Just how crazy can the Chinese media react to seeing a beautiful girl?
A young woman was caught taking off her coat behind US President Barack Obama during his town hall meeting in Shanghai early November.
I would not be naming her anymore as her name and photos are all over the internet now. And well, I am sure this blog would merit her more unwarranted attention.
But really, I find it weird how the press would just be entranced by her presence.
Anyone care to share their analysis on this topic? This is really one of the more distorted things I have noticed in Chinese broadsheets.
Some off-the-wall, “weird” news” keep popping up in the papers. Does this confirm what I read about the Chinese media lacking in “in-depth” news due to them being politically sensitive?
It’s quite entertaining though.
“I don’t want to be popular this way.” [from her blog]
Ummm…yeah.
Fauna @ chinaSMACK put it well:
Emphasis mine and, of course, it’s not always true but it’s definitely often true.
In general, it wasn’t necessarily the Chinese media that was “entranced” by this whole Wang Zifei incident. We know one cameraman obviously was, taking so many shots of her, but the reason this blew up was when those photos were uploaded and Chinese netizens became entranced. Once that happened, the media took notice of this new “internet phenomenon” and reported on it. This snowballs into even more internet brouhaha which led to Chinahush and chinaSMACK reporting on it. In fact, the HuffPo post was built off Key’s translation and posts…but at least they linked to him, which is better than the AP and other major news outlets.
What began as one person’s voyeurism led to a netizen sensation, which then became a domestic media story that was then translated for foreigners and then finally co-opted by Western news agencies. Way to go voyeurs, young Chinese men, and bridge-bloggers!
Yeah, the question should be “Just how crazy can the foreign media react to the Sinophile blogosphere reacting to Chinese netizens reacting to a photographer reacting to a beautiful girl?”
Like articles on the Iphone in China, I continue to wish for this story to die (and hope that BO’s town hall had some other deeper impact on the broader Chinese audience than this…)
It would rather be “China-related English Media Entranced By Beautiful Girl in Red And Black”. Seriously, there are “pretty girl” posts popping up on Chinese Internet everyday like this one. Yes, few Chinese media (I mean traditional ones excluding blogs and forums) reported this incident but were they “entranced”? Not likely based on my reading. Then the question is, why were China-related English Media Entranced? or were they?
Can’t really explain… but the woman’s good look and red dress stand out among the crowd.
Something to consider when talking about the English Translations of Chinese Content – the incident with the Daily Mainchi in Japan a couple of years ago. Japanese readers that understood English were horrorified to see what content was posted in the “Wai-Wai” section of the online version of the Daily Mainichi. That led to a major amount of “loss of face”, apologies, and a round of firing.
As it stands right now – folks like Fauna and Roland are bypassing that tricky widget by publishing the content on their websites – but I would not be surprised to see P.R. Chinese papers start to cut down on their online, and even paper, reporting once more complaints start coming in from the P.R. Chinese consulates and embassies around the English speaking world.
I’m not sure I understand. Are you suggesting that Chinese news agencies will start limiting potentially quirky English news items on their websites/newspapers when Chinese people who understand English start complaining to their respective consulates and embassies that such news content embarrasses China?
The thing with Roland and Fauna is that they’re translating original Chinese content into English, and that content isn’t necessarily produced by the Chinese mainstream news media. They and their websites are more on the OUTSIDE of the system than inside it. I’m not sure what “tricky widget” they’re bypassing…but again, I’m not entirely sure I understand your comment overall.
Actually, what I am suggesting that in the coming months that folks like Fauna and Roland are going to have a more difficult time of it finding source material from P.R. Chinese Language Newspapers (in actual newsprint or posted online). As with the “Wai-Wai” incident in Japan – there is a matter of vested, traditional media institutions in P.R. China that does not want to “lose face” (or worse, deal with questions from Beijing) if it is shown that they did not pay attention to what they were allowing to distributed.
Mind you, there is still the bloggers/online sites – but in light of the crackdowns by the politburo on “porno” – methinks those sources will be drying up as well.
Let’s face it, how many countries in the world allow a large and vibrant “tabloid” press for the rest of the world to see?
Thanks for the clarification. I don’t think Roland or Fauna are going to have problems finding source material, though, since I don’t think they depend heavily on Chinese newspapers or even the newspapers’ online versions. Much of their stuff are translations of private netizen posted content on discussion forums, stuff that doesn’t always pass through the official news agencies. In fact, that’s pretty much one of the charms of their websites, that they have so much content that ISN’T part of or sourced from the official mainstream media.
I actually don’t think China officially allows a large and vibrant tabloid press for the world to see. I find most of the mainstream news that is made available in English to be pretty blah. All the tabloidy stuff is actually in Chinese, which the government doesn’t worry too much about because the language itself makes it inaccessible to much of the rest of the world. As successful as Fauna and Roland are, their websites really aren’t THAT big as to be embarrassing China in any significant way. I don’t think the government is worrying about censoring everything in order to prevent people like Fauna and Roland from translating them into English for the rest of the world to see.
Cheers.
True, Fauna and Roland are only “dipping their toes” into the big and deep waterhole that is the Chinese Language media (official, private, tabloid, etc.). However, like any good local place that the locals do not want too many tourists becoming aware of, and eventually “ruining” – the locals will do things to discourage the tourists – like taking down the directions to the waterhole – i.e. http://www.danwei.org/net_nanny_follies/yeeyancom_stops_publishing_and.php
One more thing I should clarify – the question of “porno” in terms of the powers to be in Beijing appears to be, in my mind, those elements that bring disharmony to the P.R. Chinese public. To that end, I included the P.R Chinese newspapers and magazines – in which stories of corruption and heinous activities – i.e. the Guangdong/Xin Jiang Race Riots – have begun to snap back (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/09/editor-chinese-magazine-resigns)
Here is the story that I found at Wuhan Morning News:
http://www.zonaeuropa.com/200912a.brief.htm#009
I don’t know whether to believe this news report either, because why should a Shanghai story be covered from Wuhan?
But the original story was really suspect to begin with, because all the details were too finely done.
We will know in time what Ms. Wang’s plans are, won’t we?