We Welcome Our New Chinese Overlords

[Lavarinth]

All of you need to tone it down about ten notches.

[Mucky]

I do not object to racial humor in general; the point I was trying to make was that people were using it in an effort to derail and divert attention away from my actual arguments because they could not adequately address them.

Point taken.

That is not a fallacy. Ample evidence shows that the Earth is not triangular. If no such evidence existed but rather the facts suggested the contrary, then I would believe that the Earth is triangular. If that were a fallacy, then the statement that 1 and 1 make 2 in base 3 or greater, which is supported by evidence and logic, would also be a fallacy because "[n]o one here can refute" it. This, however, is clearly not so.

The point I was trying to make was drawing the conclusion based on the opponent's inability to refute the premises, rather than on the premises themselves. If I were to claim that I have an invisible pink elephant sitting next to me, and for whatever reason you couldn't refute that claim, does it follow that there is indeed an invisible pink elephant next to me? Just because a statement can't be falsified doesn't mean the argument is always sound.

I thank you for informing me that people on the Internet are generally less susceptible to the advances of reason than they would be in another forum of communication. This will save me much time in the future, I believe.

Glad to be of assistance.

In the future, when people are trolling your posts, realize that a rational force will always lose to an irrational one, and either cease the discussion or join me in posting pictures of animals being lifted by cranes.

[imgwh 591x389]http://img39.imageshack.us/img39/7725/c ... ycrane.jpg[/imgwh]

[IskatuMesk]

THERE IS A CAMEL

AND A CRANE

WHAT THE HELL

[DrumsofWar]

Wow, I can't believe this is still going on.  Anyway, since I have a break from work, I'll give you a pity rebuttal.

You still haven't proved any of your points.  Separation of church and state is far from strong in China and by your own admission, the state runs and sponsors churches.  You also haven't shown how Fulan Gong or persecuted Christians are "separatists" just for insisting that you know, they not get tortured.

Anyway, I'm sensing that you're somehow separating the "Communism" that Mao and Stalin propogated from the "Communism" that Lenin and Deng Xiaoping were proponents of, neither of which is anything close to Marxism.  You're defending the Chinese government, which is composed of the same people who were in charge in Mao's era (even if they were lower echeleon), yet you've said nothing about Mao's crimes or implied that they were somehow an abberation of Chinese Communism.

I've simply stated that all of China's progress is due to Western and capitalist ideas, which is clearly evident.  "To get rich is glorious.", as they say in China.

The only good thing Beijing ever did was stop following their own asinine ideas and slowly start aceding to their own people's demands for progress while unduly profiting from it.

[Pseudonym]

That is not a fallacy. Ample evidence shows that the Earth is not triangular. If no such evidence existed but rather the facts suggested the contrary, then I would believe that the Earth is triangular. If that were a fallacy, then the statement that 1 and 1 make 2 in base 3 or greater, which is supported by evidence and logic, would also be a fallacy because "[n]o one here can refute" it. This, however, is clearly not so.

The point I was trying to make was drawing the conclusion based on the opponent's inability to refute the premises, rather than on the premises themselves. If I were to claim that I have an invisible pink elephant sitting next to me, and for whatever reason you couldn't refute that claim, does it follow that there is indeed an invisible pink elephant next to me? Just because a statement can't be falsified doesn't mean the argument is always sound.

What you say is true, but it does not apply in this case. Someone here might say "China is X," but if I have evidence showing that China is not X, then he has made a false statement. For example, DrumsofWar stated that China imprisons the most people in the world, but in fact, the United States holds that distinction. My argument is, essentially, that his arguments are false, so my arguments can be valid precisely because his statements are falsifiable. On the other hand, I do not have any evidence that shows that for every invisible pink elephant x, x is not sitting next to you.

Wow, I can't believe this is still going on.  Anyway, since I have a break from work, I'll give you a pity rebuttal.

However, it does not surprise me that you continue to dodge the issue of whether you hate China. I shall repeat myself:

Furthermore, DrumsofWar, you can stop pretending to love China now. Not only did you tell those who "disapprove of 'hatred' of China" to "shut the fuck up," but you also are predictably silent when everyone who disagrees with me cannot find a real reason to do so and would rather ignore my points on the basis that apparently, I am writing in Wade-Giles, which I do not even know.

You still haven't proved any of your points.

Really? So I have not proved that China has not “kill[ed] more people than Hitler, the US, the UK, AIDS, and Columbus combined”? I have not proved that the Chinese government’s persecution of Christians amounts to two to three hundred people held in detention each year? I have not proved that the United States, not China, jails the greatest number of people? I have not proved that Chinese investment in Africa has been much more welcome than Western imperialism was? I have not proved that women serve in high positions in the Chinese government?

Separation of church and state is far from strong in China and by your own admission, the state runs and sponsors churches.

Having the state sponsor its own churches from each faith while officially remaining atheist seems just as fair as having the state sponsor no churches from no faiths at all. What do you think?

You also haven't shown how Fulan Gong or persecuted Christians are "separatists" just for insisting that you know, they not get tortured.

If you understood modern China better, you would know that in the 1990s Falun Gong was extremely popular in mainland China and even received several awards from the government (from a Falun Gong site: http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/special_column/recognition.html#china).

In 1999, however, around 10,000 practitioners gathered at Zhongnanhai, the headquarters of the Communist Party, to protest a recent article by a physicist who denounced Falun Gong as dangerous and pseudoscientific. Such a large crowd's ability to enter such a vital area was viewed as a threat by the party, which then began to endorse the notion that Falun Gong is a pseudoscientific, anti-government cult. If you are arguing that Falun Gong does not want to create its own state, you are by all means correct. However, it is not necessary to create a separate state in order to undermine the nation.

As for Catholics who do not belong to state-sponsored churches, they swear allegiance to the Church of Rome, of course, and the People's Republic of China has no diplomatic relations with the Holy See. One can easily see how this leads to problems.

Anyway, I'm sensing that you're somehow separating the "Communism" that Mao and Stalin propogated from the "Communism" that Lenin and Deng Xiaoping were proponents of, neither of which is anything close to Marxism.

All political systems have their excesses, some more than others, but the examples you mentioned have both been, on the whole, necessary in preserving unity, stability, and prosperity.

Regarding classical Marxism:

As for Communist ideology, which I take to mean dialectical materialism, the class struggle, alienation and exploitation, international revolution, the dictatorship of the proletariat, etc., I do not mention it.

You're defending the Chinese government, which is composed of the same people who were in charge in Mao's era (even if they were lower echeleon),

We have gone through this already:

The people in charge in Beijing are the EXACT SAME PEOPLE who caused the massive body count 40 years ago

Again, you let your hatred of China blind you to the facts.

Fact:

The leaders of China during the Cultural Revolution were Mao Zedong and the Gang of Four, consisting of Mao's wife Jiang Qing, Zhang Chunqiao, Yao Wenyuan, and Wang Hongwen. Mao died in 1976. Jiang, Zhang, Yao, and Wang were imprisoned later that year. Jiang died in 1991, Wang in 1992, and Zhang and Yao in 2005.

Fact:

The current leaders of China are Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao. Hu and Wen were both born in 1942, making them 24 years old when the Cultural Revolution began and 34 when it ended. They both worked as engineers during this period.

Hu's father was actually denounced during the revolution (http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia-pacific/2007/10/2008525172536374792.html), and Wen was actually one of the reformers with Zhao Ziyang, who sided with the students during the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 (the man in black: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/04/Zhao.jpg).

yet you've said nothing about Mao's crimes or implied that they were somehow an abberation of Chinese Communism.

Did you read my first post?

Do you understand that the Communists in China killed up to 2 to 8 million of their own people in the Cultural Revolution with bloody purges of anyone deemed to be an enemy of the state (including other Communists) and caused the deaths of another 3 to 8 million by starvation during the Great Leap Foward by forcing all farmers to collectively send their wheat to the government which would redistribute it to them?  (Some farmers who tried to hide food in order to survive were arrested and killed with many peasants resorting to killing their own family members to survive.)

The actual number of people killed as a result of Communist policies in China is probably higher than that. Various sources (listed here: http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/warstat1.htm#Mao) attribute 20 to 80 million deaths to the purges, the famine of the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, and the labor camps, with a median death toll of around 40 million people.

I've simply stated that all of China's progress is due to Western and capitalist ideas, which is clearly evident.  "To get rich is glorious.", as they say in China.

How is that "clearly evident"? If it were true, could you answer these questions?

Right, because Confucianism, Daoism, paper, and socialism with Chinese characteristics are totally Western ideas... Do you even realize that Communism is a Western idea? I guess the Western ideas really triumphed in the recent financial crisis...

Furthermore, if China has had such an influx of Western ideas, why do you continue to portray it as a giant Maoist labor camp?

The only good thing Beijing ever did was stop following their own asinine ideas and slowly start aceding to their own people's demands for progress while unduly profiting from it.

So you are saying if China had a revolution tomorrow, everyone would be much better off a year from now? Also, it is not like the Western governments do not "unduly profit" from their people, especially in an economic sense. Who do you think works harder? Barack Obama or Hu Jintao? Joe Biden or Wen Jiabao? Yet who do you think makes more money and takes longer vacations?

[thebrowncloud]

I would like to formally apologize for all my dealings in this thread and remove myself from this discussion. I was being an ass and don't wish to continue being one anymore. Again, sorry for my input. 

[DrumsofWar]

The President doesn't have to "work hard" since America is not a dictatorship, while China certainly was under the Communist regime for quite some time.  A chief executive's job is to delegate and oversee, as well as conduct daily meetings.  (Just check the White House's daily Youtube feed and you'll see he has to attend several meetings across the world every single day.)

Anyway, I still do happen to hold that Communism, maybe not as envisioned by Marx but certainly as realized in Moscow and Beijing, as one of the worst things to happen in human history.  By direct body count compared to Western imperialism (Most place the number of Amerindians, Africans, and Indians killed by the US and UK's centuries of expansion at several million at best), Hitler's Hoolocaust, and Columbus' direct killing of the Arawaks, Communism outdaunts them.  (Sorry, I'm not counting military conflicts here since you can easily blame any of the 4 sides in World War II for causing it.)  You can't attribute nearly the loss of perhaps as many as 28 million lives to an "excess of the political system", as you put it. 

China has jailed the most amount of people by both percentage and raw numbers and has killed 100 times more people by execution per year than the US ever did at its peak.

Like I said, you can point out whatever problems there are in the West, and there certainly are a lot of problems and a lot of blood on our hands, but it's come with progress while Communism only brings the former.  Communism, as it was interpreted by Mao, stunted China's growth by decades and it's only beginning to recover now thanks to embracing a more Western economy and more openness in society as well as government.

Feel free to accuse me of hating China all you like but here in America, we are able to separate dissent with government from vitriolic hate against a people.

[Negi]

I would like to formally apologize for all my dealings in this thread and remove myself from this discussion. I was being an ass and don't wish to continue being one anymore. Again, sorry for my input. 

Shut the hell up, you fucking italian homosexual.  I spit on you and your entire family. 

Also, DoW, not only do I hate the chinese government, I also hate all chinese people, vitriolically in fact.  So  I mean, you can't separate the two from me.

[Rocco]

I would like to formally apologize for all my dealings in this thread and remove myself from this discussion. I was being an ass and don't wish to continue being one anymore. Again, sorry for my input. 

Shut the hell up, you fucking italian homosexual.  I spit on you and your entire family. 

Also, DoW, not only do I hate the chinese government, I also hate all chinese people, vitriolically in fact.  So  I mean, you can't separate the two from me.

You hate Italians too?

[Negi]

Guilty as charged.  However, there's nobody whom I hate more than the irish.

[Rocco]

And what ethnicity might you be sir?

[IskatuMesk]

Hey Pseudonym, If you're the same nym I know...

Where the hell are you? I've been waiting for you on msn for weeks. You have status updates to report, geez.

If not...

Please tell our Chinese Restaurants to stop trying to kill me.

[Negi]

And what ethnicity might you be sir?

JEW

[mAc Chaos]

I don't even know what those two are even arguing about.  What is the central point being argued over?  It just sounds like a bunch of random disconnected arguments that don't add up to anything.

[Pseudonym]

The President doesn't have to "work hard" since America is not a dictatorship, while China certainly was under the Communist regime for quite some time.

So by your logic, Kim Jong-il is the hardest working politician in the world and most certainly not a somewhat deranged hedonist who has "live lobsters and roasted donkey -- reportedly the North Korean leader's favorite food -- flown out to supply the train each day" while he was traveling? (source: http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/09/09/nkorea.kim/)

A chief executive's job is to delegate and oversee, as well as conduct daily meetings.  (Just check the White House's daily Youtube feed and you'll see he has to attend several meetings across the world every single day.)

Now I know why you tend not to cite sources: the ones you find usually turn out to be inconsistent with your arguments!

http://www.youtube.com/user/whitehouse

Activities of the past day:

"The President welcomes Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore to the White House"

"The President speaks to small business owners"

"Energy Secretary Steven Chu hosts a forum with clean energy stakeholders from across the country"

"The President speaks about the importance of signing the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act"

"The President recognizes the accomplishments of former Senator Edward William Brooke"

Not even one meeting "across the world," let alone "several."

Anyway, I still do happen to hold that Communism, maybe not as envisioned by Marx but certainly as realized in Moscow and Beijing, as one of the worst things to happen in human history.  By direct body count compared to Western imperialism (Most place the number of Amerindians, Africans, and Indians killed by the US and UK's centuries of expansion at several million at best), Hitler's Hoolocaust, and Columbus' direct killing of the Arawaks, Communism outdaunts them. (Sorry, I'm not counting military conflicts here since you can easily blame any of the 4 sides in World War II for causing it.)  You can't attribute nearly the loss of perhaps as many as 28 million lives to an "excess of the political system", as you put it.

You are incorrect, since I stated twice that I did not include military deaths in my counts. Also, I would like to see any historian claim that China, Poland, France, Britain, the Soviet Union, or the United States started World War II instead of Germany and Japan and still be taken seriously.

China has jailed the most amount of people by both percentage and raw numbers

Again, you are incorrect, as I have already pointed out: "The United States has, for instance, 2.3 million criminals behind bars, more than any other nation, according to data maintained by the International Center for Prison Studies at King's College London. China, which is four times more populous than the United States, is a distant second, with 1.6 million people in prison" (source: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/23/world/americas/23iht-23prison.12253738.html).

and has killed 100 times more people by execution per year than the US ever did at its peak.

I fail to see how and why you use this fact to condemn China. Texas executes more people than any other United States state, so do you mean to say that Texas is the most brutal, dictatorial, and communistic state?

Like I said, you can point out whatever problems there are in the West, and there certainly are a lot of problems and a lot of blood on our hands, but it's come with progress while Communism only brings the former.  Communism, as it was interpreted by Mao, stunted China's growth by decades and it's only beginning to recover now thanks to embracing a more Western economy and more openness in society as well as government.

Of course, China has adopted elements of Western thinking for the better. I am not denying this; in fact, I am arguing for it when I say Chinese society is not as uniform and the Chinese people not as brainwashed as you would like to think. However, the assertions that "Communism only brings" problems and that all of China's progress is due to Western influence are blatantly untrue.

First of all, you might think Mao heavily "stunted China's growth" by noting that while China, Japan, and South Korea all emerged from the Second World War in ashes, the latter two are far ahead of China today. However, you do not take into account the effects of the Chinese Civil War, which lasted until 1949, and the fact that the United States gave massive amounts of aid to Japan and South Korea while neglecting China from 1949 to 1979. Also, you seem not to realize that China is incredibly immense and that much of her people live in rural areas. Industrialization and modernization are inevitably slower. For example, India is well known as the world's largest democracy, so why is it lagging behind China? Furthermore, it was Communism that transformed Russia from a nation defeated by tiny Japan in 1905 into the industrial powerhouse that doomed the Third Reich in 1945 and afterward into a superpower feared and respected by all.

Second, China gained nothing from Western influence between the start of the Opium Wars in 1839 and Deng Xiaoping's reforms in 1979, a period of 140 years. The only legacies of these years were humiliation, civil strife, famine, disastrous and imperialistic "spheres of influence," "unequal treaties" and extraterritorial rights, colonialism, the plundering of national resources and treasures, sanction, rebellion, revolt, and war. No one ought to forget this when suggesting that foreign powers meddle in China's affairs, especially those who do so on supposed moral and humanitarian grounds.

Feel free to accuse me of hating China all you like but here in America, we are able to separate dissent with government from vitriolic hate against a people.

Just because you can does not mean you do.

Hey Pseudonym, If you're the same nym I know...

Where the hell are you? I've been waiting for you on msn for weeks. You have status updates to report, geez.

I do not know who you are.

If not...

Please tell our Chinese Restaurants to stop trying to kill me.

The Chinese restaurants in North America do not even serve authentic Chinese cuisine. No one eats General Tso's chicken in China. Chinese restaurants are not killing you; your preference for unhealthy foods such as General Tso's chicken (and McDonald's, KFC, Taco Bell, etc.) is.