Bad German guy
Even China Daily took up the story that circulated wildly on the Chinese Internet, about the Racist tirade against Chinese by a German guy. He did wrong but did anybody care to look for the reasons of his outburst? Maybe he was daily being faced with (unpleasant) parking problems? Was there a special reason he snapped? Who knows. And yes, I know some foreigners who really act as axxholes here and shame us. But that is not the point.
My view
Sorry but I have my personal view on all this, shared by several old timers in Beijing.
Street assaults and robberies are now more common, but also anti-foreign attitudes. Worse, if a foreigner is assaulted and beaten in a robbery, he is likely to be accused of “assault”. So, I guess you give all your money and stuff, let yourself be beaten up, to avoid even worse. For those naïve, I have some (bloody) pictures of such assaults (that I did not want to post here…). As for the “racist” stuff, see below.
The story
“Senior Daimler executive removed from post after racist tirade against Chinese people in Beijing parking row”
German expat Rainer Gaertner also allegedly pulled out pepper spray to disperse onlookers during quarrel over parking space
Dated 22 November 2016
Link: http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2048191/german-executive-sacked-over-racist-tirade-china
My comment as posted on SCMP:
I have a different take on this story. Yes, the guy used improper language and attitude. Agreed. On the other hand we see in Beijing mounting anti-foreigner sentiment (without any immediate reason), racist insults and even physical aggression. If a foreigner defends himself physically he faces prison. Racist and xenophobic attacks seem to be “OK”. Will those (Chinese) attackers face any punishment? Like losing their job? It is a one-way “justice”. China has changed for the worst, in the past Chinese were overall very polite. Now some have become arrogant and blame foreigners for whatever, ranting and assaulting them. You won’t read this in the media because this is CENSORED. So, we have no rights? Contrary to what wumaos say, as foreigners we have no “favorable treatment”, on the contrary right now. Not to be surprised foreigners are leaving, so China is one of the countries with the lowest amount of foreigners IN THE WORLD. I have many local friends but they are the first to tell me “Be careful. Many bad people. Don’t try to argue”.
Hi Gilbert
I was in Beijing in 1991, 1994, 1996 and 1998-2010 so I definitely can understand what you are talking about. My experience was that the anti-foreigner atmosphere sometimes comes up and then disappears again, I thought it might be a cycle. (it was bad with the UN bombing the Chinese embassy. it has been bad for people with a darker skin color too, for a very long time)
It is all true what you write: China is a high-stress society so both Chinese and foreigners living there do tend to get angry at unusual high levels, and demonstrate behavior that is good to no one. Traffic as the place where everybody should share ‘common values’ (and be nice to one another) is exactly where it often goes wrong.
confront one another in a humourful way might be one way to deal with it? practice more Buddhism ?
Some Chinese aren’t nice to foreigners but then again, the majority is. Foreigners remain foreigners in China, they are never accepted as part of the Chinese society, even if you live your whole life there. that is painful and confronting. it doesn’t help the relationship between foreigners and Chinese for sure.
Even the (non-Han) people who made up ‘the foreign rulers’ such as the Manchus and the Mongols, accepted the Chinese culture as their own.
so the adagium might be , adapt or leave?