I expect that that Canadian family do not think that the pornographic, violent West, where you can't even walk down the streets of an English town, like Colchester(a garrison town) without the likelyhood of being beaten to a pulp by our brave lads, as the pubs tip out, is a good safe place for a child.

It just behooves me when I read crap like this. I myself have lived in dangerous neighborhoods in my life in the west and I have been harassed and threatened. I was bullied like hell in the USA when I was younger due to low self esteem and constantly being the "new" kid on the block since my family was moving around a lot. I also used to buy into the notion that china is "greener" and that this country was going to be more civilized and richer and have more opportunities and yada yada yada. That is until I actually worked, lived, and experienced the quality of people who live there and was able to make a fair comparison.

Here's the bottom line: In the free market world that we live in, the west still has the best overall education, the best job opportunities, the best systems of law, and the best business opportunities, and any of the safest western neighborhoods trumps the safest chinese neighborhoods hands down. Any investment with international credibility that goes into a 3rd world country starts in the west. I read in an Midwest American newspaper recently about the chinese bringing in an extra dozen or so jobs to the states due to some rich chinese businessmen investing. Well American jobs (millions of them) going to china was yesterday's news. What took you guys so freaking long, man? I thought we lived in a world of altruism and reciprocity...hahahaha. I guess it depends on competence too, doesn't it?

I don't know about you, but I would NOT be proud about telling my kid that his/her country is the "cheap labor" factory of the world. Sure the lack of freedom in china can mean that everything is controlled as much as possible which makes some folks feel more secure. I say it sucks to be most of you. I also will finish by adding that most of the expats who I have met overseas that talk like this either: 1. Cannot understand chinese very well so they live in a blissfully ignorant state of mind. 2. Benefited directly from the chinese system from some backhanded, corrupt way of doing business in each of their own respective lives. The former don't know what they're talking about even if they have lived in china for a long time (I have spoken with folks who lived on Canal Street which is Chinatown in New York City all their lives and still can't speak passable English). The latter obviously have no trouble lying and beating the same drum over and over and over again.

Of course, the 3rd option in this case would be that we have been arguing with people who hate the West immensely and want nothing more than to see its demise, and they will do anything possible to make that happen. Even if it's pretending to be an "expat" who has "lived" or "worked" in china for a long time.

I try to ignore posts like these but knowing how I was mislead and had my logic scrambled by statements such as these in the past I just feel like the person who makes these types of comments operates more on emotional whims rather than empirical logic.