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It's the same narrative all over again. When no strong arguments are present to defend a viewpoint, the topic suddenly becomes a "cultural" thing. Sounding smart and mysterious. In Russia, it's "the Russian way", in China it is "the Chinese way" etc. It's just BS.

What you have just said is very postmodern and the meta-narrative (or meta-sentiment) could be applied to virtually anything. I was merely trying to shift the focus of the heated discussion here as things were getting homogenous and reddit-like.

so a specific example then -- in your opinion is putting ca one million Uighurs and Kazakhs into internment camps compatible with the 'Chinese way'?

I was born in the USSR and it also had it's "own way". And it didn't resist even 70 years. The elephants in the room mentioned by others in the comments are all "meta" things at the highest level of human cognition: basic human rights, freedom of expression, religion, overall civil liberties are all above any "<insert nation> ways". Cultural differences are just irrelevant here.

Huh. Claiming that there are no valid outer narrative is postmodern.

That is the central problem of the postmodern. It is a framework that inevitably dismisses itself when you go enough meta-level up.

I don't see why it dismisses itself. It asks questions, it's just philosophy at that point and the good old epistemological questions. But the first and second order thinking it encourages is a perfectly useful framework.

It helps understand situations vastly different from ours, but it doesn't dismiss your own core values.

It's probably a good postmodern conclusion that truly understanding the Chinese way is impossible without actually being completely in it, but at that point you are again too biased. But that doesn't mean that without a full immersion we can't gain valid insights about it. We can. We are perfectly aware of the big picture, we have seen it hundreds of times by now in various countries (and proto-countries) over the last few thousand years.

> Anyway I'm fascinated by all the comments here, none of which discussed the cultural and sociopolitical differences between that of the west and that of China

To be fair, you don't describe any particular difference yourself in the following paragraph. You say these cultural differences can't be defined and simultaneously expect us to discuss them.¿

The fact is, there are plenty of businesses who have successfully navigated the cultural and political waters of China-Western relations. Maybe it's not the right time for YC - that's fine.

I think we all understand that dealings between the West and China are complicated, to say the least, by cultural, language, and historic differences. That is why we look to the best of us to reach across these differences and make deals so that we can all prosper rather than be left behind as the rest of the world moves on.

It is possible. Just extremely hard. And I will love to write a book about it after I have gone through a good amount of papers on cultural theories and had a good amount of interaction with Chinese of all walks of life so to have a better grasp of "the Chinese way" and somehow utilise the very knowledge of it in my new start-up to make Vsauce-inspired Chinese videos on liberal arts, philosophy, science and tech for Chinese audience (and hopefully go viral) and build a "quality content marketplace" where people in China get to directly connect with local and oversea creatives and they can sponsor these creatives to make explanatory videos on things, etc. The business model would have to follow "the Chinese way" and I'll need to conduct more experiments.

This does not do much to clarify.

Which person in Chinese history has had the most influence on your perspective of the "Chinese way"?

That is an interesting question, unfortunately I would say probably no one. "The Chinese way" that I'm talking about here is a contemporary phenomenon that has enabled the Chinese economy to thrive in the last 30 years, which is what makes it more interesting economically speaking than, say, "the Russian way". Basically it is about how the 1.3-billion-people system works and evolves to be more efficient over the years, macro-economically as much as micro-economically. And this is where culture theories come in. Ultimately, it is cultures that govern how people act and think in groups. Cultures towards interpersonal relationships, work-life balance, technology, infrastructure, human right, cynicism, dignity or 面子, how to navigate in grey area, irony and sarcasm, criticism, hierarchy, what roles authority play, how to game the system, etc. Of course, there are also the social-political aspects that arise from it, etc.

Recently I stumbled upon a Zhihu post (Zhihu is basically Quora in China) discussing about Vox: "What do you think about the Youtube channel Vox" (https://www.zhihu.com/question/314185948) filled with opinions accusing Vox of slandering (抹黑）China in a malevolent (恶意）manner. And the accusations regarding the biasness of Vox were in no way unbiased themselves, commingled with comments on how bad the content quality of all Vox's videos are. If you think this is just pure propaganda or some sort of communist bot commentary then you are taking the simpler path out of this, and people in China would probably find it to be disrespectful. These Chinese comments reflect the general view of people in China who are exposed to Western media that would otherwise be censored without the use of VPN. These people support the government by their hearts and they believe in the government and the surrounding ideologies. There is a somewhat modernist honesty in it. This is why people actually get agitated when the government is being criticised in ways they condemn as "pure slandering". You may be tempted to call out bigotry and label these people as having been brainwashed but from their point of view the same label and description can be applied to people in the West. And epistemologically what is brainwash but just another Freudian invention from the time of bigotry? And what is bigotry really but closed-mindedness? My point is that this is a very complex social-political situation of the 21st century. And some aspects of it certainly have direct impact on consumer behaviours - we have seen that with the boycotting of Dolce & Gabbana. And some aspects of it influence business processes too, and what it means to be professional, and how politics plays or not plays out in a working environment, etc. There are just a lot more to it than what you see on the surface. I have denoted the central mechanism to be cultural but in many ways it is behavioural and psychological as much as linguistic and philosophical. And out of all these the most fascinating is that - let it be a bubble or not - the Chinese economy has been doing extremely well over the past few decades with crazy growth rate and my prediction is that they would continue to do well in the next many decades or so until some sort of a Nash equilibrium is reached. Not only would "the Chinese way" continue to work, it would be more and more relevant in the future, especially to people in the West that will increasingly be affected by it as the world gets ever more interconnected.

By understanding more about "the Chinese way", and by having a better appreciation for it, people in both the East and the West would have a much more accurate view of how not just China but the world works. As much as "the Chinese way" is about China it is also about pragmatism and a deviation from Western ideologies.

It just came to me that there was indeed someone in contemporary history that had the most influence on my perspective of "the Chinese way". That would definitely have to be Lee Kuan Yew. Not exactly a Chinese in terms of nationality, but he sure knew profoundly lots about "the Chinese way" in contemporary China. I highly recommend his book One Man's View of the World where there is a chapter if not a couple of them on China.

>a contemporary phenomenon that has enabled the Chinese economy to thrive in the last 30 years, which is what makes it more interesting economically speaking than, say, "the Russian way".

You mean the Russia where per-capita GDP (both nominal and adjusted for purchasing power) is higher than China's?

> The Chinese government is one thing. But "the Chinese way" is another thing. And "the Chinese way" actually underlines how the Chinese society works and how the Chinese government functions.

"The Chinese Way" is a cop out, it points out the cultural differences between the West and China, but that does not change the fundamentals of political ideologies. Fascist and authoritarian regimes, all, justify their actions through the proxy of cultural differences.

It is not right to shut down discussion about political climates by reducing it to a non-negotiable argument, i.e. the other party does not understand "The Chinese Way" or they will never know the history of China. There are plenty of non-Chinese historians arounds the world who have studied China deeply, academically and by experience such as expats including myself who have spent significant time in China. We know "The Chinese Way".

> The Chinese government is one thing.

No, that's the elephant in the room here, don't be so quick to dismiss it. Ask yourself this - "Would I feel threatened to criticize the Chinese government publicly while I am in China?" If the answer is yes, you either A) Took allegiance to the Chinese nationalism B) or afraid to speak out. If it is B, then it is time to move out of China before it is too late.

> It dismisses, insults the argument that is pertaining to human rights, freedom of press, justice, freedom of speech, liberty, right to vote - some of the pillars of Democracy.

The more fundamental question here is: What if the modernist's definition of democracy which you have just laid out is extremely one-sided and full of grey areas and, when implemented into a society accordingly, would be full of vulnerabilities to be exploited for things the very ideology opposes?

> It is not right to shut down discussion about political climates by reducing it to a non-negotiable argument, i.e. the other party does not understand "The Chinese Way" or they will never know the history of China.

Firstly, I don't see how reducing an argument into a different form would end up "shutting down discussion". Secondly, this is not a non-negotiable form, actually it opens up more areas for research and there are many questions to be asked and answered such as "how does metamodernism manifest itself as we see a ~800% increase in middle class in China between 2000 and 2018"?

Also, read about the history of China so you can be more informed before discussing about China? I don't understand what do you mean by "they will never know the history of China".

> There are plenty of non-Chinese historians arounds the world who have studied China deeply, academically and by experience such as expats.

Exactly. So go read some books about the history of China. Or read a paper, say, about postmodernism in China. It really helps to put things in a different perspective.

The thing is that nowadays comments on HN have certainly diluted.

> No, that's the elephant in the room here, don't be so quick to dismiss it. Ask yourself this - "Would I feel threatened to criticize the Chinese government publicly while I am in China?" If the answer is yes, you either A) Took allegiance to the Chinese nationalism B) or afraid to speak out. If it is B, then it is time to move out of China before it is too late.

When you put people into two polar categories you are basically radicalising them just like on any other social media. The problem here is that "speaking out" doesn't change a damn thing. And it never will. Not in China. Not in the States. If you want to improve the system you first understand how the system works, then work hard and do things that will improve the system. When "speaking out" works that is merely an indication that the system has evolved and changed over the years. When LaToya Jackson spoke out in the 90s did it work? No, and that's because "the system" was still fucked. Criticising is only useful when it actually influences something. Otherwise you are just playing the devil's advocate in a Nash equilibrium that is not in favour of your proposition. And then there is the question: what is the proposition really? Can it be fine-tuned to satisfy the people's needs without shaking up too much the status quote, the legacy code? Ultimately I believe it is about improving people's lives. And it's a constraint satisfaction problem.

I agree: read books about China. Books like "Mao's Great Famine: The History of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958-1962" by Frank Dikotter, and "The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression" by Courtois et. al.

These are books you are unlikely to be able to read in China, and not because reading history does not comport with some imagined "Chinese way" but rather because the truth is threatening to totalitarians.

Preposterous to say that "speaking out" doesn't change a damn thing. So let's ignore the history of the entire world about "speaking out". Let's ignore struggle of every country that gained independence, let's ignore Martin Luther King, Gandhi, Nelson Mendela. Let's ignore the idea of free press.

I think you're circling around the main argument about authoritarian regimes and despite of evidence in front of you, some how twisting words to either avoid discussing the nature of authoritarism or subscribed to the Chinese government propaganda. Honestly, I plead you to sit down, and question the consequences of an impossibly powerful government ruling almost a billion people without representation. It is not about cultural differences, it is about co-existence of multiple cultures around the world in peace. Lately, the Chinese government is supressing free speech and using financial leverage to shut voices down - outside of China. Instead, you're arguging about what's the point of free speech which is worryingly obtuse.

Mother nature doesn't given a shit about these politicians, you're intelligent enough to not subscribe to propaganda. We have so many seconds to spend on this pale blue dot - let's do it peacefully, respectfully and with strong ideals about freedom, liberty and justice. Politicians are using nationalism to gain power over public, tapping into human psyche to rally up support. Question authority fearlessly.

We need an anti-nationalism movement on the world stage.

> The problem here is that "speaking out" doesn't change a damn thing. And it never will. Not in China. Not in the States.

Aren't you doing exactly that right now? "speaking out" on Hacker News against people you disagree with?

> Criticising is only useful when it actually influenced something.

Of course. And countries with freedom of speech allows criticism to be influential.

> Aren't you doing exactly that right now? "speaking out" on Hacker News against people you disagree with?

>> If you want to improve the system you first understand how the system works, then work hard and do things that will improve the system.

>> Criticising is only useful when it actually influences something.

The trick is to achieve system understanding first. On Hacker News, the system is set up to reward intellectually stimulating arguments, e.g. taking a systemic view of social phenomena. Since there are at least some open-minded people here, that kind of criticism may actually influence something.

To effectively "speak out" on China, you need an entirely different skillset, including being able to reference a large corpus of shared knowledge that most people on HN are probably unaware of.

Since China does not yet allow criticism to be very influential, it is likely that the effort invested into criticism would be better spent, for now, on increasing the likelihood that future criticism will be influential. There are many possible ways to do that; it appears the person you're replying to has settled on a particular one I don't quite understand yet.

I like your grey area analogy. Why do we constantly feel the need to validate our own personal point of view as the only correct solution while completely ignoring or even considering the potential from an opposite angle?

Even in the worst scenario in which the opposite side could be in the wrong, but surely there must be at least a few good things come out of it. We ought to focus on those details. Our world is indeed full of grey areas, but human nature just tends to default to a black and white, us vs. them mentality. It probably helps to strengthen our individual identity, yet it hinders and limits our full potential at the same time.

Even the strongest ideology will never stand the test of time as it is only created by humans, for it must constantly evolve or be replaced by another one due to human limited life expectancy. It can never be true forever in a dynamically changing world.

The key to intelligence is being able to hold two opposing ideas together in our minds while still function perfectly well at the same time. This, by the way, is a teaching that comes from the West.

Genuinely curious, what is "the Chinese way"?

An ineffable, inexplicable thing, bound up in the mystery of 5000+ years of culture, that you can only understand if you are Han Chinese, as they are above the rest of us humans.

It's funny cause any specific "Chinese way" that might have existed during these thousands of years was inherently crushed in the second half of the 19th century. I mean, the party that runs the whole thing is the "cultural" creation of some European idealists who lived in the 19th century (from Saint-Simon and Fourier going to Marx and Engels). Not to mention that the Taiping Rebellion, which was to blame for the death of 10 to 20 million people, was the result of a Chinese farmer who thought of himself as Jesus Christ, partly as the result of interacting with an American baptist priest [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Issachar_Jacox_Roberts

That's exactly the point people are trying to make, just not so eloquently! (So in that sense I could say "woosh", because the parent comment sarcastically pointed out that the only valid way to understand it - as claimed by the CCP - happens to be only available to them, yet analytically it's just as easily deconstructed as any other totalitarian state, and not even completely new brand at that, because it's still very recognizably follows the "revolutionist" doctrine.)

However, at the same time people rightly point out that sure, it's totalitarian and rooted in socialism and whatever it was around in the 1920s, but it's full of Chinese characteristics. And ... somehow this makes it very indecipherable, and a-okay, and not a big human rights crisis. :|

So what exactly is the Chinese Way other than something Westerners can't grasp?