I’ve talked to enough Chinese to know that it is a commonly held opinion that if the average American eats and raises children a certain way and the US is the world’s only super power, then if the Chinese eat and act the same way, China will become the next super power on the block.
This flawed belief may explain what my friend (in Part 1) wrote about the spoiled children of China’s middle class being “WAY fatter” with a sense of entitlement.
It might also explain the exploding popularity of American fast food in China leading to an epidemic of obesity, diabetes, heart disease and cancer, which is parallel to what has happened and is still happening in the US.
To see if America and China are showing signs of an impending collapse, I checked Wikipedia’s Fall of Civilizations where a summary of the opinions of twelve experts are on display.
I will mention three of these experts.
Edward Gibbons in The Decline of the Roman Empire wrote, “The decline of Rome was the natural and inevitable effect of immoderate greatness. Prosperity ripened the principle of decay…”
Arnold J. Toynbee in his A study of History wrote, “The cause of the fall of a civilization occurred when the cultural elite became a parasitic elite.”
Jeffrey A. McNeely suggested, “A review of historical evidence shows that past civilizations have tended to over-exploit their forests and that such abuse of important resources has been a significant factor in the decline of the over-exploiting society.”
After reading what all twelve experts said about the collapse of civilizations, it was obvious that there may be several causes that bring on a collapse.
However, when three of the twelve all have different opinions and all three of those opinions are happening in America and starting to happen in China, this is a good reason to be concerned.
Return to Part 1 or discover The Next Super Power
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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.
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