What terrible things a little cat could do
Everytime i see this guy
waiting outside for more and better food,
one Chinese praise appears in my mind:
程门立雪
this phrase is about two famous confucius scholars: Yangshi and ChengYi. Yangshi wanted to be ChengYi’s student, ChengYi didn’t want him at first, but Yangshi waited 3 days outside of ChengYi’s house in the snow, and ChengYi accepted him eventually.
Yangshi and ChengYi are representatives of this final version of confucianism, which is the most oppressive form.
Confucianism was invented during the Zhanguo(warring states) period, was no better no worse than one hundred other schools at that time. But during the Han dynasty, Confucianism became the only school promoted by the emperors, edited by the ruler and became a tool of mind control and oppression.
During the Ming dynasty, Confucianism developed to the extreme oppressive form, providing a super stable system where interests and resources concentrating upward and liabilities concentrating downward, benefiting the authority and exploiting the powerless.
Till now countries influenced by Confucianism remain authoritarian societies stay like this: interests and resources concentrating upward and liabilities concentrating downward, the resources and liabilities you will have totally depend on your proximity to the ultimate authority/power.
excerpt for the two scholars mentioned above, Zhuxi is The Representative of this final version of confucianism. he starved his 8 year old daughter to death only because she accepted a rice cake from a male servant, and he said “it’s better to starve than loss your chastity”. He also tortured a famous prostitute for months because he wanted her to help him frame his enemy, but she would rather die. ——now I think I was unfair to the poor cat, what terrible things a little cat could possibly do, to be analogized to such terrible people?
By the way, why was Yangshi so eager to be ChengYi’s student? the simple minded might say he was eager for knowledge, but the truth is he was not from a renowned family, so he need a renowned master to get him close to the authority.
and did it work? well, partly worked. He became a famous confucius scholar because the authorities find their theory very very handy, but even the rulers don’t find these personals very capable as government officials.