This blog is titled The Fourth Estate. The Fourth Estate is the idea that the media and the press are an informal but very influential institution (estate) in a society. The reason it is the fourth estate is because at the onset of the French Revolution, society was divided into three estates. The first, second, and third estate are the nobility, the church, and the peasantry respectively. With the overthrow of this system
So my first blog post will be about the Eastern Dragon: the People's Republic of China. I have done a fair amount of research and I have a lot to say about this subject, and I will be laying it out in the blog for the foreseeable future.
Now, to start off with. I will go over some of my own opinion of the PRC in simple point form. What I like about PRC, and what I do not.
There are several things that I do like about the People's Republic of China.
- The domestic management of the Chinese economy, in its current form. Yes. I do approve of how the Chinese government has handled the country. The lives of ordinary people have improved dramatically, especially compared to other developing country (ahem India), and in most areas, China is moving in the right direction. I wholeheartedly approve.
- The fact that the Chinese government has taken the climate change and environmentalism issue seriously. For a country of its size, output, and population, the Chinese government has been extremely, many times in an authoritarian way, being tackling these issues. Many times, the government has erected and enforced draconian and authoritarian decrees to tackle climate change, at many times curtailing and restricting the freedom of industry and the Chinese people to meet these goals. Good. I approve wholeheartedly, because you can't make environmental progress and reverse ecological and climate damage without making people make drastic personal sacrifices.
- PRC was able to make economic progress and drastically improve the standard of living for its 1.3 billion people without a declaration of war nor colonized and plundered other countries (ahem pre-WWII Europe and Imperial Japan), nor depend on handouts or giveaways from places that were not ravaged by war (i.e. US and the Marshal Plan)
- PRC has made a lot of progress over abolishing backward practices. Crap like foot-binding, absolute patriarchy family structure, and other illiberal cultural practices and mindsets that are forcefully suppressed/eliminated by the government. With brutal consequences. Good. China deserves credit for forcefully dragging the country out of backward practices of the past (something certain caste-sensitive countries failed to do)
- Tibet. Speaking of stamping out backward practices and cultural habits, nothing is more backward and degrading than theocratic absolutism. Throw in wide-spread slavery in there and other shit and you get Tibet. In my opinion, the PRC has been way too generous and forgiving with Tibetans. More on this later.
- One-Child Policy. Having too many people in a country creates social unrest, puts pressure on the scarce planetary resources and the environment, and is unsustainable. It's a brilliant and responsible move on the Chinese government's part, and the world should thank it for this.
- The Central Government just have a good grasp on nation building.
- China is not India. I will elaborate on why this is a great thing.
Things I do not like about China:
- The corrupt practices of officials. This is deemed an existential threat by the Central government. So far, it is still quite prevalent
- Overzealous government reactions to dissidents. I have a mixed opinion on this.
- Badly behaved Chinese tourists in foreign countries. I feel that the Chinese government has not been as forceful in tackling this issue as they have on other issues. However, this is not a big priority in the grand scheme of things. Still, it's something I do not like.
- Problems implementing policies and laws.
- Overzealous nationalism from Chinese youths. Knock it off, you're looking like a retard.
- Taiwan. This is a complicated issue that will be explored in a further posting. Basically, I don't approve of the Chinese stance on Taiwan (unify under mainland or get invaded) and of the fact that Taiwanese people live in fear of being shelled by China. More on this later.
In future posts, I will elaborate on my points, and I will touch on the issue of democracy in China later, specifically how people with no clue talk out of their ass on this issue.
