74% of Americans “Don’t Trust” China

• Author: Artefact
• Categories: International, News
• Date: Sep 21, 2012 15:00 JST


• Tags: China, Comparison, Made in China, Okinawa, Politics, Senkaku Complex, Statistics, USA
  

Amazingly, surveys of the American people now reveal the vast majority of them do not trust their new Chinese friends at all, with most apparently considering them a more pressing threat even than Iran or North Korea – coming as something of a relief to Japanese who had been left pondering being dumped in favour of China.

Surveys of the US public conducted by Pew (some months prior to China’s latest efforts to wrest the Ryukyus from Japan) paint a dismal picture of US attitudes to their Chinese friends.

A mere 26% of Americans thought China could be trusted, and only a third believed China takes the interests of other nations into account.

In contrast, 62% thought Japan could be trusted, and majorities even trusted the likes of Britain, France, Israel and India.

Meanwhile 66% of those questioned viewed China as a “competitor” to the US, and 15% went further and considered them an “enemy.”

45% viewed Obama’s servile policy towards China as not being tough enough, compared to 39% who considered it about right – needless to say, Republicans were much harder on China than Democrats, although 48% of them still viewed China’s rise as a “major threat” to the US, compared to 60% of Republicans.

26% also thought China represented the biggest national threat to US security, more than such darlings of US foreign policy as Iran (16%) and North Korea (13%). Bizarrely, 1% actually thought Japan represented the greatest threat to the US, compared to 3% for Russia and “0%” for evil terrorists.

Japanese are delighted to learn that their own nearly universal loathing of China is shared by their American masters:

“An expected result!”

“I’m more shocked about 40% of them not trusting Japan…”

“Probably most of them were ‘no opinion’ and ‘don’t know’ though.”

“How long are they going to hold stuff against Japan for? It’s not like Obama holds stuff against whites…”

“Be thankful for that 60%, I bet hardly any Japanese trust America.”

“Only 62%…”

“Blame it on those damn Okinawans protesting their military all the time, they think we are all anti-American as a result.”

“So that stuff about Americans favouring China over Japan was just fabrication?”

“Pretty scary that there are 26% of them dumb enough to trust China. Not that Japan is likely to be any better.”

“What percentage of the 26% were Chinese Americans though?”

“Their universities are all full of Chinese, there’s your reason.”

“26% is rather a lot really.”

“I used to think China could be trusted when we were learning about Confucius in school.”

“I’m a bit worried about all their young people trusting China though…”

“The young ones are gradually being taken in by all the Chinese propaganda. Both America and Japan ought to be concerned about that.”

“Their young people have really fallen for China’s ploys, haven’t they?”

“The young ones are too left-wing!”

“Just be thankful their young people aren’t getting this level of anti-Japanese education:”

“I bet if they took it again after the riots in China it would be in the single digits…”

“What do we have to do to become one of America-sama’s states?”

“Give it up, if we did manage to become one we’d make up too much of their electorate, they’d never abide it.”

“Who asked for a Japanese president if Japan did become a state. We need a strong American president, putting some spineless Japanese politician in there would make the whole thing pointless.”

“It’s hardly surprising they hate a currency manipulating communist dictatorship which has ruined their industries.”

“Come on you damn yanks, only 62% of you trust your loyal little Japanese doggy?”

“We’re supposed to be their ally!”

“Just remember that the average American doesn’t care about or have any knowledge of other countries at all.”