Dodson Ch.3 & 4 Responses

Dodson Chapter 3 Response

From the information conveyed by Dodson in chapter three, I would say that what is going on in the property transfers is corruption and concern only for profit over people. Land that people have sunk their whole livelihoods into are being ripped from their hands in deals they hear nothing of until one day they are suddenly torn from their homes and expected, it seems, to be okay with it! Deals are struck in their names for money they will never see or hear of for a government official to just line his pockets. Multitudes are turned out and have little to no chance of fixing their broken lives. This is something I found utterly appalling to think of, especially as it is something that is government sanctioned! To think that many people live in such a way, that their home can be taken from that at any moment just by the beck and call of a businessman waving around big bills- that anyone would consider upturning so many for their own selfish gain- is unfathomable in my mind and heart of hearts. It was especially shocking when Dodson talks about when HE was being sold land where houses sat and people watched him. The seller waved his arm and pointed to places where people were presently living and told Dodson that "All of this could be his!" is something that I find extremely unsettling...As I read further and further into China Inside Out, the more I find myself believing that China needs some sort of reform in its approach to modernization.

Dodson Chapter 4 Response

Chapter four only pushed further my thoughts on China needing a new, better reformed way of approaching the 21st century. What stuck out the most with me was honestly the instances and statistics given in chapter four- the staggering numbers of deaths all by different kinds of pollution in China, as well as the fact that China thinks it is a perfectly well and legitimate sacrifice to be made in the name of modernization and expansion! To think that someone would visit another in their hospital bed (as cited in the chapter) and tell them that their illness that is really and actually due to some form of pollution poisoning was simply from a 'mass hysteria' is something I cannot very well swallow. It is something that concretes in my heart the nasty thought that the Chinese government cares not for expansion and modernization for the sake of its people, but for the sake of expansion and modernization alone as to seem 'on par' with other parts of the world. Even further unsettling is the fact that the people of China seem to be scarily accepting of this fate and these outcomes. All I find by the end of this chapter, staring at the death tolls wrought on China by its own hand is: is all of this death and destruction really worth it in the end? Is having large factories and big cities really worth trading the wealth that is the happiness and health of both its people and its land itself?