A major Chinese government news service used a racist slur to describe the departing US ambassador in an editorial on Friday that drew widespread public condemnation in China.
The article — which called US Ambassador to China Gary Locke a “rotten banana,” a guide dog for the blind and a plague — reflected Chinese nationalists’ acute loathing toward the first Chinese-American to have been Washington’s top envoy to Beijing.
Locke’s ethnic background particularly interested the Chinese government and people.
Photo: AFP
Locke won public applause when he was seen carrying his own bag and flying economy class, but he drew criticism from Beijing as his demeanor was an unwelcome contrast to Chinese officials’ privileges and entitlements.
In his 2.5 years in Beijing, Locke oversaw the defusing of two delicate diplomatic episodes when a powerful police chief fled to a US consulate and later when a persecuted blind activist sought shelter in the embassy. The Chinese public also credit him with making them realize the harm of the tiny pollutant PM2.5 and severity of China’s foul air by posting the embassy’s hourly readings of air quality.
Meanwhile, the editorials in Chinese state media turned from initial reservation to unfriendliness, to the insolence of the final piece.
“I think it shows the unfriendliness and impoliteness by the Chinese government toward Gary Locke, and it is without the manners and dignity of a major power,” legal academic Hao Jinsong (郝勁松) said. “It is unfitting of China’s status as a diplomatic power. As a Chinese, I am very angry and feel ashamed of it.”
The editorial, Farewell, Gary Locke, took direct aim at Locke’s identity as a third-generation Chinese-American, calling him a “banana” — a racial term for Asians identifying with Western values, despite their ethnicity.
“But when a banana sits out for long, its yellow peel will always rot, not only revealing its white core, but also turning into the stomach-churning color of black,” the editorial said.
The author, Wang Ping (王平) — likely a pseudonym — slammed Locke’s portrayal as an official judicious with public funds, but accused him of being hypocritical as he retreated into his multimillion-dollar official residence and special-made, bulletproof luxury vehicle.
Wang belittled Locke’s inability to speak his ancestral language and accused him of failing to understand China’s law, but fanning “evil winds” in the ethnically sensitive regions of Tibet and Xinjiang.
“Not only did he run around by himself, he even served as a guide dog for the blind when he took in the so-called blind rights lawyer Chen Guangcheng (陳光誠) and led him running,” the editorial said.
Chen was later allowed to leave China and now lives in the US.
The editorial directed a Chinese curse at Locke, suggesting Locke’s Chinese ancestors would expel him from the family clan should they know his behavior.
Wang also made the innuendo that Locke should be blamed for Beijing’s increasing smog.
“When he arrived, so did Beijing’s smog,” Wang wrote. “With his departure, Beijing’s sky suddenly turned blue.”
“Let’s bid goodbye to the smog, and let’s bid goodbye to the plague. Farewell, Gary Locke,” the article ended, which was clearly inspired by former Chinese leader Mao Zedong’s (毛澤東) 1949 piece, Farewell, Leighton Stuart, that scoffed at the last US ambassador under the collapsing Chinese Nationalist government in Nanjing.
The piece shocked members of the Chinese public, who denounced the editorial as distasteful and offensive.
“This article by China News Service is the most shameless I have ever seen — not one of them, but the most shameless,” the popular online commentator Yao Bo (姚波) said. “Without him, we probably still would not have known what PM2.5 is, and how did he bring the smog? You have played the snake in the Farmer and the Viper.”
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
CHINA REACTS: The patrol and reconnaissance plane ‘transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,’ the 7th Fleet said, while Taipei said it saw nothing unusual The US 7th Fleet yesterday said that a US Navy P-8A Poseidon flew through the Taiwan Strait, a day after US and Chinese defense heads held their first talks since November 2022 in an effort to reduce regional tensions. The patrol and reconnaissance plane “transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,” the 7th Fleet said in a news release. “By operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law, the United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations.” In a separate statement, the Ministry of National Defense said that it monitored nearby waters and airspace as the aircraft
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique