Starving Pelican wrote: ↑Sun Mar 07, 2021 6:41 pm
Orichá wrote: ↑Sun Mar 07, 2021 12:16 pm
...hmmm, there was no old moral code, unless you are referring to Confucianism..? But it was always a fusty thing that had more to do with government bureaucracies than the advent of Capitalism in China... Communism arose against the descent and corruption of the "old codes?" following the brutal English colony, which forced the Chinese to buy opium for more than a century, lol... The local Chinese capitalism came after English colonialism, etc, etc... Before communism, a very few wealthy Chinese lived in the cities, and many millions of peasants were starving everywhere else, especially in the 1920s... And long long before the English, the Chinese were Capitalists, too... They invented printed money hundreds of years before the West...
What in the world are you on about?
Well, Starving, you wrote: "
The old moral code was wiped away and replaced with communism."
...All I am saying was that there was "no old moral code." It's an oversimplification or myth to suggest there ever was "an old moral code" ...at the time before the Communist revolution, China was controlled by a small clique of capitalists who engaged in mercantile business and some foreign trade centered in the cities of Shanghai and Guangzhou...
Also, for a long time during the 19th century, the local people everywhere hated the presence of Western imperialism, which had continued to engulf all of China after they lost the second Opium War (a treaty granted more access to China by the Western powers in 1860 and China was obliged to open up to foreign missionaries, etc...) All of this stirred up local leaders all over the place to form the "The Righteous and Harmonious Fists" who attempted to chase out Christians and the wealthy brokers living in Guangzhou, etc... This event became known as the
Boxer Rebellion.
Again, the Chinese lost to the "Eight-Nation Alliance" of Austria-Hungary, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States. . . China continued to be subjugated, following rules made for them by foreigners. This model promoted a period of capitalism in China benefitting a few locals who worked in cooperation with foreign powers. All wealth was concentration among a few Chinese working with the outside world. This situation led to an increasing desire for independence and genuine autonomy... Don't forget the old and last Qing dynasty was both under the thumb of foreign imperialists, and it was descended from more foreigners -- the Manchus, whom one could argue were originally Koreans...
So, the Chinese Republicans under Sun Yat-sen arose, and along with Cash-My-Cheque, (also known as Chiang Kai Shek,) who started to organize and
Republican China came into being in 1912... The Republicans were trying to create an independent China -- but even the money used by the central Chinese Republican banks were called "dollars" during this period, and they were printed by a U.S. firm, the "American Bank Note Company" ! They had to depend heavily on foreign connections to make their bid for "independence..."
...So, I don't think that Mr. Mao thought the Chinese Republicans were doing a very good job of freeing China and her people. He did not have to travel overseas to learn that it might be better if people across China had something to eat every night...
...No moral codes ever existed in China, except those promoting the maintenance of power elites. This "Emperor mentality" persisted across a breathtaking span of history, and some say it continues even today. Confucius was actually a sort of apologist for the forms of absolute power and dominance that centered in the Emperors, or warlords, and their small circles of merchant buddies, soldier cohorts and all that... Confucius espoused a strict orderly submission to absolute patriarchal authority, and promoted the sort of quietism that had become part of the Chinese survival mode for centuries: shut up and go unnoticed by the emperors' wrath. Never forget, when the emperor's men drafted you into the army, you had no choice but to go and fight. Scheduled annual wars between competing lords was a sport for centuries in China... Anyway, Confucius
was big on education, and he was also part of the system that condoned the form of rote-learning that hobbled the Chinese imagination for many many hundreds of years..
Becoming a bureaucrat was the only way an ordinary person might hope to rise up into the elite. To do that, you had to memorize a lot of stuff and regurgitate it on paper verbatim. For centuries getting an education and passing the civil service exam was valued above everything else in China... But that does not constitute an "old moral code" in my view... Lol...
There is no way to blame "Communism" for anything particularly new or bad in China. It is the same dragon wearing a different uniform, that is all... And actually, you could argue that when Mao and Chou En Lai and Deng took over, they actually improved Chinese society in many ways. Communism helped moderate the entrenched misogyny of the old ways, opening doors for women to get an education and become doctors and teachers. In past times, woman in China , as John and Yoko so boldly stated, was "the n.gger of the world" -- who had no right but to stay home, be slaves and keep quiet. Unless you were a rich bitch, which was uncommon. Communism changed all that radically... Communism also did a good job of feeding the entire country and really did end the starvation and gross inequality of accumulation and thievery that had persisted under Republican China -- despite the idealism of Sun Yat-sen... But of course, quite quickly, Mao became China's new emperor, living in style with many young playthings and lots of STDs...
Oh well... The myths of history.... For example: to be a successful, poet in old China, you had to flatter the emperor nearest you. But if a competing warlord came to power, you got the boot and had to starve...
Like
Du Fu
贈衛八處士 To My Retired Friend Wei
人生不相見, It is almost as hard for friends to meet
動如參與商。 As for the Orion and Scorpius.
今夕復何夕, Tonight then is a rare event,
共此燈燭光。 Joining, in the candlelight,
少壯能幾時, Two men who were young not long ago
鬢髮各已蒼。 But now are turning grey at the temples.
訪舊半為鬼, To find that half our friends are dead
驚呼熱中腸。 Shocks us, burns our hearts with grief.
焉知二十載, We little guessed it would be twenty years
重上君子堂。 Before I could visit you again.
昔別君未婚, When I went away, you were still unmarried;
兒女忽成行。 But now these boys and girls in a row
怡然敬父執, Are very kind to their father's old friend.
問我來何方。 They ask me where I have been on my journey;
問答乃未已, And then, when we have talked awhile,
兒女羅酒漿。 They bring and show me wines and dishes,
夜雨翦春韭, Spring chives cut in the night-rain
新炊間黃粱。 And brown rice cooked freshly a special way.
主稱會面難, My host proclaims it a festival,
一舉累十觴。 He urges me to drink ten cups—
十觴亦不醉, But what ten cups could make me as drunk
感子故意長。 As I always am with your love in my heart?
明日隔山嶽, Tomorrow the mountains will separate us;
世事兩茫茫。 After tomorrow - who can say?