Links - 12th October 2019 (1)

Gen Y Speaks: Why do I still get stared at in Malaysia for dating a white man? - "In Malaysia, it is common to know someone who is in an interracial relationship or see interracial couples in public. Yet it still seems that this is not widely accepted in our culture.I speak from experience as a Malaysian Chinese-Peranakan. In Kuala Lumpur, my relationship with my Caucasian partner has often been the talk of strangers for reasons we find bewildering.I have personally overheard crude conversations making assumptions about my sexual drive or the size of his private parts, my intention to migrate to the West, and sometimes the amount of money he earns. Getting stared at is an everyday thing for us both and yes, we still find it rude... it was refreshing that during our month-long travel in Taiwan last month, we got quite a different reception. The locals there never gave us weird looks nor spoke crudely about our relationship.Taiwanese people, both young and old, were more keen to know if my Caucasian partner was enjoying his travels in Taiwan (locals often assumed that I was a Taiwanese thanks to my fluency in Mandarin).Sometimes, strangers in restaurants would introduce local delicacies to us and tell us more about their cuisine. It has been refreshing and delightful to be treated like humans after what we have gone through in the last two years in Malaysia. We are currently living in Thailand and again, the locals have been nothing but lovely so far. Conversations with Thais would often revolve around where we are from and whether we like living in the Land of Smiles.They seem to be more accepting of interracial couples than Malaysians are. In fact, I believe my experience in Malaysia was not as bad as that of others, going by what some of my friends say. An Indian Malaysian girlfriend of mine once shared her scary experience with such discrimination.As she was showing her partner around Bukit Bintang, Kuala Lumpur, she was asked by a group of men she did not know: “What is wrong with Indian guys that you have to date a foreigner? You think we are not good enough for you?”They were not just rude. They came across as threatening. My friend and her partner decided to walk away quickly to avoid any further confrontation from the men"

From South Korea to Malaysia, the ‘smart cities’ hailed as answer to world’s urban ills turn to ghost towns - "Every morning, at 8.30am, an announcement is piped though a speaker in the ceiling of Kim Jong-won’s flat, barking the daily bulletin in a high-pitched voice. The disembodied broadcaster details new parking measures, issues with the pneumatic waste disposal chute and various building maintenance jobs to be carried out that day.“There’s no way of turning it off,” sighs Kim’s wife, Jung-sim, as she prepares breakfast. “I hate technology but my husband is an early adopter. He has to have everything first.”... It claims to have the highest concentration of green Leed-certified buildings in the world, yet it is still entirely car-based, with not even a train line to the nearby airport. To get to Seoul, just 30km away, takes an hour and a half by metro. Songdo may have an “Integrated Operations Centre” – a Big Brother control room where reams of data are funnelled in real time from thousands of sensors across the city – but the physical urban model is no different to any other car-riddled business district. For all its low-energy labels, it is an expensive, exclusive and impersonal place... These new cities are not for rural-urban migrants. They are instruments to attract international investment and make the urban rich even richer... They are billed as a panacea for the world’s urban ills, solving overcrowding, congestion and pollution; yet, more often than not, they turn out to be catalysts for land dispossession, environmental degradation and social inequality... City-making, and the innumerable planning, engineering and technical services that go with it, is a booming industry, and corporations are intent on recycling their ideas irrespective of local context"

It's official: White men don't have a preference for Asian women - any race will do - "Women do prefer brains and ambition while men mostly focus on looks - no surprises there. But then, women reveal a strong preference for men of their own race; East Asian women therefore prefer East Asian men. Male preferences, however, are far less racial; they almost never discriminate on race when choosing a partner. There is no evidence, the researchers conclude, of the stereotype of a white male preference for East Asian women.However, East Asian women tend to discriminate less against white men than black and Hispanic males. As a result, the white man-Asian woman partnering is the most common interracial dating."
A mixed person told me men generally go for women fairer than them, except white men who go for anything

Financial risk facing China worse than in US before global crash, former finance minister says - "The level of risk facing China’s financial system could be higher than was seen in the United States before the global crash, according to a former Chinese finance minister.Speaking at a forum in Beijing over the weekend, Lou Jiwei, now chairman of the National Social Security Fund Council, also described the state of China’s financial sector as “messy”... The country’s financial system had become “severely distorted”, he said, adding that the “likelihood of China generating systematic financial risks is pretty big”.The distortion was exemplified by the high cost of financing in China despite the loose monetary environment, Lou said."
Naturally, he can be dismissed as giving negative comments because he's jealous after being outmanoeuvred

If you’re Chinese, then being a ‘shameless’ savvy saver is likely to be in your DNA - "Hong Kong is packed with a million millionaires, 68,000 of whom have at least HK$10 million (US$1.27 million) squirrelled away... As a popular Chinese saying goes, “The first generation makes the money, the second one holds onto the inheritance, but the third one spends it.” This Chinese proverb serves as a warning and a reminder that sensible budgeting and frugality is not only a virtue but a survival mantra that needs to be etched on the mind. Therefore, our attitudes towards money are shaped early in life by our elders as an integral part of Chinese culture and upbringing. We are told at a very young age that to be a responsible person, we must work hard and save up a nest egg to secure our future and consequently, our family’s future.All Chinese are also familiar with the saying, “To store up grains in case of a famine”. This obviously is the basic principle that illustrates we may be money-oriented but it’s all for good reason... I once came across a biscuit tin that contained a big wad of HK$1,000 bills, a bank book, some old photographs and some identification documents; I later found out the items belonged to one of my aunts.When I asked her why she stored all these valuables in a tin box, she said the items were like her life – the photographs were her past and the money was to support her now and in the future. She thought keeping “her life” in a tin box was the best way to keep it safe, as in the event of a misfortune like a fire, she would be able to quickly grab all of her valuables. Last week, I was having dinner with my girlfriend and when she ordered hot lemon water, I immediately asked the waiter to give her a mug of hot water instead, but with two pieces of lemon for me. The waiter took the order but gave me a funny look. I didn’t even have to explain to my girlfriend, Patty, who is an overseas Chinese, the reasoning behind my order – I wanted to save money. By ordering the hot water and lemon separately, the restaurant wouldn’t know how to charge us – so it would be free. We burst out laughing and both agreed that being thrifty is in our DNA. We may come from very different backgrounds but we are undeniably Chinese when it comes to our views of money... an average Chinese person saves a lot more than many of his overseas counterparts. According to the International Monetary Fund, from 1995 to 2005, the average urban household savings rate in China stood at 25 per cent of disposable income, with some other analysts even putting it as high as 30 per cent"

You Might Not Actually Be Struggling With Depression - "“You’re dealing with depression’s twin cousin. It’s called acedia.” Acedia (pronounced ah-SEED-e-uh) is an old term coined by monks who lived in the desert during the fourth century. Before the Seven Deadly Sins became known to the world, the early Desert Fathers had a list of “Eight Bad Thoughts.” One of the most severe thoughts was that of acedia, which the church eventually rolled up under the sin of “sloth” when the seven sins became commonplace... Acedia was one of the most severe and deadly thoughts because of the despair and absolute disdain for life it produced in a human being. It’s a shame the word has been lost to ancient textbooks and is no longer used, because acedia’s connotations carry far more weight in today’s cultural environment... Work in the morning, but by noon, they despised the repetitive nature of chores or work. After some time in this condition, they felt little zeal for life. Prayer stopped, sleeping increased, and they felt numb. Eventually, they despised life itself as they spiraled into a dark hole... Combating acedia has simple steps that can help you act and combat the feelings of indifference, self-hate, apathy, and keep you from spiraling further. The bad news is that it begins by choosing to take part in little things that may seem repetitive, but make a big difference... most of the activities that helped were repetitive tasks that could be done daily or weekly. Things like serving within their community, writing, journaling, yoga, exercise, cleaning, or several other mundane or repetitive activities"

Empathy Might Not Be the Antidote To Poisonous Political Polarization - "The new rule for empathy seems to be: reserve it, not for your "enemies," but for the people you believe are hurt, or you have decided need it the most. Empathy, but just for your own team. And empathizing with the other team? That's practically a taboo.And it turns out that this brand of selective empathy is a powerful force.In the past 20 years, psychologists and neurologists have started to look at how empathy actually works, in our brains and our hearts, when we're not thinking about it. And one thing they've found is that "one of the strongest triggers for human empathy is observing some kind of conflict between two other parties," says Fritz Breithaupt, a professor at Indiana University who studies empathy. "Once they take the side, they're drawn into that perspective. And that can lead to very strong empathy and too strong polarization with something you only see this one side and not the other side any longer."... Researchers who study empathy have noticed that it's actually really hard to do what we were striving for in my generation: empathize with people who are different than you are, much less people you don't like. But if researchers set up a conflict, people get into automatic empathy overdrive, with their own team. This new research has scrambled notions of how empathy works as a force in the world. For example, we often think of terrorists as shockingly blind to the suffering of innocents. But Breithaupt and other researchers think of them as classic examples of people afflicted with an "excess of empathy. They feel the suffering of their people." Breithaupt called his new book The Dark Sides of Empathy, because there's a point at which empathy doesn't even look like the kind of universal empathy I was taught in school. There is a natural way that empathy gets triggered in the brain — your pain centers light up when you see another person suffering. But out in the world it starts to look more like tribalism, a way to keep reinforcing your own point of view and blocking out any others."

Zodiac shaming is a real thing. Don't do it. - "Please, keep your zodiac sign to yourself. Zodiac-shaming — the practice of treating someone differently and punitively because of their astrological sign — isn't a total joke. You never know when someone will judge you for your cosmic family tree.That's not just my Virgo privilege talking... Not all forms of labelling or grouping are bad. You can still use the zodiac to make judgements about people, Renstrom argues, but they should be holistic, non-prescriptive observations — ones that take people's whole selves into account. Instead of writing people off because they're Scorpios or Geminis, Renstrom encourages people to consider their full, complex characters. Scorpios *might* be hypersexual, but they're also loyal partners. People are their sign, but they're also far more than their sign. Behavior exists on a spectrum. Just because Virgos are thought of as anal doesn't mean they all want a vacuum cleaner for Christmas."
How about shaming people who believe in zodiac signs?

Here’s Why This California Professor Considers ‘The Lion King’ To Be A Prime Example Of Anti-Immigration In Film - "Although some of his students didn’t want to believe that this classic children’s movie could possibly reflect an anti-immigrant sentiment, Professor Martín-Rodríguez provides evidence connecting Governor Pete Wilson’s campaign to the Disney company...
Although the bird, Zazu, is informed that there has been a hyena crossing, the movie never shows you the scene of the crossing itself. The entire experience is summed up in a single sentence, along with a military salute. The audience isn’t given the opportunity to see the journey of the hyenas, including the reason for their crossing, how long it took them to cross and how difficult it might’ve been to cross. The hyenas are not given names, nor stories. In other terms, they are not humanized... Professor Martín-Rodríguez makes a note that the hyenas are kept completely off-screen during the first 15-20 minutes of the movie, which takes away from their qualities as characters. Once they do appear on-screen, their portrayal as characters is only negative.
Professor Martín-Rodríguez analyzes the parallels between the portrayal of the hyenas and the political climate towards immigrants of the time... Professor Martín-Rodríguez argues that in contrast to Mufasa’s small lion family of three, these large herds of hyenas with unidentifiable families are seen as a serious threat, which has also been the case for immigrant families."
Apparently you should have a movie without conflict. Or maybe the only possible villains are the protagonists/their ilk

Trump’s Asia Gamble: Shatter Enduring Strategies on China and North Korea - The New York Times - "As he tries to tackle the greatest challenges to American power in Asia, President Trump is overturning policy toward China and North Korea that for decades was as canonical as Confucian ritual.With North Korea, he is engaging with the enemy in hopes that negotiations will yield a surrender of nuclear weapons. With China, Mr. Trump says the United States must take a big step back from an economic relationship that has strengthened a formidable rival. The shifts were prompted by internal changes in each country, combined with Mr. Trump’s unorthodox instincts and the views of his senior Asia advisers. The administration now has growing bipartisan support in Washington to widen an emerging global conflict with China and build diplomacy with North Korea... the aggressive approach to China has drawn many supporters, including some Obama administration officials and Democratic leaders like Senator Chuck Schumer. “Hang tough on China, @realDonaldTrump. Don’t back down,” Mr. Schumer tweeted in May. “Strength is the only way to win with China.” Since the 1970s, when presidents Richard Nixon and Jimmy Carter re-established relations with Beijing, American officials and experts have contended that economic ties between the United States and China would anchor the relationship between the two nations and, perhaps, coax Communist Party leaders toward Western liberalism.But Mr. Xi, who took power in 2012, has exercised expansive authoritarian controls... One economist who advised Chinese leaders in the 1980s, Janos Korani, wrote this week that Western experts like himself had been Dr. Frankensteins, helping build up China without realizing the eventual consequences for the West. “Now, the fearsome monster is here,” he wrote. Trump administration officials argue that economic engagement without appropriate guardrails created a tyrannical behemoth that could supplant American supremacy. Some call for long-term tariffs to “decouple” the economies of China and the United States by breaking supply chains and other business ties... Former officials and analysts increasingly say diplomacy is the only way forward with North Korea, given that it already has an estimated 30 to 60 nuclear warheads. Longtime advocates of rapprochement point optimistically to the shifting consensus in Washington."
As Einstein supposedly said about insanity...