In the West, many countries have nobility and care deeply about noble lineage. So on HelloTalk, an African guy asked me, "Are there no nobles in China anymore?" It seems that Chinese people don't care much about their ancestry.
I told him that in China there's no concept of pure noble lineage. Many emperors in ancient China didn't start as nobles — they rose from common origins. As an old Chinese saying goes, "Are kings, dukes, generals, and ministers born into their positions?"
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