[The websites I’ve been using to take videos off of weibo aren’t working for me right now, none of them. I’m not quite sure what the issue is, so I’ve kind of brute-forced the issue by recording the screen of my phone while the video plays. I’m sorry for the low quality.]
“University tuition is gonna keep rising, until the point that normal families can’t possibly hope to afford it on their income without taking out a loan. This is nothing yet. Think about the worst days of skyrocketing real estate prices. The rise has barely begun.
If you really want to buy houses that much and maintain face, then I’ll cancel house quotas and increase college entrance rates, and satisfy all of you.
To put it bluntly, with how the economy’s been doing this last couple of years, the first batch of people who were supposed to lose their jobs should’ve been university professors. Second-rate colleges with shitty professors and no research and worthless diplomas should’ve been shutting their doors.
And yet, there are 10 million people turning into adults every year, and 90% of them are completely obsessed with the college dream. They’ll squeeze to get into diploma mills, even. I’m not just saying this—there’s data to back this up, that the admission rates are insane right now.
In 2016, 9.4 million people took the college entrance exam, and 7.05 million people were admitted. Admission rates were 75%.
In 2017, 9.4 million people took the college entrance exam, and 7 million people were admitted. Admission rates were 74.46%.
In 2018, 9.75 million people took the college entrance exam, and 7.91 million people were admitted. Admission rates were 81.13%.
In 2019, 10.31 million people took the college entrance exam, and 8.2 million people were admitted. Admission rates were 79.53%.
In 2020, 10.71 million people took the college entrance exam, and 9.68 million people were admitted. Admission rates were 90.34%.
In 2021, 10.78 million people took the college entrance exam, and 10.01 million people were admitted. Admission rates were 92.89%.
So where did the 8% who didn’t get admitted into college go? Maybe they went into a factory. Maybe they inherited the family business. Or maybe they just repeated high school.
Either way, in order to keep this industry flourishing, every year around exam season, all the media covers are the couple of dreamers who’ve been repeating high school for decades to get into top universities. But in reality, only 600,000 people in the country get to go to top universities every year. Or only about 1 in 100 people. But even these elites still can’t find a job once they graduate.
Last year, 10,000 people were laid off at Tencent. 15,000 people were laid off at Alibaba. The financial reports from both companies more or less explicitly say people’ll have better luck in Hong Kong. Every year, about 10,000 people graduate from a university. If a university was filled with students that want to go work at these top two companies, then that means this year, they would’ve all ended up unemployed.
Feel sorry for them? Don’t.
The path up in society has changed a long time ago, but most people still like to follow the trends. Everyone else is doing it, and it lets you slack off for another four years.
To return to my point of view that second-rate universities should be shutting down—a lot of average state universities are ran exactly like a business. Pull in a bunch of students, teach them a curriculum that hasn’t changed in the last decade or more, make you write a thesis over a couple of months, let you pass even if it’s a pile of shit.
And as for your university life, guys are basically gaming all night, playing League of Legends. They gossip with each other before bed about girls, upvote borderline pornographic videos in their beds. They basically have 0 values.
And girls just study fashion all day, take photos, talk about hot guys, figure out how to become influencers. And anyone who’s even a little cute daydreams about marrying a trust fund brat.
Occasionally, you might see someone who’s actually hard-working and goes to the library, but they’ll end up getting isolated and bullied for being a weirdo.
The corrosion of our spirit, the poverty of our thoughts is in a terminal stage. Higher education is practically a factory for producing Kong Yijis [a character in Lu Xun’s books, known for being an archetypical snooty academic]. What kind of company would hire them once they graduated?
But once you’ve graduated, you’re not the school’s problem anymore.
You’ve got to make it in the world all on your own. Once you’ve flopped your way through society for a couple of years, you’ll have a better idea of who you are.
No self-control, no motivation, no creativity. All boys can think about is black stockings and beautiful legs. All girls can think about is getting rich and beautiful over night. The only philosophical ideas they’ve ever encountered is materialism and idealism. All they’ve learned from college is how to play devil’s advocate.
Isn’t it a bit illogical for these people to not end up unemployed, but instead getting government jobs? They shouldn’t have even went to college to begin with. Which one of them did it for knowledge? Or learning about the truth?
Most students in average universities are hopeless anyways. They don’t like to study. They’ve been spoiled by their family. And as soon as they graduate, they show their true form—they’re nothing.
A lot of people are worried about future employment even before they take the college entrance exams. The reason they’re anxious is their parent’s hardwork and anticipation for the last 12 years, their teacher’s KPI, the bounds of their family, and the illusion of freedom.
I really hope that college tuition goes way up, at least six-figures a year. Let market prices change how people think. It’s just like how people don’t impulse buy houses anymore, because they know how much they make a month.
If you only for 400 [out of 750] in your college entrance exams, and still dream about going to university and graduating to find a good job, wake up and check yourself.”
Comments say, “I don’t know how old you are or when you took your college entrance exams. You might not know just how hard the exams have gotten. It’s not easy making it into a top university, or average normal state universities. If you’re telling off university students, how are community college students supposed to feel? Out of the 10 million exam takers every year, half of them make it into university, and half go to community college!”
“People always like to put on rose-coloured glasses for the past. First, those admission rates include community and technical college admissions. If you’re looking at only university admission, then that’s not even half of people. Second, yeah, sure, admission rates were sure lower 30 years ago, but were there any more employment opportunities? My dad got a STEM degree at a 985 university [Ivy League equivalent], and he could only get an entry-level job at a government-funded factory in Guangzhou (and government-funded companies weren’t what they’re today at all). And none of his high school classmates turned out successful.”
“Only 40% of people get to go university. The new college entrance exams aren’t easy at all.”
And askreddit question: “What’s the most tragic thing you’ve heard?”
The top reply is, “My grandpa told me, “After I die, remember to come to my grave with some good wine.” He passed away this year, and I dreamed about him asking me, “Why haven’t they burnt any money to me yet?” And then he asked me, “Do you need any money? I’ve got some.” And he showed me the fives and tens in his pockets, and a bunch of spare change. I didn’t take any, I told him to save it for himself.
When I went to burn money to him, the ashes fell on my head. And for a moment, I almost heard him telling me like he did back when I was a child, “Take this and go buy some candy.””
A blogger shows screenshots of a person talking with their company about not receiving their paycheck, and eventually having to threaten to report the incident to city government, post about it on social media, and taking them to court before he finally got his pay. The blogger comments, “This is a strategy that only works on big companies that care about their reputation. It’s worthless against small businesses.”
Comments say, “Yeah, small companies don’t care. If they’re shut down, they’ll just register a new business and start over.”
“I’ve seen a badass, an air conditioner mechanic, who fixed the air conditioner, only for the store owner to say that the boss isn’t in and they don’t have any money, and they need the boss to authorise the transfer first. So he pulled out his ladder, and climbed back up, and took all the parts out of the air conditioner again. The store owner got right on top of getting the transfer through.”
“I usually just gently coax them. Like, I’m on the verge of begging them for money. Thankfully, I finally got paid after over 4 months. Finally let out that breath I was holding.”
The continuous rain in Shenzhen has broken records set since 1952. From the 7th of September to the 8th, Shenzhen received an average of 202.8 mm of rain. The greatest amount of rain (Luohu Sector, Donghu Street) received 469 mm of rain.
Experts at Shenzhen Meteorology Station explains that the reason for the recent downpour is: 1. Typhoon Anemone has caused a low pressure air current in the region from the afternoon of the 7th of the early morning of the 8th, 2. Low pressure, seasonal winds, and weak cold air added together, and 3. the runaway effects of cloudbursts causes them to last longer than usual.
From 3AM on the 8th, the rain has lessened a little. Due to the effects of the low air pressure and seasonal winds, it’s predicted that the rainstorm will continue from the 8th through to the 10th. By the 11th, the rain should begin to clear up.”
Comments say, “Salaryman in Shenzhen here, wading through water to go to work.”
“Everyone knows they need to watch out for their safety. Hong Kong’s stopped all work, but Shenzhen isn’t doing this. I have to go to work even if I drown on the way.”
“Jesus Christ, what is wrong with the world? We haven’t had a peaceful day since the nuclear waste water release!”
“I used to think you needed a really impressive diploma to work at the headquarters of the largest bank in New Zealand. You need to be a Finance major or something. I only just found out that that’s not the case at all.
There’s a Chinese grandma working at the headquarters who’s 75-years-old. 30 years ago, she owned a little bakery around the bank, and got a lot of cash every day. So every day, after work, she’d go save it at the bank. After a while, she became friends with the people in the bank. When the bank needed to hire, they told her to try out. At that time, she was already in her 40s. The bank liked that she’d had previous business experience, so they put her in charge of customer management.
There’s a 30-something Beijing girl, who worked through her education at a supermarket as a cashier. The bank thought she had experience in the service industry, so they hired her.
The most hilarious one is that my bank assistant used to be a hairdresser, and the bank was interested in that too.
Once they got the bank job, they really treasure their current work environment and benefits. Some of them went to university, some of them graduated from high school. I never expected this.”
Comments say, “It’s the same in Australia. One of my girlfriends was a housewife. Once her kids grew up, she took a test, and then applied at a bank and got a job. She’s got a little card pinned to her that says, “I can speak Chinese.””
“There’s just too many people in China, too much involution.”
“Honestly, everything is great about New Zealand, but they have no pretty girls. Even their air stewardesses are little old ladies. It really affects their international image.”
A tiktok video of what influencers look like without their photoshop filters:
Comments say, “Everyone here is pretty confident. That’s kinda cute on its own.”
“It’s like when monsters show their true form.”
“All our R&D is being put towards making tiktok filters. If they put this energy anywhere else, we’d have our own microchips already.”
#Shenzhen’s dam will be releasing floodwaters at 12:15AM on the 8th of September. A warning published by Shenzhen TV Station.
Comments say, “Even the manhole covers are getting swept away. I stepped on one and almost died.”
“When the typhoon came on the 1st, I was delivering takeout. When people got off of work on the 7th, I was delivering take out. There’s no water tonight than when the typhoon was here. If people are actually receiving their take out, they’re the lucky few. I’ve been late on so many orders. I’m worried about getting electrocuted. I’m worried about hidden pits. Finally done for the time. Jesus, what a night.”
“But we still have to go to work tomorrow, right? T_T”
“Over a decade ago, when my neighbour was just 38, he got diagnosed with liver cancer. From the day he found out he had cancer, he refused all treatment, and just got along by taking pain meds. He died after just three months. At the time, everyone thought they’d given up because he didn’t have any money. But just three months after he passed away, his wife built a new house—four bedrooms, took at least a couple dozen grand.
In the neighbour’s own words, he wasn’t going to live long with this condition anyways, why waste all the money on treatment? He has two teenage sons—isn’t he better off saving some money for his wife and kids? He told his wife to remodel their old house once he’d passed away, so his sons would have an easier time finding a wife.
But after he passed away, his oldest son dropped out of school. He was only 14, 15, and started working in the village construction team. After a few years, he followed some villagers to Guangzhou and got some work in a sweatshop. The factory manufactured doors and windows. They weren’t doing too well, and didn’t offer a lot of pay, so a lot of people left the job soon after.
But the neighbour’s oldest son stayed and learned skills at the factory, because he was still young. In a few years, he got his brother a job in the same factory.
To everyone’s surprise, business really picked up for this factory after a few years, and their salary went higher every year. Both of them are very hard-working and skilled, so soon, they ended up managers, making even more money.
In another two years, both of them had bought houses in town, and both of them quickly married. Only their mother ended up living alone in the house she’d built in the village.
Later on, the older son came back to his hometown and started a business in town, making doors and windows for people. Because he produced high quality work, he’s never lacked for business.
Everyone in the village says, that this neighbour was just too stubborn. He always thought that if he didn’t leave some money for his kids to build a house, then his kids would end up forever alone. He never thought they’d be so successful on their own. Now the family is even better off than when he was alive.
The saying goes, leave the mountain alone and you’ll never lack for fire wood. If this neighbour had accepted treatment back in the day, maybe he would’ve gotten to enjoy some of his sons’ success.”
Comments say, “Liver cancer? Enjoy shit. If he’s from a normal family, he’d have to be blessed by God to last even a year.”
“If he died in just three months, he was probably terminal already and it’s metastasised already.”
“I mean, in the course of his sons’ struggle, do you think they knew how much they were loved by their father and mother? Did this love become fuel for them to be even stronger and braver against hardship?”
“I went home for autumn break, and accidentally broke a walnut that my dad’s been fidgeting with for five years. He found out after he got off of work, and burst into my room. He glared at me for a full 30 seconds in dead silence, and then turned around and left and found my mom. He tried to whisper, but I heard him anyways. He asked, “What’s our son’s name again?””
Comments say, “Did he forget the all-purpose name: You goddamned bastard!?”
“Don’t people normally just go, “Son…””
“I’ve never been called by my given name as a kid, to the point that when I started going to school and the teacher called my name, I didn’t even know who she was talking about.”
> The continuous rain in Shenzhen has broken records set since 1952. From the 7th of August to the 8th, Shenzhen received an average of 202.8 mm of rain.
Is that supposed to be September?
Also wow, that is a lot of rain. I hope all the people there and in the surrounding areas are okay.
A very depressing society with a lot of very depressing problems, but it's always interesting to see the surprisingly strong similarities.