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wins32767 posted:That's a really odd title for an actual executive. That's like a line manager or below title. Yeah, that's why I had to add 'according to the FBI'. Every article I've found calls him an executive, so if it's in error, then everyone is making it.
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Apr 21, 2023 21:00
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Kchama posted:He's referred to as an executive because that's what he was, according to the FBI. He was the Information Security Technical Lead. What source do you have for that exact title? I’m struggling to find reliable material on this matter.
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Apr 21, 2023 21:24
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Discendo Vox posted:What source do you have for that exact title? I’m struggling to find reliable material on this matter. https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/china-based-executive-us-telecommunications-company-charged-disrupting-video-meetings This is the Justice Department calling him an executive, though I looked and my source for his exact role was actually Daily Mail/NY Post articles, so I'm not sure if I should trust those and withdraw that info instead. The FBI does list him as "Software Engineer" while the DOJ calls him a executive...
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Apr 22, 2023 05:17
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Charlz Guybon posted:I posted this in the Korean thread, but that gets almost no traffic  oh my word
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Apr 22, 2023 10:16
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Kavros posted:
Summon the ambassador to ROK immediately!
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Apr 22, 2023 23:19
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A PLAN squadron arrived in Sudan to evacuate Chinese personnel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5U7UZ3c8wg Dante80 fucked around with this message at 05:51 on Apr 27, 2023 |
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Apr 27, 2023 05:49
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It’s a good thing they put that big banner on the side so that everyone knows XJP personally approved the mission. It would be desperately embarrassing to be rescued by a boat that didn’t namecheck the politician who happened to be in charge at the time like all those other loser countries.
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Apr 30, 2023 11:45
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Slightly more than a week old, but seems relevant for where the thread's ended on. Documented NY: After FBI Arrests, Chinatown Leaders Deny ‘Secret Police Station’ Allegationsquote:Documented interviewed Jimmy Lu, the president of the America Changle Association, whose offices allegedly house the police station, as well as some Chinese community leaders and members. Jimmy Lu denied the charges of operating a secret police station and said the association tried to help Chinese immigrants who cannot return to China to remotely renew their Chinese driver’s licenses and other documents during the pandemic. Granted, if a secret police station to discreetly arrest Chinese Americans was operating here, this is a likely story the perpetrators could argue, which is why it's more interesting that Documented NY interviewed other Chinese American groups & business owners, who either support the above & corroborate it or have had no run-ins with the ACA: quote:Heng Chen, the president of the Fukien American Association, expressed surprise when he learned of Harry Lu’s arrest on Monday when he was supposed to visit an undocumented Chinese immigrant diagnosed with advanced liver cancer with Harry Lu. Heng Chen explained that Harry Lu and leaders of various Fujianese community organizations were fundraising for the undocumented patient and had scheduled to visit him in Brooklyn at 11 a.m. on Monday. However, Harry Lu did not show up as scheduled. “We called him, but nobody picked up the phone,” Heng Chen recalled. They waited for Harry Lu for about an hour until they were informed that the FBI had arrested him. The ACA also claim that they sent the pictures of the Overseas Station board (the ones you see in NYPost and the like, sometimes with blurred faces to add sensationalism) to the press themselves: quote:The association informed Chinese-language media in NYC when establishing the police service station in 2022. In a picture the association shared with the press, Harry Lu, Jinping Chen and other leaders of the organization sat in front of a desk with a banner hanging on the wall that said, “Fuzhou Police Overseas Service Station.” Which doesn't seem like a very secretive move. Zhang believes that this is politically motivated: quote:Zhang said he believed the case is politically motivated. “I felt there were fewer cases like this when China and U.S. were in a better relationship before, now it seems there are more things like this when the relationship gets intense,” Zhang added. And the quotes Documented included in the article certainly don't seem very dry for an ongoing investigation: quote:“The PRC, through its repressive security apparatus, established a secret physical presence in New York City to monitor and intimidate dissidents and those critical of its government,” said Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division said in a statement on Monday. “The PRC’s actions go far beyond the bounds of acceptable nation-state conduct.” And it seems weird, to me, to let the ringleaders of an extrajudicial police station arresting & intimidating your nation's citizens, who also would (as secretive extrajudicial chinese police) have enough ties to China to be a flight risk, out on bond immediately: quote:The two were released on bond on Monday afternoon after an initial appearance in Brooklyn federal court. Entirely possible that they broke laws in operating this way, but it also seems like it could be a Confucius Institute-esque Nationalist panic. Especially if people are invoking the spectre of mafioso fronts with bad food 
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Apr 30, 2023 18:38
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I've previously mentioned the conservative Chinese analysis that blames the USSR for signing up to the Helsinki Final Act as the mistake which doomed them to destruction, as the Act's commitments to territorial settlement were toothless in the face of colour revolution, whilst its acknowledgment of universal rights weakened the Soviet will to resist colour revolutions Here's a handy CSIS translation of some recent argument in the XJP anti-peaceful-evolution campaign: https://interpret.csis.org/translations/the-fundamental-reasons-lessons-and-insights-of-the-fall-of-the-soviet-unions-party-and-state/ quote:The fundamental reason for the weakness and disintegration of the CPSU and its loss of fighting strength is that it abandoned the nature, purpose, and goal of a Marxist political party, as well as the lofty pursuit of seeking happiness for the people and liberation for mankind. In particular, the leaders of the CPSU played down, abandoned, and deviated from the ideals and beliefs of socialism and communism, which provided a bad example for all Party members, and the lessons were extremely painful. Also noteworthy for the argument taken: quote:In order to wrest the power to lead the army from the hands of the CPSU, the trend of historical nihilism in the Soviet Union became more widespread and began to foment public opinion aimed at subverting the state, pointing the finger of negation at the Soviet army and Soviet heroes. Anti-Soviet and anti-communist newspapers and extremist forces exclusively exposed and criticized the so-called problems of the Soviet army and blamed the consequences of Gorbachev’s wrong reforms on the army. It was the result of the “monster” of the Soviet army sucking up the blood and sweat of the country. It became fashionable to slander Soviet soldiers and deny the history of the Soviet army. Zoya (Зоя Космодемьянская), Matrosov (Александр Матросов), Klochkov (Федор Крючков), the Young Guards, and other Soviet national heroes and hero groups were slandered. The Soviet army became an accomplice of the “fascist regime,” and the victory in the Great Patriotic War was nothing more than the defeat of the “little fascist” in Germany by the “big fascist” of the Soviet Union. On November 14, 1990, Marshal Akhromeyev (Сергей Ахромеев) of the Soviet Union published an article in Soviet Russia, pointing out that since the middle of that year, all anti-military activities ceased to be local issues. Separatist and anti-socialist forces combined a policy of discrediting the military with crowding out the Communist Party and sparked mass unrest calling for the resignation of the government. Observe that Li brings up the physical implausibility of the claim but does not refute it - the point being the determination of the country to enforce the position of its heroes regardless. The more unbelievable the claim, the better. (the debate on Lei Feng was fervent on Weibo circa 2012, during which the same observation was much made on other Mao-period model-communist figures like Huang Jiguang) ronya fucked around with this message at 19:11 on Apr 30, 2023 |
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Apr 30, 2023 19:07
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What cultural products does China have that are consumed in the West? Or vice versa? Japan has anime, games, and J-pop, Korea has K-pop and dramas and consumes Christian religion, baseball, and American music. I feel like part of the conflict between China and the West comes from not having any shared culture, which prevents exchange of ideas and understanding. I suppose Buddhism and Taoism have had some influence on Western philosophy and mindfulness is pretty popular nowadays, and you've got martial arts, but you don't have Western people getting obsessed about China like they do with Japan or Korea. Unless they're communists and like to read Fanzhen or Mao's books. America Inc. fucked around with this message at 07:59 on May 5, 2023 |
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May 5, 2023 07:52
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America Inc. posted:What cultural products does China have that are consumed in the West? Hollywood movies.
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May 5, 2023 08:20
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Chinese games are getting more and more popular, although stuff like Genshin Impact just piggybacks on the existing "anime game" market. So in that sense we share the same culture of anime (from Japan).
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May 5, 2023 08:24
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China has a few popular mobo games; Yostar alone has azur lane, Ark Knights, Mahjong Soul, others? Genshin Impact is Chinese as well and Tencent has a large presence in hollywood movies. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tencent_Pictures Not importing their .own. culture, no -- they're still locked into their 'it's modelled after the halls of Versailles' problem with their direction and writing being .. off.. but they've certainly have a lot of money to throw around to make sure they get a cut of the US market and hire Japanese artists/VA to do the work for them. killer_robot fucked around with this message at 09:15 on May 5, 2023 |
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May 5, 2023 09:04
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America Inc. posted:What cultural products does China have that are consumed in the West? Or vice versa? Japan has anime, games, and J-pop, Korea has K-pop and dramas and consumes Christian religion, baseball, and American music. Not much, really! My HS Chinese language teacher friend (from mainland China) once lamented to me that China doesn't have any cool stuff like Japan does to get kids keen.
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May 5, 2023 13:50
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3D Megadoodoo posted:Hollywood movies. Nice hot take, care to explain it?
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May 5, 2023 16:18
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chinese historical costume dramas have been something of a thing, for a while now. It's kind of a niche interest but it was still real big, especially among east asian immigrant families in the west. Eternal Love / Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms is pretty much the most watched television series in existence, and these shows found enthusiast audiences abroad. But they're losing ground incredibly fast, because increasingly mercurial and burdensome censorship (followed by some dramatic bans in 2019) essentially destroyed them as a creative product, and they got replaced by better stories and productions, especially an amazing variety now pouring out of Korea in their cultural tv and film drive.
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May 5, 2023 17:33
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There are some great movies coming out of China that deal with the feeling of alienation stemming from the economical liberalization and the massive changes Chinese society has went through in recent times. It is a great shame that they aren't better known in rest of the world. But I understand perfectly why that is because those kinds of movies don't really appeal to masses. And of course it doesn't help that Chinese government likes censorship, like one of my favourite directors, Jia Zhangke, started his career with underground movies made outside of state bureaucracy's approval. If you want to check the 'feel' of these movies, I'll recommend the first feature film from Bo Hu, An Elephant Sitting Still. Unfortunately it was also his last movie, because he killed himself before the film's premiere. Very sad situation and the director clearly had massive talent. The movie has a long runtime and is extremely depressing, but I was blown away by it and it become one of my favourite movies. So there's potential for quality cultural exports in China, but thanks to their subject matter, I expect more bubbly pop culture from other countries having much greater success. And bigger Chinese media companies are more interested in following that trend with their lesser quality bubbly pop culture products, so I'm not really surprised Chinese media has relatively worse success outside of China compared to Japan or South Korea and their cultural exports.
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May 5, 2023 18:22
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There are some chinese webtoons out there, but I've never checked them out. I feel like China has a tendency of muffling its own cultural output, so it's harder for things to hit a critical mass locally, much less get exported across the world. Hong Kong has better output, but it's kind of a separate thing that I imagine China's tightening control will damage. There's also Shen Yun, Falun Gong's dance troupe that tours throughout the world, but that's another thing that China would sure like to muffle for very obvious reasons.
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May 5, 2023 19:10
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China doesn't have cultural exports because so much of it was destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. There's a reason why Taiwan (Republic of China) considers themselves the 'guardians' of Chinese culture, because Mao Zedong couldn't do that. Per wiki: quote:In response to the Cultural Revolution of China, the government of Taiwan began promoting the Chinese Cultural Renaissance" (中華文化復興運動), with a myriad of programs designed to promote traditional Chinese culture to counter the communist movement on the mainland which aimed at uprooting the "Four Olds". These programs involved subsidized publication of Chinese Classics, the symbolic functions of the National Palace Museum, promoting famous prewar scholars to prominent positions in government and academic institutions, textbook and curriculum design with a focus on the official view of "traditional" Chinese culture and involvement in social and community events and the exemplification of Confucian ideology intertwined with Sun Yat-sen thought.
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May 5, 2023 19:46
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When talking about exporting culture, I don't think people mean or expect it to be traditional culture that was repressed during cultural revolution. Like Japan doesn't export shintoism or Japanese Zen writings so much as they export anime and video games. So I'm not sure cultural revolution had much impact on Chinese ability to export media. It did have big effect on Chinese culture for sure. But it wasn't something that destroyed culture in a way that it ceased to exist, more like it changed it traumatically and that shaped future Chinese culture. For example classic Chinese movies like Xiu Xiu, Farewell My Concubine or The Platform all deal with the effects of Cultural Revolution in one way or another. Those are cultural products that were informed by Cultural Revolution, it tells us that culture will continues trucking on. Instead of destroying Chinese ability to create culture, Cultural Revolution was a trauma from which new culture was created.
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May 5, 2023 20:05
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I think it would still be fair to say that the echos of the Cultural Revolution has made a lot of Chinese media output unappetizing for export. There are a lot of films that are excessively formulaic, patriotic, good vs evil stuff that was very popular that people from outside the mainland wouldn't enjoy. I mean the decline of Hong Kong cinema probably has the same roots in Chinese government leaning on the creative process.
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May 5, 2023 20:12
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I'm not really seeing the effect of Cultural Revolution in Chinese media. Like sure those formulaic, patriotic, good vs evil movies are popular in China and they suck rear end, but I fail to see how they are connected to Cultural Revolution when the exact same formula films come from every other nation that makes films too. Those films I mentioned previously were all created in post-Mao atmosphere were Cultural Revolution was very much seen as a bad thing within Chinese establishment. Like one of the biggest Chinese films ever, Hero from 2002, was so deeply Confucian in its themes that were the red guards to see it, they would have demanded the head of Zhang Yimou. And I have a hard time seeing Cultural Revolution era thinking making any kind of come back during Xi Jinping era that is all about stability. Beijing would probably have some issues with "bomb the party HQ" shouting radical maoists or the extremist spirit of Cultural Revolution. Cultural Revolution within more 'chuddy' Chinese population has a position of taking kitschy and tacky photos in red guard uniforms and not much else. And especially not the traumatic and radical cultural changing force it was. I do agree that Chinese cultural exports don't really succeed compared to other countries. And I'm not saying that Hong Kong cinema isn't on a downward spiral (big shame, Hong Kong movies were just as big a part of my childhood as Hollywood action movies). I just have a hard time seeing Cultural Revolution behind the lack of Chinese success here.
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May 5, 2023 20:38
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Yeah, I think general authoritarianism and associated censorship has more to do with it than the Cultural Revolution specifically. Inasmuch as there’s a connection, it’s more a reaction against the Cultural Revolution than a continuation of it. I notice than in this discussion of Chinese cultural exports, no one has discussed the elephant in the room (xianxia-adjacent webnovels). Generally not much aesthetic merit even compared to the off-brand anime games, but it’s at least a relatively China-specific thing. (And to be fair, it’s not as though amateur serialized fiction from other countries is great as a rule.) Silver2195 fucked around with this message at 21:09 on May 5, 2023 |
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May 5, 2023 20:57
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Silver2195 posted:Yeah, I think general authoritarianism and associated censorship has more to do with it than the Cultural Revolution specifically. Inasmuch as there’s a connection, it’s more a reaction against the Cultural Revolution than a continuation of it. That is basically the legacy of the Cultural Revolution though? Conformation to Maoist thought, suppression of dissent, the KGB style informing on neighbors and watching them get thrown into gulags. I'm not sure how you separate authoritarianism and censorship from its worst expressions during the Cultural Revolution. And to expand on that, the influence is on Chinese consumption habits, look at the top grossing films in China to see what I'm talking about : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_films_in_China There are films that are absurdly popular that wouldn't have seen the light of the day anywhere else, talking pure propaganda stuff like Wolf Warrior or My People, My Country which are enjoyed because they are feel good films that cater specifically to the Chinese people without any broad appeal. WarpedLichen fucked around with this message at 21:14 on May 5, 2023 |
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May 5, 2023 21:08
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WarpedLichen posted:That is basically the legacy of the Cultural Revolution though? Conformation to Maoist thought, suppression of dissent, the KGB style informing on neighbors and watching them get thrown into gulags. I'm not sure how you separate authoritarianism and censorship from its worst expressions during the Cultural Revolution. The difference is that the people at the top perpetrating it now are largely people who were persecuted during the Cultural Revolution, IIRC. It’s a weird irony, to be sure.
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May 5, 2023 21:13
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WarpedLichen posted:That is basically the legacy of the Cultural Revolution though? Conformation to Maoist thought Authoritarianism comes in many forms and the evolution of post-cultural revolution Chinese establishment was decidedly anti-Maoist. Like the red guards railed against Deng Xiaoping and he was purged during the Cultural Revolution. The Cultural Revolution ended when forces opposing Maoist thought seized the power and Deng became the de facto leader of China. That's not to say that for example Xi Jinping isn't authoritarian. But he most definitely isn't a maoist authoritarian nor would he support radical and extremist thing like Cultural Revolution in any way.
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May 5, 2023 21:17
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Glah posted:Authoritarianism comes in many forms and the evolution of post-cultural revolution Chinese establishment was decidedly anti-Maoist. Like the red guards railed against Deng Xiaoping and he was purged during the Cultural Revolution. The Cultural Revolution ended when forces opposing Maoist thought seized the power and Deng became the de facto leader of China. That's not to say that for example Xi Jinping isn't authoritarian. But he most definitely isn't a maoist authoritarian nor would he support radical and extremist thing like Cultural Revolution in any way. I would say that this is missing the forest for the trees. The internal struggles of the party don't matter - what matters is the continuity of the party and the use of force and censorship to achieve those goals. I'll concede that authoritarianism and censorship if defined separately made a bigger impact, but it still feels all connected to me. And that's not to say there are 0 Chinese cultural exports. Some movies like Hero, Crouching Tiger, cpop is making strides with kpop, science fiction like Three Body Problem, games like Genshin, etc etc. Stuff is crossing the border, just not in big quantities because of the difference in preferences.
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May 5, 2023 21:29
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WarpedLichen posted:I would say that this is missing the forest for the trees. The internal struggles of the party don't matter - what matters is the continuity of the party and the use of force and censorship to achieve those goals. Well then it becomes a question of the effects of authoritarianism in general and not Cultural Revolution as a particular reason for Chinese challenges in cultural exports. Unless you are saying that Cultural Revolution is the reason China is authoritarian today which I'm not sure if I agree with. Because the defining traits of Cultural Revolution (upending the party structures, attacking the traditional culture and bourgeoise 'thought', purging of everyone in authority position, roving bands of red guards acting out Chinese Mad Max) were straight up challenged in post-Cultural Revolution Chinese cinema etc., not embraced. And that was of course possible because the establishment was now anti-maoist made up from people who felt the brunt of Cultural Revolution.
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May 5, 2023 21:42
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WarpedLichen posted:Crouching Tiger :/ Ang Lee is Taiwanese 🇹🇼
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May 5, 2023 21:49
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Glah posted:Well then it becomes a question of the effects of authoritarianism in general and not Cultural Revolution as a particular reason for Chinese challenges in cultural exports. Unless you are saying that Cultural Revolution is the reason China is authoritarian today which I'm not sure if I agree with. I am saying that modern Chinese authoritarianism still has its roots in the Cultural Revolution and there never was a break that you are claiming. One concrete example is the Little Red Book that everybody had to carry during the Cultural Revolution. My parents shared stories about having nightmares about losing that book and getting picked up by the police. This was de-emphasized but never denounced. People still give the book as gifts and it's even the name for a social network. The Little Red Book is still very much a part of Chinese culture. I feel people are saying the end of the Cultural Revolution was a break from Mao when China never really broke from Mao. Likewise, people never really forgot about the oppression and death squads, it just became a part of life under the Party. The worst parts were toned down but the specter is still floating over everything. url posted::/ Film was literally funded in part by the China Film Group Corporation which is owned by the Party. Unless you're saying it took somebody from Taiwan and other foreign stakeholders to make it an international success, then no argument there. WarpedLichen fucked around with this message at 22:00 on May 5, 2023 |
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May 5, 2023 21:52
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WarpedLichen posted:I am saying that modern Chinese authoritarianism still has its roots in the Cultural Revolution and there never was a break that you are claiming. Yeah personally I think that as long as China was under the control of Communist Party, it would be authoritarian regardless of Cultural Revolution happening or not. But I'm not sure what you mean by "break" that I'm claiming? I'm not saying that China became non-authoritarian after cultural revolution. I'm saying that other anti-maoist but still authoritarian people took control. And that is heavily reflected in for example Chinese cinema. Because were Cultural Revolution's legacy affecting cinema in a way that forced movie makers to conform to Maoist thought and censoring everything else and that was the reason Chinese cultural exports were lacking, then it would be strange that there'd be tons of classical Chinese movies challenging Cultural Revolution and not many movies that actually espoused maoist thought and ideas of radical cultural revolution in post-Mao era...
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May 5, 2023 22:04
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Glah posted:Yeah personally I think that as long as China was under the control of Communist Party, it would be authoritarian regardless of Cultural Revolution happening or not. I'm saying anti-maoist people taking over didn't really change anything about the legacy of the Cultural Revolution which is immense pressure to conform and keep your head down. I'm not sure how many movies overtly challenges the Cultural Revolution, most of the films I've seen are about regular people persevering through their indomitable will rather than a challenge to the state (unless 3 degrees removed and snuck past the censor boards). If you have some examples, I would check them out, I'm not an expert on Chinese cinema or anything.
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May 5, 2023 22:11
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Most of the “Golden Age” of Hollywood happened under an authoritarian system. It wasn’t the government, but that doesn’t really matter from the perspective of filmmakers making films. My point it that it doesn’t really preclude popular output even if it stifles a lot of creativity
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May 5, 2023 22:16
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WarpedLichen posted:I'm saying anti-maoist people taking over didn't really change anything about the legacy of the Cultural Revolution which is immense pressure to conform and keep your head down. I'm not sure how many movies overtly challenges the Cultural Revolution, most of the films I've seen are about regular people persevering through their indomitable will rather than a challenge to the state (unless 3 degrees removed and snuck past the censor boards). If you have some examples, I would check them out, I'm not an expert on Chinese cinema or anything. Well I'm not sure how overtly you want but the three movies I mentioned previously, Xiu Xiu, The Platform and Farewell My Concubine all pretty decidedly say that Cultural Revolution sucked and them red guards were crazy as gently caress. Al tho Xiu Xiu, while Chinese movie, was more of a guerilla shoot and was banned when it was released but I think it had more to do with it's depiction of sexual violence than denounciation of Cultural Revolution. The Platform is more rough around the edges being one of Jia Zhangke's earlier movies, but I find it the best and most interesting of the bunch (all are awesome tho, no worries!). The movie follows a theater troupe from cultural revolution era to the years of Deng's reforms in the 80's. Farewell My Concubine is the most approachable of the bunch in my opinion and IIRC it was a big hit abroad too. It follows a troupe in Chinese Opera (what's up with all these troupes lol) from 1920's to 1980's and really gives an interesting portrayal of changes in Chinese society in 20th century in addition to good character drama.
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May 5, 2023 22:23
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Glah posted:Farewell My Concubine is the most approachable of the bunch in my opinion and IIRC it was a big hit abroad too. It follows a troupe in Chinese Opera (what's up with all these troupes lol) from 1920's to 1980's and really gives an interesting portrayal of changes in Chinese society in 20th century in addition to good character drama. I've seen that one and I would say that's about the limit to the portrayal of the cultural revolution and it faced a lot of controversy. You got our brave heroes persevering and the movie at best acknowledging the excesses of the period. I don't think I've ever seen a treatment where the bad guy is a member of the party and gets his comeuppance without a healthy dose of personal failures or being saved by an opposing member of the party. I would almost cite that as a counterexample of the Chinese government allowing the Counter Revolution to be challenged.
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May 5, 2023 22:36
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WarpedLichen posted:I've seen that one and I would say that's about the limit to the portrayal of the cultural revolution and it faced a lot of controversy. You got our brave heroes persevering and the movie at best acknowledging the excesses of the period. I don't think I've ever seen a treatment where the bad guy is a member of the party and gets his comeuppance without a healthy dose of personal failures or being saved by an opposing member of the party. I would almost cite that as a counterexample of the Chinese government allowing the Counter Revolution to be challenged. While the portrayal of the Cultural Revolution is ancillary to the character drama in the movie and for example the denunciation scene is more about red guards breaking the humanity of the main characters and them starting to attack each other after that, I have an extremely hard time seeing that this scene doesn't challenge Cultural Revolution: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_5ryh9ND68 In my opinion it goes way beyond just acknowledging excess of the period and full on says that the period broke the main characters and destroyed their humanity and ability to empathize with each other. EDIT: But now we are veering to the area of subjectivity and how we interpret art and themes it raises so I do think there's room for different interpretations of the scene here... Glah fucked around with this message at 22:57 on May 5, 2023 |
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May 5, 2023 22:54
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Glah posted:While the portrayal of the Cultural Revolution is ancillary to the character drama in the movie and for example the denunciation scene is more about red guards breaking the humanity of the main characters and them starting to attack each other after that, I have an extremely hard time seeing that this scene doesn't challenge Cultural Revolution: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_5ryh9ND68 Subjective views on the scene aside, can we agree that the censors took action and that negative depictions of the Cultural Revolution were very much not a thing that is broadly supported? https://www.nytimes.com/1993/08/04/movies/china-bans-one-of-its-own-films-cannes-festival-gave-it-top-prize.html quote:The ban already is having a chilling effect on other productions. Mr. Chen, the director, said he had put aside plans to film "Life and Death in Shanghai." The book, by Nien Cheng, describes the sufferings of one family during the Cultural Revolution. To counter: Glah posted:then it would be strange that there'd be tons of classical Chinese movies challenging Cultural Revolution and not many movies that actually espoused maoist thought and ideas of radical cultural revolution in post-Mao era... There are films that depict the Cultural Revolution because the period was super lovely and formative for a lot of people. There are less films than there otherwise would be because overly harsh criticism of that period is not seen favorably by the government. I am not aware of a film that openly displays the cultural revolution as the baddies except in the aforementioned historical fiction genre: quote:most of the films I've seen are about regular people persevering through their indomitable will rather than a challenge to the state (unless 3 degrees removed and snuck past the censor boards) Like I'm thinking an Inglorious Bastards movie where the Red Guard replaced the Nazis, I can't see a movie like that existing. Edit: And to wrap up my original point since I think the film derail was very interesting, it's getting away from what I wanted to express: 1. Cultural Revolution is a big deal to the Chinese public consciousness 2. Government never fully repudiated the event and allowed the public consciousness to move past it and recover 3. Chinese public consciousness changes how Chinese people prefer their media, which in effect makes a lot of it unappealing for foreign audiences WarpedLichen fucked around with this message at 23:33 on May 5, 2023 |
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May 5, 2023 23:23
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WarpedLichen posted:And to wrap up my original point since I think the film derail was very interesting, it's getting away from what I wanted to express: For the first point I absolutely 100% agree. With your second point I partly agree but want to explain my point of view in discussion: Chinese government is authoritarian and is way heavy handed with censorship. And this can stifle more experimental artistic expression in society, at least in a way that there's not as many people doing things like that. Could be the reason of their problems with exporting media. And it is also absolutely true that without it, we'd see many more Chinese movies critical of Mao for example. But what I've been trying to say is that the problem with the lack of success of Chinese media exports isn't with the legacy of Cultural Revolution. Because even if there weren't a single Chinese movie critical of Cultural Revolution, there really isn't any Chinese movie pushing for maoist ideas and cultural revolutionary action either that would be rejected by the audience in rest of the world. That's really been my point, I don't see causal relationship between cultural revolution and current day Chinese mediascape that could explain their lack of success. For your third point if I interpret you correctly, you are saying that Cultural Revolution affected Chinese public consciousness and that in turn affected their media habits? So you are not saying that there's something particular in Cultural Revolution's aims, ideology or action that affected people's consciousness, just the trauma of it all? I guess there could be something there, but I personally am not sure. Because does something like Wolf Warrior really differ from jingoistic movies from other countries? People all over the world like stupid patriotic action schlock, even in countries that haven't gone through a massive cultural trauma couple of generations previous. But granted I really haven't seen many mainstreamy popular Chinese movies so I don't really know if there's some maoist thought coming through somewhere there. I really like less main stream Chinese cinema. And there's plenty of extremely good movies there. And if something like Cultural Revolution comes up there, it is never portrayed positively. But I understand perfectly why they don't appeal to wide global audience. Because those movies are more often than not, depressing as gently caress.
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May 6, 2023 00:03
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idk about the cultural or media stuff enough to comment, but it's been interesting to see a sort of similar struggle happen in their outward oriented messaging and diplomatic efforts, which broadly seem to really struggle to get any significant traction outside of people already extremely sympathetic to them or with otherwise directly aligned interests and a lot of the efforts seem to be specifically even counter productive because there's a lack of, idk how best to describe it, an attempt to empathize with the felt position of the people on the receiving end? Instead you get weird ostensibly diplomatic messaging that is barely a step removed from 'we're the big fish in this pond, what we say goes, this is how it will be,' which shockingly doesn't go over well. Sometimes it's not even a step removed. Along with the wolf warrior stuff presumably it's just people hopped up on internally-directed nationalist messaging who aren't really aware (or don't care) that you can't just interact with the rest of the world like that if you care about soft power, like, at all. It's peculiar because it seems like China ultimately ends up practically being far less influential on the world stage than it almost definitely should be by most metrics, but I guess that's what happens if you don't really prioritize soft power. They make even Russia's fairly clumsy efforts look skillful and nuanced and tbh the agreement between the two to unify their messaging efforts will probably be a significant boost to China's messaging effectiveness.
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May 6, 2023 00:37
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Glah posted:That's really been my point, I don't see causal relationship between cultural revolution and current day Chinese mediascape that could explain their lack of success. That is absolutely fair, this is just my personal view on why mainstream Chinese media is so "safe" as to be boring to me. And repression is just one factor of why that is and there's probably thousands more. But the original question is also kind of a gotcha, because there are a lot of big countries with less cultural influence than expected, like what's the big cultural cross over from India or hell even Germany in the last 10 years. Media heavily dominated by the US and Japan and Korea media being popular is kind of an outlier really.
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May 6, 2023 02:32
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