• rosco385 ( rosco385@lemmy.wtf ) 
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    9
    ·
    6 months ago

    I worked as an English teacher in China for a decade. It’s a wonderful place to live, but not an easy place to stay.

    Firstly, you won’t get a decent job unless you’re white and from a small range of western countries like the UK, US, Canada, Australia, NZ.

    Secondly, even if you qualify you’ll have to renew your visa yearly and after 5 consecutive years it gets increasingly difficult to get renewed.

    Thirdly, going home can be hard. You will have to go home eventually, unless the Chinese government starts giving out more greencards. I lived in a tier 3 city, and in 10 years I only knew of one guy from the UK getting a greencard, and his father-in-law had comnections in government to make that happen.

    But if you meet the conditions and can handle uprooting your life at least twice, I’d recommend it.

      • torik ( torik@lemmychan.org ) 
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        6 months ago

        Really? You think it’s that bad? I know about Juneteenth and all, but I don’t think they would be able to keep a lid on the Chinese finally being able to express themselves.

        • Look how all other data points of America’s enemies are handled. They’ve already trained western libs to shriek “wumao” at anyone who says anything positive about China. There’s no scenerio where capitalist media suddenly stops doing the thing media exists under capitalism to do.

          “During the cold war, the anticommunist ideological framework could transform any data about existing communist societies into hostile evidence. If the Soviets refused to negotiate a point, they were intransigent and belligerent; if they appeared willing to make concessions, this was but a skillful ploy to put us off our guard. By opposing arms limitations, they would have demonstrated their aggressive intent; but when in fact they supported most armament treaties, it was because they were mendacious and manipulative. If the churches in the USSR were empty, this demonstrated that religion was suppressed; but if the churches were full, this meant the people were rejecting the regime’s atheistic ideology. If the workers went on strike (as happened on infrequent occasions), this was evidence of their alienation from the collectivist system; if they didn’t go on strike, this was because they were intimidated and lacked freedom. A scarcity of consumer goods demonstrated the failure of the economic system; an improvement in consumer supplies meant only that the leaders were attempting to placate a restive population and so maintain a firmer hold over them. If communists in the United States played an important role struggling for the rights of workers, the poor, African-Americans, women, and others, this was only their guileful way of gathering support among disfranchised groups and gaining power for themselves. How one gained power by fighting for the rights of powerless groups was never explained. What we are dealing with is a nonfalsifiable orthodoxy, so assiduously marketed by the ruling interests that it affected people across the entire political spectrum.”

          • torik ( torik@lemmychan.org ) 
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            6 months ago

            I mean, it’s more than just media, but actual facts. Just like the information you’re sharing here, others could do the same should China choose to protect freedom of speech.

            • I’ve had people I know IRL dismiss things I’m seeing first hand because it contradicts what they’ve been lead to believe. But more frequently, they don’t even get that far, instead its some crazy mental gymnastics to maintain their cartoonish caricature of a country of a billion people.

              The people who uncritically believe “China destroys all motorcycles after 13 years” or “eat eggs soaked in piss” because they saw it on reddit doesn’t care about reality, only that this weird foreign place is bad.

              They don’t care about the chinese struggles, only its utility as hostile evidence.

              • gramie ( gramie@lemmy.ca ) 
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                3
                ·
                6 months ago

                It’s a variation of the observation that you can make the most ridiculous statement imaginable, and people will believe it as long as you add, “in Japan” to the end.

                Example: “Local governments erect defenses against giant monsters, in Japan.”

              • torik ( torik@lemmychan.org ) 
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                1
                ·
                6 months ago

                It’s fair for you to think that, but I shouldn’t have to answer for the ignorance of others.

                My point still stands where if China supported freedom of speech, we would hear about it beyond the reach of mainstream Western media.

                • I am not asking you to answer for anything, I am stating how the media ecosystem operates under capitalism. China stops censoring anyone who isn’t saying shit actual nazis/Elon Musk would want you to believe, and then every nazi gets a platform in western media whitewashing their views. We see this today with Shen Yun and Falun Gong.

                  China doesn’t censor them and they get a platform talking about how much China wants to censor them.

                  China’s people’s struggles is 100% divorced from the western perception of China.