How privacy doesn't work in the East

Today’s leditor to the editor comes from a Pearson H. He writes:

Dear Hot Johnny: As you know, I have spent the last week and a half in Beijing, China, at the request of my employer. Shortly after touching down at the Beijing airport, I was informed the project I was sent to complete had been pushed back to June. So, I have been spending my time milling about Beijing, trying to act busy from 9-5 (much like any other day), and spending my evenings enjoying 2 for 1 beers at the hotel bar, and watching MTV Mandarin. But I digress.

I was sitting on the pot here at the office, perusing a magazine, trying to gain some insight on the local culture, it's people, art and businesses, and looking at the underwear ads, when what should I notice, but what appears to be pictures of an adult circumcision! I ask you, dear HJ, what kind of culture have I been missing out on here in China?

I have enclosed pictures for your edification.

Dear Pearson: First, and this is my fault for never having directly stated our policy on sending pictures of male circumcision, but we here at Consolidated Hot Johnny work on the honor system. And, as such, if you SAY you have pictures of a man undergoing circumcision, well, by golly, that’s good enough for us. No need to show us pictures of some guy’s ring around the collar. We all know what a circumcised penis looks like. And if you say you've got pictures, your word is good enough for us.

That being said, yes, the Chinese don’t really value privacy the way you and I and Lyndon LaRouche do. If you’re Chinese, you know that family members will ask, in public, highly personal questions. And you know that as a Chinese person, you are honor-bound to answer said questions. Likewise, if a magazine photographer asks, “may we click, click when you get snip, snip?” it would be rude to do anything other than pay full price for a year’s subscription.

Your business is everyone’s business, in other words. This is why I believe that when the reality TV juggernaut runs finally runs amok on mainland China it will be embraced as popular, if fairly unremarkable, programming. We westerners tend to think of these shows as voyeuristic thrills into the (highly scripted) lives of persons celebrated and not, whereas the Chinese will look at these shows and wonder what the big deal is about a person who's under surveillance at all times.


Hopefully, “Meandering Conjecture” was what you were looking for in an answer. Otherwise, yer just out of luck.

Thanks for writing and keep reading.

Yours,
HJ

Oh, and PS: It could also be that the kid in question had “Free Tibet” tattooed to his dick.