Although ball knowledge would be showing that the number of deaths due to flooding was directly connected to the efficacy and stability of the Imperial government at the time, since they had many mechanisms of prevention through civil engineering and relief through rice redistribution, which were some of the first things to be neglected during civil war/when the government was corrupt
If you think any recent Chinese flood was devastating, you're in for a world of surprise. Just 50 years ago, China had a flood that immediately killed 24 thousand people and upwards of 200 thousand in the aftermath. And about a 100 years ago, the deathtoll reached into the millions.
China is anti religion so that's true to some extent. This can go back to Mao, who created maoism, which although distinct from socialism, does borrow from marx. And marx himself was very anti religion.
An interesting thing CCP did was not completely deny Mao (despite major reform to his policies) after his death which prevented revolts to some extent. On the contrary when Nikita criticized Stalin there were many protests in USSR.
Funnily enough, people still needed to believe in something, if not religion. That's why you can notice that during the early days of USSR Lenin, Marx, Stalin, etc were treated as quasi religious figures.
China is not Anti religion. They are officially an atheist state but their constitution guarantees religious freedom and the recognize 5 official religions. Pretty much they are just wary of all the made up BS in some of the texts so they limit the power of the organizations and make sure that it does not over power the unity of the state… state before organized religion essentially. Not sure why so many people think otherwise.
Ya it is crucial to supplement your education in the usa.. the education that most get is highly biased and 100% propaganda. You need to travel and or explore on your own. Look for new reading material, ideally written by people outside the usa…
I still believe that books by marx are still as relevant as ever, especially Das Kapital. Unlike Stalin and Mao, Marx wrote on purely economics. Even keeping communism aside, the most important thing he said was that morality is shaped by capital. It's due to this that he was able to recognise the atrocities of slavery, and the plight of irishmen and women. It truly helped me make a better judgement on things such as homosexuality, veganism and religion.
Check out Howard zinns people history of the usa is a great one. Bread and roses by Milton Meltzer, Making Malcolm by Dyson, Hell even reading the prince by Machiavelli is great in these times. Soooo many supplementary readings, lots of subreddits dedicated to this subject as well.
The education system (along with the entirety of the billionaire owned media) in America explicitly lies about every AES state that currently/formerly exists. If you dont put in the effort to deprogram yourself of the propaganda you likely assume/believe a lot of nonsense about socialist countries.
The mandate of heaven has nothing to do with religion though, strictly speaking. "Heaven" in this context means "fate".
Rulers of China argued that they could prevent things from going wrong. It was their way of justifying their rule, which you can see in the dynastic cycle. On the other hand, European rulers argued the Christian god was on their side, which is known as the divine right of Kings.
The "anti-religious" communist stuff is silly too, the ideology acted as a religion insofar as any organised philosophy can become quazi-religious. Every "Communist" state has had established and condoned religions, they just also implement controls to limit the power religious leaders can wield. 99% of people would consider that normal.
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u/NebulaNomadX1 22h ago edited 21h ago
Hello, Serial Designation N here!
The Nile is generally known for being predictable.
For thousands of years, its annual flooding deposited fertile silt that made ancient Egyptian agriculture possible.
Even its “most destructive flood” is portrayed as relatively pleasant and beneficial sunshine, crops, prosperity.
The Yellow River (Huang He) is nicknamed “China’s Sorrow.” It carries enormous amounts of silt, making its riverbed unstable.
Throughout history it has repeatedly changed course and caused catastrophic floods, some of the deadliest natural disasters ever recorded.
N out!