《时代》周刊之China's Me Generation
China's Me GenerationSix friends out on a friday evening, the seafood plentiful, the conversation flowing. Maria Zhang — big hoop earrings, tight velvet jacket and a good deal of meticulously applied makeup — starts to describe an island that everyone is talking about off the east coast of Thailand. It has great diving, she says, and lots of Chinese there so you don't have to worry about language. Her friend Vicky Yang is hunched over a borrowed laptop, downloading an e-mail from a pesky client on her cell phone. An actuary at a consulting firm, Vicky needs to close a project tonight. While she phones a colleague, the dinner-table conversation moves on to snowboarding (\"I must have fallen a hundred times\") to the relative merits of various iPods (\"Shuffle is no good\") and the sudden onrush of credit cards in China. Silence Chen, an account executive with advertising giant Ogilvy & Mather in Beijing, tells the group he recently received six different cards in the mail. \"Each one has a credit limit of 10,000,\" he says, laughing. \"So suddenly I'm 60,000 yuan richer!\" The talk turns to China's online shopping business, before that is interrupted by the arrival of razor clams, chili squid and deep-fried grouper.
The one subject that doesn't come up — and almost never does when this tight-knit group of friends gets together — is politics. That sets them apart from previous generations of Chinese ｅlites, whose lives were defined by the epic events that shaped China's past half-century: the Cultural Revolution, the opening to the West, the student protests in Tiananmen Square and their subsequent suppression. The conversation at Gang Ji Restaurant suggests today's twentysomethings are tuning all that out. \"There's nothing we can do about politics,\" says Chen. \"So there's no point in talking about it or getting involved.\"
There are roughly 300 million adults in China under age 30, a demographic cohort that serves as a bridge between the closed, xenophobic China of the Mao years and the globalized economic powerhouse that it is becoming. Young Chinese are the drivers and chief beneficiaries of the country's current boom: according to a recent survey by Credit Suisse First Boston, the incomes of 20- to 29-year-olds grew 34% in the past three years, by far the biggest of any age group. And because of their self-interested, apolitical pragmatism, they could turn out to be the salvation of the ruling Communist Party — so long as it keeps delivering the economic goods. Survey young, urban Chinese today, and you will find them drinking Starbucks, wearing Nikes and blogging obsessively. But you will detect little interest in demanding voting rights, let alone overthrowing the country's communist rulers. \"On their wish list,\" says Hong Huang, a publisher of several lifestyle magazines, \"a Nintendo Wii comes way ahead of democracy.\"
The rise of China's Me generation has implications for the foreign policies of other nations. Sinologists in the West have long predicted that economic growth would eventually bring democracy to China. As James Mann points out in his new book, The China Fantasy, the idea that China will evolve into a democracy as its middle class grows continues to underlie the U.S.'s China policy, providing the central rationale for maintaining close ties with what is, after all, an unapologetically authoritarian regime. But China's Me generation could shatter such long-held assumptions. As the chief beneficiaries of China's economic success, young professionals have more and more tied up in preserving the status quo. The last thing they want is a populist politician winning over the country's hundreds of millions of have-nots on a rural-reform, stick-it-to-the-cities agenda.
All of which means democracy isn't likely to come to China anytime soon. And that poses challenges for Western policymakers as they try to engage China without condoning the Communist Party's record of political repression and its failures to improve the lives of the country's rural poor. China watchers say the Me generation's reluctance to agitate for reform is driven in part by a reluctance to tarnish China's moment in the sun. \"They are proud of what China has accomplished, and very positive about the government,\" says P.T. Black, who conducts extensive marketing research for a Shanghai-based company called Jigsaw International. The political passivity of China's new ｅlite makes sense while the good times roll. The question is what will happen to the Me generation — and to China — when they end.
For anyone who visited the workers' paradise when it was still the land of Mao suits and communes, trying to reconcile that China to the one that young ｅlites live in today is disorienting. When I first visited China in 1981, I went to the People's Park in Shanghai with two traveling companions. Our obligatory Foreign Ministry \"guide\" ushered us through a special gate reserved for \"foreign friends.\" A knot of young Chinese had gathered outside. As we passed, a few made loud comments about the unfairness of having parts of the People's Park reserved only for foreigners. One of my companions, a Mandarin speaker, agreed volubly in Chinese. Immediately a group of young Chinese men and women surrounded us and peppered us with questions that mixed naivetｅ and aspiration: Are there still slaves in America? Where did you learn to speak Chinese? Do all American families really have three cars? Can you help me go to America?
That discussion took place 25 years ago, the span usually allotted to a single generation. The naive, wary Chinese I met that day could be the parents of the group gathered for the seafood feast in Beijing. But there is almost nothing about the appearance, attitudes, life experience, education or dreams for the future that those young people in the Shanghai People's Park share with the likes of Vicky and her friends.
The most obvious change is demographic. Because of China's one-child policy, instituted in 1978, this is the first generation in the world's history in which a majority are single children, a group whose solipsistic tendencies have been further encouraged by a growing obsession with consumerism, the Internet and video games. At the same time, today's young Chinese are better educated and more worldly than their predecessors. Whereas the so-called Lost Generation that grew up in the Cultural Revolution often struggled to finish high school, today around a quarter of Chinese in their 20s have attended college. The country's opening to the West has allowed many more of its citizens to satisfy their curiosity about the world: some 37 million will travel overseas in 2007. In the next decade, there will be more Chinese tourists traveling the globe than the combined total of those originating in the U.S. and Europe. Rather than fueling restlessness among the Me generation, however, the ease of travel seems to provide more evidence that the benefits of globalization can be had without radical change.
There's another reason for the lack of political ferment: it's exhausting. Like anyone else, members of the Me generation are shaped by their experiences and those of their families. When their parents talk about the Great Leap Forward (a disastrous Mao campaign in the late 1950s that left 20 million to 30 million dead of starvation) and the subsequent chaos of the Cultural Revolution, they mostly tell horror stories that would put anyone off politics forever. That chapter in Chinese history, which officially ended with Mao's death in 1976, is ancient history to today's young ｅlites. They have known little but peace and an ever increasing economic boom. \"We have so much bigger a desire for everything than ,\" says Maria Zhang, 27. \"And the more we eat, the more we taste and see, the more we want.\"
One event that the Me generation does remember is the crackdown on student activists in Tiananmen Square in 1989. But to young Chinese like Maria and Vicky, the Tiananmen protests are less a source of inspiration than an admonishment. Were popular uprisings like Tiananmen allowed to continue, Vicky believes, they would have provoked a counterreaction by conservative forces and led to a return to fortress China: no more iPods, overseas shopping trips or snowboarding weekends. \"I think that the students meant well,\" says Vicky, who was 11 at the time and has only vague memories of what happened. But the crackdown that ended the demonstrations \"certainly was needed.\"
Vicky embodies the shift in the priorities of young Chinese. She's a purposeful, 29-year-old actuary who rarely smiles but loves nothing better than a party. She and her friends meet so regularly for dinner and at bars that she says she never eats at home anymore. As the pictures on her blog attest, they also throw regular theme parties to mark holidays like Halloween and Christmas, and last year took a holiday to Egypt.
Encouraged by her new boyfriend Wang Ning, a keen snowboarder, Vicky decided earlier this year to take up the sport as well. To prime for it, she went to a mall in south Beijing that specializes in pricey, imported skiing gear. She chose a gleaming new snowboard made by the Colorado company Never Summer, emblazoned with colorful, psychedelic paintings of butterflies. Along with gloves, goggles and other paraphernalia, the new gear set her back about 0. When asked about the wisdom of spending a small fortune on equipment for a sport she may never take to, she says, \"I believe you have to be fully prepared and equipped before you decide to start a new hobby.\" Besides, she adds, \"even if I don't like skiing, think how nice will look in the hallway of my apartment. Guests won't know that I don't use it.\" Vicky smiles to signal she's joking. But she's dead serious when she explains, over coffee at Starbucks, her lack of interest in politics. \"It's because our life is pretty good. I care about my rights when it comes to the quality of a waitress in a restaurant or a product I buy. When it comes to democracy and all that, well ...\" She shrugs expressively and takes a sip of her latte. \"That doesn't play a role in my life.\"
People like Vicky and her friends represent the leading edge, the trailblazers for a huge mass of young, eagerly aspirant consumers. All over China, young professionals like these banter about blogging, travel and work-life balance. (\"Work hard, play harder,\" says Vicky several times, repeating it in case she isn't heard.) If they can't afford to blow 0 on skiing gear, they want to be able to soon.
And so for China's leaders, placating the Me generation is seen as critical to ensuring the Communist Party's survival. By 2015, the number of Chinese adults under 30 is expected to swell 61%, to 500 million, equivalent to the entire population of the European Union. From issues of grave consequence to trivialities, the government has made clear that it will do whatever it takes to keep the swelling middle class happy. In Beijing, for example, newly prosperous residents are snapping up automobiles at a rate of 1,000 a day. The number of vehicles on the capital's sclerotic roads has doubled in the past five years, to 3 million. (By comparison, there are about 2 million vehicles registered in all of New York City.) But despite a grim pollution problem (Beijing air quality is among the world's worst) that could embarrass China during next summer's Olympic Games, the central government has made no move to curb vehicle purchases through regulation or taxes. And that, in turn, has made it harder for governments in the developed world to make progress in getting Beijing to do more to fight climate change.
That's just one example of the long-term impact of the government's focus on the Me generation. In an article in the official mouthpiece People's Daily published in February, Premier Wen Jiabao stressed that economic growth should take precedence over democratic reforms for the foreseeable future, a period that he appeared to indicate could stretch to 100 years. And yet for all its machinery of control, the party is vulnerable. Senior cadres from Wen on down have acknowledged in public that growing unrest in the provinces, as farmers clash with police over expropriated land or official corruption, could threaten the party's grip on power.
As a result, China's rulers face a dilemma: the very policies that cater to the urban middle class come at the expense of the rural poor. So far the government is erring on the side of the rich. In March the government pledged to address problems plaguing the country's peasants, such as access to medical treatment and schooling, health insurance and the disparity between urban and rural incomes. And yet a relatively small portion of the budget was set aside to address the concerns of the peasantry, with the bulk of spending still concentrated on stoking the booming economy.
Even more telling was the passage of what was widely viewed as one of the most important pieces of legislation to be put forward in several decades of reform: the revised law on property ownership. Pushed through despite objections from old-line conservatives, the law for the first time gave equal weight to both state- and private-ownership rights. But a look at the fine print shows that the law only protects things dear to the rising middle class: real estate, cars, stock-market assets. Farmers, on the other hand, will still be unable to purchase their land and instead will be forced to lease plots from the government.
If left unchanged, such policies could exacerbate China's rich-poor divide and create conditions for tumultuous social upheaval. The test for China — as the Me generation grows bigger, richer and more powerful — will be whether it begins to push for the social and political reforms that are necessary to ensure China's long-term prosperity and stability. How likely is that? Though they're not exactly clamoring for free elections, members of the new middle class have shown a willingness to stand up to authority when their interests are threatened. Last October police in Beijing attempted to enforce rules limiting each household to a single, registered animal no taller than 14 in. (35 cm). The drive sparked a rare public demonstration by hundreds of well-heeled Chinese, mostly young dog owners. Within a month, according to Hong Kong's South China Morning Post, President Hu Jintao had intervened, ordering the Beijing authorities to back off. It was the first time most Beijingers could remember a public protest drawing a direct intervention by China's top leader.
It was hardly Tiananmen, but a small triumph for free expression nonetheless. And if the West hopes to see China become democratic as well as prosperous, it will have to find ways to encourage modest breakthroughs like these, rather than expect sweeping change. At the Gang Ji Restaurant, where the dishes have been cleared and fresh fruit and more tea brought in, the mood is reflective. \"We are lucky compared to our parents,\" says Maria Zhang, who works as a membership manager in one of the capital's most exclusive clubs. \"My parents had nothing themselves. They lived for me.\" Wang Ning, the snowboarder who runs his own successful advertising company, agrees. \"We are more self-centered. We live for ourselves, and that's good. We need to have the strength to contribute to the economy. That's our power. The power to contribute. That's how our generation is going to help the country.\" China's future will be defined by whether they realize that democracy can help China, too 以下是一网友的评论:
“80后”是“我一代”？这个结论下得为时过早！
原以为”80后“这个话题只在国内闹腾得沸沸扬扬，没想到喜欢创造新词的美国人居然也对它感兴趣了，甚至还以自己短暂文化历史为依据，给我们中国的“80后”起了个美国人一看就懂的词：“MeGeneration”，翻译过来应该是“以自我中心的一代”，或“自我中心一代”。如果用简单的网络化语言表述，就干脆译成“我一代”。
8月6号，这个词首次出现在美国《时代》周刊的一篇驻北京记者的里。这篇名叫《中国的”自我中心一代”》的文章告诉对中国非常感兴趣的美国人：目前处于20岁到29岁之间的年轻人，可以叫做“MeGeneration”，与80年代中国出现的“LostGeneration” (迷失的一代)相对应。
整篇文章读下来后，我一下子想到的是：美国人真是居心叵测！他们借关注中国“80后”将目光集中于我国未来将向何处去的问题上。美帝国主义者们亡我之心不死，还想把“和平演变”的希望寄托到我们中国的第三代、第四代……人的身上。呸！他们这是在做梦，他们这是在痴心妄想云云。想来，这所谓的第四代或第五代不正是当年美国人想要寄托“和平演变”的希望于其身的“80后”吗？今天，美国人又突然关注起中国的这群20岁到29岁之间的人了，并给他们起了个名字，也不管他们同意与否，叫他们为“我一代”。作者显然对当年“和平演变”的话题在有意无意之间进行了很有意味的深入诠释。
作者对中国“80后”貌似很了解，写此文章之前，曾与“80后”很多人有过相当程度的接触。他认为我们中国“80后”的重要标志就是：对政治丝毫不感兴趣。他听到80后中有人说：“我们关注政治也对政治起不到丝毫作用，还不如不谈它，也不参与进去。”于是作者对此表露出一定程度上的美国式忧虑。因为这与美国人对中国未来一代人的期望值显然有很大的相悖之处。很多并不了解中国但对中国颇有偏见的美国人很希望在中国看到更符合他们标准的年轻人的出现。而作者却在文章中告诉美国人，中国的这一代人与之前的中国人很不一样。他们更希望work hard and play hard (努力工作，玩命开心)，但远离政治。
在谈及中国“80后”对政治不感兴趣时，这位作者还不无感慨地下结论说，中国“80后”们与其所有长辈们年轻时相比，都来得更幸运些，因为在过去3年中，他们的总收入增长了34%，而这是过去所有中国人在自己的20岁到29岁时都没有得到过的。也因此，作者说，中国这群“80后”不喜欢城市因为改革而发生动荡，而更喜欢倘佯在物质享受的生活中。
接着，作者将更深层的意思写了出来，他有些带有批评口吻地说，这群“80后”，太过以自我为中心，换言之，他们只关注自我，对其他人或事根本不抱兴趣。要指望他们在中国实现“和平演变”，显然只能事与愿违。作者甚至不无调侃地拿某些个别现象说事：在中国“80后”的“愿望排行榜” (wishlist) 上，排在高高的第一位上的，不是拥有什么政治抱负，也不是担负起什么社会责任，而是得到一部日本产的任天堂游戏机。所谓的“实现个人价值”已成为他们默认的最高准则，他们以为这在美国也是这样。
其实，80后中的很大一部分人，是奋斗的人，在每天公交地铁上忙碌的身影中，可以看到正在支撑起一片天的“80后”，这样的80后们不需要某些理论和感觉，也不需要所谓的乌托邦，很多人都面对着生活的压力，背井离乡，所以无需说太多，心中只有“奋斗”两个字。对于经历过动荡的人，一部份在里面历练成了现在的精英（40-60），一部分以有过这段经历为所有的财富，回味其中一事无成。外面的机会是均等，80也好60也好，工资是社会对人们所作出的贡献的一个标准，这一点至少对大部分人来说是行得通的。
所以美国记者这样写，显然有损“80后”的面子。但事实上，如果抛开其他不谈，仅仅从是否处处以自我为中心，从而丧失更宽广的视界理解世界去观察“80后”的话，我以为，这位美国人还是说出了一定的道理的。最明显的例子就是，从“80后”写手们的作品中，完全可以看出我们“80后”很大一部分人的精神面貌之一斑。像目前比较受欢迎的写手如郭敬明、韩寒、张悦然等人的东西，都不可避免地沾染上太过自我的氛围。感觉读他们的东西更像是几个小孩子在那里胡闹，耍酷，任意挥霍成年人对其放纵态度造成的任性，因此作品显得太过缺乏大气，磅礴，和因与政治生活相关联而产生震撼感。当然，也许他们还不能将自己的目光扩大到更宽广的范围。
之后，作者还替中国“80后”简单开脱说，在全世界历史上，从来也没有过如此庞大的独生子队伍同时出现过，也因此，他们这种以“我”为尊，以“我”为最重要，以“我”为中心的倾向，就会自然而然地产生出来。最后，这位美国作者援引一个中国“80后”的话说，“与我们的父母们相比，我们更幸运些。他们不是为自己，而是只为我们活着。我们却更以自我为中心，我们是为我们自己而活，这样非常好。当然，我们还应该为我们国家的经济发展做出我们的贡献。”这个“80后”的话，应该说很刺痛这位美国作者，因为这个“80后”像其他“80后”一样，不愿谈及政治，更不愿谈及什么西方特色的东西。也因此可以说，美国作者最大可能看不到的，就是这一代有被“和平演变”的可能性。至于这位《时代》周刊记者给中国“80后”起的那个“MeGeneration”(“我一代”或“自我中心一代”)受不受到中国“80后”们的喜欢，得由“80后”自己拿主意。
在国内的许多人看来，80后具有一个共同的致命弱点：缺乏高角度而只会玩酷，因为玩酷而太过自我为中心，从而丧失向灵魂纵深处探究，丧失对政治和生命等重要议题的严肃探讨。如果仅仅寄希望于磅礴大气作品、于“80后”的写手们，只会将这种希望变为一种美丽的谎言，成为一种奢侈。还有人认为，在这种环境下成长起来的一代人，不可能拥有更宽阔的胸怀，更远大的抱负，以及更宽广的视野，这也正可能成为这一代人可能最幸运也最不幸的地方。
在我看来，“我一代”抑或“迷失的一代”，都不重要，重要的是，每一代人是否将关注灵魂、关注社会、关注政治，并因此关注生命变为第一要务。虽然从目前情形看，“80后”们还没有达到这样一种境界，但是也因此认为他们只是“我一代”，只是“自我中心一代”，只是“Me一代”、耍酷的一代 (甚至用东北话说是“玩票”的一代) 显然不够公正。我们不妨借原文作者的国籍来说事：美国的现任总统小布什年轻的时候是个什么样子？记得有篇介绍的文章写过一段比较经典的话：“未来的美国总统当时似乎是穿着一件在那个年代很流行的夹克，留着卷发，双手插在牛仔裤的兜子里，对着对面的一位修女吹了个口哨，然后喊道：‘嗨,美妞！’那个时候，谁能想到这样一个调皮的小伙后来会成为政客、成为州长、最后成为美国总统呢？” 此时的“80后”正处于一个冲动、创业、游走于校园和社会之间的年纪，所以谁又能说今天校园里热衷于追求时尚的、或者徜徉在商海中努力创业的中国年轻人在未来就不会成为一个稳重的领导人？
所以，美国的这位先生有些狭隘了。“MeGeneration”这一称谓作为某种结论扣在尚且年轻的80后们头上其实还为时过早。何况，对于任何一代人，我们都不应该以偏概全。因为无论在什么样的时代，都会有这样一群人：他们喜欢关注灵魂，关注社会，关注政治并因此关注生命的，他们存在于暂时不被国人看好的“80后”当中，也存在于所谓的“MeGeneration”的先辈，更一定会存在于未来的世世代代。
文章来源：海报网
看了这篇文章不仅让我想去读读原文到底是如何，原来是这样。
时代周刊记者对小精子做了一个采访，采访的成果就是下文了，这篇文章引起了不小的波澜，虽然记者的文字在小精子等人看来有失偏颇，并不代表她们的观点，并且在她的个人博客上做出了声明。
小精子和她的朋友们被《时代》称作“我世代”。封面上有这样一行字：“忘记民主。中国二十多岁的人忙着享受生活，无暇顾及政治”。
转自:西祠胡同-荷塘深处
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