Why There Is No Social Chaos in America

Study of the Stability of American Society

U.S. polls currently show that 80 percent of Americans do not trust the government, 19 percent of citizens are satisfied with the government and 13 percent of citizens satisfied with their congressmen. Given the strong dissatisfaction of citizens, why is there no social chaos in the U.S.? Why did no one protest about the scandal that thousands of juveniles were wrongly jailed due to the corruption of the judges? This article examines the problem in three aspects.

1. Americans grew up in the education of observing rules.

“Democracy” was translated from a foreign language, which actually was very abstract and had a meaning filled with praise. Thus, the explanation of a “democratic society” was always full of kind words. In fact, when analyzing from a technical respect, so-called “democratic society” equals “society that respect procedures and conforms to rules,” which is a direct and disinterested description.

There’s a tendency of using “democracy” lavishly, which led to various definitions of it, and no agreement was reached. Traced back to its origin, democracy was a neutral concept, the central idea of which was to “respect procedures and conform to rules.” This basic idea of democracy was not known very well by most Chinese advocates, who thought that democracy meant the embodiment of social equity and justice, which is a misunderstanding. Since the standards for equity and justice were relative and dynamic, which means they change with time, equity and justice cannot be a canon, and “respect procedures and conform to rules” is the consistent core of democracy.

Until early in the last century, in old democratic countries, the law still strictly stipulated that citizens who wanted to be voters must own a certain amount of property. British regulations required that only taxpayers had the right to vote, and whether they paid tax was based on the standard division of property; these regulations virtually guaranteed that only rich people had the right to vote. Until the middle of the last century, racial segregation still existed in the U.S., and black people did not have the right to vote. Originally, Western women didn’t have the right to vote either; they strived for the right to vote while fighting for economic independence, and the concept of human rights was introduced later. Therefore, the right to vote was related to the citizen’s economic situation and social status; from the present universal view of “one person, one vote” and from the perspective of abstract democratic opinion, those societies were anti-democratic. But since the leaders were engendered through elections, those social systems were considered democratic societies, and there were never any disagreements.

Many poor people in the U.S. don’t pay taxes. Now if there is anyone who dares to beat around the bush to propose a return to the traditional democratic advocate of “only taxpayers can vote,” he or she would surely be killed by the brick of “violating human rights.” Since “only taxpayers can vote” used to be the concept of “equity and justice” in a democratic society, then it is obvious that “equity and justice” is a relative and dynamic concept that changes over time. But “respect procedures and conform to rules” is the constant “norm” in democratic thoughts.

This article used the concrete definition of democracy, which is “respect procedures and conform to rules.” Here “respect procedures” means respecting agenda procedures. Formulation and revision of rules must proceed in certain procedures, and once the rules were formed, they should be strictly executed and observed. American citizens were raised in this kind of democratic education, getting in the habit of observing any rules as long as they are legally regulated, even conforming to evil laws. However, the revision of evil laws also needs to respect procedures. For example, if a law is judged as evil, certain procedures still must be observed for revision or repeal.

The rule-observing concept of Americans is not only immersed into home education and applied to social life but also permeates family relationships. When there’s a conflict with children, American mothers tend to let the police educate their children to observe rules, which is quite the opposite of Chinese mothers. I mentioned in my last article that a 13-year-old boy was sentenced to six months in jail for throwing a piece of steak at his mother’s boyfriend. In addition, there was a girl sentenced to jail by judge Mark Ciavarella for throwing a slipper at her mother. Of course, how Mark Ciavarella abusively sentenced juveniles is horrible, but the initiators are nit-picking parents. On the other hand, if the mother hadn’t reported the incident to the police but had slapped her daughter instead, the daughter would only need to call the police, and the mother would have been handcuffed by the police in a few minutes. The concept of rules for everything and observing rules has exerted a subtle influence on American children.

2. The U.S. police and summum jus factors

The achievement of citizens observing rules and laws was not entirely a result of instilling concepts; to some extent it was attributed to the deterrent effect of vigorous enforcement.

U.S. police are always armed to the teeth, even traffic police. The police won’t talk reasons and results when on duty; if you want to argue with the police, the lightest consequence is to be handcuffed into a police car. Policemen have the authority to arrest first and ask questions later. If there’s any chaos, troublemakers will be immediately rounded up, and waiting for approval is not needed. Backup calls will be made if there’s a lack of police force, and aid will come from all directions at top speed simultaneously.

As long as the police act by the rules, they can leave with a happy ending even though serious results were caused. The internal rules of the police strongly advocate using force preemptively; there were several cases in which the police mistakenly killed innocent people, and no punishment was given to those policemen. A few years ago in Queens, N.Y., a 6-year-old Chinese-American boy was shot to death for pointing at a policeman with a toy gun, and the policeman suffered no punishment. In 2004, Zhao Yan was beaten beyond recognition by U.S. Customs for no reason. Chinese public opinion was indignant, which actually was quite a small incidence; the U.S. mainstream media didn’t even bother covering it. And there’s no surprise that the initiating policeman was acquitted because he was acting by the rules. Bad luck to Zhao Yan, knowing little about American rules.

Therefore, the police are untouchable in the U.S. No one dares to ignore the police.

Correspondingly, American laws are extremely strict. That judge Ciavarella jailed juveniles who committed minor offenses for money is execrable. But from the other side, the judge could not put the juveniles on record solely by himself but in conjunction with the police and others who passed certain legal procedures. That such a large number of juveniles was being brought to trial before the judge for minor infractions more or less indicates the severance and acrimony of U.S. laws and enforcements.

There is a huge social cost for social stability under people’s dissatisfaction. America has always been the country with the world’s most prisoners; the proportion of prisoners of the total population is also the highest in the world. According to statistics released by the U.S. Department of Justice, on June 30, 2009, (Population must be calculated during a specific period of time. The U.S. prison population is counted on June 30 each year.), one in every 133 Americans was in prison. In the U.S., prisoners cannot be used as labor but must be locked up, making taxpayers take on the cost for imprisonment and “support.” The bed in the prison for the juveniles mentioned in this article was $314 each day. It’s not hard to deduce that the quantity and cost for the U.S. police are incredibly astonishing.

The cost for maintaining stability in the U.S. is a nightmare, which American citizens can hardly bear, and the expense is also the heaviest cross in American society, which was the nameless pain of the government. The two parties are presently fighting each other for budget and deficit, but neither of them has the guts to mention decreasing prisoners, extensively cutting down jail costs, allowing prisoners to undertake profitable production and other sensitive topics. America’s domestic problems are no less than China’s and are even more difficult to solve. America should not be the model for other countries to learn from. Which country in the world can follow the example of the U.S. burdening its society with such a high prisoner rate and ridiculously high jail costs? Moreover, such stability is within instability. In many cases of sudden power struggles in major cities in the U.S. history, large-scale robberies and thefts occurred with the police being “blind” in the dark.

3. Media coordination with government to keep the balance between freedom of speech and the control of public opinion.

Public opinion is an informational weapon with destructive power. This weapon can be used both to maintain and to subvert social order. If public opinion keeps clamoring with the voice of subversion and interrupting social stability, any government would intervene. Except that the U.S. government got lucky in that they seldom need to intervene because the elite class that rules American society is highly mature. Under its influence, the media would automatically guide and control public opinion, which makes it impossible for the clamor that is harmful to social structure to accumulate power. The recent event of Lang Lang playing “My Motherland” perfectly showed the sophistication and smartness of U.S. media.

On the evening of Jan. 19, U.S. President Obama welcomed Chinese President Hu Jintao to a state dinner at the White House. During the dinner, Chinese pianist Lang Lang played the Chinese song “My Motherland.” This song is the theme song of the famous Chinese movie “Shangganling Mountain,” which depicts the Chinese aiding Korea in resisting the American military during the Korean War. Playing this theme song was obviously inappropriate for the state banquet hosted by the U.S. president for the Chinese premier.

Chinese media all over the world immediately reported this event as breaking news, and the heat lingered for several weeks. If the two sides switched, and the same thing were to happen at Beijing’s national banquet, China’s media would have exploded with such news. But five days after Lang Lang’s show, I searched “Lang Lang pianist” and “Shangganling Mountain” on Google, and only five results appeared. The handful of articles had few follow-up posts. Among the five results, one article was published in the New York Times, one was a blog from The Wall Street Journal’s website and the other three were from some unknown websites. The article published in the New York Times was not written specifically for this event; there were only two sentences that related to the event. The first one stated that the song Lang Lang played was the theme song of a movie reflecting Chinese soldiers confronting the U.S. military during the Korean War. The other article said that although playing a song like this at America’s state banquet was a regrettable choice, the player obviously had no ulterior motives in doing so.

The Chinese elites who worship America, those ignorant of America or those who cannot stand to see it making mistakes began to “enlighten” people: The U.S. government surely reviewed Lang Lang’s submitted track and were aware of the background of the track, but they let Lang Lang play it during the state banquet to show the tolerant spirit of the West. I don’t know whether these nauseating figures remembered the “hospitality” of the U.S. government during the state banquet one year ago. That banquet received the visiting Indian prime minister, and an uninvited couple came for a free meal. They couldn’t produce the well-printed state dinner invitation card but could get through three layers of security with their gorgeous costumes and noble temperament. After entering the White House, they went directly to the president’s VIP locale, and Obama welcomed them with all smiles and shook their hands. The two unexpected guests appeared calm, composed and at ease and even asked the media to take photos as witnesses.

That was the first state banquet after Obama took office, and the White House social secretary were replaced due to this event. However, after only one year, careless mistakes happened again on Obama’s third banquet. In addition, in 2006 during Hu Jintao’s first visit to the United States, an accident occurred during the official welcoming ceremony held on the south lawn of the White House. After President Bush’s welcoming address, Chairman Hu encountered the shouting of Wang Wenyi as he gave his speech. The Chinese government has been brooding over this event, suspecting that the U.S. government intentionally let Wang into the White House to humiliate Chinese leaders. Now it’s all clear; the American government tried to prove to Chinese that the last event was due to negligence, doubly humiliating themselves.

It is somewhat ironic that the U.S. government is constantly making mistakes during such important ceremonies. But the understated response of the government and media was remarkable. The New York Times superficially mentioned it slightly in two sentences. The sensitive lyrics of “My Motherland,” consist of lines like “Good wine to friends, but if the wolves come, we’ll welcome them with shotguns.” The American media would never stir up trouble by translating it into English for American readers, which showed their maturity and wisdom. But the U.S. government and media are not truly generous. I bet that the U.S. media will not comment favorably on Lang Lang’s piano artistry any more, and the U.S. government, or even other Western governments, will never again invite Lang Lang to perform in official activities.

Generally speaking, U.S. journalists do not expose their feelings during important news reports, in order to avoid inciting the public. A news report on America’s highest-rated network Fox TV left a strong impression on me. It was during the period when Hurricane Katrina ravaged southern America. Fox covered the disaster for 24 uninterrupted hours. Then, during the first several days during prime time, a famous correspondent broadcasted the hurricane live. The third day after Katrina, a large gymnasium in New Orleans was filled with 25,000 refugees. Living conditions were very poor there, and the government showed no interest in them three days after the hurricane. The reporter emotionally faced the camera and said, “Look behind me, look at those people. People are dying here. Where is the government? Is this America or a developing country?”* After saying these words, the reporter was replaced. He didn’t show up in the next day’s report until 3 a.m. I found out that he was scheduled during the most deserted time, and his broadcasting was no longer filled with the real passion that I wanted to see more of.

In the unusual case of the bribed judge who abusively sentenced juveniles, the media did not pay more attention to it than to general news. National media just reported this as running accounts of the day, with no commentary, no special topics, no digging into details and no follow-up. After that, only a few reports were made by the local media. The comprehensive report mentioned in this article was peerless in the United States. Most sources that I used for writing were scattered among Luzerne County’s local newspapers, and reporters should maintain better records than me to sort out a complete review, but none of them did so because they knew it wouldn’t be published.

Although I frown upon the fact that U.S. media paid no attention to disadvantaged groups, I had to admire their great efforts in taking the interests of the whole into consideration. The United States has formed a structure of several large national media organizations that lead public opinions; according to my observation, the way that major media treats news internally resembles the characteristics of the film classification system. However, contrary to film limitations, news with sexual content or idle gossip was less limited, which means the public can enjoy the hype as long as the media doesn’t violate laws. Serious news that may incite dissatisfaction and distrust with government among the public were strictly moderated. Therefore, no news about the suffering of vulnerable groups were seen on mainstream media, but the news of golf star Tiger Woods’ infidelity scandal were reported everywhere. Thus we can explain the heavy coverage of Clinton’s Lewinsky scandal and the low-key covering of Reagan’s Iran-contra scandal and the Bush spy scandal; the first one was a life issue, and the last two were political issues.

Mainstream media and the U.S. government are of one heart and one mind in managing the weapon of public opinion, which won the good name of freedom speech for the U.S. government. Reviewing China’s situation, it was truly a mess. The government doesn’t know how to “persuade” and “guide” but only “stifle.” As a result, the more censorship there was, the more chaos would occur, which led to the situation that “witnessed four people holding Qian Yunhui in order to let a truck run over him,” something even Hollywood special effect cameras cannot shoot, and media provided “witness testimony” and couldn’t wait to report this before they were blocked. In fact, China should learn the foreign methods of economic management, joining ventures with overseas companies to run media enterprises or hiring executives from U.S. major media organizations to manage business, carefully observing how they manage news reports.

*Editor’s Note: This quote, though accurately translated, could not be verified.