Accidental Socrates

BEIJING – No one knew where he came from.

One minute my classmates were sitting alone in their private sleeper compartment on a train bound for Nanjing, the next, they were visited by a middle-aged Chinese businessman who barged in, intent on grilling them about their political beliefs.

An hour passed.

Even after they all left to explore the rest of the train, the man stayed put, ambushing passersby with challenges to the Electoral College.

As I passed by what unofficially became his cabin, he poked his head out the door and asked me about America’s financial crisis. It’s a popular topic in China, but for a very different reason. People always ask me about America’s banks with a barely reserved glee, the way a bitter guy might inquire as to an ex-girlfriend’s current boyfriend who was recently arrested.

I always resign myself to discussing the American financial crisis, knowing it’s going to be a slaughter. I can barely express everything I know about economics while the other combatant (and it is always combat) smugly tells me how only socialism can solve the world’s ills.

This particular lecture came complete with props. He used a pillow and a bottle of empty beer to illustrate how America had (purposefully) distorted Chinese purchasing power.

Whenever conversations like this occur, I usually try to keep them civil by ending with a friendly thanks to the other person for sharing his viewpoints. After leaving the cabin to tear my hair out, frustrated he just wouldn’t listen, I looked behind me to imagine that he was probably doing the exact same thing.

Unfortunately, there’s no correlation between how sure of yourself you are and how valid your opinion is. Both of us, utterly convinced of the superiority of our argument, had been mostly wasting our time.

Debates, whether between presidents or passengers, are rarely marked by concessions. And while we might believe in our more idealistic moments that we talk politics with people who believe differently in order to expand our worldview, usually what we really mean is that we debate so the other person will expand his worldview. Namely, by agreeing that they are wrong.

I realized in that cabin that I am particularly vulnerable to such blindness. I used to think that being from a country marked by an exquisite freedom to question whatever I wanted would provide me with the most evolved opinion I could possess.

But somewhere along the way that didn’t happen. Instead, floating in a sea of free information, I glimpsed what was convenient and became complacent. But after I talked with this man, I began to wonder if I still had the capacity to challenge what I thought.

He didn’t manage to convince me of what he believed, but in a roundabout way, managed to make me question what I believed.

For a train-ride debate, I suppose you have to take what you can get.