EDIT: no, I don't sympathize with nazis (neither I sympathize with those who call everyone nazi when they're losing an argument ;)
this post was submitted on 02 Sep 2023
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Celebrating an increase in life expectancy from 30 to 40 years old is not remotely the win you think it is.
I'm celebrating the increase in life expectancy from 35 to higher than that of the US, actually, which is the win I think it is.
The point is not the immediate increase in that specific 5 year period, the point is the clear trend of rapid, long term increases after a long period of stagnation, with the pivitol turning point being exactly when the CPC came to power. You're supposed to look at the whole graph.
China never manipulates data coming out of their authoritarian country so good thing we can trust it. I'm sure their life expectancy is great with all their industrial pollution that regularly causes smog in their inner cities.
Here is my source do you have a source that disputes that? Or is your belief based entirely on unfalsifiable faith?
Also curious if you think Chinese life expectancy is still like 35 or what lmao
You may also be interested in what the World Bank, that infamous communist propaganda rag, has to say:
No one in China is over 50. If you're over 50 in China they just shoot you, and then they lie and say they didn't.
I would expect you to understand unless you've read theory.
What theory would that be, lol?
Milton Friedman and Ayn Rand. In Fountainhead, she goes in depth about how Chinese life expectancy statistics are generally made up.
That's incredible, I honestly did not see that one coming.
So tell me, what's your best guess at what Chinese life expectancy was before the CPC came to power, and what do you think it is now? Do you dispute the numbers from before the communists were even in power? Or do you think they're still living in mud huts?
The Fountainhead is a novel about an American architect that has nothing to do with China. They're doing a weird bit, presumably about how evil tankies asking them to read books is cheating.
Yeah I got that, at least after they posted a rickroll. Guess being an idiot is a defense mechanism when they realized they had nothing.
Communism increasing life expectancy!?
Shanghai Stock Exchange: http://english.sse.com.cn/
Beijing Stock Exchange: www.bse.cn
Shenzhen Stock Exchange: https://www.szse.cn/English/index.html
That's more stock exchanges than the US, comrade!
Oh, so you consider Deng's reforms to be right-deviationist? Are you a Maoist, then?
Whether you consider the CPC to be communist or not, the fact still remains that they've made a lot of improvements in the lives of the average Chinese person.
Deng was alive and well when two of those stock exchanges were opened and the whole argument was "look at the improvements only possible under Communism".
How do you say "moving the goalposts" in Mandarin? Actually, no need to answer as you are all ~~suburban~~ petit bourgeois kids from the US.
That's... what I said? Obviously, Deng was the one who implemented economic reforms, such as opening stock exchanges and allowing foreign investment. Some Maoists consider this to be right-deviationist and counter-revolutionary, and that he should've continued more in line with Mao's policies. That's why I asked if you're a Maoist, since you consider his reforms incompatible with socialism.
I'm not sure who's whole argument was "look at the improvements only possible under Communism." China's conditions were much worse off than places like the US, so obviously it's possible to improve conditions to be better than per-revolutionary China (which is not saying much) without communism. It's just that in China's case, it was the communists that did it.
Mao died in 1976, which is where that life expectancy graph is somewhere in the mid 50s. Super impressive.
Over 60, actually. I think that doubling live expectancy over a single generation is, in fact, pretty impressive.
So I take it you're not a Maoist or a Dengist. Can you tell me who you think should've been in power in China instead? The KMT? You can see how much they did on the graph, if you don't find the CPC's numbers impressive then I'm sure you'd hate them even more. The invading Japanese perhaps? The European colonizers? Or maybe you think the Qing dynasty should never have been overthrown.
Correlation or causation? You know that industrialization increases life expectancy, right?
It's not hard to double your life expectancy when you're starting out with the same life expectancy that existed in the Roman Empire almost 2,000 years prior. Thanks, Mao!
Of course I know that, did you not read what I said?
"China's conditions were much worse off than places like the US, so obviously it's possible to improve conditions to be better than per-revolutionary China (which is not saying much) without communism."
It really is wild that no other faction was willing to do anything that would increase Chinese life expectancy above that of the Roman Empire, yes. I agree, thanks, Mao!
It's pretty funny that you criticize Deng for implenting economic reforms that led to further industrialization, while also crediting the rise in life expectancy to that very same industrialization.
What even is your ideology? And can you answer my question about who should've come to power instead of the communists?
So you agree it has nothing to do with communism and you're just trolling around the internet. Got it.
I have no idea what thought process led you to post that but ok.
There were a lot of really simple, basic improvements that the peasants in China desperately needed. Anybody could've done what was needed, but nobody else was willing to, because nobody else cared. There was no special technical economic policy that uplifted them, it was just a willingness to address their needs that no other faction possessed.
The entire point of this brilliant thread is that communism, not individuals, lifted people out of poverty. Numerous economic systems have high life expectancy (socialist, capitalist, etc) and the common denominator is basically just industrialization.
Who would have thought the ability to make nation-state quantities of medication extends lives?
You can laugh, but communist oppression is no laughing matter. Please see this article where Ben Shapiro writes a thesis-level takedown of the mythos of Chinese life expectancy.
Please, I've read that article countless times. Here is a response that breaks down all the flaws in his argument.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/dQw4w9WgXcQ?si=KTi-2uYeRb6E8_cS
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source, check me out at GitHub.
My god he can't read a graph. How has our educational system been allowed to fail for this long?
I'm not committed at all to China as the salvation of the communist project, but it's exactly this sort of self-imposed illiteracy and ignorance, and nearly religious faith in the inferiority and duplicity of The Orient that makes me default to distrusting anything negative a cracker says about it.