Post by IceCat on Jan 19, 2016 6:19:33 GMT
Overshadowing the start of the new year is a flap over a teenage girl group star and a flag that is the latest irritant between mainland China and Taiwan, the latter who just elected its first-ever female president.
The picture above shows 16-year-old Chou Tzuyu, the maknae or youngest member of the rookie girl group Twice, during an online variety show in Korea last November. The three Japanese members of her group were also depicted on that particular show with the flags of their homeland (the remaining five, who were not shown, are Korean), but Tzuyu, as the lone member born on Taiwan, has become in the past couple of weeks the reluctant center of controversy because the show's producers gave her a flag of her birthplace.
It started back on 8 January when 53-year-old Huang An, a Taiwanese-born singer now residing on the mainland, made a series of posts to his Weibo microblog accusing Ms Chou of supporting Taiwanese independence, all based solely on that one image of her with the flag. His followers and other mainland netizens then began attacking Tzuyu in postings to her social media pages. This in turn prompted two of China's regional TV channels, Beijing TV and Anhui TV, to cancel appearances by Twice on their upcoming Spring Festival galas, domestic search engines to briefly block inquiries for Tzuyu and Huawei to drop her ad for their Y6 model cell phone. In the run up to this past Saturday's elections on Taiwan it even produced a rare show of unity among the rival political camps, who each came to Tzuyu's defense and denounced the heavy handed intimidation of a teenage girl by pro-Beijing supporters. This was only reinforced when JYP Entertainment, in whose employ Tzuyu and the rest of Twice reside, came out with statements reiterating that neither the company nor Tzuyu meant to suggest support for Taiwanese independence. No doubt they were feeling the heat from China as well as it was beginning to affect mainland promotions by JYP's other artists.
On Friday the 15th (the eve of the Taiwanese elections) Mr JYP himself, Park Jin Young, released a statement apologizing to his company's Chinese fans for the misunderstanding. He also posted this video of Tzuyu, in her native Mandarin and obviously reading from a prepared text, asserting that there is only one China, that she's proud to be Chinese and stating that she was deeply sorry and would temporarily halt her Chinese promotions for a period of self-reflection:
The video pleased almost no one: Taiwanese felt that JYP coerced her into recording it while many mainlanders felt that her apology wasn't sincere enough. In her victory speech on Saturday Taiwan's president-elect Tsai Ing-Wen referred to the ongoing controversy by saying the following: "This particular incident will serve as a constant reminder to me about the importance of our country's strength and unity to those outside our borders. This will be one of the most important responsibilities for me as the next president of the Republic of China."
This story will likely percolate for a while yet, especially since Tsai was the candidate of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party, which opposed the outgoing president's moves to strengthen ties across the Taiwan Strait. JYP has a case to answer as well given how they handled, or to be more succinct mishandled, the situation.
www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-35340530
Kevin
The picture above shows 16-year-old Chou Tzuyu, the maknae or youngest member of the rookie girl group Twice, during an online variety show in Korea last November. The three Japanese members of her group were also depicted on that particular show with the flags of their homeland (the remaining five, who were not shown, are Korean), but Tzuyu, as the lone member born on Taiwan, has become in the past couple of weeks the reluctant center of controversy because the show's producers gave her a flag of her birthplace.
It started back on 8 January when 53-year-old Huang An, a Taiwanese-born singer now residing on the mainland, made a series of posts to his Weibo microblog accusing Ms Chou of supporting Taiwanese independence, all based solely on that one image of her with the flag. His followers and other mainland netizens then began attacking Tzuyu in postings to her social media pages. This in turn prompted two of China's regional TV channels, Beijing TV and Anhui TV, to cancel appearances by Twice on their upcoming Spring Festival galas, domestic search engines to briefly block inquiries for Tzuyu and Huawei to drop her ad for their Y6 model cell phone. In the run up to this past Saturday's elections on Taiwan it even produced a rare show of unity among the rival political camps, who each came to Tzuyu's defense and denounced the heavy handed intimidation of a teenage girl by pro-Beijing supporters. This was only reinforced when JYP Entertainment, in whose employ Tzuyu and the rest of Twice reside, came out with statements reiterating that neither the company nor Tzuyu meant to suggest support for Taiwanese independence. No doubt they were feeling the heat from China as well as it was beginning to affect mainland promotions by JYP's other artists.
On Friday the 15th (the eve of the Taiwanese elections) Mr JYP himself, Park Jin Young, released a statement apologizing to his company's Chinese fans for the misunderstanding. He also posted this video of Tzuyu, in her native Mandarin and obviously reading from a prepared text, asserting that there is only one China, that she's proud to be Chinese and stating that she was deeply sorry and would temporarily halt her Chinese promotions for a period of self-reflection:
The video pleased almost no one: Taiwanese felt that JYP coerced her into recording it while many mainlanders felt that her apology wasn't sincere enough. In her victory speech on Saturday Taiwan's president-elect Tsai Ing-Wen referred to the ongoing controversy by saying the following: "This particular incident will serve as a constant reminder to me about the importance of our country's strength and unity to those outside our borders. This will be one of the most important responsibilities for me as the next president of the Republic of China."
This story will likely percolate for a while yet, especially since Tsai was the candidate of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party, which opposed the outgoing president's moves to strengthen ties across the Taiwan Strait. JYP has a case to answer as well given how they handled, or to be more succinct mishandled, the situation.
www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-35340530
Kevin
