Chinese appreciation for savage beatings was on stage again Friday night when World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) rolled through Shanghai for another series of smackdowns. Unfortunately, apart from standout performances by Daniel Bryan and John Cena, WWE appears to have backed off on the marketing push. Friday's event was untelevised, fine, but it was also short on pompous speechmaking and video support, so those in the nosebleeds had to invade the lower levels just to see.
It didn't seem too good to be true, because why wouldn't you believe that a little girl, she alone amongst dozens of passersby, would squat with her pretty umbrella to help an unconscious street cleaner in Guangzhou? And that a reporter would happen to be there to take a picture?
"Mr. Kim Jong Un! Channel 4 News, UK!” yelled the journalist at the back of Kim Jong Un’s head.
The Great Marshall stopped. He slowly turned and smiled, his visage a million shining suns. The room, which had been full of raucous cheers, came to a hush. In perfect English he replied, “Yes? How may I help you?”
Just kidding. That last part didn’t happen.
Aspiring American brodude outfit Day Above Ground finally got their big break on Thursday morning after cultural provocateur Angry Asian Man, comedian David So and several other influential media personalities shaped what was initially a locus of outrage in the Asian American community on Tuesday afternoon into a viral campaign and international news story.
It's 2.6 GB, but if you have the disk space and five hours to spare, go here to download Glorious Mission Online, a first-person shooter you'll be hearing a lot more about in the coming hours and days.
Please give a hearty Beijing Cream welcome to Beige Wind, an anthropology doctoral student who studies urban living, popular culture and the arts in the cities of Northwest China. He runs the website The Art of Life in Chinese Central Asia, and will swing by these parts periodically to enlighten us with stories from Xinjiang.
This is the third post in a multi-part series on Abdulla Abdurehim.
How many deep-rooted Asian stereotypes can you cram into a five-minute music video? Dozens if you’re the American boy band Day Above Ground, the Los Angelenos who galvanized the Asian American community on Tuesday afternoon after blogger and cultural critic Angry Asian Man blasted the video for their song “Asian Girlz” in a scathing post.
While we’d love to offer a frame-by-frame analysis of everything questionable about the most racist music video we’ve ever seen, doing so would give us ebola. Our shortlist, however, includes:
