Dear J-
David Brooks recently published a column — let’s face it, he’s an opinion writer, paid to hang his views out on public display, so there’s no doubt all kinds of folks who jump on his words on a regular basis, ready to string him up for some incendiary remarks or unpopular view — the column was, as many opinion writers are finding fertile ground on lately, regarding China. The basic premise of the piece is that here we’re looking at a completely foreign way of thinking, right down to the very foundations of thought — collectivist (China) versus individualist (the West).
It reminds me a little of the worst reading assignment I ever had — that one, in first-year Chinese History, went twenty pages of excruciating detail on how the Chinese language’s lack of a definite article (“the”) doomed Chinese society to backwardness, futility, and irrelevance in the modern world. There’s plenty of folks who have pored over the reasons why, over the last hundred and fifty years, China’s been a punching bag of the East. There’s a constant need to justify the way we live versus the way they are, and we preen over our smug intellectualism until it comes crashing down around us.
Witness the events of the Russo-Japanese War at the turn of the 20th Century. Japan, less than fifty years removed from the humiliation of being forced open to trade by Commodore Perry, takes on a major Western power — and wins. The Battle of Tsushima was decisively lopsided in favor of the Japanese, and historians have scrambled to provide answers and reasons since then. Yes, the Russians had to steam virtually across the world — but this, because their Pacific fleet was already in shambles from the Japanese. Yes, the Japanese were trained by the British, possibly the finest naval tacticians of all time (this, of the gun era, prior to submerged vehicles and aircraft). And yes, the Japanese still won.
There’s a soft appeasement in the tone of the phrase Brooks turns out: “According to [the Renaissance, Enlightenment, and capitalism], societies get more individualistic as they develop.” You hear the implicit wheedling pejorative pat on the head: Good job, China, way to become like us. Keep it up. Do you remember that after Paul McCartney advised Michael Jackson to purchase the rights to music in order to ensure steady wealth, MJ went ahead and outbid Paul on the Beatles catalog? Guess who holds most of our bonds and debts? Yes, it’s fashionable to sneer at the imitation of Chinese pirates and chuckle over the innumerable contributions of Western intellect to raising the world’s standard. But remember that Edison himself stated his genius was due less to insight, but more on persistence, and who’s turning out more students than ever? Who’s funding the research? Who’s choosing careers in science?
The world keeps changing. At least the man sitting in the dunk tank knows when the balls hit the target: maybe not yet, but soon.
Mike
Dear J- 