I watched a YouBoob Dutch/British video about China.
A Sino authority suggested European cultures have been taught they must atone for their sins. The Chinaman has no such baggage. Mostly, I feel, the East Asians don’t want to be reiterated as a lower life form.
Westerners are trying to atone for a sin which doesn’t exist. Never has. We are fighting non-existent guilt.
Children’s upbringing today seems to be less negatively oriented. “Just say no” causes humans to respond ‘Watch me, I will.’ Have American parents learned to deemphasise negativity? Avoid telling their children what they ought not do? Have we learned to confess our mistakes to our children without fear they are as stupid as we? The less we tell each other what we shouldn’t do…
I was riding shotgun to the Miura Peninsula. Yoko was driving. Not oh no. Thank you.
Also in the video was a lament by two football fans. I shared their pain.
One, who needs his mouth washed out with soap, was perturbed by the ‘cultural difference’ excuse. I agree more. We too often attribute behaviour to cultures, preventing or avoiding personal accountability.
Some time back I stayed in a hostel in South Central. One of the folks refused to give her nationality. She persisted. She appeared to be of a certain race, but so do I, and I’m Asian.
Some of the other tenants expressed dismay, distrust or disgust with her unwillingness to self identify. I loved it.
By doing so, she taught me how I am constantly nationally profiling people. This person is doing this because he’s that nationality, or she’s doing that because she’s this. Why do I need to know someone’s nationality? Why do I have to tribe them?
The football fan was right. The business conflict of which he was complaining was due to personal issues. The conflict was less cultural, and probably not even business related. Even rocket science is not rocket science. It’s getting people to cooperate.
I agreed with both sides. I saw the ‘cultural’ explanation and I agreed wholeheartedly with the Chinese football club owner. More thoroughly, I agreed with the football fan that every time we say ‘O, it’s cultural’ we dodge the issue.
I hope a business school does a case study of this ‘business’ dispute. I think participants are taking things personally. Yes, there are cultural issues. Are they the problem or the excuse? Like most dichotomies, the answer is not one or the other.
The princely Silk Roads explains why the European scientific effort succeeded. One reason is a scientist says ‘I don’t know. I want to know. How do we know?’
The West does a job of satisfying the what’s-over-the-next-hill urge. The East does an even better job of communitarianism. One problem is the West’s inability to standstill, step back. Let the East lead. Will they succeed? Sometimes. Sometimes not. At the very least, the West will have a diverse view of what to do next.
If the Chinese are such a threat to the West, why do Chinese call English the BrilliantPeople?
Today I set the price of my memoir to 0.
