My partner keeps trying to read it and they keep stopping and reading me passages and then looking up actual historical fact and going wtf, this book is nonsense? Does it get better?
I don't know I haven't read it. I told them I'd ask here. Does it get better? Is it anti communist propaganda or is the ridiculous anti communist screed that starts this book serious off just setup for something better?
Thanks for all the good answers I showed them the whole thread and they said a lot of what you all said is in line with their understanding. So basically the first bit is a caricature of the bad parts of early Chinese communism and then that gets better but it turns misogynist instead. Fun series. They'll continue to read because we have a lot of family and friends who LOVE the book and they want to understand why but it's helpful to have the lens on it
If three body problem is ''anti-communist'' 90% of the Chinese people, 100% of the party members are also anti communists.
Cultural Revolution is not something Chinese people like to talk about. You'll be lucky if you managed to ply your grandparents to say some stuff about it. If they do, and you asked them to put stuff into perspective with the Great Leap Forward, you'll get more justifications for the death in the GLF than in the cultural revolution.
There is a reason why the party after Mao's death decided to give some liberties to discuss it in negative light and then for the Party just goes in the late 90s to be like: ''well, ok people we got it, you are right, now let's shut the fuck up about it because you can buy a Parasonic TV, drink coca cola and go to KFC''
Some people might agree with this lol
The people who does don't wield any power nor propose any appealing options to destroy this party