At any time, there is no shortage of words describing the life of drunken fans, those gorgeous words, excessive descriptions, it is easy to ignore the background of the times, indulge in it, and mistakenly think that everyone was like this at that time. Successful literary works such as "The Golden Powder Family" and "Shanghai Beach" have made countless people who do not understand the historical facts think that the Republic of China period was a "prosperous world".
Only by removing the clouds of history and penetrating the layers of word processing can we see the real appearance of those eras and understand the real scene of the world behind the wine pond meat forest. The Republic of China era, which countless young boys and girls fell for, no matter how free and beautiful the "prosperous world" was touted by the public, could not hide its dirty essence.
If you get close to the real Republic of China, many people's inner fantasies about that era will be shattered with the closer distance. After all, no matter how brilliant the "prosperous world" of a very small number of people is, the tragic situation of the vast majority of people is enough to make people prohibitive.
The upper class society represented by the four major families lived an enviable and luxurious life
During the Republic of China period, it can be said that it was a paradise for capitalists, and the most famous "four major families" at that time, with all aspects of the relationship mixed up like a fish, grabbed a lot of wealth for them to squander. The capitalists headed by them can be said to be the figures standing at the top of the pyramid.
The prototypes of many classic novels and film and television drama works also come from this. From the perspective of these people, the Republic of China era can indeed be called a "prosperous world".
Their lives are full of pictures of singing and dancing, a love can wrap the flowers of the whole city just for that moment of romance, the rich brother and the wind and dust woman when the wind and snow are huge, as if the world is only left with these non-essential things to pay attention to.
Song Meiling, the most famous of the four major families, satisfies almost all the fantasies of girlish feelings: Chiang Kai-shek planted sycamore trees in Nanjing for Soong Meiling, and also built the Meiling Palace, which resembles a pearl necklace set with emeralds...
However, many people only see the silhouette of these romantic and extravagant lives, but ignore that behind these extravagant lives, there is a huge amount of financial support. Without the blessing of material conditions, all this will disappear.
In the 1940s, the FBI tried to find out how much of the property the four families had transferred to the United States, but because of the non-cooperation of the major banks, it ultimately failed to get the desired results. However, the FBI still investigated the property of some of the four major families, even if only a part, it was already a rather terrible wealth.
In the two financial institutions that have been investigated, Soong Ziwen has $70 million in property, Soong Has $80 million in his name, and Soong Mei-ling, as Chiang Kai-shek's wife, has a fortune of up to $150 million.
Such a huge wealth, in the economic downturn of the Republic of China, how did the Song family do it? According to the conservative estimates of relevant financial figures on Wall Street, the four major families have at least $2 billion in assets in the United States alone. Such a huge wealth provides the four families with an incomparably luxurious daily life, which is also the fundamental reason why they can maintain the "prosperous world".
Everyone can see the brilliance of the four major families, but few people care, such a huge wealth, where do the four families come from?
In contrast to the huge wealth of the four major families, inflation was very serious at that time. In the later stages of inflation, people often have to pull a cart of money to purchase supplies, don't misunderstand, this car money can only be exchanged for a bag of rice. Later, a car of money could only barely buy an egg.
The reason why inflation at the end of the Republic of China was so severe was largely due to the "prosperous situation" of these upper classes. Most of the property transferred to foreign countries by the capitalists such as the four major families was obtained by squeezing the working people at home or simply usurping the property of the state treasury. Gold and foreign exchange reserves in the treasury were "diverted", and inflation naturally followed.
Because of famine, war, poverty and other reasons, ordinary people even have problems with survival
It can be said that the rich life of these capitalists was exchanged for the money of the people of the whole country. Those romantic, windy and luxurious lives are all ivory towers that suck the blood of the people of the whole country, while most of the citizens who really create these wealths live a completely opposite life.
During the Republic of China period, less than 10 percent of the people were able to live the above-mentioned life, and among the remaining people, the middle class barely maintained food and clothing, while those who were worse than the middle class could not maintain even a minimum of food and clothing.
Just when the four major families and other capitalists were frantically moving the treasury property, the outside world was the time of years of famine and frequent wars.
Famine is the most intolerable natural disaster for ordinary people, and it can directly lead to people being unable to survive, not even alive, let alone anything else? The need to survive is the most basic need of human beings, and it is also the needs of the people that a country and society want to develop and must first meet. However, the "prosperous" Republic of China, which is popular among many people, simply cannot meet this most basic need.
From 1920 to 1921, drought occurred in northern China, which caused famine, and more than 10 million people starved to death; in 1925, there was another famine in Sichuan, Qianxiang, and Egan, with millions of people dying; from 1928 to 1930, there was famine in eight provinces in the north, and famine in the northwest for three consecutive years, 13 million people were starved to death, and the population lost north of the Wei River was as high as 40%, the bark of the trees was not seen, and the grass root rat holes were dug to the sky.
At the same time, Chiang Kai-shek built the Meiling Palace for Soong Mei Ling and planted plane trees in Nanjing...
In addition to famine, imperialist aggression and Chiang Kai-shek's insistence on going his own way of hostility to the Communists also led to constant wars and chaos during the Republic of China period. War and chaos will inevitably bring two evil consequences to the people: harsh taxes and miscellaneous taxes, and precariousness.
Together with the war, it will definitely require a lot of manpower and material resources, and the treasury of the Republic of China will be cleaned up, and this money will naturally be counted on the people's head. Moreover, the government during the Republic of China period was corrupt, and the taxes collected could be handed over to the central government for half of the money, and most of the taxes went into the pockets of local officials.
Ordinary people had a hard time filling the government deficits and officials' pockets caused by the war, and with it came a lot of poverty. In the Republic of China, selling children and selling women is not a rare thing, if someone can pay a few more dollars, the families who sell children and daughters will even kneel and prostrate their heads in gratitude.
When poverty meets famine, a bag of millet can often buy a child, and no one will question the legitimacy of this matter, because buying and selling people during the Republic of China was not illegal.
There is no prohibition in the law, and someone must exploit the loophole. Because of famine and war, the phenomenon of population migration often occurred during the Republic of China period, and at this time, many families would be separated, and many scattered children would eventually be abducted by human traffickers and then sold.
Back in the Republic of China period, the vast majority of ordinary people are just ants struggling on the line of survival, especially fourteen or fifteen-year-old children, who will either be sold or sent to factories for child labor, and there is no possibility of experiencing the "prosperous world".
The level of educational poverty is unimaginable to today's people, and the great writers are only survivors
Zhang Hexhui, a writer who once wrote the novel "The Golden Powder Family", focused on describing the love story of the upper class society in the Republic of China period for a long time, until he saw the tragic situation of ordinary people's lives with his own eyes, and wrote the next poem with a sad emotion: "The bark of the tree peels everything in the east, and the hungry people are hungry at all times." After ten days of traveling, he fell naked in the middle of the road. ”
The poem was later placed at the beginning of another of his novels, and since then, Zhang has no longer indulged in the stories of the upper class, but has focused most of his pen and ink on describing the lives of the people at the bottom. To allow a writer to have such a great impact on the lives of ordinary people after only a few days, you can imagine how miserable the people lived at that time.
When the people do not have enough to eat and wear, other needs become luxuries, let alone such a costly activity as education. Today's compulsory education makes many people ignore the high investment required for education, and they take it for granted that reading really does not cost much money, and the Republic of China students who often appear in film and television dramas make many people think that there are not many people who can read in the Republic of China.
But in fact, the pure illiteracy rate in the Republic of China period was about 80%, that is to say, people who did not know a word in the Republic of China accounted for about four-fifths of the country. Of the remaining fifths, there are still many people who only know a few simple and common chinese characters, and even read newspapers.
Many modern intellectuals like to advocate the "cultural prosperity" of the Republican period, believing that that era was an era of cultural freedom and an era in which the people's speech was almost unrestricted. However, these people ignore that if they return to the Republican era, they may not have the opportunity to read at all.
Not to mention that studying in the Republic of China required a lot of financial investment, even if you have money at home, you may not be able to find good teachers. Many of the literary heroes who enjoyed great fame in the Republic of China period were more just ideological pioneers, and the actual cultural level was probably not as good as that of an ordinary university professor now.
In film and television dramas, after many college students are arrested for participating in various sports, their families can often find a way to fish him out of prison. This is not because it is easy to catch people, but families who can afford to go to college are either rich or expensive. You know, in the Republic of China, only the children of the upper class, that is, the children of the big landlords, capitalists and bureaucrats at the top, could afford to go to university.
Of course, it is not excluded that some extremely diligent and talented people can get into the university by their own efforts to get scholarships, but that is after all, it is a rare minority, and it is not within the normal consideration at all.
The "cultural prosperity" shown in film and television dramas and many novels is nothing more than an illusion set off by the background of the times. Living in an era of natural and man-made disasters, in order to save themselves and their own countries, people can often burst out of infinite potential, which is a Jedi counterattack after being forced to a dead end, not the norm.
The vast majority of ordinary people have no dignity in the face of natural and man-made disasters
Simple survival has become a problem, education is impossible to talk about, if these can not make many advocates of the "prosperous world" of the Republic of China to recognize the reality, then the ordinary people's life has no dignity to speak of, perhaps can make them sober a little.
In the problem of selling children and selling daughters mentioned earlier, many parents not only have to show gratitude when selling their flesh and bones, but also have to vigorously sell their "goods" and describe them as "well-bred, capable, and sensible". Children who have been sold are forced from an early age to learn to observe the color of speech and curry favor with the "lord's family."
Because of poverty, human life becomes worthless, and "justice" is impossible to talk about. Both the ranks of the warlords during the warlord melee and the Later Kuomintang army under the leadership of Chiang Kai-shek exploited the ordinary people to varying degrees.
Farmers at the time described it this way: "How much grain they want, never say a word to pay." If we don't give it, we'll be arrested as Communists. If we give them, there is no money to pay taxes. ”
In the face of such unfair treatment, the people can only swallow their anger and even laugh and please, so as not to be smashed by these soldiers. In the face of natural and man-made disasters such as famine and war, dignity has long since become unimportant, and people do whatever it takes to survive.
On the streets of the Republic of China period, ordinary people kneeling and prostrating their heads can be seen everywhere for various reasons: to raise money to bury relatives, to raise money for the treatment of relatives and friends, and even to simply ask for a bite to feed the people in the family... Such scenes are staged every day and last for more than thirty years.
Those "flower queens" of the Republic of China in film and television dramas look like unlimited scenery, but in fact, they have no dignity to speak of. When the children of the rich family pursue her, she is the moon in the sky, but once she does not comply slightly, it is likely to become a tool for them to vent their anger.
These women were not destined to enter such an occasion for entertainment from birth, they were once just ordinary people outside, and even some girls were still from the bookish mendi. They will go to such a place to do things, either the family really can't afford to be sold here, because the bid here is higher, or they are cheated here by escaping and separating from their families.
These people will be buried in such a dirty place for the rest of their lives, and even if they leave one day, these days without dignity and flattery will remain in their hearts forever. In a chaotic world, especially in a chaotic world where the government is incompetent, the people are not qualified to discuss dignity.
Such a Republic of China is the real Republic of China in the true sense, and it is the so-called "prosperous world" of many people. When looking at history, we should not only care about the situation of a small number of people, only by looking more and thinking more can we clearly recognize the real historical situation and see clearly whether it was a "prosperous world" or a famine year at that time.