Chapter 772 Official Mouthpiece
However, the tableware on Li Nai's table was not all replaced by Haihan glass products like some of the nouveau riche in Guangdong, but blue and white porcelain produced in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi Province that is commonly available on the market. This is to some extent influenced by the Haihan people, because the favorite tableware of the Haihan people who pay attention to the quality of life is blue and white porcelain, especially the ones produced in the Yongle, Xuande, and Chenghua years, and they must be produced by official kilns.
Li Nai didn't quite understand why these Haihan people, who often criticized the various shortcomings of the Ming Dynasty, were particularly fond of blue and white porcelain whose use value was far less than that of Haihan glassware. However, he could tell that the Haihan people had a great interest in researching porcelain, because Ning Qi and Tao Donglai had discussed with him more than once the shape, decoration, glaze, style and other aspects of Ming porcelain, classifying them into different categories. The level of detail is enough to write a book, and their understanding of porcelain must be far better than that of most Ming people.
Since the Haihan people insisted that blue and white porcelain was a good thing, Li Nai, who had always believed in the Haihan people's vision, followed suit and listed blue and white porcelain as his first choice. The creamy white porcelain paired with the shiny silver knives and forks seemed to Li Nai to have the "powerful style" claimed by the Haihan people, and the beef in his mouth seemed to be more delicious because of it. .
After dinner, Li Nai returned to the study on the second floor. The servant had put nearly half a month's worth of newspapers on the desk for him to browse. Although Li Nai rarely comes to Sanya now, he still asks his servants to buy two copies of each issue of local newspapers and publications, one to stay at his house in Sanya, and one to be sent back to Guangzhou by ship. Ning Qi once called newspapers "the mouthpiece of the Executive Committee," and Li Naike always kept these words in mind. From the content published in these newspapers, Haihan's new trends and future plans can often be interpreted. Li Nai was able to accurately guess Haihan's plan to colonize the island of Taiwan. Part of the information came from his interpretation of the news content disclosed by Haihan's official media.
There are currently two official newspapers published by Haihan. One is the "Haihan Reference" published for specific targets such as Haihan management, naturalized cadres, and external partners. The content is mainly about the laws and regulations recently issued by the government. , development plans, economic policies and other aspects of news, which is what Ning Qi calls the official mouthpiece. "Haihan Reference" is published for half a month, on the first and fifteenth day of each month. It is not publicly available on the market and is only delivered to pre-order users. Of course, ordinary people will definitely not spend five yuan a month to subscribe to this kind of official newspaper. What they will be interested in is another newspaper sold to the general public.
"Haihan Express" is published every ten days, and each issue is priced at only 2 cents. The unit price is more than ten times cheaper than "Haihan Reference", and people with income can afford it. The content of "Express" is mainly about various folk gossips and interesting things about the mountains and wild places, plus many promotional advertisements. The reason why the newspaper's distribution price is so cheap is mostly because the various advertisements published on it dilute the distribution costs. Even illiterate farmers and laborers will go to the teahouse after work on the day when the "Express" is published, spend a few cents to buy a cup of the cheapest oolong tea, and listen to the newspaper reader resident in the teahouse read out the contents of the newspaper. .
Both newspapers are organized, edited and published by the Haihan Propaganda Department, but each has its own targeted distribution target and readership group, so the market competition is not fierce. However, people like Li Nai who have spare money are usually willing to pay a few extra bucks to subscribe to two newspapers together. In addition to studying official policies, they also look at various trends among Haihan people.
Li Nai followed his own habit and picked up the latest issue of "Haihan Reference" first, which was published seven days ago. However, when this issue of the newspaper arrived in Guangzhou, he was probably already on his way south, so he happened to not see it. The headline news on the front page is "Penghu immigrants enthusiastically join the army and train hard to advance on land and sea." Li Nai briefly read the content. It tells the story of the new immigrants from the north who arrived at the immigration base in Penghu. Many young and strong men wanted to repay the sea and land. Thanks to Han's life-saving grace, he chose to sign up to join the militia. There were militia, navy and army stationed in the local area, so each of them recruited a part of the recruits for training.
The article neither states a clear number of recruits nor the specific content of the training. It is basically official writing, superficial and does not highlight the key points. After reading it, most people will probably only receive some information that is of little use, such as that northern immigrants are moving into Penghu, that there are militia troops stationed there, etc.
But Li Nai noticed two pieces of information hidden in the article. First, the scale of immigrants from the north is estimated to be quite large. If it is just a small effort to recruit dozens of soldiers, the weight of this kind of news is definitely not enough. It made the front page of the official media; secondly, the local garrison trained new recruits on the spot instead of sending them back to the militia military training base in Victory Port for training. This shows that the local garrison has great authority, or there is a relatively large manpower gap that needs to be dispatched as soon as possible. To fill in, Li Nai personally thinks it may be the latter situation - if the Haihan people want to colonize Taiwan, they naturally need to allocate part of their troops to garrison the new colonial point. If they can mobilize troops nearby, it will obviously be more efficient than mobilizing troops all the way from Sanya. Convenient and hassle-free.
Under this press release, there was also a short commentator's article signed "Tianshan Strange Stones". Li Nai knew that this was Ning Qi's pen name in the official media, so he continued to read it. The article mainly talks about the important role played by the Haihan immigration policy in saving refugees from the Ming Dynasty war. While cheering for the benevolent actions of the Haihan Executive Committee, it also expressed concern about the current situation of continuous wars at home and abroad in the Ming Dynasty.
Li Nai noticed that the author mentioned at the end that "the current predicament that the Ming Dynasty is encountering is not just the result of simultaneous chaos caused by external enemies and internal troubles. It is actually a natural malady of the current political system, and there is no cure. Although Haihan's assistance can alleviate its temporary pain , but the root cause of the disease cannot be cured. The end of the chaos in the north cannot be foreseen. The paradise of the world can only be found under the rule of Haihan."
The comment in this article can be described as "treason and unethical". However, with Haihan's influence in the south today, even if he were ten times more treasonous and unethical, the government would just ignore it. The Haihan people have managed Hainan Island into a state within a state. Can the high officials in Fuzhou and Guangzhou really not see this? Of course not, everyone turned a blind eye to this, because everyone knew that Daming's brand name could no longer shake Haihan, and if he rashly provoked Haihan, he would make himself embarrassed. And in today's official circles of Fuzhou and Guangzhou, how many people in official uniforms dare to swear that they have no interest at all with Haihan? To offend the Haihan people is to be at odds with yourself, your money, and your colleagues around you. Who would be willing to do such a thing?
Only the Haihan people dared to promote such anti-Ming rhetoric so blatantly. If they had changed places and roles, they would have been convicted and thrown into prison long ago. Li Nai was already used to this. After all, Ning Qi was the person who said, "The Ming Dynasty is more than three hundred years behind Haihan." He also published similar arguments more than once in the "Haihan Reference" published in the past. Article, for him to write an article praising the Ming Dynasty, it is probably more difficult than reaching the sky.
Li Nai continued to look through the contents of other pages, but there was no other big news. What occupied the most space was the news that the latest Haihan grassroots cadre training course had successfully completed. This press release not only lists the list of students who participated in the training class and their affiliations, but also contains congratulatory messages from many Haihan institutions, collaborating units and partners. The list of congratulations in the newspaper is several times longer than the list of students. This scene is also breathtaking. Of course, Li Nai quickly found the name of his own firm in the list below, and it ranked first in the list of partners, the second was "Qiong Lianfa", and the third was the Fujian Chamber of Commerce, which shows that "Fujian Chamber of Commerce" Ruifeng” has a special status.
However, what Li Nai is more concerned about is not the ranking of this list, but the changes in Haihan society reflected by this incident. People outside may not know very well what the "Haihan grassroots cadres" are, but Li Nai knows the secrets. Haihan relied on the bureaucratic team he cultivated to gradually eclipse the local Ming government in the areas under his control. These Haihan grassroots cadres also gradually replaced the land, Baojia, taxes, etc. that were originally responsible for the government. Public security, health and other functions reorganized the Haihan-style social structure. Li Nai couldn't actually tell what advantages the Haihan people had over the Ming dynasty in the bureaucracy, but it was clear that the Haihan official institutions operated much more efficiently, such as paving roads and bridges, constructing water conservancy projects, and reclaiming wasteland. In terms of affairs, the Haihan people often completed the work in a short time that the local government of the Ming Dynasty took one or two years to complete. The grassroots cadres trained by Haihan are certainly not as culturally superior to the Ming Dynasty officials who were scholars, but their practical operations and ability to handle affairs are much better.
Li Nai sighed, hastily flipped through the rest of the pages, then put the "Haihan Reference" aside and picked up the "Haihan Express". Perhaps because of the price, the paper quality and printing quality of "Express" are slightly lower than "Reference", but the layout is more compact. After all, a lot of space is used to place various advertisements, and every inch It's all money on paper.
Of course, because this newspaper targets a different readership, the style of articles it publishes is also very different from that of Reference. For example, the headline article on the front page of this issue is very sensational: When will the trend of new immigrants forming gangs stop?
Li Nai read the content of the article, and the general idea was that due to the rapid increase in the immigrant population in recent years, the current population structure of Hainan Island has become increasingly complex, and a large number of new immigrants from other places are accustomed to staying together for warmth, and some even want to stay together for a while. For the interests of the group, they are unwilling to submit to the management of the civil affairs department and accept unified resettlement and distribution. There are also some who try to violently resist the law.
The article cites an example. A group of immigrants from the north of the Ming Dynasty who were assigned to Lingshui County last month had a dispute with the local Li village over water sources, and later injured a civil affairs cadre who went to mediate. The process is written vividly, and it is quite picturesque to read. Of course, the perpetrators also paid a heavy price. A total of 36 people from 17 households were involved, and all of them were sentenced to hard labor with varying prison terms. The person who took the lead in making trouble was directly sentenced to ten years. With the conditions of the hard labor camp, he probably would not be able to come out alive.
The article analyzes the multiple reasons for this situation based on regional and cultural differences. However, in the end, the article changes its tone and believes that the root cause is still the lack of education of new immigrants. It may be a little late to teach these adults, but at least it is still possible. It’s too late to teach children to obey the law. If children do not go to school and learn the rules they should abide by, they will most likely end up breaking the law and being sent to hard labor camps when they grow up.
Combined with the report just read in "Reference" that the executive committee decided to increase the popularity of Dahai education institutions, Li Nai believes that this article should use the civil conflict as an example of official education policy changes, so that the public can Be better prepared to accept this change.
Although Haihan's educational institutions have various policy preferences for naturalized people, there are still many new immigrants who firmly believe that "study is useless" and hope that their children can engage in jobs within their capabilities as early as possible to earn money to support their families. In the past two years, Haihan has been working hard to build a new school academy and hired many scholars to provide basic literacy education to school-age children. In order to further increase the education rate among naturalized citizens, the Haihan Executive Committee has prepared to introduce a semi-compulsory education system, that is, school-age children must enter school. If parents do not cooperate or obstruct, then measures may be taken Some semi-coercive measures are taken, such as temporarily canceling the parents' custody rights. In serious cases, they may even be sentenced to prison for this.
Although the writing style of this report is quite gossipy, Li Nai still believes that this is also a propaganda method. The Haihan people need to use this to make the naturalized people with low education level aware of the urgency and necessity of their children's enrollment in school, and at the same time also By the way, I will follow the troubles caused by the new immigrants to publicize the importance of obeying the law and obeying the arrangements, so as to deter those new immigrants who have some unrealistic ideas.
The article deliberately did not make a judgment on the right or wrong of this case. Li Nai can roughly imagine the heated discussion this article will arouse among the people. After all, the conflicts between old and new immigrants are actually a commonplace issue, and Baotuan is a common issue. It is unlikely that this phenomenon will be completely banned. But no matter how people discuss it, supporting reading will probably be the common opinion of most people. After all, in the areas under the rule of Haihan, people who can read and write have a great chance of getting ahead, unlike the Ming Dynasty where they had to obtain a certain degree of fame. Only then can you get the opportunity to become an official.
If it weren't for his sensitive identity, Li Nai would have already thought of joining Haihan as a cadre. Even if he couldn't become a local official, he thought it would be okay for him to assist Schneider in managing several trading houses.
(End of chapter)