Friendly Foreign Influencers Win Growing Following in China
In a new report, ASPI said influencers were part of a Chinese strategy of “market-enabled propaganda production” that was “likely to have significant implications for the global information landscape”.
Scores of videos posted by foreign influencers reveal a consistent pattern. Almost anything Chinese — food, culture, society, infrastructure, government policies — is held up for praise. Sharp criticism is reserved for the western media, western society and even some western products.
If they don’t say good things about China or how they enjoy being here, these foreign influencers will not be able to gain popularity in China. Nor will they gain any commercial value.
The ASPI report said competitions hosted by official bodies or state-run media companies were one common way of motivating some foreign influencers, with prize money worth tens of thousands of renminbi.
In a new report, ASPI said influencers were part of a Chinese strategy of “market-enabled propaganda production” that was “likely to have significant implications for the global information landscape”.
Scores of videos posted by foreign influencers reveal a consistent pattern. Almost anything Chinese — food, culture, society, infrastructure, government policies — is held up for praise. Sharp criticism is reserved for the western media, western society and even some western products.
If they don’t say good things about China or how they enjoy being here, these foreign influencers will not be able to gain popularity in China. Nor will they gain any commercial value.
The ASPI report said competitions hosted by official bodies or state-run media companies were one common way of motivating some foreign influencers, with prize money worth tens of thousands of renminbi.
What’s behind China’s mysterious wave of childhood pneumonia?
The rebound in common respiratory diseases during the first winter after the loosening of pandemic measures — such as mask-wearing and travel restrictions — has been a familiar pattern in other countries. In November 2022, the number of people hospitalized with flu in the United States was the highest it had been for that time of year since 2010.
Nationwide lockdowns and other measures implemented to slow the spread of COVID-19 prevented seasonal pathogens from circulating, giving people less opportunity to build up immunity against these microorganisms, a phenomenon known as ‘immunity debt’
Although pneumonia caused by the bacterium is usually treated with antibiotics known as macrolides, an overreliance on these drugs has led to the pathogen developing resistance. Studies show that resistance rates of M. pneumoniae to macrolides in Beijing are between 70% and 90%. This resistance might be contributing to this year’s high levels of hospitalization from M. pneumoniae, because it can hinder treatment and slow recovery from bacterial pneumonia infections, says Cowling.
The rebound in common respiratory diseases during the first winter after the loosening of pandemic measures — such as mask-wearing and travel restrictions — has been a familiar pattern in other countries. In November 2022, the number of people hospitalized with flu in the United States was the highest it had been for that time of year since 2010.
Nationwide lockdowns and other measures implemented to slow the spread of COVID-19 prevented seasonal pathogens from circulating, giving people less opportunity to build up immunity against these microorganisms, a phenomenon known as ‘immunity debt’
Although pneumonia caused by the bacterium is usually treated with antibiotics known as macrolides, an overreliance on these drugs has led to the pathogen developing resistance. Studies show that resistance rates of M. pneumoniae to macrolides in Beijing are between 70% and 90%. This resistance might be contributing to this year’s high levels of hospitalization from M. pneumoniae, because it can hinder treatment and slow recovery from bacterial pneumonia infections, says Cowling.
Nature
What’s behind China’s mysterious wave of childhood pneumonia?
Nature - Scientists expected a surge in respiratory disease, but what is happening in China is unusual.
TomBen’s Web Excursions
最近在外调研，与课题直接相关的内容没有什么收获，但这几天的经历可以为 China scholars 提供一点进行田野调查的参考价值，毕竟距离下面这篇论文的发表已经过去了 3 年多，情况又发生了很多变化。 Repressive Experiences among China Scholars: New Evidence from Survey Data 本文考察了中国当前的研究环境及其对国外学术研究带来的影响。通过对全球 500 多名从事中国研究的学者的问卷调查，我们发现政府对外国研究人员的阻挠和干扰是…
Truex, Rory. 2023. “Researching China in Hard Times.” PS: Political Science & Politics, November, 1–3. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1049096523000641.
First, we must recognize that this environment will erode the quality of research on China—to a degree, at least—and we must continue to protect and encourage junior scholars to persist despite these challenges.
Second, we must maintain a commitment to scientific impartiality and resist ideological pressure in the conduct of our research.
Third, we must continue to advocate for exchange with our colleagues in Mainland China, even as that word becomes increasingly unfashionable.
Fourth, and finally, I believe we have an obligation as a field to use our expertise to inform the discourse on China and United States–China relations.
First, we must recognize that this environment will erode the quality of research on China—to a degree, at least—and we must continue to protect and encourage junior scholars to persist despite these challenges.
Second, we must maintain a commitment to scientific impartiality and resist ideological pressure in the conduct of our research.
Third, we must continue to advocate for exchange with our colleagues in Mainland China, even as that word becomes increasingly unfashionable.
Fourth, and finally, I believe we have an obligation as a field to use our expertise to inform the discourse on China and United States–China relations.
Cambridge Core
Researching China in Hard Times | PS: Political Science & Politics | Cambridge Core
Researching China in Hard Times - Volume 57 Issue 1
China: The Anaconda in the Chandelier by Perry Link in 2002
In China’s Mao years you could be detained and persecuted for talking with your neighbor about your cat. The Chinese word for “cat” (mao, high level tone) is a near homonym for the name of the Great Leader (mao, rising tone), and a tip to the police from an eavesdropper who misheard one for the other and took you to be disrespectful could ruin your life.
Such things no longer happen. (You are wrong, Mr. Link)
Yet repression remains an important problem, and its extent and methods are still poorly understood in the West. To appreciate it one must re-visit a dull but fundamental fact: the highest priority of the top leadership of the Communist Party remains, as in the past, not economic development, or a just society, or China’s international standing, or any other goal for the nation as a whole, but its own grip on power.
The Chinese Communist Party rejected these more mechanical methods in favor of an essentially psychological control system that relies primarily on self-censorship. Questions of risk—how far to go, how explicit to be, with whom to ally, and so on—are to be judged by each writer and editor.
By “fear” I do not mean a clear and present sense of panic. I mean a dull, well-entrenched leeriness that people who deal with the Chinese censorship system usually get used to, and eventually accept as part of their natural landscape. But the controlling power of the fear is impressive nonetheless.
Such vagueness is purposeful and has been a fundamental tool in Chinese Communist censorship for decades. It has the following four advantages:
- A vague accusation frightens more people.
- A vague accusation pressures an individual to curtail a wider range of activity.
- A vague accusation is useful in maximizing what can be learned during forced confessions.
- A vague accusation allows arbitrary targeting.
China’s constitution itself illustrates this handy flexibility. It provides that citizens have freedom of speech, of assembly, and of the press. But its preamble also sets down the inviolability of Communist Party rule, Marxism-Leninism-Mao-Zedong-Thought, the dictatorship of the proletariat, and the socialist system. The huge space between these two contradictory poles (both of which, by the way, are poor descriptions of the actual patterns of life in China) gives leaders immense room to be arbitrary while still claiming to be legal.
In sum, the Chinese government’s censorial authority in recent times has resembled not so much a man-eating tiger or fire-snorting dragon as a giant anaconda coiled in an overhead chandelier. Normally the great snake doesn’t move. It doesn’t have to. It feels no need to be clear about its prohibitions. Its constant silent message is “You yourself decide,” after which, more often than not, everyone in its shadow makes his or her large and small adjustments—all quite “naturally.” The Soviet Union, where Stalin’s notion of “engineering the soul” was first pursued, in practice fell far short of what the Chinese Communists have achieved in psychological engineering.
In China’s Mao years you could be detained and persecuted for talking with your neighbor about your cat. The Chinese word for “cat” (mao, high level tone) is a near homonym for the name of the Great Leader (mao, rising tone), and a tip to the police from an eavesdropper who misheard one for the other and took you to be disrespectful could ruin your life.
Such things no longer happen. (You are wrong, Mr. Link)
Yet repression remains an important problem, and its extent and methods are still poorly understood in the West. To appreciate it one must re-visit a dull but fundamental fact: the highest priority of the top leadership of the Communist Party remains, as in the past, not economic development, or a just society, or China’s international standing, or any other goal for the nation as a whole, but its own grip on power.
The Chinese Communist Party rejected these more mechanical methods in favor of an essentially psychological control system that relies primarily on self-censorship. Questions of risk—how far to go, how explicit to be, with whom to ally, and so on—are to be judged by each writer and editor.
By “fear” I do not mean a clear and present sense of panic. I mean a dull, well-entrenched leeriness that people who deal with the Chinese censorship system usually get used to, and eventually accept as part of their natural landscape. But the controlling power of the fear is impressive nonetheless.
Such vagueness is purposeful and has been a fundamental tool in Chinese Communist censorship for decades. It has the following four advantages:
- A vague accusation frightens more people.
- A vague accusation pressures an individual to curtail a wider range of activity.
- A vague accusation is useful in maximizing what can be learned during forced confessions.
- A vague accusation allows arbitrary targeting.
China’s constitution itself illustrates this handy flexibility. It provides that citizens have freedom of speech, of assembly, and of the press. But its preamble also sets down the inviolability of Communist Party rule, Marxism-Leninism-Mao-Zedong-Thought, the dictatorship of the proletariat, and the socialist system. The huge space between these two contradictory poles (both of which, by the way, are poor descriptions of the actual patterns of life in China) gives leaders immense room to be arbitrary while still claiming to be legal.
In sum, the Chinese government’s censorial authority in recent times has resembled not so much a man-eating tiger or fire-snorting dragon as a giant anaconda coiled in an overhead chandelier. Normally the great snake doesn’t move. It doesn’t have to. It feels no need to be clear about its prohibitions. Its constant silent message is “You yourself decide,” after which, more often than not, everyone in its shadow makes his or her large and small adjustments—all quite “naturally.” The Soviet Union, where Stalin’s notion of “engineering the soul” was first pursued, in practice fell far short of what the Chinese Communists have achieved in psychological engineering.
The New York Review of Books
China: The Anaconda in the Chandelier
In China's Mao years you could be detained and persecuted for talking with your neighbor about your cat. The Chinese word for "cat" (mao, high level tone)
外国人说我们好 with Chinese characteristics.
Holz, Carsten A. 2023. “Economic Development in West Sichuan: The Case of Daocheng County.” The China Quarterly, July, 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0305741023000784.
Holz, Carsten A. 2023. “Economic Development in West Sichuan: The Case of Daocheng County.” The China Quarterly, July, 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0305741023000784.
TomBen’s Web Excursions
外国人说我们好 with Chinese characteristics. Holz, Carsten A. 2023. “Economic Development in West Sichuan: The Case of Daocheng County.” The China Quarterly, July, 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0305741023000784.
National Geographic 1931-07 060-1 Jul.pdf
8.9 MB
1931 年 7 月《国家地理杂志》，第 1–65 页为探险家约瑟夫·洛克（Joseph F. Rock）对穿越川西（包括稻城亚丁）的记录 Konka Risumgongba Holy Mountain of the Outlaws。文字看不太清，但可以看看图片。
TomBen’s Web Excursions
腦殘遊記 The Travelogue of Dr. Brain Damages
https://www.tinkin.com/arts/the-travelogue-of-dr-brain-damages
https://www.tinkin.com/arts/the-travelogue-of-dr-brain-damages
KENNETH TIN-KIN HUNG
腦殘遊記 The Travelogue of Dr. Brain Damages ~ KENNETH TIN-KIN HUNG
Installation view at Postmasters Gallery, New York, 2011 ARTIST STATEMENTS: In response to increasingly pervasive and draconian online censorship in China, “The Travelogue of Dr. Brain Damages” examines the role of Kuso culture (惡搞文化/ détournement) and its…
Based on a nationally representative longitudinal survey and using a difference-in-differences identification strategy, we study whether and how the recent anti-corruption campaign in China shapes the body weight and health of public sector employees (PSEs).
We find that the anti-corruption campaign significantly decreased the BMI and overweight rates of PSEs.
Overall, this study offers a novel political economic perspective to shed light on an unintended health consequence of China’s anti-corruption campaign.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2023.11.002
We find that the anti-corruption campaign significantly decreased the BMI and overweight rates of PSEs.
Overall, this study offers a novel political economic perspective to shed light on an unintended health consequence of China’s anti-corruption campaign.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2023.11.002
TomBen’s Web Excursions
No feature After a year of observation, experimentation, and testing, we may have found a careful response to the challenges we face with AI. In fact we ended up doing the opposite of adding ChatGPT. In our next post, we’ll talk about the problems of writing…
iA
iA Writer 7
iA Writer dims the text you paste from AI tools. As you edit ChatGPT's input and make it your own, iA Writer keeps track of what is yours and what isn't.
Forwarded from 每周一书 🎉 (mastergo)
#GitHub
bookget 数字图书馆下载工具，目前支持约50+个数字图书馆。
项目地址 https://github.com/deweizhu/bookget
使用手册 wiki https://github.com/deweizhu/bookget/wiki
bookget 数字图书馆下载工具，目前支持约50+个数字图书馆。
项目地址 https://github.com/deweizhu/bookget
使用手册 wiki https://github.com/deweizhu/bookget/wiki
GitHub
GitHub - deweizhu/bookget: bookget 数字古籍图书下载工具
bookget 数字古籍图书下载工具. Contribute to deweizhu/bookget development by creating an account on GitHub.
何永佶 - 1947 - 從「天下國」到「地緣國家」.pdf
523.6 KB
何永佶. 1947. “從「天下國」到「地緣國家」.” 觀察 2 (19): 12–15.
「天下國」之所謂敎育是權輸「毒夾駡」（dogma），此在我國以前是承繼堯舜禹湯文武的「孔學」，在歐洲中古時是基督教神學，在現代的蘇俄是「馬列主義」。
故真正地緣國家的代表建築物，不是孔廟，不是敎堂，不是銀行，也不是囘敎寺，更不是蘇維埃宮，而是法院（courthouse）。在這種國家裡，最把他們所謂「公道」之一事當一囘事，在那件事上最用心血，最費金錢。
「天下國」之所謂敎育是權輸「毒夾駡」（dogma），此在我國以前是承繼堯舜禹湯文武的「孔學」，在歐洲中古時是基督教神學，在現代的蘇俄是「馬列主義」。
故真正地緣國家的代表建築物，不是孔廟，不是敎堂，不是銀行，也不是囘敎寺，更不是蘇維埃宮，而是法院（courthouse）。在這種國家裡，最把他們所謂「公道」之一事當一囘事，在那件事上最用心血，最費金錢。
Stop saying “there is no decoupling”. There is!
It’s true that the U.S. is buying a lot more Mexican
and Vietnamese-made products that contain a lot of Chinese parts and components. Yes, this is a real thing that is happening.
Money flowing into China appears to be falling, but so much money is exiting China that net FDI into the country has almost completely collapsed.
In the most recent quarter, so much money flowed out of China that net FDI actually went negative for the first time since they started keeping track!
It’s true that the U.S. is buying a lot more Mexican
and Vietnamese-made products that contain a lot of Chinese parts and components. Yes, this is a real thing that is happening.
Money flowing into China appears to be falling, but so much money is exiting China that net FDI into the country has almost completely collapsed.
In the most recent quarter, so much money flowed out of China that net FDI actually went negative for the first time since they started keeping track!
www.noahpinion.blog
Stop saying "there is no decoupling". There is!
Decoupling will take time, and it won't look like the Iron Curtain, but it's happening.
In Nanjing, Hong Kong and Other Chinese Cities, Rapid Urbanisation Is Multiplying a Fear of Death and Belief in Ghosts
The experiences and anxieties of many who live in urban China: elderly parents left without family at the end of their lives; ghosts harming strangers (even leading them to take their own life); a pervasive fear of death; and a strengthening relationship between a fear of ghosts and the real estate market.
There is an assumption that people in cities should be less superstitious than their rural neighbours. But ghostly beliefs are integral to the experience of urban living and rapid urbanisation.
But in all my time in rural China, I never heard anyone complain that their neighbour might be keeping a dead body at home. I never heard anyone say that the fields where they worked – and where their relatives were buried – were ‘haunted’.
I found that funerary practice in urban China differed considerably from that in rural locales. In general, people in rural areas appeared less afraid of death, dead bodies and places of burial than people living in cities.
Rapid urbanisation seems to intensify a fear of death. And this fear eventually leads to the removal of death-related infrastructure from urban areas. Throughout China, cemeteries and funeral homes are constantly relocated away from city centres.
So why are modern Chinese urbanites so afraid of ghosts? Four factors seem important: the separation of life from death in cities, the rise of a ‘stranger’ society and economy, the simultaneous idealisation and shrinking of families, and an increasing number of abandoned or derelict buildings.
What is important to note here is that all four factors are products of urbanisation itself. Urbanisation makes ghosts.
There is also a fifth point, which is distinct from these other factors but still compounds the haunting of modern China: a politics of repression.
A person who helps with the funeral of a relative in a village is a moral person, but those in cities who help with the funerals of strangers for money are to be shunned. Burying ancestors is an act of filial duty; burying strangers and dealing with their ghostly yin energy exposes one to spiritual pollution.
The ghosts from the party’s now-repudiated past – the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution or the Tiananmen Square massacre – must never be mentioned again. But I believe that the totalitarian impulse of the Communist Party regime to banish all spirits other than that of the party itself can only increase the haunting of urban China. We must learn to live with our ghosts rather than repress them.
The experiences and anxieties of many who live in urban China: elderly parents left without family at the end of their lives; ghosts harming strangers (even leading them to take their own life); a pervasive fear of death; and a strengthening relationship between a fear of ghosts and the real estate market.
There is an assumption that people in cities should be less superstitious than their rural neighbours. But ghostly beliefs are integral to the experience of urban living and rapid urbanisation.
But in all my time in rural China, I never heard anyone complain that their neighbour might be keeping a dead body at home. I never heard anyone say that the fields where they worked – and where their relatives were buried – were ‘haunted’.
I found that funerary practice in urban China differed considerably from that in rural locales. In general, people in rural areas appeared less afraid of death, dead bodies and places of burial than people living in cities.
Rapid urbanisation seems to intensify a fear of death. And this fear eventually leads to the removal of death-related infrastructure from urban areas. Throughout China, cemeteries and funeral homes are constantly relocated away from city centres.
So why are modern Chinese urbanites so afraid of ghosts? Four factors seem important: the separation of life from death in cities, the rise of a ‘stranger’ society and economy, the simultaneous idealisation and shrinking of families, and an increasing number of abandoned or derelict buildings.
What is important to note here is that all four factors are products of urbanisation itself. Urbanisation makes ghosts.
There is also a fifth point, which is distinct from these other factors but still compounds the haunting of modern China: a politics of repression.
A person who helps with the funeral of a relative in a village is a moral person, but those in cities who help with the funerals of strangers for money are to be shunned. Burying ancestors is an act of filial duty; burying strangers and dealing with their ghostly yin energy exposes one to spiritual pollution.
The ghosts from the party’s now-repudiated past – the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution or the Tiananmen Square massacre – must never be mentioned again. But I believe that the totalitarian impulse of the Communist Party regime to banish all spirits other than that of the party itself can only increase the haunting of urban China. We must learn to live with our ghosts rather than repress them.
Aeon
The haunting of modern China
In Nanjing, Hong Kong and other Chinese cities, rapid urbanisation is multiplying a fear of death and belief in ghosts
TomBen’s Web Excursions
In Nanjing, Hong Kong and Other Chinese Cities, Rapid Urbanisation Is Multiplying a Fear of Death and Belief in Ghosts The experiences and anxieties of many who live in urban China: elderly parents left without family at the end of their lives; ghosts harming…
Kipnis, Andrew B. 2021. The Funeral of Mr. Wang: Life, Death, and Ghosts in Urbanizing China. Oakland: University of California Press. https://doi.org/10.1525/luminos.105.
In rural China funerals are conducted locally, on village land by village elders. But in urban areas, people have neither land for burials nor elder relatives to conduct funerals. Chinese urbanization, which has increased drastically in recent decades, involves the creation of cemeteries, state-run funeral homes, and small private funerary businesses.
The Funeral of Mr. Wang examines social change in urbanizing China through the lens of funerals, the funerary industry, and practices of memorialization. It analyzes changes in family life, patterns of urban sociality, transformations in economic relations, the politics of memorialization, and the echoes of these changes in beliefs about the dead and ghosts.
In rural China funerals are conducted locally, on village land by village elders. But in urban areas, people have neither land for burials nor elder relatives to conduct funerals. Chinese urbanization, which has increased drastically in recent decades, involves the creation of cemeteries, state-run funeral homes, and small private funerary businesses.
The Funeral of Mr. Wang examines social change in urbanizing China through the lens of funerals, the funerary industry, and practices of memorialization. It analyzes changes in family life, patterns of urban sociality, transformations in economic relations, the politics of memorialization, and the echoes of these changes in beliefs about the dead and ghosts.
luminosoa.org
University of California Press
<p>In rural China funerals are conducted locally, on village land by village elders. But in urban areas, people have neither land for burials nor elder relatives to conduct funerals. Chinese urbanization, which has increased drastically in recent decades…
越哥说电影《过往人生》 Past Lives
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqhWKfERpGQ
14:24 其实，他思念的，或者说喜欢的，还是那个 12 岁的小姑娘。
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqhWKfERpGQ
14:24 其实，他思念的，或者说喜欢的，还是那个 12 岁的小姑娘。
YouTube
【越哥】预定2023年最佳爱情片，口碑无敌，看完之后我想说，它值得！
「越哥说电影」欢迎订阅：https://goo.gl/hc2Q2P
TomBen’s Web Excursions
越哥说电影《过往人生》 Past Lives https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqhWKfERpGQ 14:24 其实，他思念的，或者说喜欢的，还是那个 12 岁的小姑娘。
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