I always assumed it came down to exactly this. Give people money who have never had money before and there are going to be some social growing pains but eventually everything will normalize.
Do you mean politically incorrect in China? Otherwise, I'd just call this kind of study Anthropology (of some form).
Saying that [a group of] people think all people, globally, are the same is really ridiculous. Maybe online it might seem that way but people in real life don’t.
I'm always curious whether these mistakes are intentional or not. I said "most". I was being partially hyperbolic (I honestly don't know if it's half or not, it depends on what conversation you observe really).
> they even do things like use them in debates about ways to improve our healthcare, for example
That's another commonality you will in public discussions: depending on the topic of conversation, cultures/genders are sometimes considered unique and sometimes not, by the same person. Their opinion changes depending on the topic of discussion. You see it online, you see it in the news, you see it in debates (online and real world).
If a politically correct person just came back from an overseas holiday, they will speak of the "richness" of the culture there, how they do some things in a different and often better way. (I agree with this perspective.)
The very same person, on the topic of immigration, will insist in complete seriousness, that there is no noteworthy cultural difference. Oh but also, we absolutely must have more immigration, because it increases diversity (despite the people not actually being different), which is good.
And I suppose it's necessary for me to explicitly point out: not all people do this, only some people.
Of course my comment is making sweeping and baseless assumptions. It is my attempt to sarcastically express the zeitgeist.
Even assuming you don't mean culture as a proxy for race or religion (which are obviously related but not the same as culture), times being what they are when you hear "culture" from a stranger you don't usually think "oh interesting, an anthropologist!". Instead it's usually time to buckle up for a broad generalization about a very large group of people the speaker is no more familiar with than anyone else.
Because that's objective reality. Cultures do have statistically common behaviors/traditions/norms, some "good", some "bad" - that is literally a fundamental part of the very definition of culture. Acknowledging this obvious fact in a reasonable conversation is no more wrong than saying it's still not ok to drink and drive despite the fact that most impaired drivers do not cause any harm.
Mischaracterizing the simple acknowledgement of patterns of behavior as a claim that all members of a group always act that way, and no improvement is possible because the culture is fundamentally flawed, is incredibly disingenuous. Anyone who makes this claim should be ashamed of themselves, as it is attitudes like this that contribute to perpetuating disunity between cultures who will always be distinct. Cultural uniqueness is usually a good thing (and should be preserved), but not always.
Certainly not so painful that I'd avoid visiting China though.
Younger Chinese travelling as couples or small groups are much more polite. As you said, within a generation or two, I think the reputation as travellers will improve.
This guy is basically saying because of the actions of some Chinese tourists, he's going to stereotype an entire culture of people and you're the one apologizing?
Thank you for this, it's nice to see some people still have the ability to think beyond propaganda.
There are many reasons for that. A obvious one is quick economic growth makes many less educated normal people can afford previously luxury tourism. But there are more profound reasons. Unfortunately, researches and studies of personality statistics of vary large group of people(for example, behavior of an ethnic group) are very difficult and most importantly: they are politically incorrect, considered harmful and forbidden, as well as the conclusions will not be accepted by public. So most people on the earth don't know the real reasons behind that but only have fake explanations that modern human mind can accept.
BTW off the topic. with same understanding, I predicted early in 2003 that Bush's goal of Iraq war would fail FOR SURE by observation of similarity of statistical (i.e. population) mindsets between middle east people and Chinese people.
The good news is things are changing slowly towards the good direction. The habit and behavior of Chinese people, especially young generation and educated people are more and more closer to that of Japanese, Hongkonger, Taiwan people. But it will take long long time, maybe generations.