Is Kang Youwei considered a great man of his generation?

Kang Youwei has nothing to do with the great man. Some people say that he is an enlightened person. This is a complete joke, okay? Kang Youwei was a real and out-and-out royalist from beginning to end. His lifelong advocacy was against the Japanese war. After Puyi abdicated and the Qing Dynasty fell, Kang Youwei kept running for Puyi to restore the feudal monarchy. Historically, Zhang Xun's restoration was planned and implemented by Kang Youwei and him. After Zhang Xun's restoration failed, Kang Youwei did not lose heart. He moved to fight under Yuan Shikai and became the spiritual leader of Yuan Shikai's later restoration. In my opinion, Kang Youwei was just a loyal dog who was loyal to the feudal system. You can’t even be considered an enlightened person, how can you still be considered a great person? Is this an insult to a great man?

Kang Youwei was born into a family of officials during the Xianfeng period. Kang Youwei's family has been serving as officials in the Manchu Qing regime since his grandfather's generation. When he was young, Kang Youwei studied more miscellaneous things, including Song and Ming Neo-Confucianism, Confucian Classics, etc. Kang Youwei dabbled in them. In general, influenced by his grandfather, Kang Youwei received feudal orthodox education since childhood. This is also the reason why Kang Youwei vowed to defend the feudal dynasty to the death in the future. Later, Kang Youwei followed in the footsteps of his fathers and began to learn eight-part essay to take part in the scientific examination. But Kang Youwei rushed to take the exam many times, but failed. Therefore, Kang Youwei also began to have doubts about traditional scholarship.

In the fifth year of Guangxu's reign, Kang Youwei came into contact with Western literature for the first time. And from there, it started to turn from the middle to the west. Later, Kang Youwei came into contact with the Western capitalist system. He believed that the capitalist system was far superior to the feudal system, so the seeds of reform began to emerge. In the following years, while Kang Youwei studied the Western capitalist system, he kept writing to Emperor Guangxu, hoping that Guangxu would agree to implement reforms. After Kang Youwei's ideas failed to pass the court, he and some reformers came to give lectures, hoping to encourage more people to participate in the reform. Although some of Kang Youwei's ideas were very contradictory, his new concept of reform still caused great conflict with the feudal monarchy.

In the final analysis, Kang Youwei is a theoretician. If it comes to practical work, Kang Youwei is completely useless. Don't look at the fact that Kang Youwei talked about reforms in a clear and logical way. But when it comes to doing it, Kang Youwei has no rules. And full of bookishness. Kang Youwei's reforms did not take the actual situation into consideration at all. Kang Youwei was not fully prepared for Cixi, the real ruler of the Manchu Dynasty. This also caused Kang Youwei's reform to end before it even started. After the failure of the Reform Movement of 1898, the Six Gentlemen of 1898 sacrificed their lives for the country, hoping to awaken the people's wisdom with their deaths. But Kang Youwei escaped. After Kang Youwei fled overseas, he actively sought help from Britain, France, the United States, Japan and other countries, hoping that foreign forces would intervene in Chinese affairs. Although Kang Youwei wanted to use foreign forces to overthrow Cixi's dictatorship. But it is undeniable that Kang Youwei's behavior is no different from that of a traitor. Inviting foreigners to interfere in China's internal affairs, isn't this a traitor?

Later on, Kang Youwei did not even mention any reforms overseas. He became a loyalist society and went around trying to buy people's support in an attempt to support Guangxu to regain power. At this time, Kang Youwei did not mention reforms at all. He focused on Thinking about maintaining the feudal monarchy. Kang Youwei naively thought that as long as Guangxu was restored, everything would be peaceful. At that time, many progressive people in the Qing Dynasty were ashamed to be in the same party as Kang Youwei. They believed that Kang Youwei was just a slave of the European and American powers and was not worthy of respect at all. After the Wuchang Uprising, Kang Youwei was even more worried about Zhongzhong and the fate of the feudal emperor. Therefore, Kang Youwei opposed the Japanese peace and revolution. He believed that revolutions were all nonsense, and that only reforms centered on banning the monarchy were real.