China : Sex, Pride and a bit about Israel

The one blog that's been on the top blogs list in the China Blog List for a long time now is "Sex and Shanghai". The first time I encountered this blog I was pretty overwhelmed by the content detailing the affairs of one foreign English teacher in Shanghai-China who fools around with countless Chinese women. Looking at his Sitemeter stats and the China blog list you could tell that this blog is pretty successful. Having been exposed to some Israeli bloggers of the same nature acting in Israel around the very popular Isra-blog site, I didn't think much of it. Though I have my own opinions regarding such blogs and people - to each his own, I thought.

Going through my regular blog feed read, I started off with a read about "why people in China want censorship" (found through Asia Blog) :

A certain evolution has happened when it comes to questioning the government in China: From the old fear of “government wrath” (1950’s & 1960’s (and resurgence in the early 90’s)), to…Never questioning (1970’s & 1980’s), to… Acceptance (1990’s), to… Belief that it is right (today). […]

Now add into this, a mixture of nationalistic pride and the Chinese philosophy of “saving face”, and we might start to understand where censorship becomes required. […]

Censorship is a way to control all of this; it blocks differing opinions, shields the truth, and allows for the opinions of the State and the people supporting it, to come forward without hindrance.

I don't know much about China from personal experience, sadly, but I felt very uncomfortable reading this article, thinking that's it just plain nasty.

It was just by sheer coincidence that the article I read right after it was by the excellent EastSouthWestNorth about a recent "Sex and Shanghai" scandal called "The immoral foreign blogger ". The story is about some Chinese professor, Zhang Jiehai (张结海), who - after coming across that "Sex and Shanghai" blog - became pretty upset and has made it his mission to track down the blog's writer and "kick him out of China". This professor of psychology at the Department of Sociology in the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences has started a crusade in his blog (translation with Babelfish here) with a multi-stage masterplan on how this could be achieved through reading his entire blog and digging up his details in between the lines. Here's a few quotes from the translation done by EastSouthWestNorth, I'll try and skip the naughty details and bad language:

Today, with tremendous anger, I will tell you the story of an immoral foreigner and I call upon all Chinese compatriots to get together and kick this immoral foreigner out of China.

This is how it is: Several days ago, a friend told me about a blog run by an English man in Shanghai. I read it and I was shocked, angered and disgusted … after I read his blog, I had only one idea: This is intolerable and this piece of garbage must be found and kicked out of China!!! […]

This POG openly declared in this blog that he was only dallying with these female Chinese students. […] In his words, the Chinese men not only have low sexual potency, but they are also incredibly ugly. […] This is risible!  This is so risible!

And, you can't do with my Israeli twist in stories like this :

But what makes it intolerable for me is that this piece of garbage deliberately hurt the feelings of the Chinese national feelings in his class and he openly spoke to divide China. […]

But this POG openly wrote on his blog on August 17 to denigrate the nationalistic feelings of the Chinese people! […]

He said that on one hand, it is the result of the Chinese government manipulating the emotions of the people; on the other hand, he also said, "China loves its pain; dancing with their pain is romantic to the Chinese." […]

The whole world knows that Germany has done better than Japan on reflecting on the war.  But an American Jewish professor friend of mind will not use any German products.  Sixty years have gone by.  Why couldn't he forget?  Perhaps this was due to the manipulation of his emotions by the American government? […]

In the essay "The two fatal flaws of the Chinese people," I praised the Israelis for "hunting down the Nazis" at all costs and then finally sending them to hang on the Israelis' own gallows.  If a small nation can do that, then what has big China done?

For this reason, I am making a solemn call here:  Let us learn from the Israelis and let our compatriots act together on this Internet hunt to find this foreign trash until we kick him out of China. (bold in original text) 

:o 

Whether this hunt will be successful or not is yet to be seen. Either way, I'm curious to see how the Chinese people would feel and respond to something like this.

- 

Added 12 hours later, after seeing some interesting inbound links

- 

"Sex and Shanghai" has probably noticed that something is happening and was a bit shaken up by the foss about him. Here's some of his very long and detailed response article "A tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing " (without some more juicy language):

Now here’s another lunatic. […] This man is a professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences. A professor! In this is shown so much that is wrong about today’s China. A country’s educational system should be home the best and brightest, to those who can think, weigh, balance, judge. And instead what does poor China get? […]

And – astonishment piles on astonishment – he is a professor of psychology! A man who should have some insight into the shades and ways of thought, the grades and colors of morality, comes out instead with such an article! […]

I hold my head in my hands as I read his article. I had hoped China was moving beyond such folly; but as I read and re-read what he writes I see how strong the path to failure is, how compelling. If China cannot get past its Zhang Jiehais, what hope? […]

It is because of people like you that so many of China’s best and brightest seek education abroad. You have nothing to offer the young of today’s China but bankrupt ideas and meaningless platitudes. You drive the finest minds of China to the West. You have nothing to say. You have nothing to teach.

I find it interesting that "Sex and Shanghai" has decided to respond to the Chinese professor's arguments, going into a direct confrontation. What's even more interesting is reading some of the responses in the professor's and "Sex and Shanghai" blogs - It is no longer about two people, but about two groups who seem to dislike each other alot.

-

Related blog posts

The Chinese-related blogsphere is slowly waking up to this story. Here are links to articles about this story from China-related blogs :

• "Immorality and Word of Mouth " by Confused Analects ; 27/08
• "Sex and Shanghai Morality" by Travellers' Tales ; 27/08
• "Who Wants The Display Model?" by Adventures of the Humanaught ; 28/08
  
• "Shanghai Sex Blogger Scandal " by Peking Duck ; 28/08
  
• "Internet - Sex in the city gets a Chinese turn" by China Herald with reference to the "Who is Chinabounder ?" hunt blog ; 28/08
• "Internet foreigner-hunt in Shanhgai" by Timo from Wuhan
• "The Chinese Waiter" by Hongkie Town Redux ; 28/08
  
• "'Limp?' don't forget 'Arrogant '" by Mr. Morris; 28/08
  
• "And you thought horny expats in Korea had it rough…" by The Marmot's Hole ; 29/08
  
• "The Hunt for Chinabounder " by Sinosplice ; 29/08
  
• "Update: Shanghai Sex Blog Closed " by Peking Duck
• "Blogger Casanova Being Shanghaied " by Things That Bang ; 29/08
  
• "Hey, Chinabounder … " by MetaFilter's RavinDave
• "‘Sex in Shanghai' Backlash in Machine Translation " by Postcards from China ; 29/08
  
• "Sex in Shanghai " by Jottings from the Granite Studio
• "Sex and Shanghai" by My Life Without Me
  
• "Sex and Shanghai" by Peasant
  
• "Sex blog triggers manhunt in Shanghai " by DNA-world
• "Witchhunt for a blogger " by Marc van der Chijs' Shanghaied Weblog
• "Immoral Foreign Blogger " by Violet Eclipse
• "Protecting "our" females " by Micahel Turton
• "Shocking: translation from Dr. Zhang Jiehai's blog " by The Peking Duck
• "So You Want To Be A China Sex Blogger " by Idle words
• Chinese bloggers declare war on British sex-pat blogger by Cory Doctorow
• Expelling Chinabounder by October 1 by Smart Mobs
• chinavenging! by Avant Game
• Expatriate Manhunt in Shanghai… a reason for anonymity by Life of Brian
• Sex in Shanghai Witchhunt by klortho
• "Shanghai + Sex + Blog + Controversy = Book Deal? " by the Shanghaiist
• "Sex in Shanghai hits the print media " by Danwei
• "Chinabounder goes mainstream " by Peking Duck
• "Sex and Shanghai a hoax? " by Danwei
• "Sex in Shanghai's ‘Chinabounder': Pimple-Faced Geek in Denver, or Traitor in Our Midst? " by Postcard from China
• "Sex in China. What? Noo… " by High on Life
• "internet - Was "Sex and Shanghai" a hoax? " by China Herald
• "Was Sex and Shanghai all a hoax? " by Peking Duck
• "'Sex in Shanghai' blog sparks international angst " by Bit-tech
• "Witchhunt for a blogger" 2 , 3 and 4 by Marc van der Chijs
• "Chinabounder unbound? An update … " by Shanghaiist
• "Mystery Man: Chinabounder, Part III " by Shangaiist

The media? … :

• "China net hunt for immoral foreigner " by Jonathan Watts of the OZ "The Age "
• Sina.cn (Babelfish translated)
• The Beijing Daily (Babelfish translated)
• Webhunt for 'British bounder' by Jonathan Watts in Beijing for Guardian Unlimited
• NY-Times
• "Shanghai professor on-line denounces the hoodlum foreigner" interview with the professor (Babelfish translated ) at 21XC
• "Shanghai sex blog writer hoax " by the Inquirer
• "A derogatory blue blog gets locals' dander up " by China Daily
• "Chinese Internet users hunt author of racy blog, but alleged authors claim a hoax " by Associated Press
• "Sex blogs: why bother? " by Anna Pickard from the Guardian
• "CHINA: British bounder's sex blog causes Net uproar " by Taipei Times ; 01/09
• "China's internet vigilantes target British ex-pat cad " by Independent Online Edition; 04/09
• "Netizens bombard foreign teacher with sex blog " by China Daily; 04/09
• "Blue blog may be hoax " - report" by China Daily ; 04/09
• "A derogatory blue blog gets locals' dander up " by Shanghai Daily News