I loved being in China. I want to return to Shanghai. I want to see what it looks like in another year, because I’ve never seen so much change taking place in one city. I’m looking forward to meeting more people there, and finding out what they think about their evolving economic and social system.
Back home, I had to gather up my family, re-pack my suitcase, and head to Houston for my nephew’s wedding. Getting back on an airplane was stressful, but being among relatives and friends has given me lots of opportunities to talk, and reflect about my trip. People ask me about the Chinese government: Could I detect its presence? Did I see a lot of soldiers and police? Is the heavy hand of Communism felt everywhere? Anywhere?
I remember as a child hearing about the few visits of westerners to China — how the guides shepherded the visitors around, and permitted them to see only certain things. In contrast, Nancy and I moved about freely. We were asked to show our passports only when checking into our hotels. I saw fewer police in Shanghai than I do in my home town. There were more guards and soldiers in Beijing, but Beijing is a capital city filled with historic landmarks, much like Washington D.C. where one also sees many guards and (especially these days) soldiers.
The only time I felt inhibited was when websites I need to access were blocked. This blog, for instance — I couldn’t update it from China. Chris Messina kindly published a couple of my posts, and the rest had to wait until I returned to California. Apparently the Chinese government blocks all access to WordPress. After a couple of days I couldn’t upload photos into my Flickr photostream, either, and I wondered if that site was blocked as well.
Coming from unlimited access to a few million noisy, chaotic, acrimonious, and informative conversations about everything under the sun, I felt weighted down by the Chinese censorship. It’s as if the information stream to which I’ve become so accustomed was suddenly dialed down. I often complain about the overwhelming amount of information on the Web, but having the volume turned down all of a sudden felt unnatural. I don’t want to be separated from what is rapidly becoming the sum total of human communication. And I don’t want anyone else to be separated from it, unless by choice.
My first reaction to being blocked was disbelief. I wrote to Chris, asking if something was wrong with WordPress’s servers. When he told me that the blockage was deliberate, I realized that despite the physical signs of development I could see all around me, this new century may not be the Chinese century. If an author in China can’t do something as simple as posting to a blog site — or using hotmail, since it has also been blocked from time to time — then the human conversation will take place without the full participation of the Chinese.
But I don’t think the story will come out that way. Maybe I’m an optimist, but I have a sense that as the Chinese economy grows, more and more Chinese people will demand full access to the world’s information stores, and that demand will prove irresistible.
Terence Mckenna once said that each bit of human progress outsmarts itself. I’m optimistic because I see the Internet as a sign that the dominator model has finally, finally outsmarted itself. Our hierarchically organized culture, where concentrated power loves to control everything, has bred a new engine of progress that is not subject to such control. The only way to grow is to get on that engine, and go where it goes.
Thirty Second Attacks
January 8, 2006
I was watching the news yesterday, catching up on the Jack Abramoff scandal, and I heard something that nearly made me swear off news for a year. The political commentator — a Washington D.C. “insider” — noted that while we’re can’t be sure what the legal consequences will be for the various congress-critters being fingered by Abramoff, we can be sure there will be heaps of political consequences. “The thirty-second attack ads will multiply,” she said.
Isn’t this the reason we go running to blogs for content? Traditional news outlets may not help us figure out what happened, who’s guilty, and what to do about it, but by heaven, the creators of political advertising will have a heyday on TV. Why then would I even want to turn the tube on? Can’t these advertising types get a clue?
So I am swearing here and now, that for the next eleven months, whenever one of those thirty second attack ads comes on the television, radio, or other willing vehicle for such fertilizer, I will hit the Mute button. And if I can’t get at the remote because it’s under the cat, I’ll hit my internal Mute button. And if my internal Mute button isn’t working because advertising and PR specialists have figured out how to get around it — perhaps by suddenly playing snippets of Led Zeppelin in the middle of the ads — I’ll stick my fingers in my ears and sing LA LA LA. I swear it. And I urge everyone to do the same.
P.S. Just in case we need a little extra inspiration, here’s Terence McKenna’s take on TV:
I’ve been coming and going from Los Angeles a lot recently and when the plane swings out over the eastern part of the city looking down is like looking at a printed circuit. All these curved driveways and cul-de-sacs with the same little modules installed on each end of them and you realize that as long as … the TV stays on these are all interchangable parts. This is this nighmarish thing which McLuhan and others foresaw, the creation of the public. The public has no history, has no future, lives in a golden moment created by credit which binds them ineluctably to a fascist system that is never criticized.
The Non-Ordinary Conhibition Rhetoric of Terence McKenna
Terence, you would have loved blogging.
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