“To mark the No Bra Day, volunteers call the public to pay attention to the breast health in Chengdu, southwest China’s Sichuan province on July 9, 2015. Research indicates that wearing bra may increase the risks of getting breast cancer for a woman.”

Has @PDChina lost its mind? ‘Research indicates that wearing bra may increase the risks of getting breast cancer’ http://t.co/lA8ctuOagI

— Felicia Sonmez (@feliciasonmez) July 10, 2015

People’s Daily deserves not our scorn but our patience and understanding. I make the comparison with autism with absolutely no intention of being insulting to autistic people or their family and friends, and please accept my apologies if this still sounds offensive. But maybe the proper response to People’s Daily — which has underdeveloped communication skills (despite being the official mouthpiece of the government), difficulty grasping abstract concepts, and fantasies that are simply untenable in the real world — should be with tolerance, composure, and encouragement?

Via SCMP:

The Communist Party mouthpiece People’s Daily has been waging a war on the direct use of non-Chinese words such as “iPhone” and “Wi-fi” in the Chinese language. The paper has published two editorials in the past week, claiming that “mingling foreign words in Chinese has damaged the Chinese language’s purity and undermined communication”.

Perhaps we should not, due to PD’s autism, compare it to an animal. They might attack the New York Times, the Relevant Organs, Sina, porn, The Big Bang Theory, the English language, and everything enjoyable in the world, but they’re not so different from you and I. Like us, they are trying to form patterns out of and stitch sense into this weird and wondrous thing called life. They’re trying, damn it. We should meet them halfway.

The concerns come at a time when popular English terms and expressions have become more commonly used in the daily life of the Chinese than ever, as they embrace western cultural products such as Hollywood blockbusters and British TV dramas like Downton Abbey and Sherlock.

Nod.

The articles question why the Chinese language had to include English abbreviations while similar terms borrowed from other languages, for example “kung fu”, are always translated into English letters in English-speaking nations.

I like kung fu. You like kung fu. You’re not so bad, People’s Daily. We’re going to survive.

Beijing’s call to ban foreign words in Chinese media meets with mocking satire (SCMP)

People’s Daily has had an eventful week. Last Monday it called the New York Times “circling vultures” for an article on Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370; on Friday it sought “immediate rectification” from a parody Twitter account, @relevantorgans; then, somehow, it got a guest editorial out of Bill Gates. But PD truly tops itself with this next thing, because these are words that someone actually wrote. Via Reuters:

“While ordinary people and governments have enjoyed the conveniences brought by the Internet, they have also in turn experienced the Internet’s negative effects and hidden security dangers…”

Wait, okay, let me just get this in before we really hit the truly gonzo part. “Hidden security dangers,” says the paper of a government that hacks everyone, and digitally spies on governments, foreign correspondents, and its own citizens. (Does that cover “everyone,” basically?)

“If you don’t have Internet order, how can you have Internet freedom?”

If you don’t have Internet order, how can you have Internet freedom.

There are many sites that are dedicated to Internet freedom, but strangely, none within China. GreatFire.org and Free Weibo can serve as wonderful watchdogs on Chinese Internet freedom, except they face one huge obstacle: the Chinese government. Reporters Without Borders called China one of 12 “enemies of the Internet”; the report was purposefully sensationalistic, but its premise is basically correct: when it comes to Internet freedom, China gives zero shits.

There will never be freedom — nor should there be, People’s Daily is saying. It’s order that should take primacy: here’s China launching yet another anti-porn campaign, like pulling weeds out of a prairie; here they are bullying Sina into apologizing twice because it needs corporations to shoulder the dirty burden of censorship; and look, here they are pulling foreign TV shows because while they like money, they’d much rather have control.

If you think People’s Daily really cares about porn though — the lurid objectification of bodies to stimulate sexual arousal — check out what’s on its “related links”:

People’s Daily, everyone: crusader of social conservatism and lawful order.

Continuing with Reuters:

“Anyone enjoying and exercising their Internet rights and freedoms must not harm the public interest and cannot violate laws and regulations and public ethics.”

Between a) public interest, b) laws and regulations, and c) public ethics, which do you think People’s Daily considers most important? Public interest, like porn? Public ethics, like fighting for the powerless? (Hmm.) Or… that other one?

Yeah. That’s what I thought.

China party mouthpiece says no Internet freedom without order, as U.S. TV shows pulled (Reuters)

People’s Daily, the gift that keeps on giving, did a most glorious thing at 1:39 am today by “publicly condemn[ing]” a parody Twitter account, The Relevant Organs. “We have noticed that a Twitter account has been misleading people by stealing People’s Daily ‘s web address and National emblem of China to make false impression that the account is related to China officials or People’s Daily,” reads PD’s tweeted statement. “We hereby solemnly declare that this Twitter account is not related to or does not have connection with any Chinese official bodies, including People’s Daily.”

The Relevant Organs has been around since 2010 and literally no one thinks it’s related to “China officials or People’s Daily.” If English-language Twitter users were only as clueless as People’s Daily editors about satire, maybe that notice would have been necessary. As is – holy hayrick of cowdung, PD. (Is this a savvy play for more Twitter followers?) The China Girls blog has a small roundup of reactions from the Twittersphere, e.g., “oh my goodness i’m dying of laughter.” We’ve tracked some more reactions in the Storify below.

The best part is PD uses language parodied by its satirists. Note that The Relevant Organs’s Twitter tagline is, “China’s soft-power vanguard, rectifying your thought since 2010.” Here’s PD:

People’s Daily publicly condemns such theft and forgery conduct and demands the user of this account to make immediate rectification.

First of all, it’s users. Second…. PD is a bit out of its jurisdiction, isn’t it? In any case, it doesn’t look like The Relevant Organs is listening:

Investigating unauthorized @PDChina account. Initial data indicates 2,000 followers since May 2011.

— The Relevant Organs (@relevantorgans) April 25, 2014

We have over 5,000 years of history and 1.3 billion followers once you get rid of a bunch of girls. Which news source would YOU trust?

— The Relevant Organs (@relevantorgans) April 25, 2014

Smoking gun: So-called @pdchina “caught” us a year after our retirement. Much too fast for a real Party news organ. Rookie move, comrades.

— The Relevant Organs (@relevantorgans) April 25, 2014

Here’s PD’s full statement:

On April 14, New York Times reporters Kirk Semple and Eric Schmitt published an article titled “China’s Actions in Hunt for Jet Are Seen as Hurting as Much as Helping” that quoted two government officials — one from the US and one from Malaysia, both unnamed — who said China has not, to put it nicely, contributed much to the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370. It was a disturbing piece, not least because it seemed to signal the search may have entered a new phase in which the frustrations and difficulties of finding the missing jet could spill into finger-pointing and politics.

No one was doubting that the Chinese had the best intentions in mind, but the truth — an unfortunate one that no one seems able to deny — is that they lacked the expertise and technology to help. (So did other countries, of course, like Malaysia, so its government official’s quote — “‘Really helpful, aren’t they?’ he said sarcastically” – seems diplomatically tone-deaf.) The New York Times article wasn’t exactly groundbreaking, but there was nothing offensive about it. Notably, the journalists did their due diligence:

• China’s foreign ministry was given a chance to comment but chose not to.
• Balance:
  

  “The scope, scale and expense of Chinese operations exceeds anything that China has undertaken to date,” said Jonathan D. Pollack, senior fellow in foreign policy at the Brookings Institution. “The Chinese are at least as intent on achieving definitive results as anyone else.”

  “It’s possible that this has led some Chinese personnel to reach premature judgments based on limited or inconclusive observations,” Mr. Pollack said. “But this hardly seems unique to China.”

• And most importantly: high-level officials in national governments apparently felt the need to speak publicly about China’s involvement. That makes the story newsworthy.

Not everyone agrees — namely, People’s Daily, the official paper of the Chinese Communist Party. It decided the Times were guilty of exploiting the tragedy to “launch a few cheap shots at China,” as it wrote this morning in a piece called “People’s Daily Journalists address provocative New York Times report” (as tweeted by NY Times reporter Edward Wong). For whatever reason, instead of using text, the piece (“op-ed”? we’re not sure what to call this) is a series of screenshots:

Yes, it does appear the People’s Daily actually called the Times’s PR department and asked – demanded – that reporters turn over their sources. The US justice department has had less success getting journalists to comply, so People’s Daily really had no chance here.

The problem, once again, seems to lie in how China views the role of media. Here, newspapers are expected to leave inconvenient truths unsaid for fear of being rude, or — to put it less nicely — they are trained lapdogs for the government’s use. There is little to no self-awareness, no concept of a public editor, and practically no loyalty to truth, or “facts.” In that case, perhaps we should commend People’s Daily: at least they made a couple of calls, and sent an email.

First, we need to collectively realize — then get over the fact that — People’s Daily has a Facebook page. Then we can get to this story, first tweeted by Bill Bishop with the question, “People’s Daily fall for fake news again?”

Turns out, yes. Very fake.

@niubi it's fake: http://t.co/5SdDt5hNzj

— Austin Ramzy (@austinramzy) January 10, 2014

From the above Snopes link:

On 9 January 2014, the Lightly Braised Turnip web site published an article (complete with photo) positing that a squid grown to the gigantic size of 160 feet through mutations caused by radioactivity had been discovered on the California coast near Santa Monica…

By later that day, links and excerpts referencing this article were being circulated via social media, with many of those who encountered the item mistaking it for a genuine news article. However, that article was just a bit of fictional humor (a follow-up to an earlier fictional item about a giant oarfish supposedly discovered off the California coast) spoofing recent alarmist reports about dangerous radioactivity reaching the U.S. from Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant, and the photo was an altered version of a picture depicting a dead whale found in Chile back in 2011.

As always when Chinese state media falls for satire, we have to ask whether the people behind it are trolling us, or the editors. I’ve heard from credible sources that the person behind People’s Daily’s “Kim Jong-un Named Sexiest Man Alive” stunt was indeed a foreign copy editor who knew exactly what he was doing.

We’re not so sure this time. After all, this story first gained legs when people in the US were duped. Native speakers don’t always get it right, as we are well aware.

And of course, this isn’t nearly as egregious an error as media reporting that Kim Jong-un fed his uncle to dogs, which began with a Chinese satirist — one whom BJC contributor Xiao Yi wrote about in December 2012.

Keep your chin up, People’s Daily. We’re enjoying your work with pandas, scantily clad “beauties,” and the Diaoyu Islands.

POSTSCRIPT: People confused about People’s Daily’s Facebook page:

Appreciate them, damnit. The charm.

As tweeted by @PeopleDaily_USA and subsequently pilloried by everyone on Twitter — not because we’re not appreciative of our men and women in uniform, but there’s no small amount of casual sexism happening here, and… why again is this happening? – this Facebook album. Samples below.

The news here is not that People’s Daily did something ridiculous, because they do that all the time. It’s the netizen response.

But before we get there, let’s set the scene first with People’s Daily’s ridiculousness:

The Dishonest Americans Series

Solid start.

From editor: Most Chinese people think that Americans are honest, reliable, and righteous. But once you live in the country for a while, you may discover the descriptions above are a bit misleading. Today’s topic, “The Dishonest Americans Series”, does not refer to all Americans. We want to unveil some incidents and Americans we have encountered, so to provide a more objective picture of what the US and Americans are really like.

It “does not refer to all Americans,” says People’s Daily, which is good because we would never expect such generalizations and generally shoddy work from China’s state media.

By the way, have you seen the related links on the “Dishonest Americans” articles?

People’s Daily only wants to “provide a more objective picture of what the US and Americans are really like.” That’s good. Objectivity is definitely the forte of articles such as this one:

“I am tremendously distressed and disappointed by United Airlines. Over the several rounds of back and forth communications with them, I can now see clearly how unreasonable this airline is!” said Mr. Liu, a Chinese passenger who got insulted by UA staffs. He was still indignant when recounting the incident to People’s Daily Online reporter.

And this, about ADP:

Are you considering of using ADP’s services?

Actually, I’m not really, so….

Hold on for a second. Let’s read on before making your decision.

Alright, we’ll humor ya, PD. What you got?

ADP is one of the largest global outsourcing agencies that provide human capital management solutions for businesses. We have been using its services since 2010.

Really, since 2010? So it must be a pretty helpful service if you’ve been…

But ADP is not helpful, at all.

Huh.

During this period, we have spent countless hours trying to contact the appropriate person in ADP who could answer our inquires.

But… since 2010?

Frustration is the word that best describes our experience.

A good word. Frustration. It’s what I feel, often, when my VPN cuts out, or my IP is killed because my Google Image search turns up a hit from Blogspot, or when I try to use Gmail. I know exactly what you mean.

Every time, we may either get transferred to several agents, but none of them could provide us the correct answer.

However, since I’ve personally have never had any problems with customer service anywhere, you’re on your own there.

And the time that we were put on hold was ridiculous. At the end, we would look at the clock and realize we had been on this call for 2 hours or more but still couldn’t get the answers. A complete waste of time.

You get the picture.

SCMP reports that the series, in Chinese, is titled “Immoral and Dishonest Americans.” We don’t know why “immoral” was taken out in the English version, but it doesn’t matter. It’s not like “dishonest” describes the scenarios above much better.

With three articles published from March to May,  the series remained largely unnoticed until earlier this week, when a huge debate began online after several prominent Chinese media outlets reported the column.

The “debate” mostly consists of readers lambasting People’s Daily.

“Why do our officials keep sending their wives and sons to this immoral and dishonest country?,” asked many.

“There are immoral and dishonest people in every country, ” said Wu Zuolai, a Beijing scholar, “But we all know how many immoral and dishonest governments there are in the world – and we don’t need a column to tell us.”

But keep trying, state media. One of these days, you’ll get it — or do you not read the advice you solicit?

Outrage after People’s Daily’s ‘Dishonest Americans’ column goes vi[r]al (SCMP)

There’s phallic — the Washington Monument, skyscrapers, ice cream drumsticks — and then there’s penis. Behold the above, purportedly the new headquarters of People’s Daily. As Hug China explains:

Pictures of the People’s Daily new headquarters that is under furnishing at the moment have gone viral on Chinese social media. One of the picture taken by a netizen from a special angle on April 11 when the top part of the building was framed with construction racks makes the construction look like a colossal human male genital.

Of course, it’s all a matter of camera angle, as many have pointed out. But why be a spoilsport? The People’s Daily is a colossal dick.

Netizens, naturally, are having a bit of fun with this. Here’s the Penis Building, via Weibo, juxtaposed with the CCTV Tower off Beijing’s Third Ring Road in the central business district:

The CCTV tower is nicknamed Big Underpants. What nicknames do we have for the People’s Daily? Suggestions welcome.

Are you healthy? Are your parents alive? If you answered in the affirmative to these two questions, you’re well on your way toward being happy currently, as a fun little People’s Daily quiz tells us.

But like a bad dictionary entry in which the word you’re looking up is used in the definition, some answers are terribly misleading. One choice is “I am happily married.” Anyone who clicks that one should be docked 10 points for lying.

Other questions for those living inside China (that’s an answer choice for a preliminary Q) include, What do you think of current consumer prices? Local air quality? Daily meals? How big is your social circle? Mental status? “Satisfaction degree with the current social situation”?

But the quiz for those outside China is different. The fourth question, “What do you think of current consumer prices?” is replaced with, “Wealth status” (I am very wealthy … I am always broke). Sadly, “I am always broke, but enjoy 2 Broke Girls” wasn’t an answer choice.

Questions about air quality and daily meals are replaced with “children status” and “career development.” One question asks if you live with your parents. There it is, tapping into the raw nerves of 21- to 30-year-olds the world over.

Alas, we don’t want to give the impression that the quiz is flawed, or that we didn’t enjoy it. People’s Daily questionnaires are always amazing, and they should do more of them. Here are the results so far, with a higher score indicating more happiness:

You 20 people with a score between 0 and 19: may we recommend you read a little less People’s Daily? That would surely lighten your mood. Today, by the way, is a beautiful, sunny day in Beijing!

(H/T Eric Fish)

Valentine’s Day is a lot of things, including fake, commercialized, contrived, and unworthy of intellectual consideration, but in China, it’s also a “breeding ground” of “corruption and debauchery for a minority of party members,” as SCMP puts it, paraphrasing People’s Daily.

A four-paragraph story in People’s Daily said Valentine’s Day had become a hatchery of decadent ideology, indulgent lifestyle, fraud and corruption for some party members who squandered money indulging their lovers.

PD names names:

Chongqing party secretary Bo Xilai, former railways minister Liu Zhijun and former Shanghai party secretary Chen Liangyu…

The problem is because capitalism doesn’t work in China. At least that’s what I think People’s Daily is saying. As paraphrased by SCMP again:

The problem was cadres who had abandoned communist beliefs, the article said, breaking their party oath and betraying the cause.

Leave decadence, to say nothing of saccharine holidays, to the Westerners. Meanwhile, People’s Daily will have its box of chocolates and eat it, alone, weeping, today as every day. It appreciates you, but will never utter those three words.

People’s Daily denounces Valentine’s Day ‘debauchery of decadent cadres’ (SCMP, H/T Alicia) (Image Xinhua)

This is the shocking part, of course. Those of us familiar with China know how complicated the media environment here is, and put up with government editorials (i.e. ignore them), which are the suckerfish on the backs of quality journalism. But wasn’t the point of expanding to the US to at least give the illusion of a fresh start? One would think that China Daily USA (Europe, etc.) would wish to steer as clear as possible of the propaganda offices and mouthpieces in its home office. This survey does them — and every other English-language Chinese publication — absolutely no favors.

Here’s PD’s introductory message:

The Institute of People’s Daily Online of P.R.C is currently carrying out a survey on foreign users’ uses and attitudes of China’s English news websites. The main purpose of the research is to improve China’s English online news services.

Your participation in this survey would be highly appreciated. Please visit http://labs.people.com.cn/survey/2012/ to participate. Your response to this survey will be kept strictly confidential.

And the survey, which includes questions such as (click to enlarge):

The real fun part is when the survey compares two write-ups of the same news story, about forced late-term abortion. Compare the People’s Daily article with the BBC one, and then answer:

Go give them your feedback. I’m sure it’ll be appreciated.

POSTSCRIPT: Also see, from September: CRI and CIBN’s questionnaire on the CPC National Congress.

(H/T Mike)

An open China requires a civilized and healthy online world governed by rule of law. Everyone, whether supervising government bodies or the masses of internet users, must treasure this platform. Demanding that people all use the correct means to say the correct things is not practical, but they must have a consciousness of the law and take responsibility for their words — this is a must. Because regardless of whether online or offline, this is the foundation on which public order and good habits are built.

We’ve brought this up before, but how easy is it to put together these copy-and-paste editorials? Let’s see…

An open China requires a civilized and healthy micro-bacterial world governed by rule of law. Everyone, whether supervising government bodies or the masses of microbes, must treasure this platform. Because regardless of whether a prokaryote or eukaryote, this is the foundation on which public order and good habits are built.

Yup, that works.

An open China requires a civilized and healthy avifauna governed by rule of law. Everyone, whether supervising government bodies or the masses of feathered friends, must treasure this platform. Because regardless of whether a sparrow or spoonbill, this is the foundation on which public order and good habits are built.

Where else can we go with this?

An open China requires a civilized and healthy government governed by rule of law. Everyone, whether supervising local officials or Audi-driving Party members, must treasure this platform. Because regardless of whether a civil servant or law-maker, this is the foundation on wh…

WHOA WHOA WHOA! Delete delete delete. Let’s not get carried away now!

Alicia first saw this slideshow on China News, but it’s since migrated to Sina, and if you thought a slideshow of scantily clad women doing Gangnam Style wouldn’t make it to People’s Daily, under the headline, “40 sweet beauties dance Gangnam Style in bikini,” you have been living under a rock. Catch up.

These ladies (and at least a couple of gentlemen) were out to promote Henan province on Saturday at the finals of the Fairview PTZ 2012 Global Urban Tourism Ambassador Midwest Ministry. (Apologies for the translation — I have no idea what the event is supposed to be, but those words are all in the title.)

More pictures after the jump.

By TAR Nation

The flagship CPC newspaper People’s Daily is, well, it’s a bit, you know. It’s rubbish. The design is terrible, the editorials are as pleasant as a shirt of broken glass and Captain Crunch, they have military equipment on their flash home page every day and their non-CPC related stories have the detached insouciance of a disabled child petting a kitten too hard.

But they’re still good for a laugh. Chief among these good laughs is their strange and slavish devotion to making North Korea, the worst place on earth, not seem like the worst place on earth. You think editors didn’t fall out of seats scrambling to publish, as quickly as possible, The Onion’s announcement of Kim Jong-un as Sexiest Man Alive? Then you don’t know People’s Daily.

The jury is out on why People’s Daily does this. North Korea is a diplomatic pariah. Wanting to look good in the eyes of North Korea does no good, as hungry people and heavy-handed propaganda seem to be in fresh supply. Perhaps it’s the similarity in systems. With the 18th Party Congress over, the papers have been bragging about the Chinese barrel-of-a-gun theory of governance as the greatest thing in politics since kissing babies. North Korea has their back on that front.

Whatever the reason, China’s mysterious neighbor is treated with a bizarre reverence in the People’s Daily’s editorial parliament. Obviously, all of these pictures come from North Korea’s News Agency, but why, upon why, does People’s Daily publish them?

Let’s delve in. First, “Kim Jong-un Goes to Town”

The above are all thumbnails found directly underneath the editorial: “U.S. must remain neutral in South and East China seas: Clinton.”

These are all photos of Kim Jong-un… being. The dictator strides across the land visiting the nation’s top accomplishments like:

This… gym. Depressing gym. And, he also goes to this…

…mammogram machine. This…

…completely and suspiciously empty parking lot.

Actually, Kim Jong-un does this little tap dance thing in just about all the pictures. See his foot?

What is that? Is it cramping from stepping on necks?

Here he is, looking at his lunch:

Notice the surprised, amazed and gob-smacked look on everyone else’s face. In truth, this is some sort of “restaurant” and Kim Jong-un commented, “The supermarket looks unique and delicate and its display is peculiar. It was built in such a way as to be a model impeccable in any aspect.” Judging from the pictures, it is unclear as to whether it’s a restaurant or supermarket. It appears to have aspects of both. But, to be honest, you can’t expect many North Koreans will tell the difference.

Making fun of starving people is a bit wrong, but our next section will show the North Korean people having the most fun of their entire “lives,” in “Masses of North Koreans Praising their Great Leader.”

Here they are in the most perfect human rectangle of all time:

This is in a national newspaper, by the way. A NATIONAL NEWSPAPER. These people are standing around to “celebrate” statues of Kim Jong-il and Kim Il-sung at Kim Il-sung Military University. What a gas.

This is scary in an old-school way:

This is scary in a sci-fi way:

This is scary in a Def Leppard way.

Next are North Koreans praising their great leader at a football game, and I’m guessing it’ll disturb you a little.

So, for those of you wondering how North Korea can exist largely un-harassed between Russia, China and a large part of the US armed forces, the above picture is why: You do not mess with that brand of crazy eyes.

A keen eye can notice strange things in some of these pictures, like Kim’s crazy leg. Here is one where they have clearly gone tallest to shortest on either side, with Kim Jong-un in the middle. This is, presumably, so he doesn’t look like such a short-arse.

Also, notice the guy standing next to Chaiman Mao with some sort of tank-commander-cum-sombrero.

Little to no thought is put into what People’s Daily publishes in regard to these photos. Take the following caption for example: “…recently the country (North Korea) repeatedly appears with a new image as modern infrastructures are built one after another and people lead a better life. Let’s figure out a real DPRK through the lens. Believe it or not, there is something more than you know about the country.”

Oh, simple propaganda. What is it you expect to see? A skyscraper? A subway system? Well…

TAR Nation writes the BJC column To Serve People. He’s usually around on Mondays.