Hurt feelings, the real discussion
If you are here looking for an English version of my post, sorry, it won't be here, I generally only talk about NZ related topics here. The site that directed you here should did a much better job than me so I don't feel the need to translate the original post.
However, I do like to talk about it a bit. My original post was trying to make fun out of this "hurt feelings" phenomena to make the topic looks less serious - as I do in pretty much every political issue. I did express a bit of my opinion but it was quite blur and was largely undetected by translators.
By publishing that post, I hoped that my fellow countrymen can have their own opinion on these four questions:
- Did those countries really hurt their feelings?
- Why more than 1/5 of the world are such "culprits"?
- Is there any country that has genuinely hurt their feelings not on the map?
- Or is there something wrong with that kind of diplomatic expression?
I don't mind how they would be positioned on the political spectrum, as long as they start to think themselves, not to just follow what's being said in People's Daily or Global Times, then I'm happy.
It wasn't just a pointless internet research to kill some time, I got many previously unknown facts to me out of it. The biggest "feeling hurter" of Chinese people's feelings for the last century, which is Russia in my opinion, despite the fact that it has accommodated the Dalai Lama's visits before, was not on the map. The phrase was never used on Russia even in the worst times between the two countries.
Instead, it's the countries like Nauru or St Lucia, which most ordinary Chinese would have great difficulty of finding them on a world map that have hurt the "Chinese people's feelings".
It was also discovered that meet the Dalai Lama does not necessarily "hurt Chinese People's feelings". It is highly circumstantial - Sarkozy suffered a storm of Chinese criticisms for having a conversation with the Dalai Lama; but the Polish president did that too, and hosted the Sarkozy - Dalai Lama meeting on Polish soil, and yet still got away with it.
Compare with that, Iceland and Jordan, hurt Chinese people's feeling by allowing the visit of former vice president of Republic of China Lien Chan in the late 90s. Needless to say, he later turned out to be an "old and great friend" of Hu's.
The reflections of my findings I gathered from China-related blogsphere were surprisingly diverse - as long as my fellow countrymen start to think themselves rather than just follow what's being said in the People's Daily or the Global Times, then I'm happy that my effort is worth something.
Most people seem to agree with me on the fact that the vast majority of the "hurt feelings" incidents happened after 1970s is as the result of China opening up itself to the world - the famous economic reform（改革开放）started in 1978 by Deng Xiaoping.
However, some attributed that fact to Mao's death in 1976, suggesting that his departure left Chinese people's feelings unprotected and vulnerable to the outside world, and the economic reform has severely undermined the interests of ordinary Chinese people.
Some Chinese netizens were equally surprised as myself to discover that countries like Australia, South Korea or Russia were not the map. Equally, other people were surprised to find countries like Albania ("the only shining beckon of communism in the sea of Soviet revisionism/Capitalist Europe? [I'm not quite sure]") in the list. What do these facts mean is up to their own interpretation.
It also raised discussions about the phrase "hurt Chinese people's feelings" itself. I always regarded it as a very absurd and childish thing to say on the diplomatic stage. Countries don't hurt each other's feelings - they speak with 'carrot and stick'(at least for now). You don't say somebody hurts your feelings when he attacked you
with a stick, you either fight back (... well, if you are powerful enough) or just get over with it. Put yourself in a 'weak' position and make yourself sounds like the "justified" side does not do anything good but only fuels unhealthy hate and revenge thoughts among the general public as people discover that crying for "hurt feelings" won't solve anything.
And even worse, repeated use of the phrase diminishes the power of the "real" feelings of the Chinese people. The value of Chinese people's feelings deflates every time the phrase is being used - it looks less important in the foreign eyes as the feelings can be "hurt" repeatedly with no apparent consequences.
There are people who do feel that their feelings have been genuinely hurt by the countries I listed, and made a good use of my map by keeping it for future "revenge".
However, for most of the Chinese who remain apolitical for most of the their life, the expression is just something demonstrating the total
disconnect between the State's affairs and real people's life. What's the point to care who's been hurting me lately? I don't run the country, and I never had a say on anything even regarding of my own feelings.
What do you think? Any different thoughts? I would love to hear it from you.
"I did express a bit of my opinion but it was quite slur and was largely undetected by translators."
Oh well, seems I am on a roll.
"slur" does not mean what you think it means, unless you are using it is a sly fashion in this post (which is the meaning I think you intended in the posting I extracted this sentence from). A slur is an insult, and something with a sly or sarcastic hidden meaning can, of course, be a slur, but that does not need to be said.
Oh I'm terribly sorry, I meant "blur", it was an undetected typo. I mean "I didn't express myself clearly in Chinese" - as my Chinese and English are equally bad:(