| Dear Nanheyangrouchuan,
I notice that you are a frequent commenter at the Peking Duck. That's why I'm writing to seek your advice about a bizarre incident that happened about 12 hours ago at that weblog.
I wrote a comment in response to the thread titled "It's the economy, stupid!" It was posted successfully. When I logged in there again 8 hours later, my comment was deleted. This is the third or forth time I left a comment there. But it's the first time that my post is deleted. Everytime in the past I posted under my Christian name. This time I posted under the name of my blog. In normal cases it shouldn't be a problem. Jeremiah from Granite Studio uses to do the same - he alternates between posting under his own name or the name of his blog.
I'll quote my comment below for you to have a look at. Would you be able to advise me as to (1) whether there is anything inappropriate about what I've written; (2) whether it's advisable to post the same comment again at TPD or to just leave it like that; (3) whether it is worth my time to confront this Richard character directly by sending him an email.
Here is a copy of the comment that's been deleted:
---quote---
Richard wrote: "I know, I'm just a banal guy. What can I do? As I said, it doesn't matter what Time says, I come to my own conclusions based on my experience. I posted those links to indicate this notion, Asia's century, is not a new one, but simply a matter of fact."
"A matter of fact"? What fact?
"A matter of fact" is something you said when you have nothing better to say to defend your position. It's called a slogan and It is amazing how this place has deteriorated into a slogan manufacturing factory.
Let us pause for some real economic problems that China is likely to experience as a result of the US melt down:
1. Stagflation: empirical evidence from global events indicate that economic slowdowns will lead to rising, rather than falling prices. It is because inflation is monetary and may not be affected by changes in aggregate demand. So in China, inflation will continue to grow even when economic growth slows down as a result of the US melt down. The measures the Chinese government has adopted so far are mainly aimed at restraining investment growth and not consumption. The recent price control frenzy can only dampen inflationary expectation and further distort the picture of some real issues.
2. Unemployment: the real danger of an economic slowdown and a falling GDP growth is not recession; it is the prospect of employment growth failing to keep up with the growth of the labour population.
3. Social unrest: In China, when inflation is met with high unemployment, we will be looking at a recipe for political destability and social unrest.
4. Mind you, I haven't even mentioned a sharp rise in real-estate-related non-performing loans and the fragile state of China's banking system and corruption ...
So what is so good about being paid in RMB? Please enlighten me.
---unquote---
Looking forward to hearing from you.
Best regards,
Catherine Yeung
from Under the Jacaranda Tree
Dear Nanheyangrouchuan,
Thank you for replying to my earlier email. I and my co-blogger Ned Kelly both concur with your view about the expatriate culture in China. We are particularly unhappy with the lies that bloggers such as TPD and CLB are fabricating about China's co-called miraculous economic growth. Both Ned and I had lived and worked in China for extensive period of time. We both taught in Chinese universities. I also used to do a fair bit of consulting and interpreting to facilitate trade negotiations. So our experience of China is, shall we say, very up-to-date, even though we have now both returned home (and thank God for that). Since we are now back home and no longer under the jurisdiction of the CCP censors, we thought we might start a blog to write about what we really know about China and, among other things, how some shameless expatriates aid and abet the CCP in a new round of propapanda which aims at desensitizing the world against human rights abuses, environmental deprivations and economic disasters the Chinese Communists are exporting and, most importantly, the kind of negative impacts they are having for the rest of the world. That's exactly why Ned starts the Wall of Shame.
Ned and I would be really happy if you want to post an article based on my recent experience of being censored at TPD. We hope that our experience will help highlight how these western spin-doctors operate in China. We will then post comments on your blog to collaborate your story and also link your post to the Wall of Shame. Or alternatively, if you want to, Ned can post an article for the Wall of Shame and you can link to it. However, before you decide whether you want to get involved in this case, I'd like to draw your attention to a few points:
1. I admit that we are de |
