Why do China people lack diversified value pursuit?

not long ago, we went to see a friend who was visiting relatives in Shanghai from America. My friend, who grew up with me, went to study in the United States 2 years ago. He talked about living in the United States for many years. What impressed me most was that there was a considerable difference between the life pursuit of China people in the United States and that of westerners, that is, China people living in the United States seemed to attach great importance to the pursuit of material life, no matter whether their careers were successful or not, no matter what class they belonged to, as long as China people were together. No matter Taiwan Province people, Hongkong people, mainlanders or overseas Chinese who have lived in the United States for many years, they are very practical and stress the enjoyment and happiness of life. China people usually talk about nothing more than houses and cars, and they seem to have a strong herd mentality in the enjoyment of secular life, unlike westerners who are so diversified in their pursuit of life. In the west, there are indeed many people who only care about their material life, but there are also many people who are pursuing other things. For example, some people like adventure, but they are quite casual in daily material enjoyment. Some people have become billionaires in their careers, but their lives are very simple and they always drive an ordinary car. No matter how much money you earn, you won't think of buying any limousine. They don't care about how others live, what they pursue and how well they live materially. Everyone is self-centered and pursues the value that he thinks is worth pursuing. In other words, China people's pursuit of life is relatively simple, and they are very concerned about what others think of them. Since the society is centered on material life and dominated by herd mentality, people will naturally show off their success. Westerners' pursuit of life is more diversified. Even Ri Tian himself is much richer than the diversified pursuit of China people's life value. The question raised by this friend is actually a cultural issue, which I find very interesting. I also vaguely felt the contrast between Chinese and western cultures in the pursuit of life goals. Take the liberal arts graduate students and college students I have come into contact with. As far as I know from years of teaching, there are not many students who choose this major out of their sincere love for this major. Not long ago, I met an American female professor who came to Shanghai for a meeting. Eighteen years ago, when I was a graduate student at Nanjing University, I became good friends with this international student who studied China history. She is now teaching in an unknown university in New England, USA. She said that what she wants is to retire early, so that she can have enough time to study China culture and history freely, because she is too busy in class now, and what she lacks most is free time. She also said that her life is very simple. As long as she accumulates some money, there will be no problem in her life after early retirement. This attitude towards life, which regards academics as the most important pursuit of value in life, is not uncommon in the United States. In American universities, the income of assistant faculty in humanities is not so attractive. However, there are often dozens of doctors or postdocs who would rather not go to the company to make a lot of money, but come to apply. The competition for university faculty is very fierce. I once asked an American friend such a question. Since it is so difficult to get a liberal arts degree in a university, why do so many people choose to study for a liberal arts degree in the United States? This friend told me that this is because they are really interested in philosophy, history, literature and art, and they really take this subject as their sincere hobby, so they will make this choice. This incident can explain at least two things. First, no one around this citizen is really interested in things that are purely in the humanities field for a long time, otherwise he would not regard me as an alien and be so genuinely surprised. Secondly, he naturally believes that all people should pursue the same value as he pursues. He can't understand that it is reasonable and natural for others to pursue a different value from him. His performance is the most natural reaction of his attitude towards life. I just want to use this example to illustrate that in terms of the value of life, there is indeed a phenomenon of centralization, fragmentation and homogenization in China, and the value differentiation of China people is very low. This example can be used to illustrate from the opposite side what is a "maverick" attitude towards life. Another example is that one day last year, one of my junior high school classmates who made a small fortune invited me to dinner with several other students. On the taxi bound for a big hotel, he suddenly sighed and said that the most pitiful among us was the author himself. He said that this was because the author was still studying hard. In his view, how much money can you earn by reading history books in China today? I was speechless at the moment. I don't know how to answer. I really can't find the right language to refute his idea, because this is really not a simple common sense question, but a different life value attitude question. This example is particularly meaningful because this friend was the most outstanding top student in the whole school in middle school, and his composition was often printed by Chinese teachers as a model for all high school students to enjoy. But now he really recognizes money and enjoyment as the only value worth pursuing in life, and quite naturally thinks that it can be used as the only measure to evaluate whether others are happy or poor, and he doesn't think there is anything wrong with doing so at all. At least this example can show that the monistic values of money worship, utilitarianism and secularization have penetrated into our living generation like the tide. So that this kind of value advantage has achieved a hegemonic position that can point out the mountains and hide the people. Another example is that last July, I attended a family gathering hosted by a new expatriate from China in the Silicon Valley of San Francisco. I expected that these overseas friends would ask some questions about China because of the arrival of my hometown who just came from China. However, in the whole party, people only talked about how to make money, the price of the house they just bought has gone up again, and where the nursery nearby is the cheapest, and so on. People hardly noticed the existence of a visitor from Chinese mainland. It never occurred to me to ask what's new and interesting in my hometown, what's changed in China, what's wrong with China, and what will happen in the future. On the way back, I lamented this and asked my friends who brought me to the party. Why? My friends couldn't answer for a moment, just saying, "That's what most China people talk about here. What else can they talk about if they don't talk about it? " Second, why is this happening? Is it because of the lack of transcendental value pursuit in China people's national character? Is it because there are problems in China culture? Or is it a temporary and transitional phenomenon? Some people say that this is because China people have been too poor for a long time. Therefore, I will work ten times harder to pursue what I have never really enjoyed. Because people are animals with desires after all. After returning home from visiting friends in Gubei New District, I talked about this problem to a middle school teacher of mine by phone. The teacher used the plot in a novel by Jack London to illustrate this point: when a drowning man was rescued in the sea, the rescued person would unconsciously hide the water and food on board in his arms. Because he was really thirsty in the sea. Because of this, the teacher thinks that everything will change when China people get rich. People's pursuit will be diversified. However, this explanation can't explain why the middle class of China's new expatriates, who are already quite rich, are still so strongly pursuing material benefits, and there seems to be no sign of any new values emerging in them. Take Taiwan Province, which is getting richer and richer, as an example, the trend of money supremacy has developed to the point where it is getting worse. Take Hong Kong as an example. I have been a visiting scholar in Hong Kong for three months. What surprised me most was that Hong Kong, which is known as the world's first free port and a metropolis with a high-quality population of six million, could not find a purely humanistic publication run by local people except the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Does this mean that China people in Hong Kong are more like economic animals than Japanese people? Some people say that this is related to the lack of religious factors in China culture, and this explanation also has some truth. Because religion's pursuit and belief in the afterlife and the transcendental world can often cultivate people's values beyond utilitarianism. Compared with other ethnic groups, China people's religious psychology is indeed relatively indifferent. Buddhism is not the state religion of China. Compared with other religions, local Taoism is actually quite utilitarian. Since ancient times, quite a few people, including historical emperors, have believed in the purpose of this religion, and they are only pursuing immortality in this world, and have no interest in the afterlife and the other world. In China, even if people believe in Buddhism, they often ask God to worship Buddha with a rather specific utilitarian purpose. A China man who has been married for several years and has not given birth to a son burns a few sticks of incense before going to Guanyin. It is not so much out of the pursuit of the transcendental world as a bribe to the gods, which reflects the most utilitarian attitude. In a country lacking the concept of "the other shore", it has become the national character of China people to pay attention to material benefits, pay attention to secular life, be pragmatic and be less imaginative. Now we are in an era when the secularization of goods has become a trend, so it is natural to pursue the material wealth of the whole people. Some people say that the homogenization of China people's values is related to the unified Confucian values, because compared with other cultures, such as Islamic culture, Orthodox culture and Western Christian culture, Confucianism lacks strong religious feelings and value beyond utilitarianism because there is no religion as its metaphysical foundation. China civilization, deeply influenced by Confucianism, is undoubtedly the most secularized culture compared with other civilizations. However, when we trace back to Confucius' thoughts, we will find that Confucius is precisely a person with a maverick attitude towards life. Confucius himself has a strong pursuit of value beyond utilitarianism. For example, Confucius said, "If you listen to the Tao, you will die in the evening." Among the Confucian sages, the belief and pursuit of metaphysical Tao is quite persistent and strong. "One scoop of food, one scoop of drink, in the mean lane, people can't bear their worries, and they don't change their fun when they go back." A gentleman with spiritual belief like Yan Hui will live a full life and have the strength of personality. Confucius has always regarded the pursuit of super-utilitarian art and spiritual fields as far more important than material gains. He said, "Eating food and drinking water, bending your arms and resting on it, is also fun." He also realized that "those who know are not as good as those who are good, and those who are good are not as good as those who are happy." In his view, it is the pleasure of self-satisfaction that counts, and a person's pursuit has real motivation. His love of music can make him "ignorant of meat in March". In the Analects of Confucius, people can find many comments in this regard. On the other hand, Confucius' pursuit of "Tao" did not make him an ascetic, and he never simply refused material enjoyment. He did not oppose "being rich and expensive" in a general sense, like later Buddhists. He just said, "being unjust and rich and expensive is like a cloud to me." Wu Ning said that he advocated that in the secular life, while pursuing the lofty transcendental "Tao", he still maintained a moderate secular material life. This is a rather optimistic and positive picture of life with both spiritual pursuit and material enjoyment. A gentleman who takes Confucianism in the original sense as the basis of his life, what he wants is a balanced and harmonious state in spirit and material. This reminds me of my grandfather. Until his death in the early 196s, it can be said that he belonged to the last generation of old-fashioned scholars in China who were influenced by Confucianism. According to my family's memories and my vague memories of him as a child, he is a happy old man, who calls himself a "tease man", likes to drink, and he will get drunk if he drinks too much, and he is very kind to people. I study very hard and have thousands of books, so buying books has become the biggest hobby in my life. Every time I get paid, I spend it on books. After buying books, I often have no money. In turn, we have to "borrow money" from future generations. What you eat is basically a simple meal. Tears flow when you are happy. He is also very tolerant of his children. As early as the 192s and 193s, he encouraged his daughter (that is, my aunt) to read Ibsen's Puppet Family and pursue free love. He never asked others by his own will. There are many friends, and they always try their best to help others when they are in trouble. I remember when I was a child, my brother laughed at my grandfather for filling in the column of "religious belief" as "believing in Confucianism". My brother said, "How can Confucianism be regarded as religion!" Now that I think about it, my grandfather is the closest to Confucius in spirit. His sincere belief in what he understands as "Tao" is organically combined with his love for worldly life and enjoyment of worldly values, and reaches a harmonious level. He has never suppressed his personality, and it is most appropriate to describe this banter with the word "Fashu". His free and stretched personality is combined with his pursuit of meaning in life, forming a cheerful attitude and lifestyle. The significance of this attitude towards life lies in that the respect for Heaven enables one to get rid of the simple pursuit of material money, while the love for worldly life and the cheerful attitude prevent one from becoming a martyr of Tao without knowing it. I think this harmonious life can produce a free personality in the true sense, and a life style that does not deliberately wrap and decorate itself to cater to secular life. A kind of life realm with rich spiritual pursuit, reaching "forget your worries with joy and never know when you are old" It's a pity that there has been an unconnected fault between this type of Confucian and us. Now that I think about it, the image of the gentry in modern times that people have seen from the May 4th anti-feudal literary works has been masked: the Confucian gentry class in China is autocratic, uncivilized, rigid and closed, born in the Confucian gentry-ruled family society, and there is only one way to overthrow it or run away from home. In fact, the image of the gentry old parents in Ba Jin's Home is highly symbolized, which has almost become the symbol of the old parents system in China since the May 4th Movement. In fact, under the impact of external culture, the gentry class in China itself is also in the process of transformation, differentiating into different types. Of course, there are not a few autocratic parents among the gentry, but it is not without other types. At least in our family, a new type transformed from the traditional gentry has emerged. Under certain conditions, Confucian culture may not be able to evolve into a new type that can accommodate the pursuit of super-utilitarian spiritual values, accommodate maverick personality, and be accessible and comfortable in the integration with external civilization. Unfortunately, this natural transformation has not been realized in China due to various factors. Since the 2th century, the gentry culture has finally completely disappeared, replaced by a peasant culture with revolutionary characteristics. However, farmers have to make a living situation for rice and Liang, which makes this culture destined to have quite practical and utilitarian characteristics. Of course, this certainly can't explain all our questions, but maybe it can explain some of them. Of course, on the whole, the main historical trend of Confucianism in China is not to be relaxed, but to "rule by law". What we have criticized since the May 4th Movement is actually the ideological Confucianism, that is, turning the Confucian "Tao" into an official political ideology, becoming a tool for rulers, and becoming a hardened general ethics of "respecting the monarch and humbling the ministers". The result is the alienation of Confucianism itself. The most typical example of this alienation due to politicization is the "Twenty-four Filial Piety" in the Eastern Han Dynasty. A dutiful son who buried his son alive in order to feed his parents became a model and hero in China culture. This is undoubtedly a culture that sacrificed human nature for some castrated "Tao". This is