Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

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shiv
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Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by shiv »

I start this thread with some hesitation. Actually there is a lot to observe, document and discuss and I almost don't know where to start.

But let me start with blatant plagiarism from a chapter of my own book - by reproducing a couple of paragraphs after making just one change - I have replaced the word Pakistanis with Chinese
The Chinese, like all other people, display the usual range of human behavioural patterns: joy, sorrow, anger, pain and other emotions which are indistinguishable from anyone else on an individual level. But groups of thousands or millions of people anywhere in the world, who live together in nations tend to develop certain unique patterns of behaviour based on the stresses, experiences and history of their particular society. Sometimes these unique patterns of behaviour are very difficult to recognize, because the behaviour is very much like that of anyone else. Even so, it is worth recognizing minor differences because this knowledge has some value in understanding behaviour, and in negotiation and reaching agreements.

For example, communication between cultures becomes difficult if negotiators from different cultures cannot understand each others’ behaviour. A deep understanding of Japanese culture was required before international agreements could be reached with Japan on the issue of whaling and protection of endangered species of whales. Some cultures, such as Japanese culture have been well studied (41). The important role of saving face and avoiding shame is well recognized, and must be taken into account in negotiation. Another well known example of the consequences of an inability to understand cultural nuances comes from a transcript of a telephone conversation in Arabic between Egyptian President Gamel Abdel Nasser and King Hussein of Jordan when Egyptian forces were being defeated by Israeli forces in 1967. The cultural need to avoid shame forced Nasser to state that his forces were fighting well against their enemy, but King Hussein was unable to understand the nuances by which Nasser hinted that his forces were being defeated. That left Hussein, and Jordan unprepared for their defeat in the war subsequently (42).
I would like to add a caution here. When I say " I want to study your psyche" and I start making observations about you, my observations will invariably be coloured by my own psyche, my biases, and my experiences. I have found this factor to be an important player in the interaction between two people or individuals from two different cultures.

Let me state right up at the outset that the Chinese, in the media and on the internet where I encounter them most frequently come across as boastful and contemptuous of Indians often to the point of being racist. Indians on the other hand are brought up with guiding principles like "Accept all people. Accept your fault first. Improve yourself" etc. Indians are constantly engaged in an internal self correction battle. This is a huge problem in calling out peculiar traits that others may display because we are eager to learn about our faults and correct ourselves and eager to say that we must be accepting of other's beliefs and viewpoints.

In the late 1990s when I first started encountering large numbers of Chinese on the internet it was commonplace to find Indians being referred to as "curry breath" and there were lots of jokes about Indians using computers and have "floppy dicks" - a parody of a mispronunciation that some Indians make. But instead of a robust response to racist comments Indians are prone to go off on a tangent and ask "Are not racist too? Do we not treat people from the NE badly?" My personal response to that is "I friggin well don't so please don't include me in your self flagellating caterwaul" .

The point I am trying to make is that talking about "other people" is fraught with the complication that we will get consumed by guilt and start asking if we don't have the same characteristics ourselves. OF COURSE WE DO. That is what I mean by humans sharing a similar psyche. But it is just that some aspects of behaviour are either encouraged or exaggerated in some groups of people and the discussion should revolve around that and not self flagellation

People have pointed out that the Chinese have a deep sense of inferiority about the west and white skins and non Chinese eyes (no epicanthic fold) . I leave it to others to state what they think about this. I also think that the Chinese may have had a culture of politeness (this is a guess) that was erased by Mao's cultural revolution producing a nation of grabbing boors. I note that the Chinese way of dealing with anything negative about themselves is to shame and mock the other person. There is also a tendency to give finger-wagging lectures.

The combination of inferiority about the west and contempt for the foreigner has resulted in the Chinese aping America assiduously to a level where the Americans themselves acknowledge the Chinese - which is high praise. And that allows the Chinese to be boastful and contemptuous of everyone else - and nowadays even the Americans.

I hope we can have a meaningful exchange of views. And please be wary of people shifting the subject from Chinese behaviour to Indian behaviour.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by disha »

One of the subjects to understand Chinese nationalism leading to Chinese boastfulness turning into Chinese boorishness is from western eyes is - Bruce Lee.

All movies of Bruce Lee were banned by Mao., but post Mao interest surged into all things chinese where the chinese could genuflect.

In one of his movies., there is "no dogs or chinese" sign which is angrily taken down by BL who then goes on to proclaim his chinese identity. Interestingly., the "no dogs or chinese" is extrapolation of chinese myth making from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huangpu_Park. Note that the "no dogs or Indians" was more direct and brutal.

This extrapolation of chinese myth is more an appropriation of wanting to be brutalized by the west since they cannot bring themselves to the view that larger parts of China was conquered and colonized by their own (Manchurian/Korean/Japanese).

For chinese, this is like the psyche of the whore who will want to have a exploitative customer in a 'superior' white rather than their own exploiting them and feeling jealous about the poor cousin who is not thankful to its white exploitative master.

Couple that with this fact: China was defeated in opium wars by English using Indian soldiers., and later brutalized by Japanese which the Chinese could not stop. The same Japanese ran into the Indian wall at Kohima and could go no further. Here the Indians beat the Japanese., which Chinese could not.

A person going through above is afflicted by a mental disorder., a psychiatrist would be able to call out that mental disorder. The same mental disorder afflicts the communist chinese nation.

PS: Normandy was like a walk in park when compared to Kohima.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Agnimitra »

shiv wrote:I also think that the Chinese may have had a culture of politeness (this is a guess) that was erased by Mao's cultural revolution producing a nation of grabbing boors. I note that the Chinese way of dealing with anything negative about themselves is to shame and mock the other person. There is also a tendency to give finger-wagging lectures.
There is a stereotype within China: Northerners are taller, fairer, more aggressive/martial, and more foul tempered; whereas Southerners are smaller made, darker, more diffident/submissive, and far more polite and graceful in their manners.

In this phase of Chinese history, the "northern" type is extolled. Further, they admire the Mongol/Manchu types who ruled them for centuries, who are even more "uber"-aggressive and foul tempered and contemptful. They hated them, but admire them. "Mongol girl" pinups are popular. They want to digest them. Similar with the West, especially Anglos - the Chinese know that the Anglo-Saxons attained to power via unparalleled cruelty, greedy exploitation, and the world's best propaganda machinery.

Another factor is family structure - controlling parents, dominant-submissive relationship style, common for parents to use emotional blackmail (including praising the self-identity and shaming other behaviours or identities). This is common in East Asia, even more pervasively than India, across social class. However, I find that Communism actually loosened this in China, and facilitated the independence of women. And the one-child policy meant that parents began to spoil their children. The behaviour of the current crop is probably due to a combination of both - traditional parent-child relationship dynamic transposed to national-level identity + spoiled child syndrome at a family level.

Generally, Chinese will tell you that to be 'typically Chinese' means to be tenacious about one's goals, and aggressive about it. I've heard it in conversations. OTOH, I've never heard Indians say, "Oh, he is very Indian about it" - never seen that used in a positive sense, though I have heard it used negatively a lot. That's because Chinese educational system and media reinforce a positive national self-image - often falling over into ridiculous racist supremacism, or perpetuating grievances against former invaders.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by shiv »

Thanks for the fascinating inputs. I got the following from a forum lurker:
In Chinese stories
..the same thing when said by a weak person would invite ridicule would elicit belief when a strong person says it. The ideal world in the Chinese worldview is the Law of the Jungle. Where the world is a can of worms sealed so that the worms must eat each other to survive. There seems to be an undercurrent of morbid worship of violence for the most frivolous reasons and how they perceive saying ridiculous things vehemently and without shame is a sign of strength. Coz nobody dare refute them.
This explains Liu's posts to a T. He said completely ludicrous stuff but was expecting to be accepted as strong and that others should shut up. Brilliant stuff
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by A_Gupta »

Google devata yields this:
http://harvardmagazine.com/2012/01/the- ... -good-life
"China is an economic powerhouse, and a rising strategic force. But outsiders often have little sense of the Chinese as people. In Deep China:  The Moral Life of the Person (University of California, $65; $26.95 paper), eight scholars grounded in anthropology and psychiatry examine the inner selves of people who have undergone profound changes in their sense of place, opportunities and circumstances, sexual mores, and more."
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by A_Gupta »

Online book:
http://www.yitseng.net/chinese%20dimens ... ction.html
Last but not least the book seeks to serve as a guide for the wider community to understand the ethnic Chinese, either as neighbours, collea­gues, church members, team members, classmates, partners or simply as friends. It is also useful for anyone involved in retail business, import or export trade, diplomatic missions, government agencies or departments, as long as ethnic Chinese are involved.

The title of the book The Chinese dimensions: Their Roots, Mindset, Psyche is self explanatory. The book seeks to provide a basic understanding of the concepts, often poorly understood in the West. The book adopts a bilingual approach, where the relevant texts are printed in Chinese, with the standard pinyin pronunciation given wherever possible, followed by translation in English.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by shiv »

http://indianexpress.com/article/opinio ... n-4626796/
Arun Prakash writes..
While China looms large in India’s security perspectives, the former does not regard India as a threat — or even a competitor. For Chinese strategists, asymmetry is inherent in such relations; they bluntly advise that rather than obsessing with futile dreams of parity, India must reconcile itself to a subaltern status vis-à-vis China.

In a novel explanation of China’s conduct, American scholar John Garver has termed it an “autistic state”. The analogy refers to an individual whose delusions and fantasies prevent him from comprehending the motivations and emotions of others due to this neurological disorder. For example, there is firm conviction in China that the root causes of the 1962 conflict were India’s “forward policy” and its putative ambition to seize Tibet.

There is also evidence of Chinese schizophrenia. While dismissing India as a weak and effete state, ideologues also vilify it as an ambitious and expansionist power, waiting to avenge its 1962 military defeat. Most irksome to them is India’s “proprietary” attitude towards the Indian Ocean and its growing maritime relations with the US, Japan and Australia.

While China’s self-perception has always been that of a benign and benevolent great power (“Middle Kingdom”), in another example of Freudian self-deception, the Chinese simultaneously nurture a deep-seated “victim mentality” as a relic of China’s subjugation and humiliation by foreign powers during the 19th century. And yet, a strong streak of realism has ensured that China’s post-Civil War leadership retained a crystal clear vision of their aims: Hegemony in Asia, acquisition of nuclear weapons and the incorporation of Tibet into the People’s Republic.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by sanjaykumar »

<POOF> take India discussions off this thread. Keep it clean
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Rudradev »

The Chingadyas have always been small people physically.

After the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, the Chingadyas have become small intellectually and spiritually as well.

So the imperative is stronger than ever for these small people to concoct tall tales and feel better about themselves.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Rudradev »

Xi Jinping gave a tall story to Trump about how Korea is actually a Chingadya land and its inhabitants are Han Chingadyas originally.

This is a funny claim. In fact, Korean (like Japanese and Mongolian) is an "Altaic" family language. It has nothing in common with the sing-song tonal whining of the Chingadya language. Just as Tibetan, an Indic family language, has nothing in common with Chingadya language either.

Also, Xi Jinping's tall claim is based on the notion that historical Korea (Goguryeo) used to dominate Manchuria (Qing). So Manchuria was a vassal of Korea once upon a time. And under the Qing dynasty, China was a vassal of Manchuria (a foreign power dominating the Han Chingadyas). By Chinese logic this makes Koreans part of the Han Chingadya race.

In fact the Hans were the slaves of Qing Manchurians who were in turn the slaves of Goguryeo (Korea).

The contempt Koreans have for Chingadyas can be easily discerned from the word used by Koreans for Han Chinese. Koreans refer to Chinese as "Tae-Nom" (literally, "Dirt People").
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Prem »

Does Chinese mind function like that of Arab Mind 's working paradigm or Pakiesque Dar ul Chingadyas and Dar Ul Barbadiya ? Seems they must have adverse relation with all to convince themselves being special species.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Suraj »

Another note about China, and this is paraphrased from a post in the shiver or die laughing thread:

China is home to the majority of the worst wars ever in history. Almost all major dynasties ended in such horrific warfare that Indians or anyone else cannot wrap their minds around it. As a pop quiz, what were the most destructive wars in history ? WW1 and WW2 ? Well, WW2 was indeed the most, but WW1 is #8, and in between there are nearly half a dozen Chinese wars or wars mostly fought there. Anyone heard of these ?
List of wars by death toll

The Chinese call themselves the Han people. After the Han Dynasty, considered the epitome of Chinese dynasties. It ended in the Three Kingdoms War that killed over 4 million people. The Han immediately followed the Qin dynasty 221-206 BC, i.e. well after the Mauryan Empire united all of India), which Chinese call the founding dynasty. Emperor Qin is stylized in the 2002 movie Hero , but in reality was someone more in the Shah Jahan / Aurangzeb mould. And the thing is, this is seen as a desirable trait by Chinese. The emperor must be powerful to the point of cruelty to hold the country together. The famous Xi'an terracotta warriors are from his tomb. His guardian soldiers and the artists who built the tomb were buried alive with him on his demise.

The Qin themselves were preceded by the Warring States Period, and then followed by the Han after a period of warfare. The Han was followed by the above mentioned Three Kingdoms War, followed by the Jin Dynasty. That was followed by another collapse of the country, and then the Northern/Southern Dynasties. The succeeding Sui and Tang dynasties were probably the only time there was no widespread warfare. The Tang are known for their interaction with the Gupta Empire.

Pretty much every dynasty since the Tang (AD700 or so) has ended in cataclysmic warfare. The Song were destroyed by Genghis Khan, who founded the first non-Han empire - the Yuan Dynasty. They themselves were overrun by the Ming Dynasty, with more killings. The Ming were overrun by the Manchus, a.k.a the Qing Dynasty, again with a horrific death toll. The late Qing Period saw revolt upon revolt wracking up absurd death tolls. Who knows that between ~1840 and 1910, there was about 75 million deaths in revolts in China ? And no, this doesn't count stuff like famines.

The notion of Chinese unity and even politeness and civility has to be questioned. This is a country whose idea of unity is coming together under a sledgehammer central rule and spectacularly blowing apart as that hold weakens, every 200-250 years. Every time that happens, anywhere from 5-50 million die. How does one build civility of interaction in such a culture, where the threat of complete loss of life and property is intrinsically tied to the fortunes of the dynasty in charge. Such a people are going to behave like 'roosters in a pen' as quoted above.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by ramana »

The name China was given by Indians. Sanskrit cina which is cognate of zina
That is the root of historic insecurity.
Later one of the Han Empresses suggested Sinifying the statues of Indo-Bactarian Buddha and popularized Buddhism.
This was to heal the country and society from the mass casualties of the end of Han era.
I got these facts from the Asian Museum of Art in San Francisco.
Mao had great insecurity complex due to this.
He said often India conquered China without sending a single soldier.
What an idiot.
I also think that Buddhism civilized the Chinese society that was suffering from excesses of Sun Tzu nonsense of constant killing to gain marginal advantage.
Buddham Sharanam Gacchami saved them repeatedly.

Sad that the Commies want o go after Falun Gong.


The need for strong center was noted by Hegel in his 'Philosophy of History'

He said China is a state with a nation.
The strong Emperor in Beijing is need for China to exist.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by ramana »

Agree. I too saw that.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by sanjaykumar »

The Ugly Chinaman and the Crisis of Chinese Culture by Bo Yang

I have referenced this work previously


Narrow-mindedness and a lack of altruism can produce an unbalanced personality which constantly wavers between two extremes: a chronic feeling of inferiority, and extreme arrogance. In his inferiority, a Chinese person is a slave; in his arrogance, he is a tyrant. Rarely does he or she have a healthy sense of self-respect. In the inferiority mode, everyone else is better than he is, and the closer he gets to people with influence, the wider his smile becomes. Similarly, in the arrogant mode, no other human being on earth is worth the time of day. The result of these extremes is a strange animal with a split personality.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by shiv »

Suraj wrote:Another note about China, and this is paraphrased from a post in the shiver or die laughing thread:

The notion of Chinese unity and even politeness and civility has to be questioned. This is a country whose idea of unity is coming together under a sledgehammer central rule and spectacularly blowing apart as that hold weakens, every 200-250 years. Every time that happens, anywhere from 5-50 million die. How does one build civility of interaction in such a culture, where the threat of complete loss of life and property is intrinsically tied to the fortunes of the dynasty in charge. Such a people are going to behave like 'roosters in a pen' as quoted above.
I have been getting some great insights from a forum lurker in private. I asked about attitudes to Indians and he takes an analogy from Chinese cultural memes that appear in stories
..the author builds the fantasy world in which the story takes place, a place is always set aside, that typically has no rules, is extremely brutal with no laws or governing authority, and words typically used to describe the place are "Savage Wilderness" , "Desolate regions" "Great Desert" etc. The common point among them? In almost all the cases, the description of the people inhabiting them uses the word "Swarthy". Their typical conception of Indians is that of people with no self respect, because they are polite to everyone and try to repsect everyone. Sort of like a Mediocre person trying to curry favour with strong people. Because all the typical Indian traits, Politeness, Respecting other's points, Being sensitive of other's feelings are typically associated in CHinese stories with a person who is so Pathetically weak that he can not afford to offend anybody. The stories are typically big on this point, that only a person who cannot afford to offend somebody would be polite to them. Otherwise politeness is only shown to equals, people with whom you end up in a stalemate. The typical thinking is iff they cannot afford to offend me, Why the hell should I be polite to them? What can they do except swallows my insults? So when people whose behavior they typically associate with weaklings and cowards (Politeness, treating everybody respectfully) start to challenge them on their "core issues" it kind of rattles them and unhinges them.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by shiv »

More about how Indians come across to them as opposed to Amreekis
typical American attitudes are amplified and glorified. The Ugly American traits, Being disrespectful of Local cultures as tourists, Contempt for those different, are almost always part of typical novels as plot tropes. Where for ex, a visiting dignitary is rude and disrespectful but his hosts are still polite to him and even enthusiastically agree with him, because they cannot afford not to. The parallel to Indians is even more obvious when we take your "Torn Shirt- open fly" example. So, When a typical Chinese who comments on Indian shortcomings sees that Indians rather than chewing him out, seem to agree with him, It reinforces his perception of Indians as trying to curry favor with them by denigrating themselves, So far from the understanding that an Indian expects from a Chinese after that, What one gets is a Chinese being even more ridiculous and overbearing in denigrating India.

Because they think we will not offend them by Daring to contradict them, for we exhibit typical characteristic behaviors they associate with being weaklings. While Derision and contempt is seen as a symbol of a superior people, People whom they cannot afford to offend.Although because now they think themselves equal to Khan, they think they can ride roughshod over all countries because who dares to offend them?
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by shiv »

Another brilliant description of a Chinese cultural meme from the lurker
Th archetype I will describe now is the character of Master/Teacher. The ideal teacher for Indians is Dronacharya, because although he had favorites, he taught everyone equally and everyone was equal as disciples. Not so in Chinese stories where There are grades/hierarchies in disciples. There are IN-name disciples, who are typically naam ke vaaste disciples who do odd jobs. There are personal disciples, who are taught personally by the master and lord over the others and there is a Heritage-Disciple, who inherits everything from the master. He is typically the little emperor who terrorizes everyone, but his master does not stop him from bullying others, because bullying is thought top be a privelege of the strong. If you are weak, you deserve the bullying. People will even say you are responsible for your suffering because you somehow provoked the strong by your mere existence.

The Master does not interfere in bullying inbetween his disciples because he thinks its interfering with their natural growth. That stopping the bullying of a weak person by a strong disciple for the sake of the weak is not worth the risk of adversely affecting the growth of the strong, talented disciple. Parallels to this can be seen in the enormous suffering inflicted by CHinese over many little kids while training them to win olympics. Because the suffering of weak mediocre kids is thought to be okay if it brings forth a strong, talented kid who can win olympics' medals.
..more coming in due course. Let people digest this. It appears that being nice to the Chinese does not work. I now agree that a nuclear doctrine of first strike is essential for the Chinese. I bet we appear like wimps to them with our NFU
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Pathik »

May be OT. Just saw a video of a small baby run over by two cars in China, luckily the baby survived. Few years ago saw a person run over by a car and passers by just going about their business normally. Is this some kind of a phenomena chinese behaviour is turning into? Does godlessness/non-dharma lead to heartlessness?
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Pathik »

In Australia, a lot of Chinese immigrants are well into their 3rd or 4th generations and arguably one of the richest communities around given their business networking and under the table manners. Will give their older generations the hard work part though. Few observations from some Oz cities:
1. The Chinese arrive and infest towns and businesses like locusts. They have a massive community network to help each other out and the new arrivals as well. Have seen chinese groups walking about town with a diary and a pen noting down offices for sale and business opportunities. They share accommodations to help each other to the tune of 20 people cramped into small rooms including the kitchens and bathrooms.
2. Looks like the chinese government helps the mass imigrations by pulling the right strings. The Chinese investors are directly responsible for the soaring realty prices in the big cities
3. They have a very strict regime for children though family values are given importance and joint families are common. Chinese parents are more strict than indian parents when it comes to careers, studies, musical or sport pursuits and they are taught to be competitive within and outside from a very young age
4. Chinese people are extremely brand consious to a very superficial level. An apple store would have a majority of chinese swarming like bees for a new iphone launch. Same goes for all high end brands for handbags, cars, perfumes etc. Its a status symbol between relatives and communities. Diet food, skin colour, height, hair and other apparent things make up their competitive factors for which they strive hard constantly to out do each other.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Hari Seldon »

Wow.

Excellent dhaga. Timely, informative, perspective-changing, to-the-point. PranAms gurus who started this.

I can now see how Mao and Zhou En Lai must've viewed that Buffoon Nehru and his pious panch-sheel polemics.

Heck, every desi PM since Banditji must've further reinforced that perception of docility/spinelessness (even ABV). Reg NM they're still unsure, perhaps.

PRC has purchased parts of our polity (Hint: the commies CPI, CPM etc), our underground (the CPIML or Maovadis) and our neighborhood (Nepal, BD, TSP, SL, Burma, maybe even Bhutan...)

Time to flip on NFU w.r.t. PRC and on the status of Tibet when our sea based deterrent is verified and active. Period. No more pearls before swine, no more civility to cheenis. Period.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by chola »

Pathik wrote:In Australia, a lot of Chinese immigrants are well into their 3rd or 4th generations and arguably one of the richest communities around given their business networking and under the table manners. Will give their older generations the hard work part though. Few observations from some Oz cities:
1. The Chinese arrive and infest towns and businesses like locusts. They have a massive community network to help each other out and the new arrivals as well. Have seen chinese groups walking about town with a diary and a pen noting down offices for sale and business opportunities. They share accommodations to help each other to the tune of 20 people cramped into small rooms including the kitchens and bathrooms.
2. Looks like the chinese government helps the mass imigrations by pulling the right strings. The Chinese investors are directly responsible for the soaring realty prices in the big cities
3. They have a very strict regime for children though family values are given importance and joint families are common. Chinese parents are more strict than indian parents when it comes to careers, studies, musical or sport pursuits and they are taught to be competitive within and outside from a very young age
4. Chinese people are extremely brand consious to a very superficial level. An apple store would have a majority of chinese swarming like bees for a new iphone launch. Same goes for all high end brands for handbags, cars, perfumes etc. Its a status symbol between relatives and communities. Diet food, skin colour, height, hair and other apparent things make up their competitive factors for which they strive hard constantly to out do each other.

Pathik, that is spot on from what I notice. In the US that tide of money is like a tsunami. It is almost obscene. Not just the wealth but number of wealthy. The Street had been falling themselves to tap into.

The parents of my ABC spouse represent another generation where the immigrating chinis were mostly poor from the southern provinces, worked hard to move to the suburbs to raise mostly gora-assimilated kids.

These new ones from the PRC (and from HK and Taiwan) are wealthy from the start and hung up on luxury brands. One chini woman in LA awaiting trial for murdering her boyfriend posted $65 MILLION in bail. Obscene.

One would think they must have emptied a nominally turd world nation like the PRC of money by coming here in such numbers. But trillion dollar initiatives like OBOR means their printing press is putting out plenty more.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by chola »

Root of Chinese boastfulness? The Printing Press.

Without it, they can boast or be arrogant all they want and nobody would give a chit.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Kashi »

shiv wrote: Their typical conception of Indians is that of people with no self respect, because they are polite to everyone and try to repsect everyone. ...
Being sensitive of other's feelings are typically associated in CHinese stories with a person who is so Pathetically weak that he can not afford to offend anybody.
...
So when people whose behavior they typically associate with weaklings and cowards (Politeness, treating everybody respectfully) start to challenge them on their "core issues" it kind of rattles them and unhinges them.
Wonder what they think of the Japanese then...
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by hnair »

Kashi wrote: Wonder what they think of the Japanese then...
"scary" is the term. Their senior citizens still "hanfu-shiver" about 1930s Nanjing festivities and it has rubbed off on the younger lot. They unconvincingly claim the shivering is in anger.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by chola »

Kashi wrote:
shiv wrote: Their typical conception of Indians is that of people with no self respect, because they are polite to everyone and try to repsect everyone. ...
Being sensitive of other's feelings are typically associated in CHinese stories with a person who is so Pathetically weak that he can not afford to offend anybody.
...
So when people whose behavior they typically associate with weaklings and cowards (Politeness, treating everybody respectfully) start to challenge them on their "core issues" it kind of rattles them and unhinges them.
Wonder what they think of the Japanese then...
They hate them because of WWII but love them in every other way. They pour more tourists anyone else into Japan. They worship Japanese products including their toilet seats and especially their p0rn.

Similar to their relationship with Amreekis. Hate being contained but love American stuff to the extreme. Hollywood dominates their box office, American cars like Buick which can't sell in the states top their car market, Iphones, Starbucks, KFC everywhere.

Simple psyche of the noveau riche: kiss the arse of the rich and powerful you look up to, including your enemies. Everything comes down to money.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by shiv »

A link sent to me on the trauma of the cultural revolution and I suspect - a continuing transmitted meme among Chinese to avoid being critical of the communist party
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/18/opin ... .html?_r=1
Born in 1988, more than a decade after the end of the Cultural Revolution, I grew up hearing my relatives’ occasional reminiscences of daily life in the era: the food coupons, the Mao badges, the exchange of greetings with quotations from the ubiquitous “Little Red Book.” In one of my earliest recollections, my grandmother showed me a pile of old sweaters, explaining with a proud smile that she knitted them as a distraction from the “struggle sessions” taking place on the stage in her work unit’s auditorium in the late 1960s.

Yet the emotional scar has never faded away. In late 2015, when a singer stepped onto a neon-lit stage in Shanghai to perform a song about the tribulations of his family of six during the Cultural Revolution, the outpouring of public emotion surprised many people. One web commenter, quoting a line from the song, reflected: “ ‘After the Cultural Revolution, there were five of us left.’ That is not just the story of his family, but that of many others.”

The psychic damage of the Cultural Revolution has been the subject of only a few small-scale studies. An interview project carried out by Chinese researchers in collaboration with German psychotherapists in the early 2000s showed that people with Cultural Revolution-related trauma exhibited symptoms typical of post-traumatic stress disorder: Many reported intense anxiety, depression and frequent flashbacks of traumatic experiences; some showed emotional numbness and avoidance behaviors.

Cultural Revolution trauma differs from that related to other horrific events, like the Holocaust and the Rwandan genocide, studies have noted, in part because in China, people were persecuted not for “unalterable” characteristics such as ethnicity and race, but for having the wrong frame of mind. Constant scrutiny of one’s own thinking and actions for signs of political deviance became a necessity for survival that sometimes carried unbearable weight.

Recalling her high school years in the early 1970s, my mother describes a nagging fear of “letting an ‘unrevolutionary’ word slip in public.” It did not dissipate until more than a decade after Mao’s death in 1976.

Such vigilance offered no guarantee against becoming a victim. A 2007 survey of 108 Cultural Revolution participants showed that neither joining the Red Guards nor believing in Maoism protected someone from suffering long-term trauma.

Fickle political winds turned attackers into targets overnight, causing people to label one another class enemies less out of ideological conviction than out of revenge or pressure to toe the right line. The blurry distinction between perpetrators and victims makes collective healing by confronting the past a thorny project.

Wu Di, a co-founder of Remembrance, a journal of history and culture, invited members of opposing factions on a university campus during the period, now in their twilight years, to share their accounts. But his attempt at bringing reconciliation brought back unsettled scores. Each side, rejecting the story of the other, claimed victimhood from the events.

“They’ve never sat down and talked about it,” Mr. Wu told me last year. “They still can’t.”

More personal reasons may also shape people’s response to mental trauma.

Mental illness remains deeply stigmatized in China. Private despair was incompatible with the collectivist spirit and the bright Communist facade under Mao. Many traumatized people, as a result, would describe their emotional pain as physical ailments.

Xu Xiaodi, a retired teacher who saw her relatives beaten to death during the Cultural Revolution, is more forthright than most about the mental toll. She said she had experienced bouts of bad temper and powerful mood swings in its aftermath. She averts her eyes from elderly women performing boisterous dances on public squares — a popular pastime here — because they prompt her memories of struggle sessions staged by Red Guards.

But people “tell me just to move on,” she said to me. “They say, because the whole generation suffered in those years, even the national leaders.”

Rejecting such arguments, many people like Ms. Xu have refused to let go of the past by choosing to bear its psychic impact. But a growing body of research suggests that the past can have a way of plaguing the offspring of those who directly experienced it through the transgenerational transmission of trauma. The idea that life experiences could cause inheritable genetic changes has been identified among children of Holocaust survivors, who have been shown to have an increased likelihood of stress-related illnesses.

The possibility of epigenetic inheritance has been raised by Chinese academics regarding the Cultural Revolution, but to research the topic would most certainly invite state punishment.

Ms. Zhang, who spoke of the midnight house raids, mentioned another event that weighed on her. During the “rustication movement” in late 1960s, when millions of youths left the cities to work in rural areas under Mao’s command, she reported to her teacher that a classmate had hidden her age to evade the order. The classmate, Ms. Zhang said to me, had once insulted her family at a struggle session. She was promptly sent to northwestern China, where she labored for years.

After the Cultural Revolution ended, Ms. Zhang looked for her, and found her working as an usher in a small movie theater in her hometown. Ms. Zhang admitted to the classmate what she had done and apologized. “She was stunned for a while.” Now they both live in Beijing, Ms. Zhang told me. “We see each other every now and then.”
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Schmidt »

When people say Chinese , I think everyone here is referring to PRC

Whilst PRC Mainlanders are the bulk of Chinese , there are also varied populations with different characteristics in Taiwan , Hong Kong , Singapore , Malaysia , even Indonesia and Thailand


I do business with Chinese in all these countries , except paradoxically PRC itself


The Thai Chinese have fully integrated themselves into Thai culture and will only mention their Chinese origins and nativity to close friends
Of course you can easily make them out as they are much fairer than native Thai people
But they are overwhelmingly Buddhist and follow all Thai cultural aspects
Thaksin and Yingluck ( ex Thai PMs ) are of Chinese descent


Taiwanese are nice people , and have mixed feelings towards PRC
They are also more Buddhist
I have had some very good Chinese veg in Taiwan , as they have a lot of pure veg restaurants in Taipei - you can see many monks there. Also people have veg once a week etc as a habit

In general , Taiwanese , Hong Kongers and Singaporeans keep their word in business transactions . Singapore and HK are truly governed by rule of law and the people , whilst proudly Chinese , are also careful to differentiate themselves from Mainlanders whom they veiw as rude and uncouth.


Indonesian / Malaysian Chinese are the top dogs when it comes to business in these countries , hence there is a strong backlash from the natives

The worst scumbags are the PRC
They will try to screw you over given the chance and have a very low sense of morality

May be you can do business there if you are a big MNC type and have the backing of your govt etc

But not if you are a MSME type , or be prepared for the eventuality that you will get screwed one day .
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Suraj »

shiv wrote:A link sent to me on the trauma of the cultural revolution and I suspect - a continuing transmitted meme among Chinese to avoid being critical of the communist party
The Cultural Revolution was horrific in its extent. Every last person on mainland China was affected by it. Even those in power today. Eleven's daddy-o Xi Zhongxun was politically purged and put in charge of a rural tractor factory instead, in between periods of jail and beatings. Even those who brought laurels to China in that era faced persecution:
Zheng Fengrong: China's first modern world record holder in Olympic sports, in women's high jump in 1957. Persecuted during CR.
Rong Guotuan: China's first sporting world champion, in table tennis in 1959. Truly a sad wretched tale. He refused opportunities to migrate to HK, and ultimately killed himself, unable to handle the beatings and torture during CR, for some trumped up charges. And he wasn't the only one - his two teammates were also persecuted and killed themselves, which cost them half their national sports team in a span of months.
Remembering Rong Guotuan

It's a crazy period that no one who didn't live through it can wrap their heads around. Zhang Yimou and a few others have made some great movies on the period:
The Blue Kite
Farewell My Concubine
To Live
Under The Hawthorn Tree
It's worth seeing at least some of these movies. I've seen them all. The pervasive feeling of persecution every lay person encountered there is... immersing. Didn't matter if you were a barely teenaged kid - you could still do or say something that would result in your life and career being ruined, and that of your family as well (e.g. the story in Under the Hawthorn Tree). Surely some mental health practitioner will say it probably emotionally cripped an entire nation - the back to back stupidity of the Thousand Flowers Campaign, followed by Great Leap Forward and the even more idiotic Cultural Revolution. I pity the entire generation of Chinese born between late 1940s and early 1970s.

This is the sort of thing people were subjected to during CR:
Image
Provincial Party Secretary Wang Yilun, being criticized by Red Guards from the University of Industry and forced to bear a placard with the accusation “counterrevolutionary revisionist element,” Harbin, China, August 23, 1966
link
Image
Image
Image
The pictures themselves are a very vivid image of how a shame based society functions.

From the NYT article above:
“The essence of the Cultural Revolution is not just that Mao unleashed it and caused the chaos,” the Harvard China historian Roderick MacFarquhar told me. It “is that the Chinese, without direct orders, were so cruel to each other.”
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by hnair »

Suraj, the interesting thing is this: the average chinese seem to be the meekest, when it comes to rioting against their governments or coalescing around non-govt approved leaderships. Every other nationality would have erupted in anger at the stupidities of their own governments and the counter-govt movements would have raised strong leaderships who take over from the erring crop. The chinese public seem to share this with the Japanese and to some extent, the militarised Prussian society of pre-World War 2. Both were deeply doomed, but caused a lot of grief to the rest of world

Once subdued, the chinese public seem to remain subdued. A valuable datapoint for all sorts of external forces, from invaders to MNCs
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by ricky_v »

Another interesting point is the practice of foot binding that was followed by the upper class women and was considered as a mark of beauty. This "lotus feet" actually resulted in lifelong disabilities as the bones in the feet were deformed and the women could barely walk.
The emperor expressed admiration and said that "lotus springs from her every step!", a reference to the Buddhist legend of Padmavati under whose feet lotus springs forth. This story may have given rise to the terms "golden lotus" or "lotus feet" used to describe bound feet.
Bound feet became a mark of beauty and was also a prerequisite for finding a husband. It also became an avenue for poorer women to marry into money in some areas; for example, in late 19th century Guangdong, it was customary to bind the feet of the eldest daughter of a lower-class family who was intended to be brought up as a lady. Her younger sisters would grow up to be bond-servants or domestic slaves and be able to work in the fields, but the eldest daughter would assume to never have the need to work. Women, their families, and their husbands took great pride in tiny feet, with the ideal length, called the "Golden Lotus", being about three Chinese inches long (around 4 inches (10 cm) in Western measurement).
Process:
The process was started before the arch of the foot had a chance to develop fully, usually between the ages of 4 and 9. Binding usually started during the winter months since the feet were more likely to be numb, and therefore the pain would not be as extreme.[60]
First, each foot would be soaked in a warm mixture of herbs and animal blood; this was intended to soften the foot and aid the binding. Then, the toenails were cut back as far as possible to prevent in-growth and subsequent infections, since the toes were to be pressed tightly into the sole of the foot. Cotton bandages, 3 m long and 5 cm wide (10 ft by 2 in), were prepared by soaking them in the blood and herb mixture. To enable the size of the feet to be reduced, the toes on each foot were curled under, then pressed with great force downwards and squeezed into the sole of the foot until the toes broke.
The broken toes were held tightly against the sole of the foot while the foot was then drawn down straight with the leg and the arch of the foot was forcibly broken. The bandages were repeatedly wound in a figure-eight movement, starting at the inside of the foot at the instep, then carried over the toes, under the foot, and around the heel, the freshly broken toes being pressed tightly into the sole of the foot. At each pass around the foot, the binding cloth was tightened, pulling the ball of the foot and the heel together, causing the broken foot to fold at the arch, and pressing the toes underneath the sole. The binding was pulled so tightly that the girl could not move her toes at all and the ends of the binding cloth were then sewn so that the girl could not loosen it.
The girl's broken feet required a great deal of care and attention, and they would be unbound regularly. Each time the feet were unbound, they were washed, the toes carefully checked for injury, and the nails carefully and meticulously trimmed. When unbound, the broken feet were also kneaded to soften them and the soles of the girl's feet were often beaten to make the joints and broken bones more flexible. The feet were also soaked in a concoction that caused any necrotic flesh to fall off.[40]
Immediately after this agonizing pedicure, the girl's broken toes were folded back under and the feet were rebound. The bindings were pulled even tighter each time the girl's feet were rebound. This unbinding and rebinding ritual was repeated as often as possible (for the rich at least once daily, for poor peasants two or three times a week), with fresh bindings. It was generally an elder female member of the girl's family or a professional foot binder who carried out the initial breaking and ongoing binding of the feet. It was considered preferable to have someone other than the mother do it, as she might have been sympathetic to her daughter's pain and less willing to keep the bindings tight.[60]
For most the bound feet eventually became numb. However, once a foot had been crushed and bound, attempting to reverse the process by unbinding is painful,[61] and the shape could not be reversed without a woman undergoing the same pain all over again.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Suraj »

No hnair, I think you're wrong. They're not being 'meek'. They're just fulfilling their idea of Mandate of Heaven. People do not rebel against the leader until he demonstrates that he has failed to discharge his duties as leader. They give their leader a pretty long rope that way (Mao had barely been in power 2 decades during CR, and they had more than 2 dozen emperors who reigned more than 30 years), before revolting to such an extent that they lose 2-10% of their population.

It's happened to almost every dynasty of theirs. Great highs of world beating accomplishments, and it falls apart. In the next few years anywhere from the population of Bangalore to that of Mumbai+Delhi+Bangalore+Chennai gets killed, just like that . If it happened to us once, the scars would still be there. But they've done it 6-7 times in the last 2000 years. What happens to people after so much of that ? Surely it unhinges their mental state somewhat ?
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by JayS »

shiv wrote:A link sent to me on the trauma of the cultural revolution and I suspect - a continuing transmitted meme among Chinese to avoid being critical of the communist party
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/18/opin ... .html?_r=1
Looks like its was a huge national event, free for all, to settle scores with each other in the name of Revolution. Just like how people in muslim countries use sharia and blasphemy laws against others, particularly the kafirs. What kind of society does such thing to itself..?? So far at least I have never come across any other such event in the history.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by hnair »

suraj,no right or wrong judgements, please! We all are posting this based on our personal observations. I am saying they are being meek, if they agree to any crap that is thrown at them by their leadership, even if couched in divinity.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Singha »

after tiananmen, all school and univ syllabus was tightened up to include courses on patriotism and obedience to the govt allegedly. would be nice to know the content of these courses because that is what all of todays young chinese upto around 35 years of age have read in high school and from 35-45 range in university.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Pathik »

SriJoy wrote:
Pathik wrote:May be OT. Just saw a video of a small baby run over by two cars in China, luckily the baby survived. Few years ago saw a person run over by a car and passers by just going about their business normally. Is this some kind of a phenomena chinese behaviour is turning into? Does godlessness/non-dharma lead to heartlessness?
No, because the nicest and soulful people i know are atheists, not religious people. Godlessness usually leads to better human to human conduct, because people are not guided by arbitrary morals made up in a religious book, they are actually practicing the golden rule. This is why the safest places in the world tend to have the least religious people. Chinese problem is not godlessness, its their hierarchal society where only power matters.
I guess you did not read */non-dharma. It does not mean religious dogma like malsi or jehovah; nor does godliness mean the same. If you look at the mechanical way in which china is growing leading to the changes in people's lifestyle in ways in which societal values take a back seat. They wanted to achieve numbers, became a manufacturing hub, wanted to win olympic medals, came up with athlete factories for 3 year olds. The toll this has taken on people's lives there is very high in comparison to the life they get in return. In the second post I mentioned the superficial ways in which the chinese young gen is trying to satisfy their materialistic needs also goes to show on the lost values.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by Pathik »

^ No, because the nicest and soulful people i know are atheists, not religious people. - thats a very broad generalization. its like saying my non-vegetarian eating friends are better humans than my vegan friends. Its a vague statement. And who are the noble atheist souls in history to have changed the world and passed the message of peace and harmony?
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by nam »

From the content here, it looks like being bully is the thing in Chinese society? So if the Commies were not in power, any alternate power would still be a bully.

Communism seems to have given a name to a behaviour which was already prevalent. This explains the fallout with the Soviet Union as well.

So the Chinese are not "being suppressed under the commie boots"... it is the government they want. An emperor, a bully.
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by shiv »

Suraj wrote: The pictures themselves are a very vivid image of how a shame based society functions.
Absolutely. What fascinates me is that the people being shamed have been beaten into "playing a role" as it were. They must stand bowing their heads down before the people while being accused/lampooned/whatever. If you look at ISIS?Taliban executions - that "bowing head" thing is not demaded. they are simply shot.

In China there was no guarantee that they could not be killed but humiliation while alive is a strong meme.

As as digression yet again - I was personally not committed mentally to whether Indians nuclear doctrine should continue as NFU or be ambiguous. But know that Chinese see this as a sign of weakness it is essential to change the doctrine to FU. Just my initial thoughts
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Re: Roots of Chinese boastfulness - history & psyche

Post by shiv »

Another gem from the anonymous lurker: These are supremely valuable insights - I'm learning a lot
Why does China emphatically state the 9-dash line and says other's have no right to the resources there? This can be explained by the phrase "Treasuring a jade pendant". A poor peasant found a Jade pendant and kept it to himself. Eventually people found out about it, and he was killed and the pendant taken. But the thief was also killed by another, and so on, till the Jade pendant fell into the hand of somebody strong enough to wear it openly for none dare rob him. So If you have something very valuable, or earned something very valuable, it doesn't automatically become yours. You must have enough strength to defend it, otherwise you might as well give it up to a strong one and save yourself suffering. So just because ICS has oil under the EEZ of Vietnam and Philippines it doesn't belong to them unless they have the strength to repel the Chinese. Otherwise they are like a peasant treasuring a Jade pendant. Easy pickings. The Chinese will accept Arunachal belongs to India when they see demonstrable proof that we can kick their asses back to the Yellow river and more. Otherwise we are a Weak people trying to hold onto something not ours by overreaching our strength. Why is it not ours? Because China is supposedly strong enough to flaunt that Jade pendant.
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