China bans kids from playing online games for more then 3 hours per week

[Stovo]

39 minutes ago, snowyowl said:

Ok, there isn't significant protest among the Han Chinese majority (outside of Hong Kong) because the current system is, in many ways, working for them economically, tho didn't they have issues with the one child policy until recently? But calling the situation a mandate is going a bit far imo, unless they have choices via free elections or even opinion polls. 

Outside the Han areas, in the "occupied territories" (my phrase) of Xinjiang and Tibet (aka "autonomous regions") there have been protests suppressed by the Han imperialists trying to convince us that China is a unified country with a few separatist terrorist problems. 

Why do they need to have free elections or opinion polls? Their system works for their culture in their slice of history. When it stops working they will have a revolution. 

The CCP has bought stability to an otherwise dangerous part of the world. Would you prefer stage blue CCP, or stage purple/red Afghanistan? 

[Stovo]

14 minutes ago, roopepa said:

Isn't there heavy protests going on all around the authoritarian far east? I heard there is serious movement in at least three countries. One I think was Myanmar but the military has locked down internet so there is only a little info leaking out.

I got a gut feeling that there might be a stage Orange revolution coming soon in the far east, China and such.

@roopepa Maybe... I'm not sure that Myanmar is experiencing a stage orange revolution, they're too underdeveloped for stage orange. 

China, however, I could see it happening this century. 

[snowyowl]

@Stovo  my point isn't about telling them what to do, more about questioning the evidence of your suggestions that there is a mandate and general agreement with the status quo. If we don't ask them, how do we know what they want? It's apparent from our western media viewpoint that they don't have freedom to demonstrate and organise politically outside the official channels. But maybe the news I'm consuming is biased too, so it's not black and white. 

What's the alternative to the CCP? Well, I'm not convinced the Republic of China would have been much better had they won the civil war, but there was still chaos in the 60s and 70s during the cultural revolution. They need to develop and progress at their own sustainable rate, but I'm starting to worry about the Taiwan situation. 

You're right that it's been a dangerous part of the world though, China (like Russia)  borders a lot of other countries so has historically had threats coming from all directions, and it's own borders moved around due to invasions. I must be lucky living in an island! 

Edited September 1, 2021 by snowyowl

[Opo]

3 hours ago, Stovo said:

They actually DO have a mandate. Most Chinese people either support their government or are apathetic to politics. Their government has given them 40 years of economic prosperity, why would anybody oppose them? This is probably why the last significant protest in mainland China was about 40 years ago. 

Tiananmen square? 

[Stovo]

26 minutes ago, snowyowl said:

@Stovo  my point isn't about telling them what to do, more about questioning the evidence of your suggestions that there is a mandate and general agreement with the status quo. If we don't ask them, how do we know what they want? It's apparent from our western media viewpoint that they don't have freedom to demonstrate and organise politically outside the official channels. But maybe the news I'm consuming is biased too, so it's not black and white. 

What's the alternative to the CCP? Well, I'm not convinced the Republic of China would have been much better had they won the civil war, but there was still chaos in the 60s and 70s during the cultural revolution. They need to develop and progress at their own sustainable rate, but I'm starting to worry about the Taiwan situation. 

You're right that it's been a dangerous part of the world though, China (like Russia)  borders a lot of other countries so has historically had threats coming from all directions, and it's own borders moved around due to invasions. I must be lucky living in an island! 

@snowyowl Oh, you're from England, me too. We are extremely fortunate to live in the UK, an island country surrounded by allies and no enemies remotely close to us.

I speak with a bit of authority on China, because I lived there for half a year, have many Chinese friends, and dated Chinese women - one for 2-3 years.

Almost no Chinese person I have spoken to wants to overthrow the government. There was only one girl, who spent a significant amount of time in Hong Kong, that was quite open with the fact that she wants democracy in China.

The others, including my ex, are practical people. They feel this is the best government for this period of time because they feel that there are too many uneducated Chinese people, particularly in rural areas, and they feel that they're not ready to have democracy yet. 

27 minutes ago, Opo said:

Tiananmen square? 

@Opo Yes

[Opo]

@StovoI meannt wouldn't killing of protesters affect their need to protect? 

[Stovo]

2 minutes ago, Opo said:

@StovoI meannt wouldn't killing of protesters affect their need to protect? 

@Opo Ray Dalio's work, particularly The Changing World Order: https://www.principles.com/the-changing-world-order/ is a fantastic stage yellow analysis of these types of themes.

The government's choice at Tiananmen was either to crush the protests violently, or engage with them peacefully. Both were risky options. 

[snowyowl]

@Stovo  Yes I'm English too interesting that we have our own tensions between the different nations here too, with nationalism vs unionism but that's for another thread.  It's clear that we can't just go around parachuting in our version of democracy in other cultures. But from your experience of Chinese people, would you say there's any truth to my theory about the ethnic groups in China? Ie that the Han Chinese are mostly content with the way things are going, and it's the other ethnic groups who are rebelling, to the extent they can. 

[Stovo]

@snowyowl Yes, you are probably correct there, but I've never met a minority-race Chinese person. 

[Opo]

@Stovo @Stovo Could you roughly explain his perspective? 

[Stovo]

3 minutes ago, Opo said:

@Stovo @Stovo Could you roughly explain his perspective? 

@Opo Revolutions are a game of cat and mouse between the revolutionaries and the government, which start off mild and gradually get worse as each side tests the limits of the other side. The revolutionary leaders are usually young, well-educated, leftists, but not always. It's not usually clear when a revolution starts until you are in the middle of it, or it's over. 

The objective of the revolutionaries is to change the system, whilst the government wishes to maintain the system. If the revolutionaries are successful then a new order begins, and big changes occur to the system. If the government is successful then the existing system continues, sometimes with small tweaks. The winning side often punishes the losing side by imprisoning them or killing them. 

The government has a choice of how to handle the revolutionaries. They can either crackdown on them violently, or engage with them peacefully. Both have risks, for example, if you continue to allow the protests then the protests could get bigger as more people join the revolution. If you crack down on the protests you risk angering the people even more.

China chose to crack down on its protests in 1989, which resulted in a victory for the government. 

[Opo]

Great video by the pimp. 

 

[Jakuchu]

Well it depends. You can't really apply this to someone who is a professional gamer or makes a living by streaming on twitch. But in regard to an average person just playing for fun I think it fits. This is more of a SD blue reaction, but still think it is a good move. If I was a parent with kids that spent lots of time playing video games, I would probably come up with a similar rule. And three hours are a fair amount in my opinion

[Jakuchu]

3 hours per week? Ohh, I overlooked that. Was thinking 3 hours per day. That is too scant 

Edited September 4, 2021 by Jakuchu

[Sucuk Ekmek]

Funny, China loves globalization but not so much for kids. 

[Opo]

1 hour ago, Sucuk Ekmek said:

Funny, China loves globalization but not so much for kids. 

Since when does China love globalization? 

[Sucuk Ekmek]

6 hours ago, Opo said:

Since when does China love globalization? 

This quote is from wikipedia:

''  In July 2020, China's foreign exchange reserves totaled US$3.15 trillion, which is the highest foreign exchange reserves of any other nation. '' 

What's up with all the paper money? They want nothing but their own precious currency. They want the purchasing power. That is my definition of globalization. Power to control. It's not like world becoming one big village. 

[Stovo]

5 hours ago, modmyth said:

My mom is Chinese; I got less hours per week than this growing up unless I snuck in time while no one was home, haha. More like 1-2.

This is normal stuff for first gen Asian immigrant parents and/or probably for mainlander parents anyway. I'm sure they're just instituting what most people would do anyway and already have consensus on. 

Also, schooling schedules (including after school programs) are already considered unreasonable by our standards in East Asian countries. ....what free time on the weekdays, anyway?

In my view, Japan is the perfect case study of the folly of this philosophy. You would think that Japanese citizens would be materially the wealthiest citizens in the world given their crazy work ethic and strict discipline. Yet they are not, their GDP per capita is below that of most of Scandinavia, who work much fewer hours, have less strict discipline, and savour life more. 

Clearly, there are limits to strict hierarchies in terms of outcomes, and when societies hit these limits and realise these limits they shift more towards stage orange freedom. 

[Opo]

12 hours ago, Husseinisdoingfine said:

I can perfectly understand the rational behind this, too many kids waste too much of their time in pointless activities instead of developing themselves.

Excess technology is so bad for developing kids’ brains.

Before video games people with free time weren't contemplating and reading books. 

[DocWatts]

A number of good points on the issue from a therapist who struggled with game compulsion when he was younger.