Actually, this is a very good website regarding China in general since I haven’t (not yet) got the opportunity to travel there. I stopped reading blogs and other individual view-point websites because it’s mostly semi-nationalism (I agree that it’s justified to a certain extent), fighting ideals with more ideals, gossip-news-”infotainment”, and criticisms. I found a few good blogs, like yours, and mostly stay away from the Chinese discussion boards that are in English.

Nothing wrong with criticisms but they usually come from and within a specific area of interest or mentality. Often I have to read a lot about that area of interest or specific viewpoint to understand criticisms which may not make sense objectively or may not agree with my opinions. So it’s great you can post this topic in such a nice way.

This post reminds me of an undergraduate research paper I wrote in 2004 comparing racial attitudes in the US and Brazil. Frankly speaking, people will eventually learn and find solutions to problems but it will have to happen on their own terms within reality, for many reasons.

For the moment there hasn’t been any major consequence, because the number of people of different races in China relative to the total population is minimum. But the Urumqi conflict has at least a part of racism, and it is to be expected that if China continues to ignore the problem there will be more problems happening in the future.

Everyone on Earth needs to correct their racial attitudes and understanding.

USA’s problem is they act like they solved the problem.

China’s problem is that they don’t think they have a problem.

Both are horrible ways to deal with the problem and what they need to do is directly address the problem.

Sorry for late response, I have been a bit stuck these days with a a bunch of silly ducks.

Actually, I was also brought up in a very homogeneous city. When I was a kid there were no blacks living there and I remember the first time I travelled to Madrid I stared in amazement every time we crossed one on the street, to the embarrassment of my family.

I also remember how, in the local paper there were news of racial riots in other areas of Europe, and many of us would comment: man, those countries are so racist! Then some years later local economy bloomed, and lots of immigrants from all over the World came in, and I realized that among us there were as many racist as anywhere else.

I tend to see China now as my hometown 30 years ago, except that, with the massive population here it will take much longer to see those kind of social changes, if they ever happen at all.

While I agree with you that racism will only hurt China’s ability to integrate more thoroughly with the rest of the world, I find the stories I’ve heard about Chinese racism to be like a breath of fresh air. This is because mostly what I’ve heard is Chinese people vocalizing that there is a difference between races. Having just graduated from Oberlin College (where being PC is almost a religion), I find honesty about the difference between races to be a much better starting point for learning racial understanding and developing a productive relationship between cultures.

Anyways, like I said, nice post.

I don’t think you can compare the self-censorship implied in political correctness with the government censorship on the Chinese media. I used the same word (unfortunate)to describe both realities, but it doesn’t mean that they are the same or even comparable. In fact, they are essentially opposite: One is designed to repress different opinions (reduced diversity) whereas the other one aims -with variable success- to afford more protection to those who are different (increased diversity).

Much of the racial attitudes within the US has been mostly ignored until the 1960′s much because of atrocities toward minorities or actual laws against minorities. In China, there is none of that, and China don’t think it is an issue, much like issue of racism in Western countries.