The Decline of the West?
Posted by MyLaowai on Monday, January 5, 2009
We have enjoyed so much freedom for so long that we are perhaps in danger of forgetting how much blood it cost to establish the Bill of Rights.
– Felix Frankfurter
There’s this hypothetical guy, you’ve probably either met him or seen him around. If you’re anything like me, you may have mistakenly hired him, and been glad to see the back of him when you fired his ass for ineptitude a few months later. He was likely born in the seventies with a spoon in his mouth, possibly a silver spoon, but plastic is just as likely. He probably fancies himself as a musician or a writer or an artist, although he isn’t very talented at any of those things. He will tell you that he’s always had it tough, and that he learned about life at the school of hard knocks, but the truth is he never had to work thanks to Mommy and Daddy’s support. Following high school, and not having much in the way of a goal, he probably went to a second-tier university and studied a worthless degree in theatre or something equally meaningless.
He has, in all likelihood, written a number of short stories / poems / songs [* delete as appropriate], but became disenchanted at The System when editors and recording industry experts rejected them. He also fancies himself as a radical, a person who is fighting the system, and he is always happiest ‘hanging out’ at radical websites and blogs. He reads magazines such as Radical Magazine, and wishes his last name consisted of a single letter – ‘Z‘ would be just fine. He thinks Communism is a great concept that was failed by the people who ran the show, and there’s a good chance that, if he ever got a proper job, he’d be the one agitating for strikes all the time, because that’s far better than actually doing any work.
He came to Asia because he couldn’t fit in anywhere else, he teaches English because he refuses to get a real job, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he loved moody black and white photos of himself.
In Hong Kong, there is a name for people like him: FILTH. Failed In London, Try Hong Kong. China has more of these losers than one can shake a stick at, and they love it here. They love it because here they can pretend they are important, here they don’t have to be productive, here they can sit with their friends late at night in dimly lit apartments smoking weed and congratulating each other on not taking orders from The Man, and complaining about how the West is so bad. In a previous age, these people would have attempted to defect to the Soviet Union, although to be fair, the Russians were smart enough to see these useless idiots for what they were.
If this is what your average Chinese sees when he sees a foreigner, it’s no wonder they hate us so much.
It seems to me that a significant percentage of a certain generation meet the description of these toe rags, these whiners and arseholes who seem to think that the world owes them something, that they have a right to have their every whim catered for by society at large.
Well, I’ve got news for you, if you’re reading this: Society owes you squat. You have a right to think your own thoughts, except in those same Communist countries that you profess to love so much, that is. You have no right at all to tell others what they should be thinking. You have a right to shelter and food, but with that goes the right to get a job and pay for it yourself – you have no right whatsoever to expect that anyone else should pay for you. You have the right to do as you please, except where that gets in the way of other people’s rights, and you have the right to believe in any religion or political ideology you please – but not to ram that down anyone else’s throat. In short, you have the right of freedom. And that’s about it, Sparky. The Right to Freedom is a big one, bought at a high price, and the world owes you no additional favours, no extra debts, nothing. You have a right to freedom, and everything else, sonny, is charity.
I’ve a Theory on this. Stay with me.
You see, for much of human history, life was a struggle. There wasn’t enough shelter, there wasn’t enough food to go round, and what you had (including your freedom and your life) was at the mercy of anyone else who was stronger than you. The idea that you had ‘rights’ was utterly alien. The ancient Greeks had some nice ideas that set the ball rolling in this regard, and so did the Romans. The idea that a man could help himself by helping others was a good one, but it did take a while to catch on.
The Magna Carta, I reckon, was the real turning point. That was the moment when the King was forced to guarantee certain rights of his subjects, free or fettered, most notably that of habeas corpus. It came about when the Barons got together and forced the King to sign it. They could have simply replaced him – it was the done thing in those days – but they realised that by working together, they could effect a lasting change that would benefit all of them. The Magna Carta was a turning point, but it didn’t end there. In the centuries that followed, more and more people learned that the only way to freedom was to band together and demand it. Many, many people died in this pursuit of freedom, but they died in a greater cause, that of freedom for all. This idea of fighting for the freedom of others became so deeply ingrained in Western Culture, that in some ways it can be said to have become one of the defining characteristics of it.
In my mind, this fight wasn’t really won until the end of the twentieth century, when the West had fought and won the war against fascism on a global battlefield, and then gone on to declare victory over Communism. Sure, there are still some pockets of resistance against freedom in Africa and Asia – China is the best example – but at the same time people in the West had won freedom from want, and that’s the key point I’m getting to. There was suddenly enough food that everyone would not starve, enough housing that everyone had a place to live, sufficiently robust rule of law that everyone could expect protection from it. Everyone had access to an education, everyone had the chance to better themselves regardless of social class, and everyone had access to more and better information than ever before. They also had, for the first time in history, a reasonable expectation that their freedom could not be taken away by anyone else on the basis of strength. Put simply, the fight was pretty much over.
The problem is, that the idea of fighting for freedom is so deeply ingrained in Western civilisation, it doesn’t just go away once the fight is over. When your society has been doing something for a thousand years, there’s a certain inertia that keeps it doing that thing, even when the reason for doing it has gone away.
Our subject, the tyre-kicker I introduced at the beginning, is still fighting, and he doesn’t know how to stop. He has been born into a society that has achieved everything his ancestors fought and died for, and he is living at the very pinnacle of progress thus far. There is no one left to fight, and no thing to fight for, so now he has turned inwards and had begun fighting against the very ideals that gave him more from birth than any other culture in the history of the world has ever had. He is fighting for the sake of fighting, and in doing so, is attempting to destroy that which made his civilisation greater than any that has come before.
I pity this person. I pity him, and I feel sorry for him, but I do not want to see him succeed. The West cannot afford to see him succeed, because the alternative is very much like what I see every day in China: brutal totalitarianism and an utter disregard for the rights of any man to freedom in the smallest degree.
I’m an optimist, however. I see signs that people like him are increasing in terms of noise output, but I think I can see light at the end of this particular tunnel, too. We in the West may have lost our way somewhat, but we have always found our way back into the light when things got bad. I think history will look back on these times and judge that the West found itself a second wind, and that the aberrant behaviour of some was merely a temporary sickness that soon passed.
It isn’t hard for us to do – we have the talent, we have the knowledge, and we have the freedom to do the right things with them.
And when the chips are down, it’s that freedom that makes the difference.
Men fight for liberty and win it with hard knocks. Their children, brought up easy, let it slip away again, poor fools. And their grandchildren are once more slaves.
– D.H. Lawrence
Wo Shi Laowai - Wo Pa Shui 
Neddy said
I really like this one. The one thing I will have to give more thought to, is where these not so hypothetical men come from. Is it what your first quote (Felix Frankfurter) and the last one (D.H. Lawrence) suggests, or is it that “Our subject, the tyre-kicker I introduced at the beginning, is still fighting, and he doesn’t know how to stop”?
You see, to me “the fight was pretty much over” thing rings false. An old Roman, I forgot who he was, said “You can have peace, or freedom, but not both”. The fight never ends. But sometimes, some of us forget.
Other civilisations had declined, and fell, but ours has more solid foundations than any other, ever. I might even opine that the shit we are in, from financial crisis all the way down to the navel gazing hypothetical men, is good for us. See it all as a wake up call. We have the strength, and the tools. We hope for humanity to prevail, but do not rely on it; we have already learnt that “a good Emperor” is not the solution. Our system may be imperfect – it’s a work in progress, after all – but it beats the crap out of anything else ever invented.
Oh, and I cannot resist: Do not ever compare 5000 years of civilisation (read 5000 years of authoritarian suppression, forced conformity, and kowtowing to power) with 6000+ years of an Idea! Yes, it did not start with Greeks and Romans. The roots were in Sumer. The middle East, I sh1t you not.
This rant is to be continued, IF I bloody feel like it.
Meursault said
Certain other traits of the type of person you describe:
They ironically watch and refer to old TV programmes from the 70’s and 80’s that should have remained dead. No, Charlie, I don’t want to talk about Bagpuss or The Clangers or whatever. You’re 36. Stop watching back to back re-runs of the A-Team in an “ironic fashion” and get a job.
They have elevated Che Guevara to the same level as the Adidas 3 stripes or the Nike Swoosh. Che Guevara was a failed revolutionary, he was not a logo made to adorn deliberately non-ironable t-shirts.
They talk about things like “House” and “Garage” as if they were forms of music, and not (as every reasonable human being knows) places of personal and vehicular residence. Then they start a blog telling people where to go to hear the best “mixes”. I go to bars to drink mixes, not to listen to them.
The micro-scooter is a perfectably acceptable form of transport to them for the daily commute.
They refuse to vote in general elections because the main parties all work for the man, but quite happily spend 2 pounds a text on selecting their favourite contestant in the X Factor/Big Brother/Celebrity Get Me Outta Here/Whatever. Ironically, of course.
I could go on but I appear to have no thumbs.
justrecently said
Lemme quote myself… quote –> China probably has a “non-democratic advantage” (political consistency) when promoting its international position, as the Taipei Times has put it. But a multi-polar world offers opportunities of its own. In future global differences, good arguments will probably count much more than in the past, and much more than mere economic and military weight. China without political change will have little else to offer than weight itself. <– unquote
It takes everyday work to succeed in material terms ourselves – and to defend our own countries if need be. A reasonable amount of hard power is essential for self-determination. Some good individual and public judgment, too. Even democratically elected governments only account to their people if they have to.
Just to avoid misunderstandings, I’d like to add that Human Rights aren’t “Western tools”. They are universal, and that’s documented here.
justrecently said
grumble – documented here.
Neddy said
I like the responses to this post. The best one was the briefest one: Justrecently’s “grumble” #4. No time is better than the present to rub their noses in it. Amen.
Andy Best said
Hello, eerrr …. what’s your real name again?
Outing you for writing offensive trash like ‘slit-eyes’ is apologizing for the Chinese regime, is it? You can’t use a freedom of speech/rights argument to complain about me saying something, can you? As soon as you say stuff out in the public, on your blog, you have to expect other public members to have their say.
Anyway, it’s a good debate and thanks for the lengthy response. I’ll post the links at my blog so my readers can get both sides. To be fair.
Let’s go to the linked document from Justrecently, hard fought for but almost completely ignored by all:
And I quote:
“Article 1.
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.”
MyLaowai said
Dear Mr Best,
Don’t flatter yourself: this post was not about you. It’s something that I’ve been meaning to say for some time now. That said, I suspect you probably do fall neatly into the description. It isn’t personal, however.
Whatever you mean by ‘outing’, I do consider you to be badly misguided and sympathetic at best, with regard to the regime in Beijing. I don’t have a problem with you believing and/or saying whatever you wish, but I do have a moral objection to your tacit support for the brutal, evil bastards that run the show here, and the degenerate, callous, xenophobic culture that makes their continued rule possible. I consider this nation to be the single greatest threat to civilisation since the Nazi’s, and that’s stating it mildly.
Again, I wish to stress, it’s not personal, and I’d be happy to have a beer with you under different circumstances.
As for the quotation from Article One of the Declaration, be advised that this is a doubled edged sword when used this way by supporters of the Chinese. It might also be worth putting it into context by quoting Article Two:
“Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.”
Show that to your Chinese buddies and ask how they feel about Tibet, or Taiwan, or Tienanmen, or East Turkestan, or India, or Burma, or Zimbabwe, or the Sudan, etc etc etc.
Actually, Article Five is pretty good, too:
“No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”
As is Article Nine:
“No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.”
And I could go on, but I hope you see where this is going.
One final note: it is very apparent that you do not get the point of this blog at all. Perhaps you could develop an improved sense of humour and try to see what it is that so many of my readers see? I’m an optimist by nature, and I believe that you have the ability if you try hard enough.
Have a nice day.
Andy Best said
Thanks for the reply. We’re done then.
Bye for now.
s said
Just when I thought you are getting boring with the same old tiring crap, you came out with the goodies again:
“the West had fought and won the war against fascism on a global battlefield, and then gone on to declare victory over Communism.”
Yes indeed !!!
I await eagerly for your announcement of the West’s triumph over Capitalism.
MyLaowai said
We aim to please lah…
Sinosceptic said
Sinosceptic said
And I’m also too stupid to use the ‘blockquote’ tags correctly. Shoot me.
Strawman said
Great article. You are almost sounding like a libertarian!
You don’t really define the concept of freedom. I have posted my
own views on freedom
here, for those who are interested.
I am less confident in the future of The West than you are. I see us
sliding backwards into form of soft-socialism – full of people trying to
live at everyone else’s expense. Alas the Che T-shirts are here to stay.
s said
Re #10
yes off course.
You are still the best clown in town.
Anyone not amused by your silliness or takes you too seriously are missing the point.
Keep up the good work.
MyLaowai said
Thanks S.
As for you, Sinosceptic, isn’t ‘counterpoint’ a bit like crochet or knitting or something? That’s a bit gay for my liking. CounterStrike is more in my line of country.
justrecently said
Methinks S is an auld acquaintance.
Shark said
I’ve really enjoyed reading this entry. I thought it was well-argued and it really struck a chord in me! I totally agree with everything that you’ve written here. Well done!
Sinosceptic said
“CounterStrike is more in my line of country” – and here’s me thinking that Brokeback Mountain was more in your line. Now, excuse me while I get back to making my Macrame MyLaowai dolls *chuckles and cackles*
s said
@16,
Indeed .. .well spotted ..
The mylaowai Circus is back in town and back in form and me here a beer in hand enjoying the laughs.
MyLaowai said
Speaking of Ang Lee movies, he has just finished filming his latest:
‘Crouching Cowboy, Hidden Sausage’
justrecently said
S: are you afraid that people might get you wrong?
s said
???
Pls explain
justrecently said
You keep repeating how much you enjoy this blog, as if you were afraid that someone might not believe you.
s said
“…it is very apparent that you do not get the point of this blog at all. Perhaps you could develop an improved sense of humour… blah blah …”
just trying to help our esteemed comedian to enlighten the uninitiated
(like in TV shows where the studio audience are directed to laugh on que)
Sounds like you don’t like my efforts, I’ll try to refrain from doing so in the future.
That being said, like many people, I do enjoy xenophobic, racist jokes. This type of comedy are best when performed by comedians picking on their own, eg Russell Peters.
That is why methinks this is one of mylaowai’s better rants…another classic from memory was the one about a white trash bashing other whites in SH bars and trying to extort money from them ( .. it later appeared he was barking at the wrong tree .. but that is another story)
verstehen?
BTW, i like the way this yank spells humour.
justrecently said
Methinks that it is very apparent that you do not get the point of this blog at all was @ Mr Best, not at you, S. I don’t mind your efforts, I just feel with people who seem to make more efforts than needed. But if you enjoy it, I’m the last one who’d want to spoil the fun.
Vikram said
You are correct to a great extent, I would like to raise a few questions though.
Can you prove that the demand for the Magna Carta itself was something that intrinsically came from Western Civilization ? Isnt it likely that some other barrons in some other kingdom on some other continent could have made a similar set of demands ?
Finally, East Asian societies have shown the ability to absorb democracy within their existing social and cultural systems. Examples are Japan, Korea and Taiwan. It can also be argued that a country like Japan is a place more equal than the US/West and just as free. So there is a possibility that China can also achieve the same. And in that case it wont be so much the decline of the West, as the rise of the East.
MyLaowai said
I don’t feel that that the Magna Carta was the product of intrinsically Western values. That said, however, it was the product of Western civilisations (I include the near Middle East in this). Wikipedia has a nice summary (I paraphrase a little):
The island of Arwad, settled in the early 2nd millennium BC by the Phoenicians, has been cited as one of the first known examples of a democracy in the world. In Arwad, the people, rather than a monarch, are described as sovereign. Another possible example of primitive democracy may have been the early Sumerian city-states. Vaishali in what is now Bihar, India is also one of the first governments in the world to have elements of what we would today consider democracy, similar to those found in ancient Greece (although it was not a monarchy, ancient Vaishali is perhaps better described as an oligarchy). A similar proto-democracy or oligarchy existed temporarily among the Medes in the 6th century BC, but which came to an end after the Achaemenid Emperor Darius the Great declared that the best monarchy was better than the best oligarchy or best democracy. The term ‘democracy’ first appeared in ancient Greek political and philosophical thought. The philosopher Plato contrasted democracy, the system of “rule by the governed”, with the alternative systems of monarchy (rule by one individual), oligarchy (rule by a small élite class) and timocracy. Athenian democracy is today considered by many to have been a form of direct democracy.
The Roman Republic contributed significantly into certain aspects of democracy, such as Laws, although it never became a democracy. The Romans did have elections for choosing representatives, however.
There are claims that early democratic institutions existed in the independent “republics” of India, Sanghas and Ganas, which existed as early as the sixth century BCE and persisted in some areas until the fourth century CE, although the evidence is scattered and no pure historical source exists for that period.
The Parliament of England had its roots in the restrictions on the power of kings written into Magna Carta. The first elected parliament was De Montfort’s Parliament in England in 1265. After the Glorious Revolution of 1688, the English Bill of Rights was enacted in 1689, which codified certain rights and increased the influence of the Parliament. The franchise was slowly increased and the Parliament gradually gained more power until the monarch became largely a figurehead.
Although not described as a democracy by the founding fathers, the United States founders shared a commitment to the principle of natural freedom and equality. The United States Constitution, adopted in 1788, provided for an elected government and protected civil rights and liberties.
In 1789, Revolutionary France adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen and, although short-lived, the National Convention was elected by all males.
New Zealand granted suffrage to (native) Maori men in 1867, white men in 1879, and women in 1893, thus becoming the first major nation to achieve universal suffrage.
Currently, there are 123 countries that are democratic, and the trend is increasing (up from 40 in 1972).
Hunxuer said
Sounds like the “NG Whore” I wrote about ages ago on Sinocidal!
very late on this post said
I heard about this debate a while back,but didn’t really have time to sit down and carefully read through the whole thing until today.I thought i would be more angry. But to be honest,after i read the bus poem, i laughed. So I guess the poet could get a bit relief ? cuz your purpose is to be funny? I am chinese,born and raised in Shanghai. and frankly,i get annoyed a lot by people’s odd,thoughtless,bad behavior in this city. I haven’t lived abroad, so i do not know if people in other countries are all very neat and polite and helpful.But by the equal amount of drunk Chinese and drunk foreigners i’ve seen, aslo by the same amount of time i spent reading chinese and english news, i don’t really see much difference in the big picture or on individuals. By this post, you described some kind of foreign douchbag living in Asia.So if I follow your logic of thinking all chinese people are smelly and dusty, i guess all foreigners from non-asian countries are douchbags either currently living in asia or wanting,trying to come here?and you obviously are one of those who already made it and living it up. I laughed at the end of your poem, cuz not only this poet have the idea of summing up 1.3 billion population to one category, but also he worked on it and expected it to be humour. and what’s more, when there was 1 person out of the large amount of readers on this best china blog award winning site,challenged the poem, he couldn’t quite understand, and acted like someone insulted his mother. In china, people are very insensitive about the race issue, and very small amount of people here really pay attention to world news, unless there was a war or earthquake or somehow a national scandal.If the awareness of human rights and “human race” here is on the same level as it is in America, for example, I don’t think you would be safe living here anymore. bluntly, I have a quick idea, and would love to see you working on a brave experiment.It is : Go to New York, start a blog about your life there and write a well structed poem on the purpose of amusement about how you hate all black men becuz they are smelly and dusty and god shouldn’t have created them. First of all,let’s see if your belief in freedom of speech is strong enough to support to start such experiment.Second of all,if your great sense of humour successfully win you a trophy again, I will bash that Andy best for you at any cost and in any way you want.and At last, for my own little curiosity, I wound love to find out, in this experiment which may or may not be started becuz of testicle problem,would any of your bound to exist american fans happen to wear some sort of white mask-hat for some extremely funny theory which has been carried on by generations of great humour since 1600s.For such an optimist like you, I will go through all these trouble to let my freedom of speech to fly me skyhigh, and say my very personal opinion that no one needs to agree with, which is, You are holding this blog trophy,standing on the ladder of ignorance(since you are proud…oops, in denial of racism,i try to work on my words for you,just not to upset you too much). I also have a question to your slogan,ni pa shui? cuz i cannot imagine that question being rhetorical since you offered beer drinking with Andy Best after he asked for your name.or is there some great humour in that also which most likely is more than I can handle.I am actually pretty scared now, since i saw you responded to Andy Best with such a legit post debating his points very clearly and IN HIS FACE aswell. I’m not ready to accept my category yet, but i do kinda have some idea which group i might belong to. I am a girl, and I am from Shanghai.Ring a bell? You are a writer, try some interesting writing on that one,would you. ——– just as i was submitting this, i noticed that mail is required, ah, i am sure this time,i am gonna be busted, since it may take longer for me to spot you in the crowd of laowai bloggers. so hey, can i get treatment as good as Andy Best’s beer settlement,if you spot me on a bus with my distinguish eye shape or something? and when the day comes that I can finnally write in decent English without finishing every sentence with Lah, i will try to start my own blog.and maybe you can be kind enough to tell me how you made your page so ugly looking with all the big font,ect, so that i will not make the same mistake and my blog won’t look too GAY? — yes,that’s right, i spotted another one. you said something’s gay as in lame, feel free to quote the bible to prove its ok ,meanwhile, maybe i can search your posts for a punchline for this one?note to Sinosceptic, feel free to call me any name to support your lover.
and now it’s time for my annual bath.
justrecently said
Suggested Experiment: Go to New York, start a blog about your life there and write a well structed poem on the purpose of amusement about how you hate all black men becuz they are smelly and dusty and god shouldn’t have created them. First of all,let’s see if your belief in freedom of speech is strong enough to support to start such experiment.Second of all,if your great sense of humour successfully win you a trophy again, I will bash that Andy best for you at any cost and in any way you want.
Hi Verylate,
this is mostly a matter between Mylaowai and you, but I think that the answer to your experiment is obvious. Just do it, and little will happen. You can open an Anti-Islam shop there if you like, or an Anti-Christian-Right site. It will probably be so eventless that you will stop again soon, out of boredom.
Or a Ku-Klux-Clan website, if you like, which is kind of anti-black, I’ve learned at school. Just enter “Bringing a Message of Hope and Deliverance to White Christian America” into google.com, and you’ll find the KKK’s website (if you can climb across the Chinese Firewall, anyway). I won’t enter its link here because that would probably get my comment caught in the spam filter.
Enjoy your bath!
very late on this post said
of course it exists, that’s why its still a very sensitive issue and the fight against racist will prolly never end. and that exactly shows why making fun of a certain group of people in the way Mylaowai’s poems is not humour.and i dont think you really get what i said,but i dont blame you if you didnt finish reading my reply,cuz it is quite long. you somehow misquoted me by copy and paste, so here,the 3rd one you missed: At last, for my own little curiosity, I wound love to find out, in this experiment which may or may not be started becuz of testicle problem,would any of your bound to exist american fans happen to wear some sort of white mask-hat for some extremely funny theory which has been carried on by generations of great humour since 1600s. so,there we go. he would have lots of “soulmates”, but all those ones that we,morden,civilized(at least trying or claim to be) people do not accept and fight against. so if you agree with me that him writing such poems about chinese is same as writing about blacks in newyork, and gave me such lists of those hateful rascist groups which by the way,i call complete C*nts, my understanding here is that you agree with me that Mylaowai is a racist,and his blog shouldnot be rewarded. cuz none of those groups got a popular award in regular society,but of course,correct me if i am wrong.and go back to Andy Best’s original point: Shame on us! Racist/sexist C*nts do exist,and will always be there,but we readers,net browsers owes responsibilty to our brain. and the thing kinda shocked me a bit was that after Andy Best pointed that out,some people still suported the racist side? I rather did not expect that.and then as if that wasn’t enought already, after Mylaowai posted a reply not really making decent debate,insted, over half of the post was personal attack which had nothing to do with the topic, some people still didn’t see anything wrong with this blogger?and then not long after all these insults and nonsense about foreign douchbag theory,he offered beer at a bar as if nothing happened? seriously,no one notices?
and,i appriciate decent debates, but i do lose my temper once the person turns into personal attacks.but on top of everything, there’s no debate on racism — it does exist,rather badly,in a large scale,and everyone shall be responsible.
justrecently said
my understanding here is that you agree with me that Mylaowai is a racist,and his blog shouldnot be rewarded.
Actually, I don’t think of Mylaowai as particularly racist. I voted for this blog myself, and recommended it to others.
very late on this post said
you recommended it to others? well done. “hey dude,there’s this guy writing about how all chinese people smell,haha,check it out,it even rhyms”. wow,you are hilarious.
as the original debated started with Andy Best’s point being that we cannot change the fact that racist does still exist,but shame on those who read it and liked it. Shame on you.
and what is ur definition of a particularly racist and just a racist? there’s no a little racist,either you do have the thought or you don’t — having a little means you do have it. usually,i would expect a BUT/even tho,right after such sentence like “I don’t think of xxx as particularly xxx”.but hey,you recommended this to others, i don’t count on your intelligence.however,you did get lucky on one point, i dont have enough energy or time to get annoyed at every racist cunt i come across everyday.and i’m just gonna do what Andy Best did which is fucking brilliant — say bye to nutjobs and not let them consume anymore of my time.
2 quick quotes in the end,
first one :
What do you think the biggest all around human fault is?
“That we see patterns that are not there. One of the best things about humans is we recognize patterns, so we get things like science, music, philosophy. One of the worst things is that we see patterns that are not there so we get things like racism, homophobia and Jerry Falwell.”
second one,quoting Andy Best “Thanks for the reply. We’re done then.Bye for now.”
i had a good bath,now it’s time you rinse your brain. cuz the only point in the bus poem would be hygiene is important?
justrecently said
Verylate:
I’ll have a brainwash if I believe I need one. For now, I’m quite happy with my state of mind, and my level of racism. Yes – I am a little bit racist, just as I am sometimes a little bit jealous, horny, lazy, workaholic etc. After all, I’m no reborn Christian, and I believe in progress, rather than in perfection.
That said, my level of racism looks pretty small to me, compared to the level I have often be seen in China.
If the bit of racism you might find in the laowai blogosphere fascinates you, just keep reading, and commenting.
s said
“Actually, I don’t think of Mylaowai as particularly racist. I voted for this blog myself, and recommended it to others.”
hey ..JR my boy, Uncle Adolf again, and I have to admit I’m a bit of a racist (or was if you count me as past tense). Now son, let’s be frank here, me thinks Mr Mylaowai is racist and me thinks you are too.
JR my son, there is really no need to mince your words ..what is a “particularly racist” ? You are either a racist or you are not.
How do I know, you wonder. Well, it takes a racist to spot another racist.
Take this from the ever wise uncle Adolf: be racist and be proud !!!
Take care,
Uncle Adolf
s said
“Yes – I am a little bit racist, just as I am sometimes a little bit jealous, horny, lazy, workaholic etc”
Little horny ??? come on JR, with so much sucking Mr Mylaowai you are still not satisfied ?
you would just ran out of steam, wouldn’t you ?
justrecently said
Dear Adolf,
I think gassing several million people because of their “race” was a bit more racist than Uncle Obama’s white granny’s uneasiness about passing by a black man on the sidewalk. But I can understand that you see no difference there.
Welcome back. I knew you couldn’t resist it. ;)
s said
“Yes – I am a little bit racist, just as I am sometimes a little bit jealous, horny, lazy, workaholic etc”
Little horny ??? come on JR, with so much sucking Mr Mylaowai you are still not satisfied ?
you would just run out of steam, wouldn’t you ?
justrecently said
P.S.: your sexual fantasies are a bit uncool.
justrecently said
You are repeating yourself, as usual.
s said
“That said, my level of racism looks pretty small to me, compared to the level I have often be seen in China.”
This is a bit rich from a German isn’t it ? Guess you never heard of neo-nazis or the National Democratic Party or the hundreds of racial murders and hundreds of thousands of violent crimes since 1990.
There is a bit of Uncle Adolf in everyone of you.
s said
” P.S.: your sexual fantasies are a bit uncool. ”
Oh well, you said you are horny …
You can blame yourself for bringing it up.
MyLaowai said
Dear all: Jews do not belong to a ‘race’, Jews belong to a religion called Judaism. If you want to talk about history, at least do it the favour of getting the facts right.
As for the MyLaowai team, we don’t discriminate on the basis of ‘race’, whatever that is supposed to mean. That said, we have been known to make judgements about people based on their cultural attitudes, personal hygiene (or otherwise), apparent moral fibre (or lack thereof), political beliefs, suitability for employment in my company, criminal record, size of their breasts, whether they drink lager or proper beer, whether or not they know how to mix a proper dry martini, whether they pay their round at the bar, and a whole host of other equally important things.
Seriously, what is this ‘race’ crap that tofu-munchers like to spout off about? Being a trained geneticist and keen anthropologist with a strong background in biology, I always thought we were all Homo sapiens sapiens – yes, even you, Stoogie. Honestly, all this talk about ‘race’ is just small minded bigotry, largely from the people who go on about it the most.
Grow up.
Oh, and VeryLate? I haven’t yet replied properly to you, but I will. I wanted first to think carefully how best to respond without further upsetting either your dear Mr Best, or you, or any of his other girlfriends.
justrecently said
Stoogie:
you are really messing all your threads of thought up. I am talking about my level of racism, not about that of my country. Be careful if you don’t want to start looking like a racist (OMG! What a dirty word!) yourself. I’m neither going to defend or lavishly praise Germany’s records here. All I’m saying is that you might be a bit out of tune with global opinion. But that’s OK – I think both that survey and you are on dope.
In praise of diversity:
JR
s said
mr mylaowai,
listen here pal, there is really no need to justify yourself to me,or for that matter, anyone else, Mr Best and his girlies included.
I have always maintain that it is ok for you or anyone else to discriminate others for being different: straight, gay, far-left, far-right,colour, culture, education, wealth, poor,race, ….. as long as you can take it when others ditch the shits back at you.
I know you don’t normally commit such crime,but your cronies (main nephew Adolf and huffy&puffy from down under), in their eagerness to suck up to you, immediately comes to your defence.
The effect of this makes you look like a bit of a suck hole.
Now Mr Mylaowai, repeat this to yourself n x: I’m a wanker, a hypocrite, a racist in a pig mask.
s said
JR my boy, why go and look for racism in other countries when there a tens of thousands of violent little nazis running around under your eyes at home ? Maybe you never felt threaten by them because you are of the same kind ?
“…bit out of tune with global opinion.”
ok .. lets see …”…continue to show positive views of China’s influence, including large majorities in Ghana , Nigeria, and Central America. A majority in Chile has a favourable view, while Mexicans lean positive , as do Indians”
and you seriously think 1/4 of humanity should give a shit what the frogs, dirty poms, sourkrauts thinks of them ?
MyLaowai said
I do think that the Chinese should care what the people who are trying to drag them out of the Dark Ages think of them. This includes the USA, Canada, the UK, virtually all of Europe, much of South East Asia, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. Why do I think the Chinese should care? Because without the help of these more socially responsible, technologically advanced, and more experienced countries, China would slip back into the Dark Ages (a place that it has occupied for a very long time indeed) within a very short span of time.
That’s something for you to give thought to, Stoogie. Much thought. Don’t go biting the hand that feeds you, or you may find that it stops feeding you altogether.
justrecently said
Now Stoogie, before we discuss tens of thousands of violent little nazis that you see under my eyes, read this and come back with some numbers – or personal impressions – of your own.
Most people in my country take these cases – although not as numerous as you seem to believe – very serious, and they aren’t our internal affairs. Any organization or individual from any place is free to gather information – that’s a prerequisite for trust. I understand that. Just wondering if you do.
s said
Here you go again with the same old tiring crap ..
Oh yeah … the aboriginals in Aust, US, Canada, NZ etc are very grateful to the poms, frogs and virtually all the white Europeans for dragging them out of the Dark ages.
Not to mention the krauts and the Japs not so long ago tried to drag the world out of the Dark ages.
Learning from New Zealand ?
What are you suggesting? They do to sheep what you do to Mrs Mylaowai.
As for your “feeding hand”, Messiah Mylaowai, its only useful purpose is to pull your knob.
s said
so this is just a numbers game to you?
Just because any organisation or individual from any place is free to gather information or comment on the situation somehow exonerate your responsibility to fight against racial prejudice?
I guess you had never been subjected to or felt threaten by any racial abuse, so you go to a foreign land and search for the racial abuses that you heard of but never experienced. But rest assure what you “seen in China” is kid’s stuff compare to what is happening right under your nose.
For any report of violent racial crime committed by neo-nazis are cheered on silently by at least hundreds of thousands if not millions of your average Germans.
And you wonder why Germany is the breeding ground for Nazism.
And you wonder why not so long ago, the whole of Germany was either nazis or nazi sympathisers.
So next time mr mylaowai misbehaves, confront him and no more of this apologetic shit.
So next time the little nazi in you started to come live, don’t try to justify yourself because you felt horny, just go and whack off with your “feeding hand”.
MyLaowai said
You not had yer oats lately, Stoogie?
justrecently said
Tell you what, stoogie: without the numbers, your allegations are nothing to rate the situation in my country. So there’s a reason for me to give you that link. I have lead you to the rivers of knowledge now – and they are easily available from a number of sources. If you drink from them is up to you.
Neddy said
Guys, why do you waste your time talking to this Stoogie poofter, as if he was worth the effort? He’s just a facsimile of intelligent life form; he has nothing to say, nothing to contribute. Just huffing and puffing, heh! A bloated zero who feeds on your taking him too seriously. Ditch him.
justrecently said
I’m a very compassionate man, and always hopeful. I believe that some day, everyone will see the light.
justrecently said
Besides, if this huffing and puffing is his only pleasure in life, wouldn’t it be cruel to deny him the fun?
S said
mr mylaowai,
You reckon you could learn alot from NZ, and they do to sheep what you do to Mrs mylaowai …..
oh my …. is Mrs Mylaowai in fact a SHEEP ???
s said
JR, so you just want to hide behind some numbers, piles of paper reports and the situation is adequately dealt with ?
When you have the National Democratic Party winning elections and getting into parliaments, what does it say about the people who voted them in ?
You want numbers?
In 2005, NDP won 9.2% of vote in the state of Saxony which has a population of 4,321,000.
There you go, there are at least 400K Nazis or nazi sympathisers alone in just one state !!
Now JR my boy, I’ve just shown you the basic skills on reading the meanings behind numbers, you can go and drink from your river of knowledge and work out how many Nazis or nazi sympathisers in the whole of Germany.
And for every one violent racial crime reported, rest assure there are 10 violent racial crime and 100 non-violent racial crime not recorded.
So JR my boy, do you have to go to a foreign land to look for racism now ? and do you have to go to a foreign land and start calling the foreigner nazis?
How could you sleep at nite ?
s said
as for huffy and puffy from down under
Has 95% of your extended relatives, mrs neddy included sent you to an angry management clinic yet ?
And please, a bit of originality..
You must have enjoy me calling you huffy and puffy, this tag is going to stick with you like shits to a blanket.
MyLaowai said
Isn’t it nice though, that the people of Germany can at least vote and be heard?
Mind you, if the people of China could vote, I reckon they’d vote 97% in favour of the Communist Party, as the CCP have long held sacred their ‘virtues’ of ‘racial purity’ and xenophobic discrimination towards non-Han (that’s nearly one point four billion xenophobes in one country alone). Guess we’ll never know for sure though, seeing as how the Party is a jealous God and allows no chance for anyone to vote either way.
Sux to be you, Stoogie. Keep trying for that Aussie passport, lad.
s said
mr mylaowai,
any chance Mrs mylaiwai is also called Dolly ?
justrecently said
Calm down, stoogie. I’m not cold-hearted at all. But the fate of people who become victims of nazi crimes isn’t the issue here. I understand you better than you seem to believe. The issue is that you are using these numbers from my country to defend the Chinese motherland (not sure if it is yours, or if you are just a bit over-identifying yourself with it). And that’s why studying some numbers is in order.
I’m glad to see that you’ve been to the river, although it was apparently a pretty short stay.
Every vote cast for Nazis is one too many, but that’s no reason to throw a big blanket over it and act like if there was nothing. That may be the approach elsewhere, but not here. To solve a problem, we prefer a clear picture.
The percentage of people who cast their vote for the NPD in Saxony was 9.2% indeed. To help you a bit with interpreting this number, let me point out a few things…
a) Not everyone who casts his or her vote for the NPD will attack foreigners.
b) Of the people eligible to vote, only 59% went to the polls.
c) Children don’t vote.
d) The NPD won a share of 9.8% in Baden-Württemberg in 1968. That was when the first generation of Turkish migrants there had settled down – you see, in the long run, the NPD was no success there, so you may be more confident about my country’s future – if you like. I have no intention to deny you the fun of ranting on.
Now, let me share a bit about China with you. As Mylaowai has said, we don’t have reliable numbers from there, as choices there are somewhat limited. But let’s take a glimpse on one of the big Chinese cities:
Some Africans studied there on a Chinese grant, and had Chinese girlfriends. The staff of their dormitory was very upset, and as they were probably a bit bored anyway, they found out the ladies’ home addresses and phoned their parents or other relatives. A Chinese teacher told me that the girls might never return to their home towns, because their families had disowned them. An affair with Chinese classmates on the other hand wouldn’t have been a reason to make long-distance phonecalls to people they didn’t even know personally. You can be sure that this would be no reason to make phonecalls even for most of those people here who vote for Nazis. They would make themselves laughing stock.
OK, stoogie. That was in one of China’s most progressive cities, in one of those cities’ most progressive places (a university). Now, back to the river of knowledge, lad. If you need some more help, just come back.
justrecently said
Re your post #60
If you ever manage to sort this out, I’ll lead you to the river of fun next, stoogie. You need a better sense of humor.
s said
By motherland ? do you mean “Vaterland”?
I should give you the benefit of doubts and reduce the number by a factor of 4. If you are happy with 100K nazi and sympathisers + god knows how many more silent supports in Saxony, and confident in the future of your vaterland, that is fine by me.
s said
mr mylaowai,
i’m glad you are surviving well and living in style among 1.4 billion xenophobes.
may be that was the reason you wear a gorilla suit and pig mask ?
and somehow, you even managed to save a Chinese Dolly that was heading for the hot pots in Xiao Fai Yang …
and what a lovely story it was, our hero mylaowai kissed Dolly and they got married and …
I wish you and Dolly the best and hope your fairy tale continues …
justrecently said
You see, stoogie, that’s the difference between us. Only someone who is a hypocrite like you is happy with things that are wrong in his own country (I take it now that you are Chinese). I’m not happy when something is wrong in my country, and I’m doing my share to make it better (don’t expect further explanations). That’s why I’m at peace with myself and why your obsessive allegations that I am happy with 100K nazi don’t touch me. And this blog here angers you because you are in a state of denial. Start doing things that help you to be more self-confident, and you will be able to handle criticism.
Cheers, JR.
s said
assumptions assumptions assumptions … what makes you think I’m angry? just the thought of Mylaowai and tofu-munching Dolly …
It is bleedingly obvious who is a hypocrite in denial by the way you trivialise the often brutal and violent nature of racism in Europe and the US (“Uncle Obama’s white granny’s uneasiness about passing by a black man on the sidewalk”), I’m sure you would rather be whacked on back of the head by some skin head than a sticky beak ringing you about your daughter’s choice of boy friend.
“don’t expect further explanations”
don’t worry son, i wasn’t expecting anything anyway. You are under no obligation to explain yourself to me or anyone else.
justrecently said
It is bleedingly obvious who is a hypocrite in denial…
I leave this decision to the judgment of any readers who might work their way through these now 67 comments.
s said
now that is not what I call confidence !! Asking mr mylaowai’s fckers to crawl out of the woodwork for support.
justrecently said
As the presence of verylate, Mr Best and you show, the mylaowai blog enjoys a pretty diverse readership. What do you expect, stoogie? A continuation of this debate? I can understand that you can’t get enough from this, as it is an opportunity for you to communicate with real people. But for now, you need to be alone with yourself, as hard as that may be for you. See comment 52. Happy camping-out.
S said
mylaowai is real ?? what is his real name again ?
In praise of… being a China expat | Nanfang Insider said
[…] Sometimes these conversations may have spilled over into self-congratulation and some of us may have fit the description laid out in this song which ridicules English teachers as “losers”. The anti-China blog Mylaowai illustrates this stereotype in more detail in the post “The Decline of the West.” […]