The following is from the latest book by Taiwanese scholar Kō Bun'yū, one of the world's leading China experts, published on 7/31/2022, titled China's Terrifying Future, The Identity, and Future of Sinocentrism.
This book is a must-read not only for Japanese citizens but for people all over the world.
It is one of the best books of the 21st century.
It starts on p. 162.
A culture of lies nurtured over 5,000 years in China reinforces dictatorship.
As discussed in Chapter 5, China's history has been so war-torn that it could be said there has never been a war-free year.
It led to the development of political maneuvering and the use of what we now call "fake news" and lies to distract the enemy.
In addition, due to the influence of Confucianism, a family-oriented religion, lies became commonplace as a characteristic of the Chinese, with the awareness that everyone outside the family was an enemy.
Arthur Smith, an American missionary who spent more than 20 years in China at the end of the Qing Dynasty, in his book "The Chinese Character" (translated by Munehiro Ishii and Nako Iwasaki, published by Chuokoron-sha), introduced his analysis that "Falsehood, duplicity, dishonesty, and a servile attitude of trying to fit into circumstances to suit oneself, are the outstanding national characteristics of the Chinese people. These are the salient national characteristics of the Chinese.
Smith then asserts that China is a society of mutual distrust.
It has long been well known in the West that the Chinese are a people who often lie.
For example, Hegel, Montesquieu, Rousseau, and others have spoken of it.
Montesquieu gave examples of Chinese merchants, saying that every merchant has three scales and that cautious people use accurate scales, light scales when selling, and heavy scales when buying.
When you look at the Chinese, you should think that lying is the essence.
Everyone lies, as a matter of course.
Even married couples lie to each other, and national leaders lie more.
Arthur Smith also stated that the Chinese do not get as angry as Westerners when they are told, "You are a liar," because it is a bland expression.
In China, there is a saying, "The world is as black as a crow."
My high school teacher in Japanese literature often said this.
To cheat is called "deception (pen)" in Chinese. Many publications have written about the "culture of deception" in China.
There is a cultural theory that Chinese culture itself is a "culture of deception. The art of deception is called "deception (pen Xiu)," and many books have been written about it.
At the end of the Qing dynasty, a scholar named Li Zongo wrote a book titled "Thick and Black Studies," which states that the secret to success is to live black-heartedly and brazenly.
In "Zuo Zhuan," the phrase "there is no fixed stipend in a country, and no fixed rank among sovereigns and vassals" is used to warn that it should never trust even vassals because their subordinates could replace them at any time.
Kuwabara Jitsuzo, professor emeritus at Kyoto University and a leading authority on oriental studies from the Meiji period to the prewar Showa period, wrote in his article "Compromise and Suspicion among the Chinese" that "the Chinese are quick to compromise when they see their opponents are tough, but they are very suspicious, and there is much suspicion and jealousy even between father and son and between brothers. In dynasties, there are so many scandals between the emperor and the crown prince that the crown prince often does not live to the fullest.
He discusses how there is a lot of deception in China.
It is a land of deception, and the only thing that can come from it is a society of distrust of humanity.
Mistrust of people is not a new phenomenon but has been a traditional cultural climate since ancient times.
More than 2,000 years ago, the immortal work "Han Feizi" (The Book of Mistrust) became the "study of mistrust of mankind," and the first emperor of the Qin Dynasty, who read it, even exclaimed, "If I could meet the author of this book, I would not regret my death.
In such a society where lies are rampant, and mutual trust is lacking, the only way to bring it all together is through a dictatorship by force.
The fact that a dictatorship can only rule China is due in part to its national character and social climate of mutual distrust.
◎"Chinese disloyalty" incompatible with Japanese sensibilities
In his book "The Chinese Character," Arthur Smith lists 26 characteristics of the Chinese, including intellectual chaos, euphemisms, and pretending to obey but secretly betraying. "As far as we have experienced and observed, there is no integrity to be found anywhere in China," he said.
Max Weber, the eminent German sociologist, was even harsher.
In his famous book Confucianism and Taoism (translated by Tokuo Kimata, Sobunsha), he stated unequivocally that "the Chinese are the most dishonest people in the world.
In China, where people are full of liars and distrustful of human beings, everyone cheats, and no one trusts anyone.
That is why they never apologize and never admit to lying.
And to emphasize that they are not at fault, they use strange quibbles to change the subject.
For example, when the U.K. and the U.S. criticize China for its suppression of human rights in Uyghur and Tibet, China replies, "The U.K. started the Opium War," and then switches to a completely unrelated issue. In China, street fights are common, and when the police catch a Chinese person beating someone in a violent incident, they often make up a cryptic excuse, such as, "This guy hit me in the head with his fist.
The person, apparently beaten and bleeding from the head, would say, "He tried to head-butt me, and I dodged, but my hand hit him. I avoided him, but my hand got hit. My hand hurts because he hurt me.
Such scenes are a common occurrence.
Arthur Smith, in his book "The Chinese Character," also describes the Chinese quibbling.
Many readers may remember that in 2011, a Chinese high-speed train was involved in a rear-end derailment in Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, China, resulting in a catastrophic accident that, according to official reports, killed 40 people and injured about 200 others.
The "handling of the accident" by the authorities, who buried the train rather than rescue the victims and cover up the accident, also became a hot topic.
In China, however, it is believed that there has never been a fatal high-speed train accident in China.
The online version of "Global Times," an affiliate of "People's Daily," claims as much (Sankei News, June 29, 2015).
The reason is this.
China's definition of a high-speed train is "a train traveling at a speed of 250 kilometers per hour or more." In the accident in Wenzhou, the train was traveling at about 100. In the accident in Wenzhou, the train ran into the train in front of it at a speed of about 100 kilometers per hour. Hence, the government claims it was an accident involving a special rapid train, not a high-speed train accident.
However, the train that caused the accident was based on Japan's "Hayate" bullet train, which was introduced as a high-speed train. It was clear that China's poor train operations led to the catastrophe.
If China's argument is correct, an accident involving a Japanese Shinkansen train slowed down by a stop or a slow move could be called a "special rapid train accident" rather than a Shinkansen accident.
On the other hand, China is stingy with Japan's claim that "Japan's Shinkansen trains have yet to have a train accident that killed a passenger.
China's criticism is that "Japan may want to say that fatal high-speed train accidents have occurred in France, Germany, and China, but since there have been no deadly high-speed train accidents in China either, Japan's claim is false.
In this way, the Chinese are quite adept at using all sorts of quibbles to switch, cover-up, and blame the problem on others.
In particular, they blame others for everything wrong.
For example, when I was a child, I was taught in the KMT textbooks that came from China that China is so poor and behind today because of the corruption of the Qing government and the aggression of imperialism and Japanese militarism.
They also cried out for the responsibility of the Gang of Four during the Cultural Revolution.
In any case, everything was someone else's fault.
They were taught through textbooks that everything wrong is someone else's fault.
The Chinese are entirely unaware of the concept of "self-responsibility."
It is not that they don't have it, but they don't know about it.
The Chinese do not think, nor does it occur to them, that they may be responsible to some extent.
A person who feels responsible for himself cannot survive in China.
They will be thoroughly taken advantage of and hunted down.
Remorse is something you make the other person do, not something you do.
During the Cultural Revolution, those forced to criticize themselves through violence had a miserable end.
If they did not admit guilt, they were tortured endlessly, and if they did admit guilt, they were lynched, executed, or at best sent to labor reformatories.
Showing remorse was fatal; therefore, they did not feel guilt or any sense of remorse.
In other words, they are self-centered, and it is commonplace to think that everything wrong is someone else's fault.
Countries with long histories and cultures often have an account of war and exile.
And in such countries, there are many liars because they could not survive in an otherwise turbulent society.
On the other hand, Japan is the oldest country in the world with an "unbroken imperial line," but it has never experienced exile.
Although Japan was defeated in World War II, it quickly rose to become the world's second-largest economy. It built a super-stable society, with the emperor as its central figure.
Therefore, the Japanese did not need to lie.
In addition, Japan is a natural disaster-prone country. The percentage of disasters that occur in Japan as a percentage of the world's total is as follows. 18.5% of the number of earthquakes of magnitude six or greater (2003-2013), 7.1% of the number of active volcanoes, 1.5% of the number of disaster fatalities, and 17.5% of the amount of disaster damage (US$100 million), which is exceptionally high compared to 0.25% of the world's land area (Cabinet Office "White Paper on Disaster Reduction 2014").
Because of this, the country has naturally developed a society where people cannot survive without helping each other.
In a society that distrusts people, people cannot help each other in the event of a natural disaster and will eventually be wiped out.
The reason why there are so few liars among Japanese people can be attributed to this natural situation.
It is well known worldwide that lost property is highly likely to be returned to its owner in Japan.
According to the Metropolitan Police Department, in 2018, it returned 93% of the 400,000 lost wallet reports submitted in the Tokyo area to its owners.
It is unthinkable in other countries.
