A small personal anecdote
Social scientists and others rely (or should rely) on extensively sampled data to support generalizations that they make. Valid generalizations can hardly arise from anything but sampling of a wide range of relevant data. To generalize about a given population, you at least need to sample it in some way.
Nonetheless, statistical generalizations do NOT seem to be very persuasive to most people. Not unreasonably, people tend to be much more influenced by observations and events that they know personally or that people they know have told them about. So generalizations will not usually gain much traction without illustrative examples. Anecdotes are at least as persuasive as well-founded statistical generalizations.
So what I want to do below is give two small anecdotes from my life that do in my view illustrate at the personal level two generalizations that I believe are well supported by other historical and psychometric data: That many Muslim populations are emotionally immature and that the Chinese are innately a highly civilized people. There are exceptions to every rule of course but what I want to do is give examples that illustrate the rule.
I often eat out for breakfast. And in highly multicultural Australia the providers of breakfasts are ethnically highly varied. And the “ethnics” often do not understand English well. So getting a breakfast from them can sometimes have its communication difficulties. On one such occasion, I was having difficulty getting what I had ordered from a Muslim (Iranian, I think) business. After communication had repeately failed, I began to get a bit irate. When I did so, however, the Muslim owner got irate with me and accused me of insulting him. At that point I simply turned on my heel without another word and walked out— and I never went there again. He went broke a few months later.
On a second more recent occasion, a similar situation transpired in a business run by a Chinese man. Did his “honour” get besmirched by my annoyance? Not a bit of it. He was apologetic and conciliatory. I did not walk out of HIS eatery. I enjoyed my breakfast when I eventually got it and I will eat there again. I shook his hand as I left by way of apology for my bad temper. And I am betting that he won’t go broke. Give me the Chinese any day. I have known Chinese people since childhood and have had umpteen opportunities to observe their behaviour here in Australia—and the example I have just given is absolutely typical of them in my experience: Truly smart, patient and civilized people..
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I believe you are correct and it is interesting to note that in UK the Chinese community’s pro-rata representation among prison inmates is exactly half that of the overall population. You may have noticed ,if you have visited Malaysia ,that the difference in manners and decorum between local Chinese educated in the English-medium schools and those from the Mandarin-medium is considerable, the former being more polished.
When I was in Sydney with my family for a few days in 2001 we ate at a Greek-owned cafe opposite our hotel (in the city centre. regrettably - not on the Harbour). My wife made a friend of our waitress, who was a very fair Anglo, and they are still writing and sending small gifts to to another. She would never have done so had the formalities of cross-racial communication applied.
I, too, respect the Chinese, frequent the Panda Garden in Lewes, do business in Hebei and Shanghai. That’s all very well. But race matters immeasurably more than food and economics. The Chinese have their country. Why can’t we have ours?
Posted by Guessedworker on Saturday, November 26, 2005 at 11:38 AM | #
Some curse you, some smile to your face. But they’re all enemies. And Johnjayray is their sucker and shill.
Beware, white man.
Posted by Thor on Saturday, November 26, 2005 at 12:32 PM | #
Grouch!
I thought this would be one of my “provocations” that would earn me reams of condemnations and denunciations!
People here must have got used to me
Posted by John J Ray on Saturday, November 26, 2005 at 11:39 PM | #
“I thought this would be one of my ‘provocations’ that would earn me reams of condemnations and denunciations!” (—John “Prejudice-Free” Ray)
John doesn’t understand that liking the Chinese doesn’t mean wanting to turn into them.
Here’s a pair of sentences: “I like the Chinese. I don’t want my country to turn into a Chinese country.”
These sentences “don’t compute” in John’s brain. He can’t understand them. He thinks if you don’t want your country to turn into a Chinese country you must dislike the Chinese.
When he wishes to convince people they shouldn’t want limits on Chinese immigration he starts saying how nice Chinamen are. But we already know how nice they are. That doesn’t mean we want to change into them.
Any seven-year-old child would grasp that, but not John Ray. So he’s going to keep trotting out the same line for all eternity: “You question the notion of unlimited immigration from China? You don’t think there should be an open invitation to all one billion three hundred million of them to crowd into Australia? But the Chinese are such nice, polite, civilized people. There, that’ll make you reconsider your opposition to unlimited Chinese immigration.”
Sorry, John, but it doesn’t make us reconsider it. Yes, we like the Chinese. That doesn’t mean we want to our country to turn into China.
I think John is proud he doesn’t harbor low racial prejudices and is forever trying to show that quality off to others, thinking they’ll be impressed. The reason we here aren’t impressed is no one at MR.com harbors low racial prejudices. Gentlemen generally don’t. John must think he’s the only gentleman here.
Dream on, John. (And do try changing your tune a little ...)
______
“All I know is that to see, and not to speak, would be the great betrayal.” —Enoch Powell
Moratorium-plus-Repatriation!
Balkanization is better then Brazilianization!
The 1965 Immigration-Holocaust Act: the gift that keeps on giving!
Posted by Fred Scrooby on Sunday, November 27, 2005 at 06:38 AM | #
Leaving the Chinese for a moment, let’s consider Muslim “honour”, which in my opinion is simply an ugly composite of machismo and a massive chip on the shoulder. Its a bit like the black concept of “respect”. Its all about demanding an attitude of deference, usually with a covert threat of violence. This attitude has its genesis in a well deserved inferiority complex.
Posted by Calvin on Sunday, November 27, 2005 at 10:12 AM | #
The ‘honour’ of the Muslim male lies up the vaginal canal of his womenfolk.
Posted by Al Ross on Monday, November 28, 2005 at 01:39 PM | #
Johnjayray, the libertarian enthusiast for all things Eurasiatic, ought to read this. At two Silicon Valley Californian high schools, there isn’t quite as much sweetness and light between orientals and whites, for all their students’ equivalence of IQ and good behaviour:
“Whites aren’t quitting the schools because the schools are failing academically. Quite the contrary: Many white parents say they’re leaving because the schools are too academically driven and too narrowly invested in subjects such as math and science at the expense of liberal arts and extracurriculars like sports and other personal interests.
“The two schools, put another way that parents rarely articulate so bluntly, are too Asian...”
Full story at:
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB113236377590902105-lMyQjAxMDE1MzEyOTMxNjkzWj.html
Posted by Amalek on Tuesday, November 29, 2005 at 01:30 PM | #
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Posted by Al Ross on Saturday, November 26, 2005 at 09:14 AM | #