# Ask the Locked-down in Beijing Doper **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 22, 2022, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355 "2022-11-22T02:07:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2022, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/41 "2022-11-27T15:00:37Z")
I think even the Chinese have their breaking points. They can legitimately ask “when will it end” and the answer, if the current policy is to be believed, is “never”. It is probably being exacerbated by the world cup coverage. The Chinese are footy mad and [seeing the rest of the world freely mingling and maskless](https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/sports/chinese-soccer-fans-world-cup-highlights-covid-lockdown-blues-2022-11-24/) can’t be easy. I asked the OP before about the likelihood and prevalence of disturbances and protests like these but on reflection I’m not sure how open anyone in China be about it. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2022, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/42 "2022-11-27T17:19:39Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > [seeing the rest of the world freely mingling and maskless](https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/sports/chinese-soccer-fans-world-cup-highlights-covid-lockdown-blues-2022-11-24/) can’t be easy. Dunno about that. I tried to talk a Japanese guy into visiting the US for a special event in about a year. And he replied, “no, we’re still trying to avoid covid, and not running around vacationing and going without masks like you folks. If i say ‘no’ this year, can i take you up on that offer in a year or two?” Not everyone wants to be freely mingling with maskless hordes. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2022, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/43 "2022-11-27T18:45:38Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > Not everyone wants to be freely mingling with maskless hordes. Sure, we can always find outliers in every country but it starts to become a problem if enough people _en-masse_ decide that their national policy is wrong. I don’t know if China is at that point but it can’t be far off. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2022, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/44 "2022-11-27T19:29:50Z")
Fwiw, my friend didn’t say, “i don’t want to do this”, he said, “Japan is different from the US, we aren’t doing this stuff that you are.” Of course Japan never had a lot of hard lockdowns. They left the elementary schools open all the time, i think. They just leaned heavily into masking and improving ventilation, and discouraging excessive socializing when stuff was worst. And their total mortality rate demonstrates that was a good strategy. Their total covid mortality to date seems to be about 40/100k. As compared to, say, Sweden \>200/100k, or Denmark at ~130/100k (or the US or UK, which seem to be tied at about 325/100k) (Source is the 91 divoc site. They say “All of the data presented on this visualization comes from a trusted, high-quality data source: either Johns Hopkins University, Oxford University (Our World in Data), or The Atlantic (COVID Tracking Project).”, And also that it’s mostly from Johns Hopkins.) ---
**Author:** ![romansperson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/romansperson/32/17100_2.png) [@romansperson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/romansperson)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2022, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/45 "2022-11-27T19:30:02Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > Sure, we can always find outliers in every country but it starts to become a problem if enough people _en-masse_ decide that their national policy is wrong. > I don’t know if China is at that point but it can’t be far off. Welp, there’s this going on right now: [https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/26/china/china-protests-xinjiang-fire-shanghai-intl-hnk/index.html](https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/26/china/china-protests-xinjiang-fire-shanghai-intl-hnk/index.html) > Such widespread scenes of anger and defiance – some of which stretched into the early hours of Monday morning – are exceptionally rare in China, where the ruling Communist Party ruthlessly cracks down on all expressions of dissent. But three years into the pandemic, many people have been pushed to the brink by the government’s [incessant use](https://edition.cnn.com/2022/11/02/china/china-covid-foxconn-tibet-disney-intl-hnk/index.html) of lockdowns, Covid tests and quarantines – as well as ever-tightening censorship and continued onslaught on personal freedoms. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2022, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/46 "2022-11-27T19:40:34Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > Of course Japan never had a lot of hard lockdowns. And this is my point. If they _had_, and they were still doing so _now_ then even the normally compliant Japanese would likely be up in arms as well. If all the Chinese were doing were imposing masking restrictions then I suspect it’d be a different matter. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2022, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/47 "2022-11-27T19:51:47Z")
Yeah. My point is that the Japanese aren’t “compliant”, they are happy to continue to avoid covid. And they are still avoiding travel, and avoiding going to places like the US where people have given up trying to avoid covid. Not because the law forces them to, but because they think it’s a good idea. But china’s hard lockdowns must be wearing people out. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2022, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/48 "2022-11-27T20:05:06Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > My point is that the Japanese aren’t “compliant” I’d disagree with that, I lived and worked with Japanese people for nearly a decade and “compliant” is definitely one impression they left me with. It may not be any explicit laws that they comply with but they certainly put a huge amount of weight on social expectation and unwritten rules. Which is actually perfectly in line with what you said… > [@puzzlegal](#): > > Not because the law forces them to, but because they think it’s a good idea that’s the unwritten social rule that they are abiding by. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2022, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/49 "2022-11-28T02:53:21Z")
When covid first hit it was almost impossible to get someone from China to use the word “covid” in an email. They would dance around the idea of being short staffed. They were unwilling or unable to talk about it. ---
**Author:** ![JaneDoe42](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/janedoe42/32/14104_2.png) [@JaneDoe42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JaneDoe42)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2022, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/50 "2022-11-28T04:30:54Z")
Heres hoping the OP is OK. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2022, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/51 "2022-11-28T04:46:28Z")
Thanks! The wife and I are able to go outside the apartment and the community as of this past Wednesday afternoon. Classes are still to be held online and this is unlikely to change before the end of the semester. I’m covering three sessions this week (one done this morning, the other two tomorrow and Wednesday) for middle school teachers who got hit with positive results. As it turns out, the tasks I’ve already designed for the rest of the term for my 12th grade classes (low level in either English or their core subjects) is something that really lends itself to online collaboration. The students who participate seem to enjoy that and it makes me look good to the school management. What worries me, though, is my wife and I need to go to Korea during the winter vacation between semesters. This might preclude me from going and there’s a possibility she’ll be delayed in returning. I **am not** looking forward to a repeat of the 10-month separation we experienced in 2020. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2022, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/52 "2022-11-28T14:31:02Z")
I suspect @JaneDoe42 was worried about the apparently widespread unrest in China over the COVID restrictions. I know I’m curious / concerned about that for @Monty’s sake, and that of our other Dopers in China. ---
**Author:** ![JaneDoe42](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/janedoe42/32/14104_2.png) [@JaneDoe42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JaneDoe42)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2022, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355/53 "2022-11-29T22:13:53Z")
Well, yes, that was on my mind, but there is still the general concern going on as well 🙂 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-locked-down-in-beijing-doper/975355.md?page=2)