Reasons to Despair: 1) China

I and many with me were positively confident that China would take steps into democratization and leave its barbaric past bloodsheded by the "Culture Revolution" and the 1989 Beijing massacre. I applauded the take over of Hong Kong from the british colonialists and were sure that the announcement of Chinas 2008 Olympic games hostship was a proof of a autocracy slowely joining the civilized world. I was wrong! China now destroys what was left of the old Beijing from the countries rich past, arrests dissidents en masse and starts projects that will surely break the regions ecologic balance. The manners from the days of Mao still is rooting deep. With bamboo sticks under the nails and the head drenched in a ice cold water bucket it isn´t easy for Tibetan monks, freespoken culture nobilities and ecologists to express their freedom of speech. I have no hopes for a democratic (not even civilized) China for along, long time. The 2008 Olympic Games just seems like another sad show-off of Western dollar green pragmatism in symbiosis with Chinese Maoist capitalism. The only winners in this game will be greedy people like Rupert "bloody hands" Murdoch and the big bad sponsors.