my fatigue with palace intrigue
After threatening to dive into the Confucius wiki hole a couple entries ago, i decided i'd do just that. But rather than going straight to the man himself, i figured it'd make more sense to get a broader overview of Chinese history before deep-diving on philosophy that i've previously barely shallow-dived on. Also i figured it'd help so next time i walk into a temple here in Taiwan i'm not a complete ignoramus about whatever fat guy with a long mustache is being worshipped this time around.
I tried, oh how i tried. But, as i have long suspected, Chinese history is just century upon century upon century of rich, selfish, violent assholes being rich, selfish and violent. Even the "best" emperors, even the heroes who are revered for their poise and grace, the rebels who come from nothing... they're all still raging assholes. Two thousand years of history has been meticulously recorded, and every single character of it is about megalomaniacs going to war with each other. With a parallel story of idle aristocrats sitting around in luxury writing poetry and doing philosophy... about exactly the fucking megalomaniacs! There's no working class heroes, there's no independent adventurers, no low culture, the women and eunuchs are always the villains, nobody give a shit about the peasants, it's just reams and reams and reams of horrific battles and cynical betrayals and palace intrigue.
It's so fucking boring.
It makes me understand the appeal of Mao Zedong coming along and promising to finally create a government of China that puts the proletariat first... Well, that might've been the intent, but present-day China is just the same old imperial bullshit, same burgeoning class of corrupt bureaucrats, same educated middle class with snobby attitudes about the poor, and the same old jostling amongst the elites for who will become the next autocratic ruler.
It's why Chinese politics is so infuriating to try to follow too. Because it's all happening in secret amongst various factions who will never reveal what's really going on to the peasants. Eventually when it all shakes out, some high culture tosspot from the winning faction will write a story about "what really happened", and that will become the myth that is repeated over the years, and eventually one of these assholes will be deified and now they're painted on the door of a fucking temple.
Then while all this is going on Prigozhin makes his move. At the start of the Ukraine war i said i had no deep interest in it, because i didn't really know anything about the regional politics. Well after 18 months of this stupid fucking invasion being the top story in the news every day, i regretfully do now know about the various factions in Russian politics and some of the historical and cultural issues of the region. As we all know, the Wagner drama was over in about 24 hours, and it ended in a way that left everyone trying to guess at what actually happened. And... you guys... it's the same depressing shit that China watchers do. Can you imagine being a person whose full-time job is just to try figure out what's happening in the imperial palace? Because those jobs exist. And i think i would shoot myself from the boredom.
Because, you know, at the end of the day, there's never a surprise. There's never anything novel. It's always just rich, selfish, violent assholes being rich, selfish and violent.
It wasnt always this way for me, though. I used to be pretty interested in the nitty gritty of politics. I cared about the movers and shakers. I watched TV shows that glorified the soap opera of shitheels vying for power. Dallas is a classic example, but there's a bottomless pit of these shows. Sons of Anarchy... I can barely believe i watched that whole show - and a good chunk of Mayans MC too - even after i knew i didn't like it any more. Nowadays i just switch off in the first couple episodes when i figure out a new show is just going to be more of the same. Assholes being assholes to each other, in a battle to become top asshole. It's the worst! Who wants to watch that? Why is that entertaining? Nobody is nice. Nobody is honest. Nobody is humble. Nobody is fair. Nobody is like the actual real people who exist in real life down here in the real world. Everybody is a variation on the scummiest, most obnoxious, greediest fuckhead that there is.
And sure, it's just art imitating life. These fuckheads are the guys who are at the top of every autocratic system. Arguably also plenty of democratic spaces as well, although at least in the democratic sphere there is some sort of structure designed to keep the bastards honest. I get that these stories must be compelling. Humanity has been writing them down for thousands of years and probably reciting them orally for thousands more. For some reason people are fascinated by the worst of us.
But i'm just tired. I'm over it. I'm bored. What happened to me? Is this part of getting old?
I know if i continue digging through Chinese history with a fine-tooth comb i will find stories in there of people who aren't the worst. But is it worth it? Then i pop open the other tab and now there's a live feed of amateur Kremlinologists giving their hot takes on what a bunch of awful people are doing on the other side of the planet. Ugh.
So this morning i went on a bike ride. I biked to Keelung, which i'd never been to before because i assumed that to get anywhere east of Taipei you had to cross a really high mountain, but as it turned out... wasn't much of a mountain, if you follow the river and the pass. There's some tunnels cut too. It was a grueling ride, though. It is extremely humid and very hot.
And then Keelung itself was disappointing.
It's a Hong Kong style harbor, where there is a tiny strip of habitable land between the mountains and the sea, and most of that land is used up by a commercial port, so there is nowhere for ordinary people to get to the sea. I cycled around a bunch of places, but there's sea walls and the whole coastal area is either rocky and difficult to access or already used as a port or marina, so after cycling 3+ hours in sweltering heat, i didn't even get a single drop of seawater on my pinky toe.
The place was crawling with tourists too, and because of the geography it was impossible to escape them, unlike around Tamsui where you can just cycle past the tourist street and go up to the beach that nobody goes to because most Taiwanese people don't like beaches.
Eh, whatever. It did at least remind me that i live on a Pacific island, because that east coast of Taiwan has a completely different vibe to the west coast. West coast is rice paddies and factories and salt flats and sand bars. East coast is epic cliffs dropping sheer into the ocean, thick jungle opening up to reveal secret piratical coves. It's nice too, but not what i was prepared for this far north on the island. I'll go see more of it on my July adventure, maybe revisit Taitung, which was my favorite spot on the east coast. Tough place to visit without a private vehicle, but i'll figure it out.
I tried, oh how i tried. But, as i have long suspected, Chinese history is just century upon century upon century of rich, selfish, violent assholes being rich, selfish and violent. Even the "best" emperors, even the heroes who are revered for their poise and grace, the rebels who come from nothing... they're all still raging assholes. Two thousand years of history has been meticulously recorded, and every single character of it is about megalomaniacs going to war with each other. With a parallel story of idle aristocrats sitting around in luxury writing poetry and doing philosophy... about exactly the fucking megalomaniacs! There's no working class heroes, there's no independent adventurers, no low culture, the women and eunuchs are always the villains, nobody give a shit about the peasants, it's just reams and reams and reams of horrific battles and cynical betrayals and palace intrigue.
It's so fucking boring.
It makes me understand the appeal of Mao Zedong coming along and promising to finally create a government of China that puts the proletariat first... Well, that might've been the intent, but present-day China is just the same old imperial bullshit, same burgeoning class of corrupt bureaucrats, same educated middle class with snobby attitudes about the poor, and the same old jostling amongst the elites for who will become the next autocratic ruler.
It's why Chinese politics is so infuriating to try to follow too. Because it's all happening in secret amongst various factions who will never reveal what's really going on to the peasants. Eventually when it all shakes out, some high culture tosspot from the winning faction will write a story about "what really happened", and that will become the myth that is repeated over the years, and eventually one of these assholes will be deified and now they're painted on the door of a fucking temple.
Then while all this is going on Prigozhin makes his move. At the start of the Ukraine war i said i had no deep interest in it, because i didn't really know anything about the regional politics. Well after 18 months of this stupid fucking invasion being the top story in the news every day, i regretfully do now know about the various factions in Russian politics and some of the historical and cultural issues of the region. As we all know, the Wagner drama was over in about 24 hours, and it ended in a way that left everyone trying to guess at what actually happened. And... you guys... it's the same depressing shit that China watchers do. Can you imagine being a person whose full-time job is just to try figure out what's happening in the imperial palace? Because those jobs exist. And i think i would shoot myself from the boredom.
Because, you know, at the end of the day, there's never a surprise. There's never anything novel. It's always just rich, selfish, violent assholes being rich, selfish and violent.
It wasnt always this way for me, though. I used to be pretty interested in the nitty gritty of politics. I cared about the movers and shakers. I watched TV shows that glorified the soap opera of shitheels vying for power. Dallas is a classic example, but there's a bottomless pit of these shows. Sons of Anarchy... I can barely believe i watched that whole show - and a good chunk of Mayans MC too - even after i knew i didn't like it any more. Nowadays i just switch off in the first couple episodes when i figure out a new show is just going to be more of the same. Assholes being assholes to each other, in a battle to become top asshole. It's the worst! Who wants to watch that? Why is that entertaining? Nobody is nice. Nobody is honest. Nobody is humble. Nobody is fair. Nobody is like the actual real people who exist in real life down here in the real world. Everybody is a variation on the scummiest, most obnoxious, greediest fuckhead that there is.
And sure, it's just art imitating life. These fuckheads are the guys who are at the top of every autocratic system. Arguably also plenty of democratic spaces as well, although at least in the democratic sphere there is some sort of structure designed to keep the bastards honest. I get that these stories must be compelling. Humanity has been writing them down for thousands of years and probably reciting them orally for thousands more. For some reason people are fascinated by the worst of us.
But i'm just tired. I'm over it. I'm bored. What happened to me? Is this part of getting old?
I know if i continue digging through Chinese history with a fine-tooth comb i will find stories in there of people who aren't the worst. But is it worth it? Then i pop open the other tab and now there's a live feed of amateur Kremlinologists giving their hot takes on what a bunch of awful people are doing on the other side of the planet. Ugh.
So this morning i went on a bike ride. I biked to Keelung, which i'd never been to before because i assumed that to get anywhere east of Taipei you had to cross a really high mountain, but as it turned out... wasn't much of a mountain, if you follow the river and the pass. There's some tunnels cut too. It was a grueling ride, though. It is extremely humid and very hot.
And then Keelung itself was disappointing.
It's a Hong Kong style harbor, where there is a tiny strip of habitable land between the mountains and the sea, and most of that land is used up by a commercial port, so there is nowhere for ordinary people to get to the sea. I cycled around a bunch of places, but there's sea walls and the whole coastal area is either rocky and difficult to access or already used as a port or marina, so after cycling 3+ hours in sweltering heat, i didn't even get a single drop of seawater on my pinky toe.
The place was crawling with tourists too, and because of the geography it was impossible to escape them, unlike around Tamsui where you can just cycle past the tourist street and go up to the beach that nobody goes to because most Taiwanese people don't like beaches.
Eh, whatever. It did at least remind me that i live on a Pacific island, because that east coast of Taiwan has a completely different vibe to the west coast. West coast is rice paddies and factories and salt flats and sand bars. East coast is epic cliffs dropping sheer into the ocean, thick jungle opening up to reveal secret piratical coves. It's nice too, but not what i was prepared for this far north on the island. I'll go see more of it on my July adventure, maybe revisit Taitung, which was my favorite spot on the east coast. Tough place to visit without a private vehicle, but i'll figure it out.