Beast Song｜Revisiting “The Garbage Time of History”

On September 16th, I wrote an article saying that history can have garbage time, but individuals do not. At the time, I thought: The ancients said that if the world has the Way, then one appears; if the world has no Way, then one retreats into seclusion. In essence, this is also a form of lying flat. Looking back at history, how many people chose to retreat into the mountains and forests because of the darkness of the court, leaving behind countless famous works? It neither affects their reading and writing poetry, nor does it affect their enjoyment of the mountains and rivers. Therefore, although the court has garbage time, literati and poets can indulge in the mountains and rivers, and ordinary people can bury themselves in the fields… What garbage is there?

But recently, I’ve had some other thoughts.

The examples I gave above are actually not accurate. For example, although Li Bai had no official position, he could still be unrestrained, because Emperor Xuanzong of Tang could tolerate him. Tao Yuanming could pick chrysanthemums under the eastern fence because he still had some fields. The Four Gray-haired Elders of Mount Shang could refuse Liu Bang because Liu Bang had a magnanimous spirit. If you were to try this with Zhu Yuanzhang, what would you do? You want to retreat into seclusion? “The treacherous and greedy villains, therefore, slander, all saying that it is difficult to be an official in the court.” Slandering the court is a serious crime, and you must be dealt with!

How exactly do we define “garbage time in history”? For example, many people consider the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan as the starting point of the Soviet Union’s collapse, but in my opinion, it was much earlier: from the implementation of the Gulag system, the Soviet Union entered the garbage time of the countdown, and if we follow Mises’s statement, then this time is even earlier.

In 1920, Mises published an article titled “Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth”, which, from the perspective of economic calculation, negated the socialist planned economy and the possibility of centralized resource allocation proposed by Pareto. At this time, the Soviet Union had not yet been established. In other words, before the Soviet Union was born, Mises predicted through logical reasoning that this economic entity would inevitably fail. According to Mises’s logic, the Soviet Union entered garbage time from its birth in 1922.

This kind of inference seems a bit arbitrary, but the Soviet Union, from its establishment to its collapse, was indeed in blood and filth: rising in blood and filth, collapsing in blood and filth.

Therefore, according to this inference, in some places, such as the Soviet Union, the entire historical period is garbage time. How do we determine the “garbage time” in it? It can only be said to be “garbage within garbage”, “there is no most garbage, only more garbage”.

There is a saying circulating online, “Garbage time in history is an economic concept, proposed by (the famous Austrian) economist Mises, which refers to an era that seriously violates the natural laws of economic development, where individuals are powerless to change its direction, and the entire era is bound to fail.” Mises never said this, it was fabricated by netizens, but it cannot be said to be without reason.

This term originally came from football matches, and was later extended to the entire sports event system. “Garbage time” in sports terminology refers to the situation where the outcome of the match has been decided, and the remaining time cannot change the result, which is dispensable for the match. Later, this term was used by netizens to describe a period in history, where the overall direction of events seems inevitable and irreversible, and even individual efforts cannot change the outcome. This term probably became popular in July 2024, and it has been more than a year now.

The cultural class is probably the most sensitive group to this term. According to the head of Qinghe:

Whenever history enters garbage time, the first to fall are always the cultural people and thinkers. Each round of cultural catastrophe is like a historical repeater: from the disappearance of sharp criticism, to silence being considered malicious, then to not praising enough is also a crime, and finally only one voice remains: lies.

Therefore, the cultural class is very sensitive to this term. Moreover, we can see that in the garbage time period, both the social and cultural fields and the economic field are very different from normal countries and normal societies. Whether it is the writers or the speakers, they are often the kind of people who tell lies who are in their element. The more they cover up problems, gloss over mistakes, and flatter, the more people will follow and applaud, while those who want to tell the truth, especially those with reflective nature, are often attacked by the crowd; as for the economic and scientific fields, they often stagnate and it is difficult to make any qualitative leaps. Not to mention leaps, it is very difficult to maintain the status quo.

Garbage time in history is the natural enemy of culture, or rather, besides culture, other industries are not doing well either. The entire country falls into a vicious cycle of simple replication of low-end culture and low-end economy. Taking the 600 years of the Ming and Qing dynasties as an example, especially the Qing dynasty, which claimed to have the prosperous reigns of Kangxi and Qianlong, but in fact, the whole country was doing almost meaningless repetitive work: farmers mechanically planting and harvesting grain, ministers repeatedly attending court and praising the emperor. Everything seemed very stable, proceeding step by step, but the essence was that society and the country did not progress, but only went in circles. Looking back at the West at this time, Newton created classical mechanics, calculus, optics, and astronomical theory. At the same time, the Qing dynasty was carrying out a large-scale literary inquisition. In 1689, the eighth year of Kangxi’s reign, Kangxi defeated Oboi and gained unprecedented power, while Locke published “Two Treatises of Government”. At the same time, the British Parliament passed the Bill of Rights, restricting the king’s power and giving more space and benefits to the people, stimulating the enthusiasm for innovation and wealth creation from the people; while Adam Smith published “The Wealth of Nations”, North America published the “Declaration of Independence”, and Watt mass-produced steam engines, Emperor Qianlong was destroying books on a large scale… From this perspective, Huang Renyu’s statement that the Ming Dynasty perished in the fifteenth year of Wanli, and historians’ belief that the Western Han Dynasty perished during the reign of the most powerful Emperor Wu of Han, also seems quite reasonable – Ming emperors like Kangxi and Qianlong, while consolidating their own positions, also buried the development of the country and society under their thrones, thus making the place where the holy light shines barren.

Indeed, during this garbage time of the Ming and Qing dynasties, thinkers like Huang Zongxi and Gu Yanwu also appeared, but they were ultimately just stars in the night sky, only able to be admired by the world, unable to provide more assistance to society and the country. The Enlightenment era, which emerged in the West during the same period, was a historical trend under the dawn, not only with a clear direction, but also with a strong force.

Therefore, direction is very important. If the direction is wrong, effort can only be counterproductive.

Which emperor of the Qing dynasty was not diligent in governing? But the country still declined day by day, the people were dejected, the thinking was rigid, the spirit was withered, there was no hope for the days, and people dispersed. Anyway, everything belonged to the emperor, what did it have to do with me? This is probably also a fundamental reason why the late Qing army’s combat effectiveness was inferior to that of the West.

Epilogue

I am also one of those who are unwilling to sink into this, so I have been writing and speaking, and I am saying things that are not welcome. I think this is probably the only thing I can do in this era, the only thing that proves my goal and meaning of living.