Face to Face with Ignorance, Hatred and Infanticide

March 27, 2011

My family had a date to walk the mile to the local Sunday Farmer’s Market, which up until today has always been a pleasant experience.

However, at the Farmer’s Market, I came face to face with the ignorance and hate that surveys say about 40% of Americans have concerning China.

It started out as a conversation with a young man giving away free samples of a local newspaper as part of a program to grow subscriptions.

The feature story on the front page said, Walmart sex-discrimination case headed to the Supreme Court. This led to a conversation about Wal-Mart being anti union.  The newspaper vendor said that in Europe Wal-Mart had no choice about unions then I mentioned that Wal-Mart had stores in China where all the workers belong to unions.

The conversation then turned to China. Eventually the newspaper vendor asked why I knew so much about China, and I told him that I write a Blog about China.

Since spending a decade researching Robert Hart for my first two historical fiction novels, it has become my goal to explain why China is the way it is since it was during that decade that I discovered how biased and ignorant many in the West are of China.

That’s when the fair skinned WASP with the ruddy winter blush on his cheeks stepped in. He was standing several feet away with his trained dog sitting on its box.  He’s there almost every Sunday demonstrating what a great animal trainer he is. Since I have no interest in training animals, I’ve never had a conversation with him.

Without being asked, he said China was guilty of killing twenty million women.  (I don’t remember the exact words but that’s close enough.)  Within minutes, he would boost the number to forty million.

I attempted explaining that China’s central government cannot be blamed for centuries of cultural behavior and that there were laws against female infanticide in China today. I started to explain that even the one-child policy is misunderstood but he cut me off.

The WASP with the ruddy face waved his arms above his head and shouted I should get two Communist flags and wave them in the air so everyone at the market would know I was a China lover.

I don’t love China. I also don’t hate it. Instead, I want to understand.

America, with all of its flaws and there are many, is my country but I do not blindly love the US either. I wore the uniform of a US Marine and fought in Vietnam out of youthful patriotism decades before I discovered that in Vietnam then in Iraq, US presidents launched wars based on lies and deceit.

Standing there at the Sunday Farmer’s market, the adrenalin started fizzing through my body as my PTSD was triggered and I moved into combat mode thinking of all the China facts I could teach this ignorant, biased WASP, while realizing that he didn’t want to learn.

The Marine Corps taught me not to get into a fight that I couldn’t win and winning meant killing before being killed.

I decided to walk away but before leaving, I jabbed an index finger in his direction and said, “Your biased opinions are based on ignorance. There is a lot you should learn of China.”

That’s when the WASP doubled the figure of female deaths in China from 20 to 40 million.

If surveys are correct, about 120 million Americans hold the same ignorant, biased opinions of China that this WASP believed.

Most Sinophobes know nothing of The Opium Wars; Sun Yat-sen in the early 20th century seeking help from the British Empire and the US to build a democracy in China and being rejected; or the facts behind China’s Civil War and all the other history that led to China being as it is today.

It’s true that female infanticide has been a cultural practice in China for centuries.  It’s also true that the CCP passed laws to end that practice and sends teams into rural China to teach the people that it is wrong. That doesn’t mean that all the Chinese will change.

In fact, The Society for the Prevention of Infanticide (SPI) says, “Infanticide has been practiced on every continent and by people on every level of cultural complexity, from hunters and gatherers to high civilization, including our own ancestors. Rather than being an exception, then, it has been the rule.”

SPI says, “One way to control the lethal effects of starvation was to restrict the number of children allowed to survive to adulthood.”

Even “Darwin believed that infanticide, ‘especially of female infants,’ was the most important restraint on the proliferation of early man.”

“Today,” SPI says, “At least 60 million females in Asia are missing and feared dead, victims of nothing more than their sex. Worldwide, research suggests, the number of missing females may top 100 million.

“Estimates indicate that 30.5 million females are ‘missing’ from China, 22.8 million in India, 3.1 million in Pakistan, 1.6 million in Bangladesh, 1.7 million in West Asia, 600,000 in Egypt, and 200,000 in Nepal.”

However, the ignorant WASP at the Sunday Farmers Market was “foaming” at the mouth about the evils of China when in fact, SPI says, “The colonists brought infanticide to America from England while at the same time finding that the Indians practiced it as well.”

In addition, “In 1646 the General Court of Massachusetts Bay had enacted a law where ‘a stubborn or rebellious son, of sufficient years and understanding, would be brought before the Magistrates in court and such a son shall be put to death.’

“Stubborn child laws were also enacted in Connecticut in 1650, Rhode Island in 1668, and New Hampshire in 1679.”

In Modern American “In 1966, the United States had 10,920 murders, and one out of every twenty-two was a child killed by a parent.”

“Statistically, the United States ranks high on the list of countries whose inhabitants kill their children. For infants under the age of one year, the American homicide rate is 11th in the world, while for ages one through four it is ‘first’ and for ages five through fourteen it is ‘fourth’.

“From 1968 to 1975, infanticide of all ages accounted for almost 3.2% of all reported homicides in the United States.”

I learned something new today. I learned that it is easier to deal with ignorance at a distance on Blogs and Internet forums where there are others reading what I write than it is talking to ignorance face to face.

It took more than an hour for my burst of combat adrenalin to work its way out of my system and it wasn’t until I finished writing this post that I was calm again.  I wanted so much to attempt smacking down that WASP and discover if I had remembered what the Marine Corps drilled into me of hand-to-hand combat. After all, that training kept me alive in Vietnam, and I’ve broken bones learning martial arts.

However, I’m glad I walked away. Violence is not a solution to ignorance and it won’t open closed minds. After Vietnam and the Marines, I was a teacher in the public schools for thirty years (1975 – 2005) where I learned how difficult it is to open minds.

You cannot teach someone that doesn’t want to learn.

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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.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

2 Comments | America, China, Chinese Culture, Chinese history, Chinese women, crime, cultural differences, family values, parenting, religion | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

The Role of Religion

March 26, 2011

While reading Religion flourishes in political and historical titles by Henry L. Carrigan Jr. in ForeWord magazine, I thought of China’s history with religion, and saw no comparison as to how religion has influenced beliefs and politics in the West.

Carrigan wrote a seamless piece mentioning fourteen titles that deal with atheists and religion in America. After reading the piece, it’s obvious why Western religion plays such an important role in US politics.

However, in China, religion has never had a role and probably never will. In fact, religion never had an impact on China until after the First Opium War early in the 19th century. The result was the Taiping Rebellion led by a converted Christian known as God’s Chinese son.

More than twenty million died due to God’s Chinese son. Imagine how that influenced opinions regarding Christianity in China. The first major contact with a Western religion ends in bloodshed and much suffering.

The Exodus of the Jews from Egypt took place around 1504 to 1254 BC about the time of the Shang Dynasty (1783 – 1123 BC). A few Jews (not enough to establish the religion in China and have a lasting impact) would reach China almost twenty-four hundred years later.

In 312 AD, Constantine adopted Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire, and he did it for political reasons.

Next came the rise of Islam after Mohammad proclaimed the message of believing in one God about 610 AD.

Freedom of religion in America wouldn’t be guaranteed until July 4, 1776.

The evolution of religion in the West spans thousands of years, yet China’s Western critics expect the Chinese to accept these religions and allow them to have an important role in Chinese culture almost overnight.

Carrigan writes, “Over the past decade, most polls have consistently found that 95 percent of Americans say they believe in God…”

However, more than a billion Chinese do not belong to any organized religion. It is estimated that the number of Christians in China number 40 to 100 million depending on whom you believe. If the high number is correct, that’s still less than ten percent of the population compared to America’s 95%.

In fact, religion in China has mostly been family-oriented for thousands of years.

Some scholars doubt the use of the term “religion” in reference to Buddhism and Taoism, and suggest “cultural practices” or “thought systems” as more appropriate.

Generally, the percentage of people in China that call themselves religious is the lowest in the world compared to America, which is probably the highest number.

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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.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

Leave a Comment » | China, Chinese history, Christianity, cultural differences, history, Islam, religion | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

The Butterfly Lovers

March 25, 2011

Recently, I received a comment on my Romeo and Juliet in China post. Y Chan wrote that there were two Chinese tragic love stories similar to Romeo and Juliet.

Chan said, “You probably cannot be regarded as knowing Chinese culture if you do not know these two love stories.”

One of the stories Chan mentioned was The Butterfly Lovers. The other was “the story of Lady White Snake“, which first appeared in 618 AD during the Tang Dynasty.

I’ve heard of The Butterfly Lovers before. The basic premise is of a young woman in China wanting to go to school. Since boys were the only ones allowed to attend school, this young woman, like Barbara Streisand in the movie Yentl (1983), disguised herself as a boy.

Yentl was based on Isaac Bashevis Singer’s (1902 – 1991) short story Yentl the Yeshiva Boy.

When I mentioned what Chan wrote in the comment, my wife found her copy of a popular theme song of The Butterfly Lovers played as a violin solo by Yu Lina. As the house filled with the music, which may also be found on the following embedded YouTube video, my wife started to dance.

She said, “This is one of my favorites. I cannot resist dancing when I hear it.”

In fact, Yentl the Yeshiva Boy and Shakespeare’s (1564 – 1616) Romeo and Juliet must be combined to become The Butterfly Lovers. In The Butterfly Lovers what begins as a charade becomes a love story ending in the suicide of two young lovers.

The legend of The Butterfly Lovers first appeared during the Jin Dynasty 1600 years ago. The love story of Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai is one of four Chinese folk legends and one of the most influential and best known in China.

China has traded with the West since the Han Dynasty (206 BC – 219 AD). There was an overland route in the north and a sea route in the south, which the Roman Empire used around the time of Christ.

Since China has traded with the West for more than two thousand years, it is conceivable The Butterfly Lovers reached the West and was adapted by Shakespeare and Singer after being exposed to the plot.

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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.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

1 Comment | China, Chinese Culture, Chinese history, Chinese literature | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

How a Unified Korea becomes a Win-Win for China and the U.S.

March 21, 2011

I subscribe to Imprimis, a publication of Hillsdale College.  While finishing my morning exercise routine on the stationary bike, I read an essay written by Sung-Yoon Lee of Keeping the Peace: American in Korea 1950 – 2010.

Professor Lee is an adjunct assistant professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and an associate in research at the Korea Institute at Harvard University.

He writes of the pressure North Korea has applied on the United States to sign a peace treaty that might require US troops to leave South Korea.  Professor Lee feels this would be a mistake, and I agree.

He says, “It is important for Washington to hold quiet consultations with Beijing to prepare jointly for a unified Korea under Seoul’s direction, a new polity that will be free, peaceful, capitalist, pro-U.S. and pro-China.”

This is the first I’ve read anywhere in a Western media source (and Hillsdale College is decidedly conservative in its political stance, which I don’t always agree with) that it is possible a country could be both pro-U.S. and pro-China at the same time.

In fact, Hillsdale College is often anti-leftist (liberal) and anti-entitlement to the point that it has rejected accepting Federal aid even in the form of student scholarships since almost every entitlement dollar from the Federal government comes with strings.

By saying that a unified Korea under Seoul would be both pro-China and pro-U.S. admits China is not the evil dragon so many in the West believe.

When Mao ruled China, North Korea and Communist China seemed as if they were evil twins.  However, today that is not true. In the 1980s, China emerged as a hybrid one-party republic with term limits and age limits so one man would never rule the Middle Kingdom again as Mao did for 26 years.

China became a hybrid capitalist-socialist economy while politically it was an authoritarian one party republic guided by the 1982 Constitution.

Prior to 1911, there was the imperial aristocracy, a “small” middle class (with an emphasis on small) and a huge peasant class living in severe poverty with hard labor and short life spans.

Today, China’s middle class has reached about 300 million and almost 500 million are connected to the Internet, and China’s attempt at censorship does not totally control the flow of global information to those that want it who then share what was learned through Chinese Blogs and e-mails with friends, fans and family.

North Korea is frozen in time, but South Korea and China have evolved and adapted to the global economy.  It would be in China’s interest to see North Korea merge with South Korea and become a capitalist nation open to the world for trade.

In fact, China does more trade with South Korea than the North, which by all accounts is a burden since China often feeds many of North Korea’s citizens to avoid famine sending food grown in China that should have gone to Chinese consumers.

If Korea is unified under Seoul’s leadership, the threat of war in Korea will evaporate.

However, under Pyongyang’s leadership. Korea becomes a larger threat to both China and the US and more difficult to contain.

The US must maintain a military pretense in South Korea and I’m sure China agrees even if it never says so publicly since a war between Pyongyang and Seoul would not be in China’s interest economically.

Learn of China in 1950 Korea Protecting the Teeth

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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.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

7 Comments | America, business, capitalism, China, Chinese history, Communism, history, politics | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

Sarah Palin is not a Washington, Lincoln or Roosevelt

March 20, 2011

 

Sarah Palin once again opened her mouth and demonstrated her ignorance of history—this time China’s and the world.

While she was in India, Time magazine said of Sarah Palin, “Her personal appeal was apparent to those who attended the event.’She said the right things,’ said Kiran Aurora a retiree from New Delhi. ‘I don’t know if she’s Presidential material, but she’s charismatic.’…”

Time magazine said, “While lauding India’s democratic rise and economic liberalization, she expressed concern over China’s growing economic influence and militarization. She described Chinese ownership of American debt as ‘dangerous’ and questioned the country’s new military buildup.”

Palin said, “I personally have huge military concerns about China. They are stockpiling ballistic missiles, submarines, new age ultra modern fighter aircraft. Is that all for a defensive posture? How could that be when you don’t see a tangible outside threat to that country?”

If Sarah Palin knew history, she would know that “no threat today” does not mean “no threat tomorrow”.

With history as our teacher, we quickly learn that there are no guarantees for the future and that even America is not safe from change.


Is Sarah Palin America’s next Ronald Reagan?

In fact, America has changed much since 1776 when the Founders created a Republic where only 10% of citizen were allowed to vote in national elections.  Today America has become the democracy the Founding Fathers feared.  What started out as 13 states spread along the east coast of North America has grown into a global empire that has hundreds of military bases around the world.

Global Research says, “With more than 2,500,000 U.S. (military) personnel serving across the planet and military bases spread across each continent, it’s time to face up to the fact that our American democracy has spawned a global empire.”

After we add together the distruction and millions of deaths from the wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan then include what America, Britain and France are doing in Libya, we have more evidence that explains why China has a right to a strong modern military.

After all, the best offense is a strong defense.

A look at China’s history from the early 19th century starting with the Opium Wars (started by Great Britain and France then later joined by America); the invasion to suppress the Boxer Rebellion in 1900 (American troops also took part in that invasion of China), and two wars with Japan ending in 1945 with the conclusion of World War II, China has good reasons to maintain a strong military for potential future threats.

Every country should have a strong, modern military, which may be the best deterrent to an invasion and war.

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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.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

Leave a Comment » | America, China, Chinese history, history, military, politics | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

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