It's a common foreign prejudice that someone with a Chinese face, resident in China, must have a more information, and more accurate information, than outsiders. But even the Chinese have sayings about the opposite being true, and they are themselves hampered by the limited single-point-of-view education that is forced upon them. travelinmanS has it just right.

Indeed it's often said by foreign teachers in China that those who missed out on middle school see things much more clearly than those who've been through the propaganda mill.

I never bring up politics in China and for the same reasons mentioned by others, but I do find that in many cases Chinese (on trains, in taxis, on buses) bring it up with me after a little chat about other things. I've found several times of late they've heard that legal systems are fairer overseas, and want to ask about that. On being assured that while they have their problems legal systems in developed nations are generally fairer, they sometimes fall back on, "Oh well, we have more culture than you do." And that's a bit of a conversation stopper, unless, like Moondog, I'm in a bad mood.

It's rarely profitable to talk about politics, but in general it's just better to let others bring up politics than bringing it up yourself. And in general it's better to let the other party be critical before making any comparisons in which China comes out unfavourably. Remember that it's little more than 20 years ago or so that talking to foreigners was still a dangerous thing to do, and let the person you're speaking to decide on their comfort level. But very few who speak frankly, and who turn to the topic first, have anything good to say about the Party, and the proposition that the Party couldn't care less about the laobaixing (ordinary people) almost never meets dissent.

People will often ask how you know so much. And if they put forward a proposition about modern Chinese history ("Tibet has always been an inalienable part of the motherland"), which you then counter with a different proposition, may observe that your sources are no more to be trusted than you say their own are. There's nowhere really to go with that, except to point out that you have access to every point of view on the issue, including theirs, whereas they have access to none except that provided by the government, and let them draw their own conclusions from that.

But beware those who buttonhole you while there's some hot issue around, as they are often only interested in bludgeoning you with their own ignorance and prejudice, and not in having any kind of real exchange at all. There's certainly no shyness about talking politics in these cases. Being in China at the time of the US bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade was certainly entertaining, for instance. The response ranged from someone shouting "Sha! Sha!" (Kill! Kill!), to another stopping me in the street to shout "F*** you NATO," to yet another shouting, "Beiyue pengyou, ni hao?" (Hello, NATO friend!) and giggling. But several rather saner exchanges took place as part of casual conversations with others, and certainly friends wanted to know what the foreign opinion on it all was.

Peter N-H