American entertainers need to stop apologizing to the Chinese government

Publish date: 2024-07-20
2021-05-29T12:28:00Z

The Chinese Communist Party is a genocidal dictatorship that, at best, continues to block international efforts to investigate the COVID-19 pandemic's origins.

President Joe Biden has at last brought a sense of urgency to investigating the possibility that the coronavirus was the result of an accidental leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. And his Asia czar, Kurt Campbell, publicly conceded that when it came to US-China relations, "the period that was broadly described as engagement has come to an end." 

On trade, military issues, and COVID-19 transparency, the US and China are in a state of adversarial competition.

The American people seem to understand this. In a recent Pew Research poll, 89% of US adults surveyed said they considered China a "competitor or enemy, rather than a partner." And 70% said the US should do more to promote human rights in China, even if it harmed our economic interests.

But while the government and the general public appear to agree that the CCP's influence is malevolent, many of our private institutions are not on the same page. This divergence is particularly clear when it comes to cultural exporters like Hollywood and the NBA, businesses that have become so reliant on the Chinese market that they've essentially handed veto power over their content and messaging to the CCP.

This matters because American popular culture is enormously popular and influential throughout the world, even in places where the US government is not particularly well-liked. These institutions can wield that influence in ways the government or public can't, and they can also easily undermine the US message if they give in to the CCP.

And for all the earnest social-justice messaging coming out of the mouths of NBA superstars and Oscar-winning actors, fear of offending the CCP is where their commitment to social justice ends.

I'm not so naive to think LeBron James is going to start wearing "Free Tibet" or "Stop Killing the Uyghurs" on the back of his jersey.

But I'd hope it's not too much to ask that unfathomably rich and internationally famous performers stop apologizing to the CCP.

Bending the knee to a monster, for profit

John Cena, the World Wrestling Entertainment star turned blockbuster actor, while promoting the latest "Fast and Furious" sequel on Taiwanese television, said "Taiwan is the first country that can watch" the film.

Cena's seemingly innocuous comment caused a stir because of Taiwan's precarious political state. The island is a democratic autonomous independent state that refers to itself as the Republic of China. But the CCP insists Taiwan is a rogue breakaway island, not an autonomous country, and will forever be a part of the People's Republic of China. 

China last year surpassed North America as the largest moviegoing market. That's why Hollywood studios tailor their films to avoid offending China's dictatorial class. Thus, Cena's off-hand Taiwan quote was, in fact, a threat to the studio's bottom line.

Cena, a bankable movie star, seemed to understand his job as a company man was to atone for the unforgivable sin of referring to Taiwan as a "country," so he issued a groveling apology in Mandarin on the Chinese social-media app Weibo. 

The Cena incident wasn't unlike when NBA players, coaches, and executives beclowned themselves by condemning then-Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey's retweet of an image expressing support for Hong Kong's pro-democracy demonstrators, who at the time were enduring brutal crackdowns ordered by the CCP and who would soon lose what political freedoms they had enjoyed under the former British colony's always tenuous "one country, two systems" arrangement.

The NBA is perhaps the most openly activist of any sports league in the free world. But when it came to speaking up about social justice for Hong Kong, an exception was made for CCP's authoritarian boot.

And the apologies didn't keep China from banning the NBA from its television systems for a full year.

The CCP is quite literally committing genocide against China's Uyghur Muslim population — with forced labor, involuntary sterilization, and "reeducation camps," that old communist authoritarian favorite.  

And it keeps Taiwan — a model country for protecting its citizens from the worst ravages of the COVID-19 pandemic — out of the World Health Organization.

Any post-pandemic accounting was not going to make the CCP look good. The Chinese government blatantly lied about infection and death rates and has continuously obfuscated any efforts at transparency, which is itself a threat to the world, as it stymies the knowledge gathering needed to prevent another pandemic.

Corporate performances of "social-justice" activism are meaningless if they are coupled with apologies to one of the most inhumane entities, the CCP.

And if US institutions — the government, private business, and the public — aren't all rowing in the same direction, then China feels no meaningful pressure to change. By selling out to appease the CCP, socially conscious companies aren't just undermining their messaging but also opposing US efforts to hold China accountable.

If you won't stand up to the bully, at least stop apologizing to the bully

Beijing is set to host the 2022 Winter Olympics, and the world is faced with a choice — confront the genocidal dictatorship for its human-rights atrocities and culpability in the spread of the worst pandemic in 100 years, or let the CCP continue apace.

A hot war with a nuclear-armed China and a standing army of almost 2.2 million would be apocalyptic.

But American institutions could do their part to weaken the CCP, though it would mean sacrificing profits, which is anathema to capitalism. 

When superstar music acts in the 1980s banded together to protest the South African government, they didn't topple the racist apartheid regime. But a boycott of South Africa's whites-only musical venues contributed to the international condemnation and demonstrated that some markets were worth losing for the cause of justice.

China, of course, is a much bigger and more economically crucial country than South Africa. We can't cut trade with China overnight. And a boycott of the Beijing Olympic Games very likely wouldn't loosen the CCP's yoke on the Chinese people.

But if every journey starts with a first step, movie stars and basketball gods could do their part to confront the Chinese government with simple acts of defiance.

A good start: Don't sell out victims of the regime by apologizing to it. And don't distance yourself from those who will speak the truth, profits be damned.

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