Kids and Teens in China Banned From Playing Online Video Games for More Than 3 Hours Per Week

[Onexy]

Wumao.

 

[macdos]

Someone else noticed that too, I thought but why would they bother posting on MacRumors, but it seems like no matter the website, if there is a major story on China, you see these random uber Chinese nationalist type posts.

Wake me up when China gets close to the American per capita income, and to the person who compares the U.S. to China in terms of freedoms, that person would break down after a week of having to make a living under that kleptocratic gangster style Chinese government.

European here, thank you very much. Lived in the US, lived in China. Prefer China anytime.

Although your per capita income is higher (and will remain so for a long time), that freedom is of little use if it is not spent properly. Let me remind you that the average American has not seen any real wage increase since the 1990s, while the 2% richest have multiplied their fortunes. America didn't stop growing when it outsourced to China, but it distributed the wealth differently. While Average Joe got unemployed and the Rustbelt emerged, the industrialists with factories in China got rich. As a consequence, you've got the housing bubble 2008 and the current political upheaval. If you are so rich, why can't you afford a home?

Americans spend 17% of their income on health care, yet they are the most obese people in the world, with 38% having a BMI of 30 or over. How can you be free if you are a prisoner of your own body? As a consequence, you have the highest prevalence of cancer in the world, with 6% having the disease. It goes without saying that you are the undisputed pandemic leader in the world, with 650 000 dead this far – China has less than 5000, positive growth and a normal society.

You are also the most addicted people in the world, with 4% having a drug use disorder. How can you be free if you are addicted to drugs? You die like no other people in opiate and cocaine overdoses, and you also put people in prison like no one else in the world. How can you be free if one percent of you are constantly in jail?

You are indeed free to own an Uzi, but unfortunately at a cost. To the outside world, you look like any South American banana republic when it comes to violence and firearm related murders, accidents and suicides. American freedom has always grown out of the barrel of a gun, from the genocides of the native populations to the countless wars around the globe – your silly country has known eight years of peace altogether since its foundation over 250 years ago…

 

[Le0M]

My girlfriend, Beijing citizen, believes that this political move is part of a bigger scheme where the government is trying to make the very rich people less rich, so as to redistribute the economy.

 

[macdos]

My girlfriend, Beijing citizen, believes that this political move is part of a bigger scheme where the government is trying to make the very rich people less rich, so as to redistribute the economy.

She's right. It is part of a wider scheme to foster the population and maintain control over business. Celebrities like Zhao Wei and others are taken down, and whole industries are being revamped to better suit the party's vision. This is the socialist component of the party, if you will.

 

[jennyp]

The dictatorship in China is very delicate. It may seem the president Xi has all the power, but he doesn’t. If the Politburo decides that he is unfit for presidency, they will vote to remove him, which almost happened during his early days as the president. He was only saved by the former Chinese president Hu, whom vetoed the movement.

The one-part autocracy in China is also not dangerous, because it’s in-check by the people, if the government does‘t perform, then it will be replaced via a revolution. But since the party and the government are so big, they include all the talents in the society, most changes can be done from within via evolution instead of revolution, which is better for China. The CIA tried for decades to subvert the Chinese government and to cause a revolution, but without success. Their tricks just don’t work in China, where people can see it right through.

So one man vetoed it, huh? There's a lot of good that can come about by cross-party endorsed centralised decisions, but - "in-check by the people"? And "replaced via a revolution"? Don't hold your breath for that. Marxist claptrap. Come on, Comrade. It's totalitarianism, pure and simple.

 

[himanshumodi]

Many mobile games are designed so that players have to login every day, even just for 10 min to do their so-called “daily quests”.

These kind of "games" should be banned all together. I don't think world needs to be as authoritarian as CCP. But we can't afford to let free market make all the rules either.

 

[ian87w]

I understand the premise of this, but this is antipodal to the idea of humanity. This wasn’t the way to go at the issue.

I do wonder what would happen if the world imposes similar restrictions on China as China does on humans. Let’s allow flights only for as many hours as this. Let’s allow trade for only as many hours as this. Etc.

I know I’m sounding absurd, but that’s because this is absurd. I’m waiting for reactions to this from the world and UN.

The UN is China's mistress... Ask Taiwan.

 

[ian87w]

My girlfriend, Beijing citizen, believes that this political move is part of a bigger scheme where the government is trying to make the very rich people less rich, so as to redistribute the economy.

Made sense from their recent moves. The Chinese government has been on a roll lately going after their tech companies. And these Chinese tech companies do play a lot in mobile gaming.

Wonder how Epic will do when Tencent starts cutting them off...

 

[MacGekko]

European here, thank you very much. Lived in the US, lived in China. Prefer China anytime.

Although your per capita income is higher (and will remain so for a long time), that freedom is of little use if it is not spent properly. Let me remind you that the average American has not seen any real wage increase since the 1990s, while the 2% richest have multiplied their fortunes. America didn't stop growing when it outsourced to China, but it distributed the wealth differently. While Average Joe got unemployed and the Rustbelt emerged, the industrialists with factories in China got rich. As a consequence, you've got the housing bubble 2008 and the current political upheaval. If you are so rich, why can't you afford a home?

Americans spend 17% of their income on health care, yet they are the most obese people in the world, with 38% having a BMI of 30 or over. How can you be free if you are a prisoner of your own body? As a consequence, you have the highest prevalence of cancer in the world, with 6% having the disease. It goes without saying that you are the undisputed pandemic leader in the world, with 650 000 dead this far – China has less than 5000, positive growth and a normal society.

You are also the most addicted people in the world, with 4% having a drug use disorder. How can you be free if you are addicted to drugs? You die like no other people in opiate and cocaine overdoses, and you also put people in prison like no one else in the world. How can you be free if one percent of you are constantly in jail?

You are indeed free to own an Uzi, but unfortunately at a cost. To the outside world, you look like any South American banana republic when it comes to violence and firearm related murders, accidents and suicides. American freedom has always grown out of the barrel of a gun, from the genocides of the native populations to the countless wars around the globe – your silly country has known eight years of peace altogether since its foundation over 250 years ago…

Who wrote that I was referring to you, again, tyro stats, those South American countries, actually Central American countries have murder rates of 40/50/60 per 100,000, our murder rate is 6, a shade higher than 1957, the glorious 50's that everyone celebrates, and that is with 3 times the number of guns and population.

Your other simplistic views are not worth going over, time to check your social credit score, now there you go, there is some nuance you will need to bone up on.

 

[ian87w]

These kind of "games" should be banned all together. I don't think world needs to be as authoritarian as CCP. But we can't afford to let free market make all the rules either.

I don't think they should be banned. Banning things don't usually address the root of the problem.

 

[asiga]

When I entered this thread, I thought supporters of this totalitarian control would be winning, because totalitarian ideas (ie: let the government and my wearable decide what's best for me) are trendy nowadays. I'm happy to see the contrary. Not everything is lost.

 

[DMG35]

The free country in which pictures of bare-chested ladies are illegal to view as minors but violence are not? Yeah sure.

I don't know what you are even talking about here but again we can just agree to disagree.

 

[DMG35]

Concession accepted.

Uh no, just can't argue with someone who thinks their opinion is fact.

 

[cosmichobo]

I think a lot of nerds tend to be commies because they don't really understand human beings. Feel free to move to a commie country though.

Oh, wait, no! People vote with their feet and only move to the West, nvm 😅

You do realise that the West is waning, and soon those feet wont be bringing defectors...

 

[jennyp]

My girlfriend, Beijing citizen, believes that this political move is part of a bigger scheme where the government is trying to make the very rich people less rich, so as to redistribute the economy.

Well, she would, wouldn't she. Many others may not believe this.

She's right. It is part of a wider scheme to foster the population and maintain control over business. Celebrities like Zhao Wei and others are taken down, and whole industries are being revamped to better suit the party's vision. This is the socialist component of the party, if you will.

"The party's vision"? And who gets to vet that?

 

[jonnysods]

After being in multiple lockdowns, and feeling the despair for my kids that sometimes the only way they can talk to friends is online gaming, I can see the other damage it has done to them. We're making some changes in our house this school year to limit electronics. I've even been working hard to restrict my own usage of it.

This year I bought one of those sunlight alarm clocks, and when I get home from work I put my phone down in my basement, and don't get it out until the next morning. I have the AW to get important messages or calls. I'm telling you it was like coming off of heroin.

Just trying to reconnect with the idea of day dreaming, and actually sitting down and not doing anything and looking out a window without anything to do. And I want that for my kids too.

 

[Shirasaki]

These kind of "games" should be banned all together. I don't think world needs to be as authoritarian as CCP. But we can't afford to let free market make all the rules either.

THe irony here is these games are a huge cash cow for the developer company, thus extremely attractive for new game projects. At the same time, gacha feeds off many people's gambling addiction to spend 20x 50x 100x or even 1000x the amount they'd rather spend, and big "award" fills those player's self-esteem. Banning them outright is difficult.

 

[Steve121178]

Only a matter of time until the West copies this stance.

 

[macdos]

"The party's vision"? And who gets to vet that?

Ultimately, any party or ruling class is dependent on popular support. And popular support is much higher in China than in any Western country. When popular support wanes enough, the party will fall.

You think just because you can vote every four years – provided you "register" to vote in that developing country of yours, and provided you have not been sent to jail and stripped of your political rights in your backward country – that you have some control over the political class. You don't, really.

 

[philosopherdog]

You’re not going to be able to rule the world if your youth can’t do anything except play games. Totally lost generation of people out there who know nothing else.

 

[macdos]

When I entered this thread, I thought supporters of this totalitarian control would be winning, because totalitarian ideas (ie: let the government and my wearable decide what's best for me) are trendy nowadays. I'm happy to see the contrary. Not everything is lost.

Totalitarian is when I have to surrender my laptop, my passwords and my phone to US border agents for tapping.

Totalitarian is when I have to take off my shoes and be X-rayed to get on a plane.

Totalitarian is when I have to tell your government what party I support or have supported.

Totalitarian is to have my phone calls, chats and other electronic data surveilled in its entirety by a foreign service like yours.

Limiting gaming, though, is as totalitarian as limiting booze, drugs, betting, casinos, guns or any other social mechanism that can be harmful to individuals and society.

 

[matrix07]

They are successful partially because of China's market and demand.

They are successful partially because of the US's fear of China's rise. It's the Containment Policy, and Red Scare.

They are successful partially because the US views them as harmless, or so we thought then delivered a death blow to Japan in the end via Plaza Acord.

Those countries are only as important to the US as they are useful against China.

If you carefully analyze Singapore, it's actually a dictatorship. If the US tries as hard to subvert Singapore, which it does all the time, as it is trying to subvert the Chinese government, Singapore will be just like China today.

"They don't need CCP to prosper", yes, but they need it to not become the US's client/vassal states, or pawns.

Umm.. Japan and South Korea has been successful LONG before China came out of its shell. Hong Kong under the British has never been poor. Likewise for Singapore. They're all financially successful countries. My my you sure buy your country propaganda without a shred of thinking, don't you? And you're talking about IQ? 🤣

 

[matrix07]

It means that they are analogous.

Man, you would do very bad on Raven’s progressive matrices, which is a major part of a rigorous IQ test.

Says someone who thinks Honey Bees or Fire Ants has government. Okay.. 🤣

 

[macdos]

The UN is China's mistress... Ask Taiwan.

You do realize that PRC rather than Taiwan represents China because of Nixon, Kissinger and the American desire to access the Chinese market and use China as a means to encircle the Soviet Union back in the 70s, right?

Or are you referring to the agency Washington Health Organization, who seems to have joined the paranoid schizophrenia and delusions about lab leaks?

 

[IllinoisCorn]

Look how kids are becoming in the west, parents don’t have a say, they go to college normal and come out radical left and completely changed it’s not the parents doing it, it’s the society that’s so damaging, kids being taught lgbt stuff and confusing them at a young age it’s so damaging and again no hate just being real, you see kids now that think they are non binary and it’s not the parents fault, culture as well is being erased from many western countries because of political correctness, at least in Asia and China they stay true to who they are and don’t want there culture changed with woke nonsense

I dislike leftist policies as well, but not everyone is me.

I value freedom more than anything you mentioned in your post.