What America and China Have in Common

An interesting piece appearing today on CNN’s website profiles the states of mind of Chinese youth who were born post-Tiananmen Square uprising. The story focuses on one Chinese college junior in particular, who knows “next to nothing” about the incident and its political/cultural implications. He does, however, know a great deal about computer technology, karaoke singing, and drinking and girl-hunting, pursuits in which any cultural consciousness has apparently been drowned in 21st century China. There is one fact, however, that seems to validate this yojng man's desensitization: Discussion of the uprising and pre-1989 politics in China are, in fact, illegal.

I was struck by the parallels between what goes on now with the youth in China and what has happened in post-1960s America. Much like their Chinese counterparts, the youth of today have largely morphed into techno-savvy, club-friendly, social media hipsters who could care less about the group consciousness movements of the sixties, the colorful era of civil rights, long hair, hippies, the Beatles, and all things countercultural. China is going through the same numbification that we did, twenty years later. The only thing that’s missing in our deal is going to jail for reminiscing about the past. We just make biopics about it.