a new word. Congrats, I like it!!
coineineagh:
assholery is definitely not my invention. pretty sure i picked up the phrase on some message board or other.
For me it's TCM and the health superstitions that go along with it. Drinking some disgusting tea to reduce, "you're inner wetness"?? This shamanism with no scientific backing drives me crazy, especially when someone tries to give me TCM health advice.
Of course, this relates back to Coin's comment on education. I agree, that is the source of all WTF-ery.
expatlife26:
yeah I second that. Ignore tons of real dangers but freak out about peasant superstitions.
Helmet on a motorcyle? "Fuck no, head injuries are just a crazy rumor nobody dies from that at alarmingly high rates in china"
Eat an Apple with milk? "You're throwing your life away!! HOW CAN YOU BE SO IRRESPONSIBLE???"
WooMow:
Haha right on.
Wear ANY sort of eye protection while welding or cutting metal? NEVER! Just have some dude attach suction cups to your back, that will align your Chi and help you avoid a horrific accident that leaves you blind!
...Damnit Delphine you go me started.
hi2u:
Actually some TCM has been verified by science to be effective, and more is currently being studied. It's an interesting field of study. Not all has scientific basis, but some.
expatlife26:
No...where it's effective it's effective by accident.
There may be a compound in some random herb they use that genuinely is good for the kidney or something. And that's great, that's really where all medicine ultimately comes from
but it's the stopped clock right twice a day principle. It's NOT tcm that's effective, it's a chemical within a treatment having an effect that practitioner doesn't understand. Isolate it and prescribe it in measured doses and it becomes science. Not TCM.
The whole rationale behind TCM is bullshit. It's the eastern equivalent to the old "4 humors" european medicine. Leeches ARE helpful for certain things, but not because you have too much blood and not enough black bile.
If something doesn't stand up to double-blind testing it's not real.
Shining_brow:
One of my pet hates "don't get me started" is on pseudo-scientists who actually think that just because something hasn't been 'proven' by the scientists, then it's not real or doesn't exist. (completely ignoring science's own basic fundamental principle of 'it can never be proven - only dis-proven - and each instance is only an instance". That, and using logical fallacies to defend their stance.
expatlife26:
None of these china problems are unique to china, but conditions here can make them worse.
I think TCM among other things is kind of a crutch. Simplifies the world so mentally lazy people can cope with it.
I'm healthy because I would never mix milk and apple and I drink hot water! Get sick? Oh, that's just bad luck.
And I'm a good parent because I serve hot water and did whatever dumb pregnancy shit they do and make sure they study all the time. If my kid is an unemployable ticking time bomb...well that's certainly not my repsonsibility.
It's just a way of having a shorter mental checklist of things to worry about.
hi2u:
@expatlife: "It's NOT tcm that's effective, it's a chemical within a treatment having an effect that practitioner doesn't understand."
It doesn't matter if the practitioner understand it or not. Some treatments have chemicals that have been proven by science to be helpful.
expatlife26:
well listen we're just arguing semantics.
The point is that most of it is bullshit, but they should do some studies on what is helpful and figure out the best delivery system.
Don't get me started on the 50 (erm), I mean, 5000 years of culture or the myth of Chinese good manners.
To all you posters: drink more hot water!
The CCP's survival. From there you can rant on any topic.
How Chinese bodies are different
andyinshenyang:
Yet they don't seem to like it when I turn it around on them.
"I can drink ice cold water in winter because western bodies are different."
"Don't be stupid, everybody knows you can't. You'll die!!!"
Lord_hanson:
Haha, my wife called her friend stupid the other day when her friend said western medicine wouldn't work on her child because Chinese bodies are different. My wife pointed out that Chinese people abroad take medicine with no problems.
1. The completely idiotic idea that you can scream at and hit children and animals into learning something.
2. Grandma says drinking anything cold is bad for you health based on ZERO scientific evidence.
3. Wrapping up warm even though it is like 25c.
4. Believing that getting a cold comes from being outside in the cold, instead of inhaling a virus.
Nessquick:
No.1 absolutely the case. Can see it at home, but I hope it was last time after what happened yesterday.
andy74rc:
4. Actually getting cold could have an effect if it lowers your antibody response.
The inability to make a plan. "We're going out for a company dinner tonight". "I'm sorry I can't go, I have plans". "But you have to go, it's a company dinner". "I can't, maybe if you told me severely days in advance instead of 1 hour I might have been able to make it". "But the bosses are expecting you to be there". "I don't care, I CAN'T GO" Awkward silence......
It happens time and time again. Drives me up the wall.
lewn:
This is done deliberately to see how important they are that you'll suddenly drop everything to eat with them. Shows their power.
andyinshenyang:
Yeah but most of us will just say "No, I've got plans", resulting in a massive face loss. Oh well..
expatlife26:
And that my friends is why i'm happy I don't work for trashy locals.
That would drive me up a wall. I'm very flexible when it comes to making plans, but I don't like when people try and impose changes on your plans to suit themselves. Pure selfishness.
estern:
@lewn
I know they do it deliberately, but that just makes it even more annoying. It's not just incompetence, they are going out of their way to make life difficult simply because they can.
In these situations I take great pleasure in not going, and not giving them the "face" they so pathetically crave.
lewn:
Yep I do exactly the same I say I've got plans even when I don't, just to deny them the face. 48 hours notice, no other way.
This freakin' obsession with blaming Japan for this, that and everything raking up events that happened 70 to 90 years ago pretending that the Chinese have been the only victims of atrocities that have occurred in world history.
VJ Day was weeks ago. The outside world went into a day of quiet commemoration for those that died or suffered. But guess which country can't let it go?
It makes my fekkin' skin crawl.
yongge:
While on this topic - doesn't it make you wonder why the war took so long, considering the Chinese outnumbered the invading Japanese by millions, and according to Chinese accounts (at least as portrayed in movies and TV series) everyone fought heroically.
The complete and total willful ignorance - and the whole-hearted faith in opinions based on that ignorance.This includes the lack of logic and causality.
There are, obviously, certain 'facts' about the world, but being Chinese means these facts can be safely ignored if they run contrary to "China is great"., or "I am a great person because I'm Chinese". this often results in "you don't understand"... or some other stupid response.
And the hypocrisy that all this creates... :(
Eg - the other week, my ex- is telling me how much she hates living in Thailand, because everyone cheats and lies to her & tries to rip her off. A week later, she wants me to help her get her friend a fake degree so they can work in China....
Bad service, particularly in places where you would expect good service.
Lazy none horny Chinese husbands that send heir wives to find us after they divorce or before divorce. I get Chinese women that were married once tell me that they hate their husband because they could only last in sex for 4 minutes and Chinese girls that are in their 30's well their sex drive kicks in then they go find it any where they can get it or offer to marry us with their divorce riches. Why 90% of young Chinese girls only look for the house and funds first haha. So don't get me started when I say hey Chinese husbands stop sending us your wives, I'm tired of your wives trying to steal me away from my wonderful wife...
Natives not giving a fuck about pedestrians using crosswalks or motorcycles forcing you to jump out of the way on the sidewalks. 
