The French have a reputation among English-speakers for
being prickly about people speaking French. Forty years ago, I myself was once upbraided by a tobacconist
for pronouncing my French Rs “in German,” as she put it, which was probably
true since I had just spent a year studying German in Austria. Picky, picky,
picky. But in my two months in Paris so far, I have never had a bad experience
on this score. Both in Paris and on a recent trip to Normandy, everyone has
been very kind. My wife, who is still learning French, has never had anyone be
unkind, and as a result, she is increasingly willing to try speaking. Perhaps times
have changed, or maybe this notion that the French are surly and critical of
other people speaking French was never really true, just an exaggeration, a
stereotype. And nowadays, especially in Paris, many people speak English quite
well, at least well enough to offer service in restaurants and shops. Often,
people will break into English when we speak in French.
Sign urging politeness
On the other hand, it is now Americans who are sometimes
obnoxious. In a restaurant two days ago in Bayeux, the American lady at the
table next to ours became impatient with the slower pace of service that is
typical in French restaurants. She had ordered a cheese plate as her appetizer
but did not finish all the cheeses, and had moved the platter to the side to
try to indicate she was done. She then started calling out to the harried waitress
to get her to clear the table. Calling out like that is not done in France, at
least not in restaurants with white tablecloths. She made matters worse when
started calling out “Scusi!,” which is the Italian word for “Excuse me” and means nothing in French. Ugly
American, Exhibit A.
Paris is a very civilized city. They work at it, with very
good public services (even though the French complain about them all the time)
and campaigns encouraging civil behavior (The poster above says "There are those who remain polite, even if they are irritated... and then there are the others."). When out walking or in museums and restaurants, it is common for me to
hear American English spoken more loudly than French. I hear it in part because
it’s my native language, so it pierces through the noise, but also because
Americans do speak loudly, at least more loudly than the French. On subways and
trains in Paris, there is no loud talking. So civilized.
The China Project was a media company that tried to provide balanced coverage of China for global English-speaking audiences. It was formerly known as SupChina, and began as a newsletter in 2016, expanding to include podcasts and events, and becoming a "news and business intelligence company focused on helping a global audience understand China."
They reported on abuses in China, including on the horrible treatment of Uighurs in Xinjiang, but also called out China-bashing in the US. As a result, as Goldkorn put it, "We have been accused many times in both countries of working for nefarious purposes for the government of the other."
There may have been many reasons for its closure. The "Some sad news" post refers to legal issues; apparently they were being sued by people or companies on both sides of the Pacific, though there are no specifics. I would like to know some examples because it seems bizarre, but this is a classic example of a "strategic secret": neither The China Project nor those who sue them have any interest in publicizing the suit, as it draws additional negative publicity to both of them.
It is clear that the main reason they are closing is that it is becoming dangerous to try to stand in the middle between the US and China. People both in China and in the US who understand both sides and try to explain the other side to their people are accused of being biased, or partial to the other side. In fact, despite the excellent work of The China Project/SupChina writers, when my wife was invited to speak at a one of their events last year, she was advised by her company's outside PR firm that she should not go because the organization was viewed as too pro-China, but she went anyway since she felt SupChina was quite balanced. One can see what effect this would have if everyone coming in contact with The China Project got similar advice.
Indeed, the trigger for the closing was a sponsorship not coming through as expected. Most companies are very cautious about associating with controversial groups. Nowadays, anything in the US having to do with China is controversial. And the reverse is also true.
The early colonists in 17th century Plymouth Colony, Massachusetts, were able to cooperate with the Native Americans by exchanging 10-year old boys who lived with a family of the other culture and would thus learn the other group's language and culture. These interpreters understood both cultures intimately. But in the lead-up to King Philip's War (1675-76), which is often considered the deadliest war in colonial America, these interpreters were distrusted by both sides, and were unable to prevent the conflagration. It is worrisome to see a similar pattern with The China Project. A voice of reason that understands and can explain both sides has been lost. Gradually, only shrill nationalistic voices will remain.
I have never paid much attention to presidential inaugurations before. In fact, I remember more than one person in rural Taiwan in January 1985 asking me if I was going back to the US for Reagan's 2nd inauguration, and I thought it was the most ridiculous question I'd ever been asked. First of all, I never even watched the news coverage of past inaugurations; it seemed like meaningless pomp. Secondly, I was not some sort of VIP who could actually attend the inauguration.
But after four years of norm-breaking and two months of lies about the election being "stolen," and then most importantly, after the mob insurrection at the capitol building, I found myself unable to concentrate on anything but the transition, and ended up watching at least five hours of TV coverage of the inauguration.
Mostly I just felt relief that what to me has been a nightmare of stoked divisions, pettiness and hate is over. I was surprised that I also found several moments moving. I don't believe in rah-rah jingoism, but had to smile when Lady Gaga pointed to the flag over the capitol building when she sang the part of the national anthem that goes, "And the flag was still there" (CNN missed the moment, but you can see her turn around and point to the flag in the video here; start at about the 2:00 point).
And I was moved by the young poet Amanda Gorman (video here), which is surprising because I don't normally care much for poetry. But the way she spoke, and the way she moved her hands, as well as the words she chose, spoke for many.
In part, she said:
We've seen a force that would shatter our nation rather than share it. Would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy. And this effort very nearly succeeded. But while democracy can be periodically delayed, it can never be permanently defeated. In this truth, in this faith we trust. For while we have our eyes on the future, history has its eyes on us.
We’ve learned again that democracy is precious. Democracy is fragile. At this hour, my friends, democracy has prevailed1.
1Throughout the speech, Biden intersperses the idea that democracy and our system of government have triumphed over threats, while acknowledging that victory isn't final. — Aaron Blake
The January 6th insurrection has changed a lot. A number of commentators on TV said that Americans took their institutions for granted, but seeing them at risk, and seeing how vulnerable institutions are to violence and "the big lie," has made people realize that democratic institutions need to be fostered and constantly rebuilt, and cannot be taken for granted.
I have to admit that I always took for granted the peaceful transfer of power, and did not fully understand until this year how important and significant it is (though I remember my father saying so). Even when Al Gore conceded in 2000, I saw it as necessary once his legal remedies had been exhausted. I tended to see it more as Gore accepting the inevitable, rather than sacrificing for the good of the country, even though the sacrifice narrative was widely used in the press.
We studied "The big lie" of the Nazis in school, but I thought that applied to other times and other places; I never would have imagined that it would apply to the United States today. Gore could have continued to contest the election; he had justifiable complaints that the Brooks Brothers Riot by Bush supporters, the bias of Republican Secretary of State Kathleen Harris, and the partisan 5-4 Supreme Court ruling that stopped the recount had essentially stolen the election, an election in which he had a majority of votes and only lost the Electoral College vote because of Florida's messy and disputed 537 margin of votes. But Trump created (with the help of Fox News) "the big lie" that he had actually won the election in a landslide and that it was stolen from him, simply by saying it over and over, and attacking anyone in his party who disagreed and dared to admit the truth. And as of mid-January, a CNN poll found three quarters of Republicans still did not believe Biden won the election legitimately.
The "bully pulpit" describes the power that a president's words have. Yet, sometimes presidents are able to use it, while other times they are not. Reading Obama's recent book, I'm struck at how often he was not able to convince people that what he viewed as thoughtful and balanced policies were reasonable, and yet Trump, by repeating "the big lie" that there was fraud in the election (indeed, he started saying this even before the 2016 election), managed to have most Republicans believe it. That this was possible in an open society with a free press, and over 200 years of institutionalized democracy, still surprises and worries me.
Basically, this shows the plasticity of culture; people often think of culture as fixed, as rails along which the train of society moves, but it is actually more changeable that that. A democratic culture needs to be constantly reproduced. This means that everyone has a responsibility to support and renew democratic institutions if they are to last. Yes, for now, the flag is still there. But everyone needs to re-focus their attention on core democratic values. A recent study showed that only 3.5% of respondents would change their vote if their preferred ideal candidate did something blatantly undemocratic. That has to change; voters have to care more about the democratic process itself. And if they do, the polarization of society will also decrease. Hopefully the members of the evenly divided Senate will be forced to re-learn the art of compromise, and the dysfunctional polarization can be reduced.
This is in everyone's favor, since Democrats may control all three branches of government for now, but they won't forever. In fact, if tradition holds, they will lose seats, and control of congress, in the mid-term 2022 elections. And hopefully the flag will still be there.
There have been reports the CDC is
reconsidering its recommendation that people not wear a surgical mask when they
go out (see WaPo story here and NY Times story here, for example). As it has become clear that asymptomatic people can transmit
the coronavirus, more and more Americans have been
wondering whether it would not be a good idea for ordinary people to wear
masks all the time.
Scientists have long said that wearing surgical masks to
protect against SARS and Covid-19 is not effective. The scientific
view is that surgical masks help prevent someone who is infected from spreading
the virus, but wearing a mask does not protect against becoming infected. (Here is an adamant position against non-sick people wearing masks, from 29 Feb.) As this NPR story from 2015 notes,
masks are good if you are sick so you don’t spread germs to others, but it is
better to just stay home. The CDC, as of today, only recommends wearing a facemask around
other people if you are sick, or if you are in the same room as someone with
coronavirus who cannot wear the mask (e.g. because of difficulty breathing).
The Hong Kong health authorities during SARS essentially
agreed with this viewpoint, and said that people should wear masks to avoid stigmatizing
anyone who had to wear a mask. The thinking was that if only sick people wear masks, then they would be discriminated against; people who should wear one would not do so to avoid being shunned.
Actually, most Hong Kong residents felt that wearing a mask would help at
least a little, and even if they had doubts, “it’s better to be on the safe side” and “it can’t hurt.” It has gradually become common sense that wearing a mask protects the wearer. And
this approach predominates with the coronavirus; the Hong Kong government
encourages people to wear a mask when they go out. This is contrary to the WHO, which only recommends
wearing a mask if caring for an infected person.
An opinion piece in the NY Times by the medical anthropologist Christos Lynteris argues that though there is little evidence
that wearing a surgical mask is a good prophylactic against the coronavirus, in Asia wearing
a mask is a sign of being modern, of taking hygiene seriously, and of concern
for others because wearing it prevents the spread of the virus if the wearer is
asymptomatic. Chinese first wore masks in 1910, when the Cambridge-educated
doctor Wu Liande recommended the use of gauze masks to fight the pneumonic
plague. He was right, and his success, in contrast to European doctors at the time who disagreed
with him, was a source of pride for Chinese and began the custom of wearing
masks against contagion, Lynteris argues.
But it was SARS in 2003 that made mask-wearing ubiquitous in
recent times. I was in Hong Kong at the time, and no one went out without a
mask. However, it has never been shown that the wearing of masks was significant in
winning the battle against SARS.
The PRC government position is that before hospital personnel realized
there was a coronavirus outbreak, many hospital workers contracted the disease
and dozens died. The government then mobilized 20,000 doctors and nurses from
the rest of the country to go to Wuhan to deal with the epidemic, and all used
masks, eye shields and gowns, and none of them were infected. George Gao, a leading Chinese researcher, says it is a mistake that people in the West are not wearing masks,
because asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic cases can spread the virus.
There are three issues with having everyone wear masks.
First, the medical effectiveness of ordinary people using masks and N-95 respirators is not clear. This MedpageToday article from 2009 shows how
contradictory the evidence has been, with many tests showing no benefit to wearing
a surgical mask to avoid contagion. A recent Lancet article includes a box that shows most countries agree there is no benefit to the public
from wearing masks.
But then you have non-medical commentators, like this AI entrepreneur, who think the argument for wearing masks is clear, and who calls
for everyone to wear masks. (It's funny how people successful in one field, especially rich people, show no hesitation about propounding on other areas outside their area of expertise.) The problem with masks is that if they are not worn, removed and disposed of
correctly, they are of little use. The “best” masks, the N-95 respirator, makes
it very difficult to breath if it is worn properly, with edges sealed. (And one
cannot have facial hair and seal the edges.) Some have said (and I know from experience) that even walking
is difficult when wearing the N-95, if it is worn properly.
The second issue is the shortage of masks in the US. When
Covid-19 struck, the government stockpile of N-95 and surgical masks was way
down because of a failure to restock after the 2009 Avian Flu epidemic (blame for this can be spread widely). The CDC and other authorities’ recommendation was that the general public
NOT wear masks, and that they leave them for the health professionals who really
needed them. There are horrifying reports of many hospitals and nursing homes
where staff have to reuse masks. By comparison, during SARS, we were told in
Hong Kong that we should replace the mask once it became wet from our breath,
roughly every two hours. So one can’t help wonder whether the calls for the
public not to wear masks are because of a kind of rationing, giving priority to
those who benefit the most, rather than that the masks do not help at all. But
of course the argument that they do not help long precedes the coronavirus
crisis.
Third, there is the issue of the image of masks. Americans
have been giggling about Asians wearing masks for years, and I’ve noticed that
in a number of cases of reported anti-Asian incidents, the victim was wearing a
mask (on 'maskphobia' see here). A number of Chinese friends have been shocked at Americans’ reluctance to
wear masks. This humorous video sums up American’s views on the wearing of masks.
The lyrics say:
Don’t wear masks They don’t work (and plus you look like a jerk) You might think you’ll help a billion but you scare the little children!
While in Asia, wearing a mask is seen as pro-social,
protecting others from one’s own possible infection, in the US it is a sign of
being sick. Americans have a strong antipathy towards medical masks, which is
surprising because everyone wore a mask during the 1918 pandemic (see here and here). This crisis may well change American attitudes.
People’s motivation for wearing
these masks goes far beyond simple considerations of medical efficacy. Cultural
values, perceptions of control, social pressure, civic duty, family concerns, self-expression,
beliefs about public institutions, and even politics are all wrapped up in the
“symbolic efficacy” of face masks.
Which leads me to wonder if libertarian and other Americans
skeptical of the government will not resist and even refuse to wear a mask. The same people who think Covid-19 is "political" will see wearing a mask as some sort of government plot. Already skeptical of science, they will wonder why the establishment has changed its mind on masks.
Interestingly, US hospitals have rules against medical
personnel wearing masks that seem to focus primarily on not scaring other
patients and avoiding the impression the hospital is germ-filled. Several
doctors who insisted on wearing a mask in hospital hallways have been disciplined
and fired, though it seems some hospitals have reversed themselves. As this NYTimes article today puts it:
Amid the confusion, furious and
terrified, doctors and nurses say they must trust their own judgment.
Administrators counter that doctors and nurses, motivated by fear, are writing
their own rules.
As the article notes, some hospitals are insisting that
masks are not necessary, and are insisting on all staff sticking to the rules.
Other hospitals are allowing, or even recommending, that caregivers wear surgical
masks at all times at work.
This article from WebMD yesterday (30 March) says that wearing
even a homemade mask might help, but hand washing and keeping distance
from others are more important. Many reading that article will think, “Better
safe than sorry,” and decide to wear a mask.
Since we will not eliminate the virus but can only try to control
it, i.e. prevent its rapid spread, I can’t help but wonder, after the “stay
at home” rules end on April 30, will the mask will become required when in public? We
face many months of continuing, albeit hopefully low level infection, until a vaccine
is developed or sufficient immunity in the population allows the epidemic to
burn out. Already an article from 20 March in The Lancet argues for
widespread use of masks, calling it a “rational recommendation”:
“As evidence suggests COVID-19
could be transmitted before symptom onset, community transmission might be
reduced if everyone, including people who have been infected but are
asymptomatic and contagious, wear face masks.”
Interestingly, of the six co-authors, two are based in Hong
Kong (the rest in the UK) and five have Chinese names (the one Anglo name is
based in Hong Kong). One wonders how much Asian attitudes towards masks
influenced their recommendation. Conversely, one wonders what cultural
attitudes make Western medical researchers resistant to the generalized wearing
of masks. This really shows how cultural attitudes can influence scientists' judgement.
It seems we are close to a tipping point where everyone in
the US will be allowed, or even encouraged, to wear a mask. But it will be hard
to know if it is medically advantageous and appropriate, or is being done
primarily to make people feel protected and more in control. But first the
country needs a supply of masks.
I heard a very interesting NPR Fresh Air interview withRichard Rothstein yesterday on the podcast while doing errands (transcript here). He has just published a book that shows
how US federal government policies during the New Deal (1933-1941) had systematically
discriminated against Blacks. He noted, for example, that the term “redlining”
referred to government maps that had neighborhoods marked with a red line
where government loans were not allowed because residents of those
neighborhoods were Black. I thought I had heard him on Fresh Air before, so I
googled his name. Sure enough, I found that he was a guest on Fresh Air almost two years ago.
In my google search, I stumbled across a right wing blog by Jack Coleman of the Media Research Center’s “News Busters” (which claims to expose "liberal bias") that has a severely distorted take on Rothstein’s argument, and it—and especially
the comments section—show serious lack of understanding of social forces.
First the distortions. Coleman begins by implying that
though FDR is an iconic leader for liberals, his record with the New Deal is
problematic. He then includes a transcript of sections of the Fresh Air
interview, with key parts in bold, to highlight the facts raised by Rothstein.
These facts (accurately reported) include:
The Public Works Administration of the New Deal had
explicit segregation policy, “So public housing policy created racial segregation
where none existed before.”
The Federal Housing Administration would not give loans to
Blacks, so the suburbs that sprang up after WWII were all white.
“Public housing became all-black in the inner city. And
these two policies -- of public housing and Federal Housing Administration
subsidization of suburbs -- are the two major factors that have created the
segregation that we know today.”
Coleman also highlights a part of the interview where
Rothstein mentions that George Romney (Mitt’s father and former governor of
Michigan) had tried, as Nixon’s Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, to
only offer federal funds to communities that desegregated, but was blocked by
the Nixon administration. He somehow thinks this exonerates Republicans from
being charged with racism; seems to me it only exonerates Romney the Elder. Coleman
also notes that unions prevented Blacks from joining, and that this
discrimination was endorsed by the National Labor Relations Board, so was not
merely a local action. Only after 1964 was this reversed. Again, this is
supposed to indict all labor unions (American conservatives hate unions), but my take is that racism was deep-seated and made worse by state action,
not that racism was somehow inherent in labor unions.
Rothstein’s point is made clear when he notes that for most
Americans, homeownership is the main way that wealth was created and
accumulated, and since subsidized home ownership was not possible for Blacks,
it resulted in much lower levels of wealth for Blacks. While Blacks earn 60% as
much as whites, they own only 5% as much wealth as whites. This provides Blacks
with less of a buffer, which is why Blacks suffered more than whites from the Great
Recession of 2008.
(As an aside, Rothstein repeats many of these points in his
2017 interview, including these 60% and 5% numbers. I checked the transcripts
to see if the 2017 interview was not a repeat of the 2015 interview, but it is a
new interview, albeit with some repetition. A good interviewee knows how to
tell a story and focus on the core message, even if he/she is repeating
himself. If I had been interviewed, I might have assumed listeners had heard me
the first time, or would be annoyed by my repetition. As it happens, I only
vaguely remembered the first interview, so he was right to repeat himself.)
Coleman’s take on all this is to imply that liberals have
suppressed this information because it conveniently “perpetuates the myth that
the Republicans are solely responsible for racism in this country.” This “myth”
is, in fact, a surprise to me. A myth of a myth. While the Republicans are
indeed the party of racism today, they were clearly the opposite from Lincoln
through to Eisenhower. Coleman displays fake surprise that a Berkeley professor would do such research, and that such a story would
end up on “liberal media.” This is rather disingenuous, since it is liberals in
general who are concerned with questions of inequality (conservatives assume a free market would reduce inequality; they do not believe Picketty). Coleman likes the story
only because he thinks it undermines the ideals and practices of the New Deal,
which conservatives love to hate.
Implicit in Coleman’s critique is also the idea that if it
had not been for “government interference,” there would not have been any
discrimination. That is not how most liberals will take this story. They will
see it as a case of how despite the liberal intentions of the FDR
administration, Black interests were sacrificed because of racist notions at
the time. Liberals will not see this story as undermining the New Deal. But
conservatives are right that “good intentions” and government programs have the
potential to cause great harm. Of course, not acting can also cause or perpetuate great harm.
The most up-voted comments to Coleman’s blog shows that
right wing Americans are intensely individualistic. One comment is a resentful
attack against “victimhood”, particularly of “blaming conservatives and
Republicans, and whites in general.” Addressing Blacks, he/she says:
Stop blaming whites, stop blaming slavery, stop blaming Jim
Crow and segragation [sic] and start taking an independent initiative to make a
better life for yourself and your family. Continue to blame whites and don't be
surprised to find your children and grandchildren still living in ghettos for
generations to come.
A comment to this comment says:
Until a spotlight is turned on black inner city
culture...nothing will change. It's not about race...but it's always been about
culture. Getting an education, being married, and bringing up your children to
do the same is a large part of the answer. Why can't anyone say that in public
today?
Because it is simplistic and wrong?
That writer falls back on the common “blame the victim” argument:
Blacks are poor because of their individual behavior, because of their (implicitly)
dysfunctional culture. Americans are intensely individualist and ahistorical.
These commentators are not interested in how the past affects the present.
Interestingly, they are not even following the logic of the blog (and the book), which is that
federal government intervention made poverty worse for Blacks. These readers
assume that by getting an education, being married, etc., one can single-handedly pull oneself up by the bootstraps, as the expression goes. The
institutional factors like redlining that disadvantaged Blacks are completely ignored. While
Rothstein is making institutional racism even more dramatically clear with his research,
these commentators insist on individuals being Horatio Alger. They are saying, OK, racism happened, but get over it! Move on! If only it were so easy.
There are important individual choices that each person
makes that affect their lifecourse. But any basic social science course (by which I mean sociology, anthropology, political science; not economics) will
also teach us that we do not make these choices entirely freely. Interestingly,
conservatives in Europe are more aware of the importance of institutions and
historical forces in shaping our individual choices. American conservatives
have perhaps studied too much economics, and reduce everything to the
individual. We need better ways of integrating the structural forces of society
with individual choices. This has, in fact, been one of the main issues in
anthropology over the past 40 years. But there is little hope for the US
politically if many people cannot see structural forces, and even misread
research like Rothstein’s and think it only means individuals need to make better
choices.
Culture is often used as an explanation for why some unusual things happen. Here is one example. When a gunman killed 8 Hong Kong tourists in Manila, the SCMP reported:
City University criminologist Dennis Wong Sing-wing said if the drama had occurred in the United States or on the mainland, the gunman would have been killed much earlier.
"It may be due to cultural differences. Filipinos are more easygoing and peace-loving so that they tend not to adopt fierce action. If the same scenario happened in the US or China, snipers would have killed the gunman a long time ago," Wong said.
"The negotiators might also have failed to assess the situation correctly, thinking it could be solved without force, as the gunman released a number of hostages."
Blaming this terrible crime and botched rescue on "culture" is ridiculous. In fact, it is no explanation at all. Many have even claimed the opposite, that there is a "culture of violence" in the Philippines (see this article in Global Nation, a Philippino online publication), and The New York Times had an article just half a year ago discussed the "culture of violence" that results from arguments over bad singing of "I did it my way" by Frank Sinatra. A better explanation was provided by a security officer in another article, also published in the SCMP:
The police assault on the bus, according to a French security expert, was “badly prepared and risky”.
The police who stormed the bus in Manila did not have specialist training and “visibly lacked adequate equipment and tactical competence”, said Frederic Gallois, who once commanded France’s elite hostage rescue unit.
After seeing live television images of the operation, the former colonel said that “one cannot understand what justified this badly prepared and risky assault.”
The police, for example, did not attempt a surprise tactic like entering the bus at several points and had also stayed too long outside the vehicle before launching their assault, he said.
Bad planning, bad government, incompetence. Common in poor countries. Simple as that. No need to resort to "culture."
