Republics of hurt feelings, and how to read the Global Times

Welcome to today’s The India China Newsletter, coming to you at a later than usual hour (it’s been one of those days).

The singer Rihanna and South Korean YouTube star ‘Hamzy’ may not have much in common. Except they have, in the past few days, become the targets of ire in the world's two most populous countries.

The Guardian reports:

The pop singer Rihanna has provoked the ire of the Indian government after wading into the debate over protests by farmers in the country, just as heavy police security and “war-like” barricades continue to be built up at demonstration sites around Delhi.

This week authorities began cracking down on the hundreds of thousands of farmers camped out on the Delhi border since November. Police embarked on a heavy fortification of three camps in Ghazipur, Tikri and Singhu, erecting layers of concrete barriers, digging trenches, putting up barbed-wire fences and cementing iron nails in the roads, in effect cutting off entry and exit to the sites.

Greta Thunberg, the climate activist, is also in hot water after sharing a 'toolkit' related to the protests. From The Hindu:

The Delhi Police cyber cell has registered an FIR to investigate an "international conspiracy" to defame the country, a senior police officer said on Thursday. e said that they have registered an FIR after a Twitter handle had shared a "toolkit" but deleted it later. No names have been mentioned in the FIR, the officer said.

In China, meanwhile, Hamzy waded into a row over kimchi (yes, you read that right):

A South Korean internet star who live-streams herself binge-eating various foods – a phenomenon known as mukbang – is in hot water amid an online dispute over whether kimchi is Korean or Chinese. The YouTuber, who goes by the name Hamzy, found herself caught in the crossfire of this cultural clash when she added a thumbs-up emoji to comments online about China claiming Korean kimchi, a fermented cabbage dish, as its own.

Chinese internet users said she had insulted China by showing her approval for what were seen as anti-China comments. Shanghai-based company Suxian Advertising, which runs Hamzy’s video accounts and online shop in China, was quoted as saying it planned to terminate its contract with her, shut down her online shop on Taobao, an e-commerce portal, and delete her videos.

“We are firmly against any action that insults China and do not allow any foreign bloggers we signed contracts with to have any attitude or comments that insult China,” Suxian was quoted as saying in an online notice.

The criticism of Hamzy followed a social media storm over popular Chinese vlogger Li Ziqi’s use of the hashtags #ChineseFood and #ChineseCuisine in a YouTube video of her preparing a meal that included pickled vegetables made using a method similar to that for kimchi.

It isn’t only social media outrage. India’s Ministry of External Affairs had this to say about Rihanna’s tweet (well there’s a sentence I never thought I’d write), via Indian Express:

Slamming foreign individuals and entities for comments on the ongoing farmer protests, the Ministry of External Affairs Wednesday said it is “unfortunate to see vested interest groups trying to enforce their agenda on these protests, and derail them.”

In a detailed statement, the MEA said that the Parliament of India only after a “full debate and discussion” had passed reformist legislation relating to the agricultural sector.

Defending the three contentious farm laws, the MEA said the reforms intend to give expanded market access and provide greater flexibility to farmers. “They also pave the way for economically and ecologically sustainable farming,” the MEA statement read.

This MEA statement took me back to Foreign Ministry briefings in Beijing where I’d hear the spokesperson of the day weighing in on the latest controversy involving some usually Western celebrity, who had said something or had wittingly or unwittingly posed for a photo with the Dalai Lama, and hence “hurt the feelings of the Chinese people”.

Indian historian Ramachandra Guha had this to say:

Before yesterday, I barely knew who Rihanna was. Nor, I suspect, did our Home Minister or our Foreign Minister. But once they did, they acted as if all they wanted was for her one hundred million Twitter followers to be annulled by one hundred million Twitter followers of Indian celebrities taken together. Film stars and sportspersons were thus falling over each other to promote the government line, often using the same words and same hashtags on Twitter.

That last sentence jumped out at me, as it sounded familiar to what you may come across in China. If there was a Premier League of easily offended states, China may probably be at the top of the table (here is a not very short list of actors who have angered China) but India is perhaps not very far behind (and closing the gap quite quickly) with plummeting thresholds, in both countries, for what ‘outsiders’ may have to say.

David Bandurski has an interesting piece on the history of ‘hurt feelings’ in China, and the role of the state in often deciding when the public is ‘hurt’:

Far from being the product of some generalised Chinese cultural context, the “hurt feelings” phrase first emerged in 1959 in the pages of the Chinese Communist Party’s flagship newspaper, the People’s Daily. The phrase was regularised after 1978, becoming a permanent feature of the Party’s political discourse. Its proper “native” context, therefore, is the political culture of mainland China.

Power is the deeper question at the root of these “feelings.” And the people, the abstracted renmin (人民), are upset when the Chinese Communist Party wills it.

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Yang Liu and Jiafei Lu have an interesting read on facts and myths about the Global Times, which I recommend reading in full in the Beijing Channel newsletter:

Once asked whether his paper’s editorials can be interpreted as the CPC’s official voice, Hu [Xijin, the editor-in-chief] gave quite an honest answer.

“It’s hard to give a simple answer to this question. I’m appointed by the Communist Party, so it can influence me. My tone is in line with the Communist Party. I will never turn against the party,” he said, admitting that his paper has “more freedom of reportage” as a market-driven news outlet.

“We say these words, and the officials probably think the same, but turning them into policies is another thing. Sometimes there’s a big gap between an idea and a policy. Some ideas might never be turned into policies. Not to mention that I don’t dare to say my ideas are always the same as that of officials,” he elaborated then.

To your host, Hu’s wording seem to suggest a crucial message, that is whatever written in his editorials are NOT top-down directives from any specific gov’t agency, especially given his high-volume production on a daily if not hourly basis - it is nearly impossible for some “visible hand” to dictate, review or approve his messages as part of some 24/7 non-stop "window guidance." Rather, that's his understanding of what the government is most likely thinking. That said, given Hu’s experience and insights, his analysis is as good as any that is available on the market.

Comment: A couple of readers have asked me why I inevitably link to a Global Times piece in my newsletters and isn’t it just noise that should be ignored? I’d borrow a phrase from Hu Xijin in the above extract that it’s hard to give a simple answer.

I have a complicated view on Global Times. I’d broadly agree with the above description that whatever the paper has may not necessarily be a top-down directive. But of course whatever it says is tolerated for a good reason. The paper may not reflect policy, but I’d say it reflects a sentiment that can’t be ignored, and increasingly so.

There’s no doubt lots in GT English that’s just clickbait for Western and Indian audiences (I hear India is one of their target markets which is why there’s so much on GT English on India, and less on in GT Chinese) but I particularly pay attention to the pieces that appear in both editions. It’s important to know what the paper is telling its not insignificant domestic audience and as journalists we can’t ignore it.

A final word: increasingly, as the piece above notes, some of Hu’s tweets and GT’s articles have broken stories ahead of the ‘official’ media in China (by official, I refer to Xinhua or CCTV, which are more authoritative than GT) so it’s fairly clear Hu has his finger on the pulse. I probably had a different view 8 or 10 years ago when there was often a glaring gap between what GT advocated and the actual policy, but the fact that the gap has narrowed, in my view at least, and that the line GT often advocates has become so much more mainstream, is something to think about. In a way, Hu Xijin has been ahead of the curve. I mean, he is, in some sense, the Original Wolf Warrior.

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India's air chief  RKS Bhadauria says China brought in the J-20s amid the stand-off soon as India brought in its new Rafales:

He said that the Indian Air Force(IAF) is fully prepared to face any situation along the Line of Actual Control(LAC) with China amid the standoff at the border"They had brought their J-20 fighter aircraft to areas close to eastern Ladakh," adding,"The moment Indian Rafales were brought in, their J-20 was there."

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And finally…

UK regulators have pulled the broadcasting license for China Global Television Network, or CGTN, the State-run English language news channel:

Media regulator Ofcom said Thursday that it had withdrawn the Chinese state-owned channel's license after an investigation "concluded that the license is wrongfully held by Star China Media Limited."

Ofcom said that Star China Media Limited did not have "editorial responsibility" for the channel's output, and therefore "does not meet the legal requirement of having control over the licensed service." Star was acting as the distributor, rather than the provider of the news channel, it added.

The regulators also rejected a proposal by CGTN to transfer the license to a new entity after finding that it would ultimately still be controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, and therefore disqualified under UK law.

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Thank you for reading!