Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

For this Show and tell project, I wanted to look further into China’s strict regulations regarding social media usage among its citizens. One of the few things I knew about China before taking this course was how censored and controlled the internet use was. I wasn’t exactly sure why this was the case, or what…

No Post this week, I’m using my free pass

This week, we started off by discussing the collapse of Mao’s leadership following his death and what that meant for China. For a period of time, Mao’s wife was able to remain in power but was later sentenced to jail, along with her associates. This caused several changes in China that primarily affected the female…

On Wednesday, I  read the fictional piece “The Three Body Problem” which was about the “struggle session” of a professor who was forced to appear before the Red Guards. The young Red guard revolutionaries were punishing the physics professor for being a reactionary. The professor was eventually killed by the impassioned youths, while the daughter and…

The documentary describes Mao’s launching of the industrialization era a few years after he came into power. He hoped that it took China to new heights but it ended up creating a great famine that led to the death of millions of people. Due to his importance, people feared speaking against or about it. From…

For Friday’s class, I read Mao’s speech (from exploration pack 3 on dissidents) to the people on how he plans to handle contradictions. He talked about several contradictions within China that if not handled properly can turn antagonistic. According to him, contradictions existed in China within the people, for instance between the working class and…

The development of the warlord era can be traced back to the time between 1916-28. The Warlords were former members of the military, who took control of various parts of China at a time when it lacked a centralized and organized leadership. Its history goes all the way back to the collapse of the Tang…

On Wednesday, I read about the events leading up to the second world war and the outcomes of the war. The war began partly due to a misunderstanding, which led Japan to invade China, cause thousands of casualties and take control of its cities. At the time, the CCP and Guomindang were still divided, which…

On Wednesday, I chose to explore the primary sources, one of which was the Guomindang “Emergency Laws.” I couldn’t help but notice that the text was somewhat repetitive and the main takeaway that whoever is reading the text should understand was that efforts to thwart the new Republic’s governance were punishable by death or imprisonment. …

This week, we discussed the falling Qing empire and the factors that played a role in this. This included the presence of foreigners in China which caused divisions that ultimately led to rebellions, the struggling economy and failing government. The government began looking to foreign countries for ideas on how to rebuild and reform China.…