03/11/24 - If guns were legal, I’d shoot a handful of people every day.
“Just came upon this post by a Taiwanese girl working in Singapore. She had a fight with somebody in the middle of the night, and ran out of her house and sat down in front of a department store and just had a crying fit. And she got taken to the mental hospital by Singapore police to get checked out. The doctors said her emotions were extremely unstable, so she got forcibly committed to accept treatment, and she’s not allowed to have any contact with the outside, she couldn’t inform her family or her workplace. Just straight up became a missing person.
The environment in the mental hospital is awful, she’s terrified, but in order to prove that she’s not “crazy” so she can be released quickly, she has to work hard to adjust her mood to be as happy and upbeat as she can in front of the doctors so she can get away from this hellhole.
Considering I also have a tendency to have breakdown cries over nothing and scream for no reason, I’m terrified. If I get committed to a mental hospital, how do I prove I’m not crazy?”
Comments say, “Same in America. I got threatened by a psychiatrist that if I didn’t calm down right now (I was just crying my eyes out), he’d call and have the hospital commit me.”
“Holy shit. Now I definitely never want to go to Singapore. It seems so crazy over there with all the strict rules and punishments.”
“Same in America. If you show suicidal tendencies, you’ll get forcibly committed to “protect you from hurting yourself”. A bunch of super buff police officers will show up and gently and calmly explain al of this to you while they handcuff you. Happened to me.”
“A lot of people say that America has really bad racism, and that it’s a lot better in Asia. I don’t really agree with that take. Mostly, I take issue with the second half. Of course America totally has a serious problem with racism, but the reason a lot more of the conflict is “obvious” in America is because there’s a lot of interaction between different races.
It looks like there’s fewer incidents in Asia, because there’s just not a lot of interaction between races. When white people appear in Asia, sometimes, they have even more privilege than they do in their native country.
Like, a good example is that a lot of times, after Chinese people move over to the west, they find that people judge them for their accents a lot less than in China. So even though there aren’t many native English speakers around them in China, people have very deep-rooted biases about what counts as “proper English.””
Comments say, “I dunno, I feel like China has pretty severe regional prejudices.”
“Just the fact that the hukou system exists is the highest form of racism.”
“Because all the Asian countries are almost mono-ethnic. Like, 95% of China is Han ethnicity. When almost every is a part of the same group, of course you don’t feel any prejudice. And a lot of people take that to mean there is no prejudice.”
A tiktok video of deep-frying egg yolks:
Comments say, “Boring ingredients, the least skilled cooking method imagination. It makes even the cook look unintelligent.”
“White people really don’t have much to eat, do they?”
“There are so many delicious ways to eat eggs, and he picked the yuckiest one.”
[The wedding of the riches man in Asia—some billionaire in India—has been trending all over weibo, with people gossiping about the people involved, the ceremony, and, of course, the jewellery. Today, there’s another blog on this topic.]
“These two solid chunks of mosquito repellent has upgraded again. [Chinese mosquito repellent liquid is almost exactly the same colour as these emeralds]. I saw yesterday someone say that they’re made from beer bottle glass XD
The reason this necklace has been talked about so much is because nobody’s ever seen emeralds that huge. Columbia produces a lot of huge emeralds that they ship straight to European royalty. But honestly, we’ve never even seen pictures of this necklace before. A lot of people guess that it’s actually an antique from 16th century India. Maybe it was bought at a private sale.
I think the main theme of this wedding was supposed to be, “Indian men make great husbands”, where India’s riches man tries to change people’s stereotypes, but literally just a few days ago, that Spanish tourist blogger got raped in India, so people are more afraid of this legendary country than ever.”
Comments say, “European royalty’s running out of their collection too. They’re adjusting their old stock, buying smaller stones, etc.”
“She measures her necklaces by the pound.”
“Just realised the guy I went on a date with sprung an obedience test on me.
Right at the beginning, he said he wanted to find a gentle, sweet woman. He doesn’t know how to cook food or do housework, nor does he want to, but he’s willing to hire a maid, and he asked if I would be okay with that. I said yeah, and felt like maybe he had a bit of a strong, intense personality.
Then at night, I was dealing with work while chatting on him on the phone, and I said, “Alright, I need to go. Let’s talk tomorrow.”
And the next day, we exchanged where we live and where we work, and he said he wanted to meet me around his workplace in the morning. And I was confused, like who would arrange a date on a weekday in the morning when everybody has to work? So I said that time didn’t work for me, and he went, “You’re in your thirties—you’re not still a bottom level employee, are you? What does it matter if you leave your job for an hour or so?”
First, he subtly asked my job position and amount of work. What a genius at business negotiation.
Second, obviously, this was an obedience test. He wants to see if I’d abandon work to go see him.
Third, it wasn’t meal time or anything, so he wouldn’t have to take me out. We can just sit around somewhere for free and he’ll save money. What an amazing scheme.”
Comments say, “If you can take an hour away from work right now, then once you’re married, no matter what comes up with the kid, you’re the one who’ll have to take time off of work to go deal with it.”
“Check out this date that I’ve only known for two weeks.” [This commenter attaches screenshots of texts from her date, which read, “My dishes from lunch are still dirty. Find someone who can wash them for me.”]
“Just answer honestly and sincerely here: are you going to offer enough value for it to be worth stepping away from work for me? And help him set a couple of short-term goals [doge]” [“Short-term goals” is a slang term for 100 million RMB in China, gotten from a meme of the CEO of Evergrande saying in an interview, “I’m going to set some simple, short-term goals, like earning a hundred million RMB.]
“I was just talking with my friend about “motivating kids”.
My friend, who works in education, said that she’s never worried about her kid before, and her kid gets almost full marks on his TOEFL exam.
She said, “You don’t have to push them for them to study well.”
And I joked with her that this is why she doesn’t make any money.
If you’re always saying that there’s no need to push your kids too hard, then what’s your commercial value? You need to act like you’ve done a lot, you’ve put all of your effort in, and it’s only through the curriculum you put together, the assigned reading you gave out, the homework you set that made these kids into geniuses. Or else how are you gonna get anyone to pay for your services?
And she thought I made a good point, and reflected, “It’s true. You can’t sell parents something like, “You don’t have to worry about your kids.””
Honestly, it’s not that you can’t say something like that, or even that you can’t sell it. It’s that nobody will believe it.
Collectively, as a whole.
From what I observe in parents, they seem to think that unless they’d done something (spent a certain amount of money), then they can’t clam to be a good parent. They can’t even forgive themselves for not buying classes, not hiring tutors, not signing kids up for extracurriculars. Not spending money. They feel like they’re denying their child a beautiful future.
This mindset has radiated to every corner of society.
I’ve got a reader who’s kid is a high-functioning autist. They make a little over 10K a month as a household, just about middle class, and they have to spend their money very carefully. And yet, the mom will pay 300K-400K for her kid to get tutoring, to study, to hire teachers, because she feels bad about herself if she’s not spending her money on something. She’s just buying her own peace of mind.
After I heard that from her, I got really upset. Like, that kid is going to need money for a lot of things when he grows up. For him, at least, they shouldn’t be spending money on his grades, but on teaching him basic life skills.
But on the other hand, I kind of get how this reader feels.
As the parent of a dumb kid, I’ve went through the same emotional journey. I’ve also throw a boatload of money on my kid’s studies, and at the end, I was also spending money for my own peace of mind. I’ve paid double digits for tutoring classes, to triple digits, to four digits even.
Once, a rich friend of mine said that her kid’s tutor charges 2000 RMB an hour! And I’ve heard a Shenzhen mom say that she spends 400K+ on her kid’s tutoring a year! And he’s only in seventh grade!
I was flabbergasted.
It reminds me of a movie I watched a few days ago, The Pig, The Snake, and The Pigeon.
Chen Guilin was supposed to kill some leader of a cult, but when he got there, he was swept up by the energy of the cult and ended up believing in it too, and cried and begged to be allowed in, and even gave all his money to the cult leader. And at the end, when Chen Guilin realised this was a cult and wanted to wake everyone else up, they all fought against him. They’d rather die than leave.
I remembered this segment, because maybe every time I said something like, “I don’t wanna push my kids.” “You shouldn’t push your kids”, all I’ve ever received was mockery?
I mean, sure, go ahead, I guess. You’re not spending money out of my pocket.
I actually need to fit in more and push my kid a little bit. Maybe I can at least get a few more ad sponsors for my blog that way.”
Comments say, “What if your kid just refuses to cooperate? I don’t dare to tell anyone that my kid doesn’t have any tutoring and just studies at home. And my kid doesn’t have good grades either. I’m worried people will gossip about me, say that I’m stingy, that I won’t even let my kids go to tutoring.”
“”Nobody pushed their kids back in the day. Was it really better back then?”
“My viewpoint is changing a lot. Now, I only push my kids to do more exercise, invest in their health.”
A man in Guangzhou went downstairs to buy breakfast at a stall for 5 RMB when he accidentally fell. He sued the stall owner for 200K, and the judge ruled that the stall owner was 60% responsible for this accident. The stall owner says, “Well, fuck me, then. I need to sell 40,000 servings of breakfast to make this money back.”
Comments say, “Yeah, it’s not just inside your store. You’re responsible for anyone who slips and falls outside your door too.”
“Some restaurants literally never clean their floors, and it gets so greasy and slippery. The spicy soup restaurant downstairs is like this. I gotta be super careful just walking in.”
“Cool idea. Taking notes :D”
“My daughter shared a peanut butter sandwich with an allergic kid.
I took my kid to the park nearby on the weekend, and packed her a couple of peanut butter sandwiches and fruit. We ran into our neighbour there, and the kids started playing with each other. When it got to snack time, my daughter offered to share her sandwich with the other kid, and she accepted. Well, they shared with each other.
We didn’t say that it contained peanut butter, and the other kid and her parent never said she was allergic to peanuts either.
And she ended up having a really severe reaction. Scared me half to death.
Her parents are really mad at us for feeding her without permission.
We paid for all her medical expenses. I won’t be letting my daughter play with her after this, and I’ve told my daughter to never share her food with anyone. Who knows what people are allergic to these days? If someone had a problem, it’d turn into a huge hassle.
If we knew she was allergic, I never would’ve shared it.
So be careful sharing your food, kiddos! There’s a lot of kids with allergies out there!”
Comments say, “A lot of people with IPs in foreign countries are being really smug. Guess why it’s not common sense in China to never share something with nuts? Because this kind of problem is genuinely pretty rare in China. I know a ton of people with allergies, but not a single person who’s allergic to peanuts. You don’t have to make fun of the blogger or tell her off so harshly, do you?”
“Shouldn’t it be the kids with allergies who need to learn not to take food from other people? Why should we teach normal kids to stop sharing?”
“It’s nice that your kiddo shares, but there’s a lot of people allergic to super common ingredients like fruit, eggs, or even common spices. Just think of this as spending money to teach your kid a lesson.”
“If I gave you 50 million RMB and you had to spend all of it in one month. You can’t invest it, can’t buy houses or cars, can’t spend it on strangers, can’t donate it, and you die if you break any of the rules. But if you succeed, you get a billion RMB to keep, how would you spend this money?”
Comments say, “I’d spend it on myself—teeth correction, eye surgery, every kind of plastic surgery rejuvenation shots I can find, including the kind that celebrities get for like a million RMB a pop. Then, I’d spend it on my hobbies—learn a couple of languages, instruments, skiing, surfing, skydiving, flying a plane—find the best teachers and you can blow a couple of million on a single hobby in a month pretty easily.”
“I mean, I guess I’d throw myself a party and invite all the hottest celebrities. I’d succeed for sure, but I don’t really like spending money this way.”
“Gold? Diamonds? Brand name bags? Cars? Watches? Hmmm, I don’t think I’ve got enough money.”
A tiktok video by a European girl talking about how China changed her:
Comments say, “Made me so mad, I actually laughed out loud.”
“You white people need to shut the fuck up.”
“It’s true, Chinese people like to look very calm on the surface, like they have it all under control, but it’s so draining to maintain this surface-level peace. We never learn how to actually resolve any conflicts, how to express our emotions. We just vent everything at strangers on the internet.”
“Chinese people are numb. Of course they look patient.”
“Lady, do you not know what repression means?”
“If guns were legal, I’d shoot a handful of people every day.”
“Yeah, nobody gets angry in the streets because we’re all too busy committing suicide at home.”
“Found a post by a guy studying abroad in England, about his thoughts on it. He’s around 20 years old, did his Bachelor’s in England, and he says three types of people shouldn’t study abroad:
First, people from average family backgrounds. Studying abroad is tremendously expensive. This guy showed his expenses for a year in England, and I gave it a glance, and it was 930K or something. But even if it was a round million, the guy says this is just barely enough to keep him alive.
Second, people who are morally upstanding shouldn’t come, because relationships in the west are very messy. For example, if a couple has a fight and one of them ghosts for a while and has a one night stand and then comes back, that’s a pretty normal scenario here.
And third, people looking for good-quality boyfriends/girlfriends shouldn’t come, because you can’t find true love in a bar, and you shouldn’t be looking for treasure in a garbage heap. You should be looking for treasure in a gold mine or diamond mine.
It’s my first time seeing such an honestly international student in England. I’m really worried that he’ll get internet bullied by those smug international students all like, “I’ll spend the rest of my life reminiscencing about London.””
Comments say, “Lol, the million a year made me laugh. Even if you work at a British hedge fund, you won’t make barely 500K a year, and he’s saying you need a million a year just to stay alive?”
“A million a year to stay alive? Then how to normal people in England live?”
“I highly doubt his first point. I went a decade ago, when the exchange rate was about 13:1, and at the time, it cost 500K. Now that the pound has fallen a bit, there’s no way you need a million just to cover normal expenses. As for the second and third point, I never ran into people like this while I was there. But back then, as soon as I got off of class, I went fishing, never spent a lot of time on relationships. I don’t deny there are people like this, but not everyone is like this.”