I stopped teetotalling years ago.
In any case, my dear lover of ewe, the question of this thread is “is Chinese Culture All About Money?” Which clearly it is not. This is not about shades but condemnation.
It’s not a post about cultural difference. I know how those look. Pity you don’t.
In any case, was there really a need to insult me here? Having a bad day?
[color=#FF0000]Mod Note[/color]: MM, I didn’t realise that the quote above was directed at anyone in particular. If either you or SuperHans has a problem with it, please contact me by pm and I’ll take further action. Until then I’m going to let it stand as a generalisation.
Fair point. The “all” in the thread title rather does set things up for a fail.
And having a Mordeth video in the very first post is a recipe for an Epic Fail.*
*apologies if I’m too old to be using such terms.
Cheers, my good fellow.
I have a case of oatmeal stout, some fishing line, and a lake named Nancy (who is generous with her Dolly Vardens) to get to. Expect no posts for a couple days.
With all respect, this discussion–the discussion itself–is weakened by its subjective nature, and is finally dealt a knockout blow the moment one even glances at the “control groups”–that is, other societies. There may be a small number of small societies that don’t depend on money, but to everyone else in the world, money is vital.
[quote=“Mucha man”]It’s not a post about cultural difference. I know how those look. Pity you don’t.
In any case, was there really a need to insult me here? Having a bad day?[/quote]
OK, fair point - but even if the post is not originally about cultural differences, does that mean that parallels can not be drawn in order to further the conversation? In my posts I was trying to draw the focus away from “All” about money to a culture which is largely centred around money.
I just find, reading through your posts - and not only the ones in this thread, that you can’t handle criticism of Taiwan very well, and that’s just fine. But bringing the way other cultures are perceived into any conversation which is not about how those cultures are perceived in order to make a point is, in my opinion, extremely immature behaviour. And in any case, the half-hearted insult wasn’t only directed at you.
I’m having a very nice day, thanks. I have a bit of a headache, but I’m off to the mountains for a bit which should sort that out. I hope you have a pleasant weekend too.
Genuinely.
SH
[color=#FF0000]Mod Note[/color]: SH, I didn’t realise that the quote above was directed at anyone in particular. If either you or MM has a problem with it, please contact me by pm and I’ll take further action. Until then I’m going to let it stand as a generalisation.
You all don’t understand money.
In countries without a significant Chinese or Asian population, if a person works all his life in Starbucks or a gas station or a 7-11 type of convenience stores, no one is gonna give two hoots about that person’s status or how much he acquired.
His relatives are less likely to look down upon his supposed “poverty” and even if he remains unmarried all his life, his friends, neighbors, families are much less likely to make snide remarks about his state of life than the Chinese.
Similarly, if a non-Asian woman remains unmarried or without a child all her life, her friends, neighbors, relatives are less likely to make snide comments about the way she lives her life.
It is not that Chinese are obsessive with money. I feel that they are more obsessed with the “face” and “sense of stature” which money and properties give them. Chinese society is a pathetic state of things and I am not only talking about China society. The bloody HK and Singaporean societies are just as bad.
The Taiwanese are just a tad better but they are still screwed up in the head due to their chinese blood. At least they learnt some sense of courtesy from their Japanese ex-overlords.
It is this group-think in the Asian societies which is preventing Asia countries from evolving as quickly as the West.
[color=#FF0000]Mod Note[/color]: Personally, I find this post a tad offensive and over the top (the wording more than anything else), but I’m letting it stand as no one has complained about it as yet.
Hans, making observations of cultural differences is not racism, bigotry etc … as long as they are CORRECT observations. If they are incorrect, then it is indeed ignorance, racism or bigotry, depending on how far off the mark they are.
I wonder if the real reason why these posts are made is not just the need to vent frustration about living in a country which pisses you off so, rather than the need to make an observation that you want to share with others. I should know because I’ve done it in the past.
I mean, perhaps before some of us came to Taiwan we expected all Chinese people to be like the waiters in our local Chinese restaurant abroad and like Monty Python’s “I like Chinese song” - small, cute and guaranteed to please. Then we come to Taiwan and newsflash, it turns out that they are real people, with their own lives, concerns and culture- damn, it turns out that their raison d’etre is not to please us foreigners after all ! And they are so obsessed with money ! This is such a harsh culture !
[quote=“Ryan the third”]
No its not the same and “face” is by far the most moronic cultural concept I have ever encountered.[/quote]
Why is it moronic? It obviously works within the context of East Asian culture. Maybe you just don’t like it, but there’s nothing “stupid” about it.
[quote=“pgdaddy1”]Hans, making observations of cultural differences is not racism, bigotry etc … as long as they are CORRECT observations. If they are incorrect, then it is indeed either ignorance, racism or bigotry, depending on how far off the mark they are.
I wonder if the real reason why these posts are made is not just the need to vent frustration about living in a country which pisses you off so, rather than the need to make an observation that you want to share with others. I should know because I’ve done it in the past.
[color=#FF0000]I mean, perhaps before some of us came to Taiwan we expected all Chinese people to be like the waiters in our local Chinese restaurant abroad and like Monty Python’s “I like Chinese song” - small, cute and guaranteed to please. Then we come to Taiwan and newsflash, it turns out that they are real people, with their own lives, concerns and culture[/color]- damn, it turns out that their raison d’etre is not to please us foreigners after all ! And they are so obsessed with money ! This is such a harsh culture ![/quote]
You had to come all the way here to Taiwan to figure that one out. Do the waiters in your country wear monkey costumes?
Umm, no. Why ?
The point is, you don’t get a realistic feeling for a culture by going to your local Chinese restaurant. So in our home countries it’s difficult to get a sense of what Chinese culture really is unless you have married into it. A visit to Chinatown, if you have one in the city you come from, won’t leave you too much the wiser, you’ll just think that China is full of tasty food. served quickly and efficiently.
IMO that’s a slippery slope. Who is the one who decides if observations are correct? IMO the phrasing of this OP is clumsy and has a bad feel, but to play the “replace Chinese with whatever culture game” in order to attack folks who write their opinion about “Chinese and money” is rather aggressive and not helpful for a discussion, but I agree with the general drift of Mucha Man’s following post.
Umm, no. Why ?
The point is, you don’t get a realistic feeling for a culture by going to your local Chinese restaurant. So in our home countries it’s difficult to get a sense of what Chinese culture really is unless you have married into it. A visit to Chinatown, if you have one in the city you come from, won’t leave you too much the wiser, you’ll just think that China is full of tasty food. served quickly and efficiently.[/quote]
What does it have to do with expectations that are or are not being met? If I encounter something that I think smells horrible then thats the way I think of it. Has nothing to do with what I expected it to smell like. It will stink either way… (Metaphor. Not saying that chinese stink.)
Next time I encounter something as stupid as this thread I will remember to be more polite and tame and self-censoring. Of course there are some who will attack me for that too so you can’t win. Kind of like Taiwan. If the people here weren’t overly concerned with money Forumosans would doubtlessly be ripping them for being naive and hopeless. 
[quote=“pgdaddy1”] making observations of cultural differences is not racism, bigotry etc … as long as they are CORRECT observations. If they are incorrect, then it is indeed ignorance, racism or bigotry, depending on how far off the mark they are.
[/quote]
Cultural observations can never truly be fact only trends or genralizations. They are always subjective.
Even something like “all Asians like rice” or “all Muslims and Jews avoid pork”, both of which may be true in most cases are not facts because there are enough exceptions to both statements to easily prove the “all” part wrong.
cfi: There are tons of supposed facts that, under your scrutiny, should not be considered facts in daily life. Yet we have working models because otherwise we’d never really be able to interact in/with the world.
This thread is not completely useless, I lol’d to that 
GiT - A working model though is subject to change. Making an observation about a culture is essentially creating a stereotype, which is different from fact (although it may be correct at times).
cfimages: Stereotypes are a kind of working model, surely? Also, do you really think most people’s working models of the world are that subject to change? I think many wouldn’t be.