不劳而获 : When you want to get something for nothing

Hi guys, I recently saw something on Youtube which I'd like to talk about in more detail here - now the channel where I found this was China Insider with David Zhang, he is very anti-CCP (yup, that's me and my echo chamber one again0 and uses his Youtube channel to expose a lot of the crap that is going on with the Chinese government. Zhang shared two videos created by the CCP featuring Chinese nationals being cornered by thieves intent on robbing them abroad, the both videos looked like somewhere in Africa or even somewhere like Cuba or Haiti. I have embedded Zhang's video below and as ridiculous as these videos may be, it is true that a lot of Chinese people in China actually believe this to be totally true because they really crave respect and that's exactly what is being portrayed in this video: a Chinese person getting respect abroad simply for being Chinese. Whilst it is natural for people to crave respect, I think it is very wrong to lie to them and tell them something that simply isn't true. Two years ago, I found myself in one of these situations as portrayed in the CCP's propaganda video, I was in Panama and someone tried to rob me - an angry man approached me whilst holding a massive machete and demanded that I handed everything over or he would chop me up into little pieces. Did I try to negotiate with him? No, I decided to put my faith in my ability to run and got away as fast as I could by doing my best impression of Usain Bolt - I never knew I could run that fast, for that long, without slowing down but when you have someone chasing you with a huge machete threatening to kill you, that usually provides the inspiration to run especially fast. But if I had tried what the CCP's video had suggested, then I would have probably been killed by this madman. Now this is just common sense, why would people in China actually believe what was portrayed in the video? 

I know the answer to this question because I come from a very working class family - my father is one such person who would watch such a video and totally believe it because he craves respect but has never enjoyed it. There's one aspect of my father's family I need to explain - his big brother (whom we referred to as 老大 Laoda) was so rich, he was one of those crazy rich Asians who lived in a mansion whilst my father was a humble primary school teacher. Needless to say, my grandparents often looked at my father liked the failure and would say things like, "why do you want to be a teacher? How much do you earn a month? Why don't you ask Laoda to give you a job in his company or ask him to teach you how to be a businessman like him? Why do you want to be poor like that?" My father adamantly refused out of pride, but I suppose there was also a very practical aspect to that as well - I really doubt my father had the brains or the business acumen to do what Laoda did. So ironically, I think my father made the right decision but it must have been frustrating to say the least, when he was far less successful and rich than his big brother and be reminded of that every time he spoke to his parents. But at least my father could depend on some degree of "respect" from his work as a primary school teacher, when he walked into the class, he could order the students around and punish those who did not obey him. His students would remember him as a very strict teacher who would never tolerate any misbehaviour in his classes and so they would be very scared of being punished by him. Likewise, I was afraid of my father as a child, he had a violent temper and if I did anything that annoyed him, he wouldn't hesitate to beat me up for disobeying him. However, there's a fundamental difference between fear and respect. Imagine you're in a safari in Africa and you encountered a massive crocodile: you would be afraid of it as you know the crocodile could easily kill you with one bite. That emotion is fear, that's not the same as respect - you fear the crocodile, you don't respect the crocodile. Fear is what we feel when there's a clear and present danger, but respect is something you earn. So for example, I respect my uncle Laoda for having built up a very successful business empire despite getting virtually no help from his parents, he created something out of nothing. My respect for him is based on what he has managed to achieve under very challenging circumstances and so what I feel for my uncle is very different from what I would feel should I encounter a ferocious crocodile in the jungle. 

Hence I think at some level, my father does understand the difference between fear and respect, he wants respect but he can only inspire fear so he settles for that and convinces himself that the two are really not that different. To further confuse him, in many East Asian societies, respect is usually given automatically rather than earned, so for example we are expected to respect our elders regardless of whether or not they have earned that respect. I think there's a fundamental problem that boils down to vocabulary here: let me give you a case study to analyse. Recently when I was on a crowded train, I saw an old lady and I offered her my seat - she was grateful for the kind gesture and I was happy to stand as long as that seat went to someone who needed it more than me. I did the right thing and expected nothing in return. Now in many Asian cultures, they would chalk that up to respect: the man offered the older woman his seat as he respected her. No, that is very misleading. I never met that old lady before, so there was no way I could offer her any kind of real respect as she was a stranger. However, I felt sorry for her, I didn't want her to stand, what I did was a gesture of kindness, sympathy and generosity on my part. Now you may say, whatever dude, the end result is still the same - you stood up, the old lady sat down, why does it matter what emotions you experienced in the process? The issue is that if we lump everything into that same category as respect even when it is clearly something else, then you don't even recognize real respect when you encounter it or in this case, if you're looking for respect, it helps to know what you're looking for so you wouldn't end up wasting time searching high and low for the wrong thing. I agree that we should be kind to old people like that lady I encountered on the crowded train, but what I don't agree with the way Asian people often mistake that kindness for respect when they are two very different things. Kindness should be offered unconditionally, we should strive to be kind to others because our society will be a better place if kindness avails - imagine a selfish society where an old, frail lady boards a crowded bus and everyone just ignores her or looks down at their phones, hoping for someone else to offer her a seat. I am sure you wouldn't want to live in a society like that, that is why we need a society which offers old people kindness, we should act with generosity and be considerate when we deal with the elderly - we can do all that without offering them respect as that's something else altogether, so what is respect? 

I am currently watching season 2 of Physical 100, the popular Korean reality TV show. So for those of you not familiar with it already, the format is simple - it is a quest to find out which physique is the strongest in South Korea. So a hundred contestants are selected to take part and they are drawn from a mix of backgrounds - there are some top athletes (boxers, wrestlers, martial artists, gymnasts, footballers, swimmers, rugby players etc) but you will also have some from the military, law enforcement, actors and of course, this being Korea, a number of K-pop idols. The contestants are put through several rounds of insanely brutal physical tests (known as 'quests' in the show) and some contestants will be eliminated at the end of each round until a winner is finally crowned at the end after everyone else is eliminated. So the one word I keep hearing over and over again is 'respect' (존경 but they like to use 'respect' as a loanword from English, but said with a Korean accent). It is a really good programme, albeit rather cheesy given the Korean style of presenting. The best performers on Physical 100 naturally win the respect of the other candidates when they impress with their outstanding efforts on their quests - the show is engineered to allow some of these contestants to truly excel at some of these quests to impress not just the other contestants but also the viewers at home. The message is simple, if the top athletes in Korea are so incredibly impressed with this guy's effort and are showering him with respect, then you at home ought to react the same way and as a formula, it works. However, very few people in society actually get to prove themselves through such a format - most people do the complete opposite. They are ordinary working class folks who simply do a job well within their capability and we barely notice them. I got some help from a worker at the supermarket today as I accidentally scanned an item twice, she came over and helped me resolve that. Was I impressed by her customer service? No, she was merely doing her job (and admittedly, it wasn't a particularly hard job). But of course, I was kind and treated her with courtesy, I spoke to her politely and thanked her for her help not because I respected her, but I was being kind to her. People like that lady at the supermarket would never ever take part in a process like Physical 100 and be able to do extraordinary feats to win the respect from others - hence the way I behaved was a reflection on me not her, I was polite because I am a nice person, not because this woman has done anything to have earned my respect. The Korean celebrities on Physical 100 are the exception to the rule whilst this woman at the supermarket represents the vast majority of people out there who are just ordinary working class folks who can rarely inspire respect.  

This sets up a situation whereby people trick themselves into believing that kindness is the same as respect. Allow me to use an analogy to make my point: if you like sushi, you would know that wasabi is one of the key ingredients in most types of sushi but did you know that real wasabi is actually really expensive and most of the time, we are consuming a cheaper substitute made of horseradish, mustard and green food colouring to make it look and taste like the real thing? Purists would turn their noses up at the cheap substitute if they are used to having freshly grated wasabi at top Japanese restaurants, but most of us would just choose to ignore the fact we are actually consuming a cheaper substitute and enjoy our sushi anyway since the cheaper wasabi substitute does still give us that spicy kick we expect from wasabi. Hence in the case of ordinary working class folks, they can still experience kindness from others and even though that's not the same as respect, it still makes them feel good. Allow me to give you an example: my mother likes going to church because they have a team of volunteers dedicated to taking care of the older folks amongst the congregation. The volunteers there are acting out of kindness and probably because they feel good about doing something like that for the church, believing that their reward would be in heaven and that God is somehow watching their every move as they volunteer. My father even described the situation as, "他们真的很尊重老人!" (They really respect old people!) But of course, I have to split hairs and point out that they are very kind to the elderly worshippers there, but that's not the same as respect, it is kindness. The volunteers who take care of my mother at the church don't really have a relationship with her, but they go out of their way to be nice to her the same way the receptionist at a 5-star hotel would smile and greet you enthusiastically as if she was really pleased to see you - it's a form of customer service at the end of the day. I compare it to the kind of great service I tend to get in American restaurants because the waiters are trying to earn a nice, big tip from you by making you feel special. So whatever their motivation may be, that's not respect but it sure makes us feel good regardless. Hence for many people like my parents, they mistake this type of kindness or quality customer service for respect as it is a close substitute, the same way the cheap wasabi substitute we consume is close enough to the real thing as it does achieve the desired effect and whilst I might be splitting hairs here, it is still not the same thing. 

So let's go back to the CCP video that I talked about at the beginning of this post - it is telling ordinary Chinese citizens that they will be instantly respected abroad the moment they announce that they are from China. The message is simple: you want respect, you've got it, thanks to the efforts of the glorious CCP, you will be respected when you are abroad, even if you are struggling to make ends meet in China and living quite a miserable life. The intended viewers of this video would never be able to travel abroad - even with an emerging middle class, only about 10% of China's population actually have passports to facilitate international travel. That means that the other 90% are simply too poor to afford international travel and hence would never be able to test if they would instantly get respect when visiting another country simply for being Chinese. Thus it is like telling a poor working class man a lie like, "I know you are very poor now, but I am putting a billion dollars into an offshore bank account for you. You will not be able to access that money, but hey, you can still feel like a billionaire in the knowledge that this money belongs to you, so I hope that will make you feel happy!" This of course sounds like a complete con, but for many poor working class people in China, it is a lie they want to believe it is true as it can bring them a bit of joy, so they would gladly cast aside any doubts and believe what is blatantly propaganda. Now you may think this is ridiculous, but a lot of people want to believe that they will get the respect they so desperately crave without having to put in any effort to earn that respect, such as simply by being Chinese and having the world kowtow at your feet or in the case of my mother at church, simply for being old. Mind you, this theory wasn't completely baseless as people used to die a lot younger even if we just go back 100 years. Back in 1920s, most people could expect to live to about 50 and so if you have managed to stay alive into your 70s or 80s, then you are doing something different to have outlived most of your peers and that was enough reason to earn the respect of those around you. This is why there was actually some reason to respect your elders back in those days as these elderly folks were doing something right to avoid dying at 50, but managing to stay alive these days with the aid of modern medicines is really no big deal and so this concept of "respect your elders" no longer applies in this modern age as longevity is now completely random - brilliant scientists can die of cancer or in a car accident at the age of 50 whilst completely uneducated working class folks can easily live to 100. Just staying alive really isn't worthy of respect in 2024. 

Hence this is why I have used the phrase 不劳而获 to describe this situation - it is a Chinese phrase which means "getting something for nothing", but more specifically, it refers to reaping the benefits without having to put in any effort or labour to actually deserve it. So for example, popular British comedian Paul Merton has been appearing in many BBC programmes like Have I Got News For You, for over 30 years now. His real name is Paul Martin, but he uses the stage name "Paul Merton" to differentiate himself from another performer by the name Paul Martin. This was a real story that happened when Paul Merton was filming the documentary "Paul Merton in China", the hotel reservation was made under Merton's real name "Paul Martin". The hotel were told to expect a foreign celebrity but had somehow mistakenly assumed that it was Paul Martin - the former Canadian prime minister. This led to the hotel pushing out the boat to give Paul Merton the red carpet VIP treatment when he arrived, only for them to realize that they had made a mistake when Merton had to inform the owner of the hotel that he was a British comedian and not the Canadian prime minister. Whilst Paul Merton is a big star in the UK, he certainly wasn't expecting anyone in China to even know who he was and hence was shocked by the VIP welcome he got at the hotel. Thus this is a classic case of mistaken identity leading to 不劳而获 - the hotel thought they were welcoming the Canadian prime minister, not a British comedian. The bottom line is that respect ought to be earned and even if you stumble upon it accidentally, the right thing to do would be to admit that you don't deserve that respect which was what Paul Merton did the moment he realized what had happened. Now you might say to me that this level of honesty is quite demanding, why do you insist upon it? If some Chinese factory worker wants to believe that he would be respected halfway around the world in Mozambique or Cuba simply for being Chinese, what is the harm in that? Whilst we know it simply isn't true, isn't this kind of white lie somewhat harmless and even beneficial if that penniless Chinese factory worker can boost his self-worth and confidence with this kind of propaganda? Please let me explain to you how this has affected me on a personal level and how it has harmed my relationship with my parents. 

My father is one of those people who wants to believe in 不劳而获 respect, so as an elderly Chinese man, he believes that people would automatically respect him for being a) old and b) Chinese. When respect is simply given on that basis rather than earned, meritocracy goes out of the window. Contrast that to my world, where I have to fight so hard to prove myself in the world of business - what I do isn't that unique, but what I am really good at is proving to my clients that I am the smartest and the best man for the job, so they will entrust me with major contracts and important projects. However, when I have told my father in the past about the successes I have had in the world of business, he would chalk it up to the kind of 不劳而获 respect that I have been given, such as, "white people trust you because they think Chinese people are hardworking and are good at maths."  This infuriates me as I have put in so much effort to prove myself to my clients and employers that I am really good at my job and nobody has ever given me a job based on some assumption they made on the basis of my skin colour. Even if I am in a position whereby the role does require Chinese language skills, I would have had to face intense competition from other Chinese candidates in order to secure the role. Now my parents simply don't get the concept of 'competition' because they are so working class. After all, my parents never even had a single job interview in their lives - they were given jobs by the government the moment they finished their teacher training programme back in the day, so the concept of having an element of competition at work is completely alien to them. The key difference is that for people like primary school teachers or that woman at the supermarket, there is no element of performance-related pay at all for what they do, so they usually just do the bare minimum in the knowledge that they will not be financially rewarded for going above and beyond what is required of them. But in my case, the better I perform, the more money I can earn - there is a clear and direct relationship between my efforts and my income. That may seem obvious with those of you familiar with the concept of meritocracy, but for people like my parents that is a rather alien concept. This is frustrating for me of course as my parents will always chalk my successes up to factors that are out of my hands ("they gave you the job because you're Chinese") rather than actually acknowledge how hard I had to fight for that success ("they gave you the job because you totally vanquished all the competition and proved you were the best.") 

I have another theory why I think my parents have chosen not to see my point of view on this matter. If my parents believe that respect is something you can receive automatically whether you deserve it or not, whether you have earned it or not, they wouldn't want to take a closer look at my world where I have to fight so hard to prove myself every step of the way, to establish my credibility in the business world in order to earn the respect of those whom I work with. My theory is that if they actually realized just how hard it is to earn genuine respect in the business world, they would come to the realization that they have done absolutely nothing to earn any respect from their peers in their lives and that what they have mistakenly regarded as 'respect' was at best kindness or customer service. Some years ago, when I was in Singapore, my father asked me to accompany him to the bank because he was afraid he might have to fill in some forms in English or encounter a Malay or Indian manager who didn't speak any Mandarin. As it turned out, he was served by a very pleasant lady who spoke Mandarin flawlessly and thus my father was very pleased because she was able to explain everything he needed to do to him in Mandarin (which meant that my translation services weren't required at all). As we left the bank, he told me that the lady who served him really respected the elderly (她真的很尊重老人!) and I just rolled my eyes as I knew that lady in the bank didn't actually respect my father, she was just doing her job in being polite to him. There's a difference between simply behaving in a respectful manner and offering someone genuine respect. My father has been going through life mistaking instances like that as respect when it was very clear to me that this lady at the bank was in customer service mode - she had behaved like that because it was part of her job, she was paid to do so and the bank probably prided itself in offering excellent customer services to all their customers. We had a great experience at the bank, but there really wasn't any element of respect in that interaction. The ugly truth is that nobody really offers people like my father any genuine respect, so he convinces himself that he is experiencing respect in instances like that and even I think it would be really cruel to explain to him how he has confused the issue. So at this point, I pity him rather than respect him so it's better to let sleeping dogs lie in this case because ignorance is truly bliss.  

Don't get me wrong - I am a kind person, I simply believe that respect should be earned whilst I am more than happy to offer my kindness unconditionally. Kindness makes our society a better place and we all have a moral duty to be kind people. After all, I did receive a lot of kindness when I was growing up. A lot of nice people recognized that I was a very troubled young person having a difficult time at home, they showed me a lot of kindness and took care of me. I received kindness from so many people, even from people who didn't know me well but went out of their way to take care of me and the only way I can repay that debt of gratitude is to play it forward by offering others that same kindness unconditionally. I'm not here to brag about the kind deeds that I have done over the years but please believe me when I tell you that I've done plenty to repay that debt I owe to the kind people in my life and I intend to continue being a very kind and generous person. The obvious question would be, well if you believe in showing kindness, then why can't you show your parents some of that kindness then, even if you don't respect them? You're not obliged to like them or have any respect for them but at the very least, can't you offer some kindness? The weird thing about doing charity is that I really don't expect anything in return apart from that lovely warm glow in my heart knowing that I have exercised kindness to another person, some of the people I have helped in the past don't even know how to get in touch with me if they wanted to thank or repay me, but that's alright. But with people you have known all your life like your family members, it's different. The context is my very messed up childhood and there are just too many bad memories I'd rather forget, thus showing kindness to my parents is a lot harder as it would inevitably involve opening a Pandora's box that I'd rather just keep shut. Perhaps that is selfish of me, but I find it so much easier to show kindness to strangers as that Pandora's box just isn't there - I start with a completely clean slate with a stranger: I exercise kindness, they feel grateful, everyone is happy as a result and there's something very beautiful about just how simple that interaction is. I sincerely hope other people will be kind to my parents, but I'm sorry, that is not something I could take on at this stage in my life. 

For people like my parents, if they actually accept the fact that if we want respect, we have to earn it, there would be this moment of realization for them that they had been doing it all wrong their lives. I think that even if they did have that realization for a moment, they would simply go into denial and say, no that can't be. It would be just too difficult for them to accept that they had been doing something wrong all their lives and thus going into denial would be a natural response. It takes quite a lot of humility to admit that you've been doing something wrong your whole life and you're willing to make an effort to change but I know exactly how their brains work: both my parents have very bad teeth so I remember that time I tried to persuade them to floss as it would help improve their gum hygiene. They went into complete denial of course, they claimed that flossing was just too complicated, it took too much time, it wasn't worth the effort, it was too late for them to start and that it was only for people with really bad teeth and they didn't need to do it. I can only imagine how they will react if I suggested to them that they should modify their behaviour in order to win the respect of those around them, starting with their own family members. In the meantime, it is just too easy for them to consume all that CCP propaganda about just how they don't have to lift a finger to gain respect and it is something that they can simply expect given to them unconditionally. They want respect, yet they don't want to lift a finger to earn it - it just doesn't work like that in the real world. This is the version of events they would rather believe and that is what they will cling onto until they eventually pass on. I don't agree with them on that point but I also refuse to do what my sisters have done in simply giving into them and letting them have their way. At the same time, I really don't want to have an argument with them so I simply stopped talking to them. My father actually surprised me by reaching out to me on my birthday this year, he sent me a message and I replied within a few hours (I was in Nice sightseeing on my birthday). I thought it might have been the start of something, but no, days went by and there was no further communication - that was it. Mind you, if he had actually replied to the message I had sent him, we might have start communicating again but no, sadly that was not the case. Ah well. I shall end on that note, please leave a message below and as always, many thanks for reading.