Unequal treaties

Now, the Opium War, that was also there.

The Boxer Rebellion, the Unequal Treaties.

If you grew up Chinese in the early 20th century and you cared about your country, you had every reason in this period to be very furious.

Now, Mao was furious.

But what if it's not? People often talk of the alleged agreement as a poor decision on our part.

But agreements are far easier to sign with a hand on your throat.

If you've got a sharp stick and the others have a laser rifle, do you ever really say no to the deal? Here's another one for you.

What if we were told we've been reset before? There are, after all, tales of the flood and of cataclysms throughout the ages.

On the twenty-ninth of August, eighteen forty-two, at the end of the First Opium War, Chinese officials signed the Treaty of Nanking.

They signed it aboard a British warship, anchored in their own river.

China would later call it, and agreements like it, the Unequal Treaties.

Both sides put their name to the paper, but in reality only one of them had a choice.

Madame Butterfly is historically plausible.

Japan had been forcibly reopened to the outside world due to U.S. gunboat diplomacy in the 1850s, and after the Unequal Treaty subsequently forced on Japan by outside powers, Nagasaki became a treaty port.

Thus, there were a lot of American sailors hanging around.

I've seen some articles that say temporary marriages like the one portrayed in the opera were indeed a thing, but I've found others that cast doubt on this, so perhaps that bit is apocryphal.