MCLC: comrade Locke

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: Rowena He <rowenahe at gmail.com>
Subject: comrade Locke
***********************************************************

Source: Foreign Policy (5/14/12):
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/05/14/comrade_locke

Comrade Locke: Why is China so obsessed with America's backpack-wearing,
coupon-clipping ambassador?
BY ANNE HENOCHOWICZ

China doesn’t know what to make of Gary Locke. The first Chinese-American
ambassador to Beijing, the friendly, self-effacing Locke has become an
online celebrity for acting like the opposite of a typical Chinese
government official. His fans think he’s selfless and heroic; his
detractors call him deceitful and traitorous for representing the United
States instead of China.

The Locke debate began last August with a photo taken of the incoming
ambassador at the Seattle airport on his way to China to take up his post.
The photographer, a tech entrepreneur named Tang Chaohui, watched in
disbelief as Locke bought his own coffee. "The funny thing is Ambassador
Locke pulled out some kind of coupon and gave it to the cashier," Tang
wrote <http://www.weibo.com/1748584244/xj5CzhUgt>. "The cashier looked it
up and down, and said he couldn’t accept it. The ambassador wasn’t angry,
he just smiled, took the coupon back, and got out his credit card. The
server kind of didn't give him face." In China, government officials don't
buy their own coffee, let alone use coupons. Tang's post was "re-tweeted"
more than 31,000 times and received at least 8,400 comments, most of them
positive. But China’s state-owned press gave him mixed reviews: While many
editorials noted that Chinese officials could learn from his humble
behavior, the Guangming Daily warned
<http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2011/09/20/chinese-internet-users-embra
ce-neo-colonialist-u-s-ambassador/> it was all a "neocolonialist" trick.

Even with this heady beginning, some saw Locke walking a fine line between
his American and Chinese identities. Last August, political cartoonist Sun
Baoxin rendered <http://blog.sina.com.cn/vip20080909> Locke as a tai chi
warrior in the midst of U.S.-China relations battles. Locke made it clear
<http://www.globaltimes.cn/NEWS/tabid/99/ID/670892/Locke-stresses-US-value.
aspx> from his first press conference that although he’s the “child of
Chinese immigrants,” he and his family “personally represent America and
America’s promise as a land of freedom, equality, and opportunity.” Unlike
his predecessor John Huntsman, Locke speaks no Mandarin. "Gary Locke, that
banana man, with his white heart," snarked Qin Feng, niece of former
Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing, on her Weibo account in early May.

Locke burst again into the spotlight when he cut short
<http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/09/world/asia/behind-twists-of-diplomacy-in
-case-of-chen-guangcheng.html?pagewanted=all> a vacation in Bali to help
bring self-taught legal activist Chen Guangcheng, fleeing illegal house
arrest, into the U.S. Embassy. The recriminations came on strong: The
Beijing Youth Daily blasted <http://cmp.hku.hk/2012/05/04/22365/> Locke
for "putting on a show," while the Beijing Daily News warned
<http://epaper.bjnews.com.cn/html/2012-05/04/content_335949.htm?div=-1>
him against "flagrantly meddling in other country's domestic politics." So
did the praise: Netizens have nicknamed Locke "Director of the Office of
Petitions and Appeals," his "office" being the last resort for Chinese
citizens seeking justice.

Here’s Ambassador Locke as Lei Feng, the epitome of selfless devotion in
Chinese Communist Party lore. Lei Feng was a Mao-era model People’s
Liberation Army soldier <http://en.invest.china.cn/english/DO-e/28188.htm>
said to have “donated all of his spare time to social causes.” Since 1963,
China has celebrated "Learn from Lei Feng Day" with public service,
sometimes in costume
<http://shanghaiist.com/2012/03/06/gallery_a_day_of_learning_from_lei.php#p
hoto-1>. The Locke-as-Lei-Feng meme, which emerged after the news of Chen
Guangcheng's escape, puts a sly twist on state propaganda. What could be
more ironic than casting a "neocolonialist" American as the paragon of
Chinese communist virtue?

The popularity Locke enjoyed last summer is now muddied by anger over his
role in Chen's flight to the embassy. This Photoshopped image by
ErDongchen, a nationalist Weibo user from Beijing, is sarcastically
entitled “American Politician’s Shoddy Behavior.” The image, showing a
downtrodden Locke receiving Cultural Revolution-style punishment,
continues to make the rounds on Weibo. The ambassador's “crimes,” strung
around his neck, include flying economy class, carrying his own backpack,
and using a coupon to buy coffee. “Ambassador Locke, you have thrown
yourself into the boundless sea of China’s corruption,” ErDongchen
intones. The post seems too serious not to be a joke, but irony can be
hard to read online. Popular Weibo user Liu Buchen
<http://cmp.hku.hk/2012/05/08/22615/> re-posted this image and asked if
the ambassador would ever again "dare to make a show for the Chinese
people." Liu's post disappeared on May 3.

Cartoonist Dashix <http://dashix.blog.163.com/> also riffs on Lei Feng. In
this May 6 illustration
<http://dashix.blog.163.com/blog/static/20451241220124641449584/>, the
flag quotes Mao Zedong: "Serve the people." Beneath it, in black
characters, is a message from China's netizens: "Learn from Comrade Gary
Locke." On his Weibo, Dashix posts his cartoon alongside Erdongchen’s,
asking “Should we learn from [Locke] or knock him down? It certainly is a
thorny question.”

Locke's fan club has withstood the tumult of the last few weeks. A Beijing
Weibo user who calls himself Poetic Landscape-Marvelous Painting snapped a
photo with the ambassador on May 8, "again in economy class, again without
pomp." His post has been re-tweeted more than 2,300 times and has received
nearly 800 comments. In it, he writes: "Sigh. I must admit, I've been
brainwashed again.”