Protests in China as Sudden Bursts of Releases in Social Pressure

Corporate denizens from around the world have an almost identical habit of getting absolutely wasted and hammered whenever they do not have to work the day after.  It is not because everyone is secretly alcoholics waiting for that right moment to get in touch with their dark side, nor even because most of these people are truly so fond of intoxicating beverages and equally intoxicated company of others that they must carry on such rowdy affairs week after week, year after year.  Instead, the motive is one of release, of even temporary escape from dark realities of bondage to stressful work and hierarchies.

For those people who have at least lived in China for part of their lives, the parallels between stress originating from excess laboring in a corporate environment and the stress gained from dealing with all the sometimes ridiculous, sometimes dangerous socio-political shenanigans is simply uncanny.  Sometimes, the stress from living in China is so much that downing a few bottles of beer, or even a few bottles of 40% alcohol rice wine does not suffice is making the stress go away, even temporarily.  The pressure of that stress need to released - in a more significant, sustained way.

Finding an excuse for getting drunk is easy.  "It's Friday night!" by itself is good enough.  But what if the social pressure need to be released on the streets?  Slogans need to be shouted, signs need to be devised, and sense of righteousness need to be created to back up whatever potential damages that will inevitably emerge from confrontation with authorities enforcing social order.  Thankfully, the CCP offers up plenty of legitimate excuses for Chinese citizens to voice their dissenting opinions away from the official line of interpreting a changing China and her place in the world.

But anyone with even a bit of consciousness in China would know that going against the CCP in China carries huge risks.  Sure, sense of stress from living under political suffocation may be temporarily alleviated, but the CCP will make sure you pay for your pleasurable misadventures.  The little release in stress against the will of the CCP might as well guarantee that you will face greater stress much more in the future.  Most Chinese people, no matter how stressed out they are by living under the CCP, simply would not go down the road of risking their lives calling for socio-political changes.

And then, just as the Chinese people are desperately looking for a target to unleash their misdirected fury, and the CCP thinks hard how to prevent an angry populace directing their anger to itself, Japan raises her hand and volunteers to help out.  In what seems like a trivial move for the Japanese populace with little political repercussions domestically, the government decision to purchase some uninhabited rocks from private owners manage to piss off the CCP and the Chinese populace at the same time, beautifully putting the normally opposing forces in sync against a "common enemy."

Both the CCP and shrewd Chinese people are fully aware of the fact that they are now on the same page.  Gone are the risks of random arrests for protesting on the streets of a culture that is generally intolerant of such (unlike the case of many Middle Eastern ones) and presented are opportunities to genuinely letting off some serious steam by rampaging through the streets without, most likely, ever having to pay a single cent for all the damages to innocent people, both Chinese and Japanese, the rampaging will inevitably cause.

Such is the story of the newest cycle of a series of anti-Japanese protests that have been flaring up more and more frequently since the boat collisions not that long ago.  The Japanese conveniently presented themselves as scapegoats in a perfect timing for endless strings of domestic issues created by the CCP and giving the Chinese people major headaches in their daily lives.  The inopportune entry of Japan into the public spotlight at such timing allow the Chinese government and people to burst out their frustration while further delaying necessary reforms to resolve those domestic issues.

The reality is that, in essence, the Chinese does not specifically pick on the Japanese.  Japan's role in this whole fiasco could be replaced by any other foreigners "seeking to prevent the peaceful rise of China."  The Americans are a favorite target with endless support for Taiwan and containing Chinese presence abroad.  Even the Norwegians can become a target of hate by giving some prizes to the wrong people.  The fact that the Japanese are so shocked by the current development probably says much about just how little the Japanese really knows about issues with contemporary Chinese society...

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