United States of America Still a Nation of Conservatives

Originally Posted by Mooncalf

If the cultural maturity of Europe is that of a 5 year old, then China is roughly 25 and America is a soon to be aborted fetus. Islamic fundamentalists were trying really hard, they just needed bigger guns.

PS: you guys don't mind if I talk in imagery right? I'm just trying to use inclusive language here.

Excuse me, but lolwut? How do you figure that China's that mature as compared to the rest of the world? If we're JUST basing it on the fact that China has very ancient history, then much of Eurasia and a good portion of Africa also possess that. Are you basing it on something else?

And America's not that bad. IIRC, the USA has the oldest surviving governmental system in the world at over 230 years. There are many countries which are much older, but not their governments, with many being monarchies up until the 19th or 20th centuries.

Originally Posted by Bravo

Excuse me, but lolwut? How do you figure that China's that mature as compared to the rest of the world? If we're JUST basing it on the fact that China has very ancient history, then much of Eurasia and a good portion of Africa also possess that. Are you basing it on something else?

it's called cultural maturity you [censored]. and it was a vague comparison.

China is trying re-embrace their culture from the top-down, which is why they are alienating themselves from the world via staunch sensor-ship and hard-to-obtain visa's.

If america was smart, they'd sit down, shut up, and figure themselves out before trying to police the world again on China's dime. It's their turn now. They are making more deals in moscow than they used to. Them being run by the CPC, I am quite baffled that the idiots drunk off of the power of collective stupidity are still flinging the word "communism" around like it's God's bain.

*edit*

sorry that was a bit of a rant.

did that make any sense?

Originally Posted by Mooncalf

it's called cultural maturity you [censored]. and it was a vague comparison.

China is trying re-embrace their culture from the top-down, which is why they are alienating themselves from the world via staunch sensor-ship and hard-to-obtain visa's.

If america was smart, they'd sit down, shut up, and figure themselves out before trying to police the world again on China's dime. It's their turn now. They are making more deals in moscow than they used to. Them being run by the CPC, I am quite baffled that the idiots drunk off of the power of collective stupidity are still flinging the word "communism" around like it's God's bain.

*edit*

sorry that was a bit of a rant.

did that make any sense?

Makes perfect sense to me, I agree that it is quite ironic that so many people whine about communism when the supposedly communist china could destroy our entire economy in an instant if they wanted to.

Originally Posted by Tyras

Makes perfect sense to me, I agree that it is quite ironic that so many people whine about communism when the supposedly communist china could destroy our entire economy in an instant if they wanted to.

*cue de-railing of thread here*

yea, communism is a weird thing. From what I can gather, in it's original form: it was a philosophy of change ala revolt, concentration of power via economic infrastructure, and a way of life, all wrapped up into one neat little word. People thought it would work, Russia vs. US, "capitalism" won, North and South Korea happened, other proxy wars etc....(I suck at history) Russia changed it's tune, etc....

In short: Karl Marx is the ultimate IRL troll (albeit an honest one)

Now China has this controlled capitalism thing happening and their politicians are worse than Karl Rove and Dick Cheney taking a nap in a sex farm and in the meantime the religious fascists have nukes and their leader is probably a bit crazy while the less religious communist fascists also have nukes and their leader is definitely crazy, but at least he sticks to his guns (intentional pun.)

No wonder people are going crazy that effing main can't get it's **** together

[/rant]

Originally Posted by Mooncalf

it's called cultural maturity you [censored]. and it was a vague comparison.

China is trying re-embrace their culture from the top-down, which is why they are alienating themselves from the world via staunch sensor-ship and hard-to-obtain visa's.

If america was smart, they'd sit down, shut up, and figure themselves out before trying to police the world again on China's dime. It's their turn now. They are making more deals in moscow than they used to. Them being run by the CPC, I am quite baffled that the idiots drunk off of the power of collective stupidity are still flinging the word "communism" around like it's God's bain.

*edit*

sorry that was a bit of a rant.

did that make any sense?

I'm sorry but if that is cultural maturity then it is an oxymoron in my view. If you're closing yourself off from the rest of the world to re-embrace tradition and basically try to bring back things that you probably got rid of for a reason, then you're a bit silly to say the least.

Cultural preservation is bad enough because it holds anything back if it'll infringe on a nation's culture, cultural restoration is even worse when it basically involves rewinding certain aspects of society to do so. "Culture" and the preservation thereof is an inherently retarded idea, as it creates artificial barriers based on the history of a particular area or a particular people. Quebec has anti-free-speech laws to preserve the "French culture" of that region for example. It stands in the way of free speech purely to preserve "the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution, organization or group". It's defining yourself by the culture rather than the aspects of it which are beneficial, which is just like defining yourself by a country which claims to have certain ideals rather than defining yourself by those ideals directly. There is little benefit to the preservation of culture if it stands in the way of advancement.

Culture is what exists in a nation at any given moment, so to try and preserve old cultural facets kind of defeats culture to begin with.

Originally Posted by Lord Zero

I'm sorry but if that is cultural maturity then it is an oxymoron in my view. If you're closing yourself off from the rest of the world to re-embrace tradition and basically try to bring back things that you probably got rid of for a reason, then you're a bit silly to say the least.

Cultural preservation is bad enough because it holds anything back if it'll infringe on a nation's culture, cultural restoration is even worse when it basically involves rewinding certain aspects of society to do so. "Culture" and the preservation thereof is an inherently retarded idea, as it creates artificial barriers based on the history of a particular area or a particular people. Quebec has anti-free-speech laws to preserve the "French culture" of that region for example. It stands in the way of free speech purely to preserve "the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution, organization or group". It's defining yourself by the culture rather than the aspects of it which are beneficial, which is just like defining yourself by a country which claims to have certain ideals rather than defining yourself by those ideals directly. There is little benefit to the preservation of culture if it stands in the way of advancement.

Culture is what exists in a nation at any given moment, so to try and preserve old cultural facets kind of defeats culture to begin with.

^good points all around.

Cultural maturity as I used the phrase exists in the memory of the peoples. it is not derived from the top down. that is called social engineering.

Social engineering in this case is the Chinese people being cut off from the free-speaking world.

If you look at the opening olympics ceremony, the leaders are incredibly proud of their recent and ancient heritage (as are the people that I spoke with when I was visiting there) Mao Tze Dong is their George Washington according to a med student that I met there.

They are perhaps the only superpower in which true nationalism still thrives.

Hopefully that clears things up a bit.

Originally Posted by Mooncalf

^good points all around.

Cultural maturity as I used the phrase exists in the memory of the peoples. it is not derived from the top down. that is called social engineering.

Social engineering in this case is the Chinese people being cut off from the free-speaking world.

If you look at the opening olympics ceremony, the leaders are incredibly proud of their recent and ancient heritage (as are the people that I spoke with when I was visiting there) Mao Tze Dong is their George Washington according to a med student that I met there.

They are perhaps the only superpower in which true nationalism still thrives.

Hopefully that clears things up a bit.

That actually hasn't cleared anything up since it still sounds like a matter of cultural preservation or engineering or whatever, which is still contradictory to what culture is about. Also America is a pretty nationalist country, let's be frank.

Originally Posted by Lord Zero

That actually hasn't cleared anything up since it still sounds like a matter of cultural preservation or engineering or whatever, which is still contradictory to what culture is about. Also America is a pretty nationalist country, let's be frank.

cultural maturity is not cultural preservation. cultural preservation is social engineering.

cultural maturity is essentially the history of genetically and geographically connected peoples, and China is a mish-mash of both--boasting 57 cultural minorities which can be seen printed on their monetary exchange.

So I don't see how cultural maturity is any different to "culture", which is ""the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution, organization or group".

Originally Posted by Lord Zero

So I don't see how cultural maturity is any different to "culture", which is ""the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution, organization or group".

cultural maturity can only be applied to nation-states, if I remember correctly.

*edit*

but it's also a collective memory of a nation-state's history, plus what you already said.

So how is that maturity?

Originally Posted by Lord Zero

So how is that maturity?

err, wisdom comes with age?

I didn't invent the phrase ya know.

sorry if it is an inaccurate descriptor. it is what it is.

/semantic-tautology

*edit*

apparently this guy came up with it, if you're in the mood to read a random blog.

(I honestly don't remember where I first read the term

I'm not sure where you're deriving the "wisdom" part from.

Originally Posted by Lord Zero

I'm not sure where you're deriving the "wisdom" part from.

I edited.

are you done playing semantics now?

I can keep going if you need me too.

*edit*

oh: about America being nationalistic.

the only people who have a reason to be nationalistic right now are gay-a-phobes and/or people who care more about a government approved marriage than a stable household.

yes I just said that.

That is an absolutely terrible article and if I were you I would cease using any terms "coined" by the author of it immediately. The term seems completely made up based on absolutely nothing and attributes some kind of significance to culture that is unnecessary. He doesn't even explain what he himself means properly, he seems to be making a concentrated effort to appear deep and meaningful yet falls so far short of the mark it's like he was aiming in the opposite direction. Bloody hell.

Originally Posted by Lord Zero

That is an absolutely terrible article and if I were you I would cease using any terms "coined" by the author of it immediately. The term seems completely made up based on absolutely nothing and attributes some kind of significance to culture that is unnecessary. He doesn't even explain what he himself means properly, he seems to be making a concentrated effort to appear deep and meaningful yet falls so far short of the mark it's like he was aiming in the opposite direction. Bloody hell.

hahah.

You hate taxonomists.

*does a little dance*

CULTURAL MATURITY

If that guy is a taxonomist, and taxonomy is a word defined by what he does, then perhaps so.

Originally Posted by Lord Zero

If that guy is a taxonomist, and taxonomy is a word defined by what he does, then perhaps so.

*points at shiny new user-name*

/spam

How is this relevant to anything?

Originally Posted by DrZaius1

How is this relevant to anything?

it's not.

just more sophist wankery and cannibalistic taxonomy.

nothing that should be unexpected here really.

*edit*

well it's relevant to the future survival of the human race.

Personally I like this thread's definition better than Mr. Blog man's definition.

*edit*

but it's impossible for me to be objective in the matter of which definition is better.

*edit*

this thread is probably a good example of how words are imbibed with new meaning.