Extreme Euphoria.

I. The Collapse of Ideology after the Cold War

On 4 June 1989, the Tiananmen student democracy movement was suppressed.

On the evening of 16 November 1991, Gorbachev announced the dissolution of the Soviet Union¹. With that, the red flag came down, and the world’s largest socialist country fell apart.

On 11 September 2001, four planes were hijacked by terrorists, and one of them crashed into the World Trade Center², killing thousands of people. Terrorism was on the rise, and the West turned its gaze from Eastern Europe to the Middle East.

Since the end of the Cold War, America has stood alone at the top, and this caused ideology to collapse. China, wanting to keep out Western ideas while still developing its economy, took the road of socialism with Chinese characteristics under Deng’s leadership. Socialism with Chinese characteristics counts as the sinicisation of Marxism, but quite obviously it contains not a shred of Marx’s economic theory. “Let some people get rich first, and let them bring the others along.” “Socialism can have a market economy too.” None of this fits Marx’s “to each according to his needs” at all³.

People chase profit, and the lure of capital leaves everyone unable to help themselves. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer, classes begin to harden, and a new middle class begins to rise. Losing a shared ideology is like losing one’s faith, and a kind of emptiness grows in the heart. How do you fill this emptiness? Only with extreme euphoria.

II. What Extreme Euphoria Is

Extreme euphoria is the outward form of the immense emptiness caused by the great crisis of faith humanity has suffered since the start of the 21st century.

How should we understand extreme euphoria?

Take one example: the new literature springing up like bamboo shoots after rain is loved by secondary-school students everywhere. Online fiction has produced a crop of excellent fantasy, suspense, horror and romance novels. But with the development of technology came plagiarism and copycats, and this produced a great many “instant-noodle” novels and “instant-noodle” anime with no ideas in them whatsoever.

But if we look at the essence of it, we can actually see that these novels have a loyal readership: the city’s new “proletariat”. Coming out of university, they are doctors, or programmers, or engineers, but without exception their jobs are simple and repetitive. One word sums it up: “boring”. Why boring? Because of the emptiness inside. How do you relieve the emptiness? Extreme euphoria.

Another, similar example: what does the arrival of short-video apps like Douyin and Kuaishou mean? With short videos, the point is short, usually 11 to 13 seconds. Scroll through a few more, and an hour or two is gone just like that. It is a perfect weapon for killing time.

But why can we keep watching? If we found these short videos as boring as work, wouldn’t this phenomenon disappear? It comes down to people’s state of mind. When people are working, especially at work they don’t like, a question arises in them: “Why do I have to finish this?”

At this point, the so-called self-disciplined people will say: it is for my future, for my goals. But that is only a small minority (this may be a bit sweeping); the vast majority have lost their goals in life, leaving only an empty shell. Work deepens this doubt about one’s own existence, and it drives people mad. How do you stop this doubt about existence? Only with extreme euphoria.

III. The Collapse of Belief

As I said earlier, as the economy develops, more and more people sink under the weight of life, and this causes enormous emptiness inside. At the same time, because classes have hardened, education is the only way up for the vast middle class, so education has become utilitarian, a tool for some people to make money, and students become empty before their time.

Extreme euphoria: I explained the meaning of “euphoria” above; now let us imagine the consequences of the “extreme”.

First, this is a deformed society. An oversized middle class has become the motor of economic growth, and at the same time it has created an obstacle to economic growth. And the obstacle to growth will leave more of the middle class choked off, leading to “clogged and blocked blood vessels”.

Looking back now at the golden decade of 1998–2008, we are amazed. China kept up super-high growth of more than 10% for ten years in a row, and some cities starting from a small base even doubled in a single year. Meanwhile America’s average GDP growth over the same period was under 5%, and even that was its highest growth rate since the war. But look at the last few years, especially since the 2008 financial crisis broke out and the state rolled out its massive stimulus: growth has gradually slowed and settled at 7%–8%⁴. What does this tell us? Not that state policy has stopped working, but that the people of the new era have grown slack.

“As we enter the new era, the principal contradiction in our society has become the contradiction between the people’s ever-growing need for a better life and unbalanced, inadequate development.” How incisive, it draws blood at the first prick! But how do you stop the bleeding? The “Four Comprehensives”? The “Three Represents”? “Xi Jinping’s socialism with Chinese characteristics”? Every act of using political means to forcibly fill the emptiness in people’s hearts is utterly absurd. It treats the symptoms, not the disease.

As I said before, the middle class has once again become an obstacle to economic growth. During the Anti-Rightist Campaign of the 1950s, the petty bourgeoisie was struck down, and everyone knows what came after: the Great Leap Forward, the people’s communes. Now another bewildered middle class has emerged. Those above squeeze them to live; those below oppose them to survive. So should the middle class just go and die?

I don’t know. Don’t ask me, because I’m middle class too.

A deformed society will deepen the unease in people’s hearts, and the people no longer have an ideological faith to resist it with, so they grow ever more afraid. This process is slow and takes generations to spread; but it is also fast, because once there are pessimistic parents, there will certainly be pessimistic children, and the growth will be exponential.

From economic crisis to political crisis, and then to riots: I cannot predict what will happen. But in the end, it all comes down to one thing: a crisis of faith.

IV. Dissolving “Extreme Euphoria”

Can the consequences above be avoided? I think it will be hard. But I think there are ways to make the consequences smaller.

Extreme euphoria is an escape from social life.

Extreme euphoria cannot be solved; it can only be “dissolved”. Note that the word I am using here is “dissolve”. And what does “dissolve” mean?

Anyone who has studied chemistry knows that a soluble substance can dissolve in water. And here, extreme euphoria is the soluble substance, and you yourself are the solution. Dissolving means the two becoming one.

Feel your heart carefully, and you will find a suffocating emptiness. It cannot be destroyed; it can only be dissolved into a part of yourself. But no one wants to admit this thing exists, so they use morality to coerce and law to constrain. This is only escape; it is a counterfeit. Any attempt to cover things up with counterfeits is foolish.

The Three-Body Problem has a premise: the Trisolarans have no language, and every thought between them is transparent. This is exactly Big Liu’s (Liu Cixin’s) longing for sincerity between people.

How do you dissolve extreme euphoria? Only by treating one another with a true heart, and keeping a heart that seeks the genuine.

If everyone had a true heart, there would be no individuals left in the world. You are me and I am you, the emptiness inside would naturally dissolve, and there would be no need to escape into extreme euphoria.

But this is only a utopia. That is why I say the consequences of “extreme euphoria” cannot be lessened or avoided. Humanity will only wake up after suffering a great crisis of faith. Only thought that stands upright in the ruins is philosophy.

I will spend my whole life thinking, endlessly calculating, endlessly searching. I will always hold on to the pursuit of utopia, and always chase this elusive, genuine thing.

I hope I can stay true to where I began.

Everything I write is what I think in my heart. It cannot see the light; it cannot be shown to anyone. But I know that if I don’t write it down, I will never get the chance to write it down.