Interesting conversation
Don't know if this is a case of Chinese propaganda at its worst or stupidity of an individual, or barrier in language and communication.
So apparently someone I know thinks that the Chinese invented fire. I never got a chance to ask this person how he/she came to such a conclusion, or what the Chinese claim to have done and how. I got blocked on MSN with a promise that I will never be spoken to again because I was too white and that there was no point trying to reason with me.
Is this Chinese propaganda? They aren't happy with poisoning the people's stomachs they have to poison their minds as well? Are the general Chinese population so arrogant and so recklessly bold that they will take God's work and call it their own (and maybe rename it fyre)? But the government and much of its followers renounce God anyway, so perhaps they're not bold. Just stupid. Even with God out of the picture, fire cannot be invented. Maybe they'll claim they invented light and heat as well. And perhaps even invented eyes for perceiving the light and nerves for sensing the heat.
Or could it be that this is not the result of the Chinese government and its people's general lack of knowledge, but the individual's stupidity? Who knows.
But to give the person the benefit of the doubt and not consider him/her a lunatic right away, let's assume this conversation and its outcome is the result of language barriers. In Chinese, "fire" is the first half of the word (or maybe it's not called "word" because of differences in the two languages) "gunpowder," as it literally translates to "fire drug" or something along those lines. Don't hurt me Joseph. And since this individual is known to ellipt necessary words or parts of words from a sentence to completely render it meaningless, by "fire" he/she may be saying "gunpowder."
But the rest of the conversation did not seem to support this last theory, since he/she responded to my comment, "when lightning hits a tree and is (sic) starts to burn, the chinese (sic) aren't invovled (sic) (Yes, I'm having loads of fun with the sic)" with a rant that I was not knowledgeable of Chinese history (and remember kids, history books, usually biased and sometimes inaccurate, are often used in political propaganda!) and that I was a white wannabe (this is probably the longest sentence on my blog and it's loaded with parantheses). He/she also said something about me being nameless because I had a Chinese surname, which strengthens the second theory.
Either way, it was quite the interesting talk, even though it seemed to have cost me a friend. Unlikely that this is permanent, but we'll see.
So apparently someone I know thinks that the Chinese invented fire. I never got a chance to ask this person how he/she came to such a conclusion, or what the Chinese claim to have done and how. I got blocked on MSN with a promise that I will never be spoken to again because I was too white and that there was no point trying to reason with me.
Is this Chinese propaganda? They aren't happy with poisoning the people's stomachs they have to poison their minds as well? Are the general Chinese population so arrogant and so recklessly bold that they will take God's work and call it their own (and maybe rename it fyre)? But the government and much of its followers renounce God anyway, so perhaps they're not bold. Just stupid. Even with God out of the picture, fire cannot be invented. Maybe they'll claim they invented light and heat as well. And perhaps even invented eyes for perceiving the light and nerves for sensing the heat.
Or could it be that this is not the result of the Chinese government and its people's general lack of knowledge, but the individual's stupidity? Who knows.
But to give the person the benefit of the doubt and not consider him/her a lunatic right away, let's assume this conversation and its outcome is the result of language barriers. In Chinese, "fire" is the first half of the word (or maybe it's not called "word" because of differences in the two languages) "gunpowder," as it literally translates to "fire drug" or something along those lines. Don't hurt me Joseph. And since this individual is known to ellipt necessary words or parts of words from a sentence to completely render it meaningless, by "fire" he/she may be saying "gunpowder."
But the rest of the conversation did not seem to support this last theory, since he/she responded to my comment, "when lightning hits a tree and is (sic) starts to burn, the chinese (sic) aren't invovled (sic) (Yes, I'm having loads of fun with the sic)" with a rant that I was not knowledgeable of Chinese history (and remember kids, history books, usually biased and sometimes inaccurate, are often used in political propaganda!) and that I was a white wannabe (this is probably the longest sentence on my blog and it's loaded with parantheses). He/she also said something about me being nameless because I had a Chinese surname, which strengthens the second theory.
Either way, it was quite the interesting talk, even though it seemed to have cost me a friend. Unlikely that this is permanent, but we'll see.
posted by J-FK at
3:50 PM
2 Comments
