American-Chinese Writer Slammed as “Pro-American Traitor” on Internet, Says China Uses Her in Propaganda
American-Chinese writer Fan Jiayang has recently taken to Twitter to fight for a waiver that would allow private nurses to care for her mother, suffering from ALS, at the hospital during the epidemic. The incident was widely reported and hotly debated in China with Fan being slammed by Chinese netizens as a “traitor”, “worshipping America,” and “bringing shame to her extended family.” In a New Yorker article, Fan tells the story of how she and her mother have been used by China in its propaganda.
In her article “How My Mother and I Became Chinese Propaganda,” Fan says she was born in Chongqing, China in 1984. When she was two years old, her father was sent to the US to study biology at Harvard University. At the age of eight, she followed her mother, who was a doctor, to America to reunite with him.
A year and a half after Fan arrived in the US, her father had an affair and left her and her mother. To provide Fan with the best education possible, her mother moved to Greenwich, Connecticut to work as a domestic helper in an affluent neighbourhood—just so her daughter could attend a public school and receive a scholarship to attend a prestigious school. Having been through the Great Famine and the Cultural Revolution in China, her mother, as Fan describes, developed her survival instincts out of a “brutal, unsentimental pragmatism.”
Fan eventually graduated from Williams College, became a writer for The New Yorker, and moved to New York City with her mother. In 2011, her mother, then 59, was diagnosed with ALS, which left her paralysed and hospitalized for an extended period of time. Since 2014, she has been unable to breathe on her own and relied on a ventilator at all times. Fan hired a round-the-clock caregiver to take care of her mother. Communication with her would now have to depend on blinking and letter boards.
When the Wuhan virus pandemic broke out in New York City this March, the Henry J. Carter Specialty Hospital, where Fan’s mother was staying, banned visitors like Fan, who now had to rely on the caregiver to care for her mother. As a patient was diagnosed with the virus, the hospital expelled everyone other than medical workers on 9 April. The caregiver Fan hired was among those asked to leave.
Fan then gave a detailed account of the incident on Twitter, stressing that her mother required exclusive care, and posted photos of the situation at the hospital. This drew the attention of a number of legislators in New York. With the help of various people, Fan’s caregiver was able to return to the hospital the following day to continue taking care of her mother.
Fan’s story was soon widely reported in China. The Global Times, a state-run media outlet, said Fan had been targeted by the protesters when covering the demonstrations in Hong Kong for The New Yorker last year. The tabloid then said she described her Chinese-looking face as a “liability” on Twitter following the assignment. Other reports said that Fan’s articles endorsed the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong and that she has “misattributed the origin of the virus to China.” Fan was attacked by a large number of Chinese netizens on WeChat, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, who criticized her for being a traitor and making a living by slandering the motherland. They hurled at her such slurs as “NMSL” (“your mother is dead”) and threatened to burn, rape and abuse her. A photo of Fan and her mother also circulated on the Internet, where netizen China15z0dj wrote, “Your mother’s gonna die, haha. The 1.4 billion of us wish you a reunion with her in hell, haha.”
Source: Apple Daily #Sep12
#US #HK #China #FanJiayang #TheNewYorker #Internet #Propaganda #WuhanVirus #Coronavirus #Pandemic #COVID19
https://bit.ly/33dCDLi
American-Chinese writer Fan Jiayang has recently taken to Twitter to fight for a waiver that would allow private nurses to care for her mother, suffering from ALS, at the hospital during the epidemic. The incident was widely reported and hotly debated in China with Fan being slammed by Chinese netizens as a “traitor”, “worshipping America,” and “bringing shame to her extended family.” In a New Yorker article, Fan tells the story of how she and her mother have been used by China in its propaganda.
In her article “How My Mother and I Became Chinese Propaganda,” Fan says she was born in Chongqing, China in 1984. When she was two years old, her father was sent to the US to study biology at Harvard University. At the age of eight, she followed her mother, who was a doctor, to America to reunite with him.
A year and a half after Fan arrived in the US, her father had an affair and left her and her mother. To provide Fan with the best education possible, her mother moved to Greenwich, Connecticut to work as a domestic helper in an affluent neighbourhood—just so her daughter could attend a public school and receive a scholarship to attend a prestigious school. Having been through the Great Famine and the Cultural Revolution in China, her mother, as Fan describes, developed her survival instincts out of a “brutal, unsentimental pragmatism.”
Fan eventually graduated from Williams College, became a writer for The New Yorker, and moved to New York City with her mother. In 2011, her mother, then 59, was diagnosed with ALS, which left her paralysed and hospitalized for an extended period of time. Since 2014, she has been unable to breathe on her own and relied on a ventilator at all times. Fan hired a round-the-clock caregiver to take care of her mother. Communication with her would now have to depend on blinking and letter boards.
When the Wuhan virus pandemic broke out in New York City this March, the Henry J. Carter Specialty Hospital, where Fan’s mother was staying, banned visitors like Fan, who now had to rely on the caregiver to care for her mother. As a patient was diagnosed with the virus, the hospital expelled everyone other than medical workers on 9 April. The caregiver Fan hired was among those asked to leave.
Fan then gave a detailed account of the incident on Twitter, stressing that her mother required exclusive care, and posted photos of the situation at the hospital. This drew the attention of a number of legislators in New York. With the help of various people, Fan’s caregiver was able to return to the hospital the following day to continue taking care of her mother.
Fan’s story was soon widely reported in China. The Global Times, a state-run media outlet, said Fan had been targeted by the protesters when covering the demonstrations in Hong Kong for The New Yorker last year. The tabloid then said she described her Chinese-looking face as a “liability” on Twitter following the assignment. Other reports said that Fan’s articles endorsed the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong and that she has “misattributed the origin of the virus to China.” Fan was attacked by a large number of Chinese netizens on WeChat, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, who criticized her for being a traitor and making a living by slandering the motherland. They hurled at her such slurs as “NMSL” (“your mother is dead”) and threatened to burn, rape and abuse her. A photo of Fan and her mother also circulated on the Internet, where netizen China15z0dj wrote, “Your mother’s gonna die, haha. The 1.4 billion of us wish you a reunion with her in hell, haha.”
Source: Apple Daily #Sep12
#US #HK #China #FanJiayang #TheNewYorker #Internet #Propaganda #WuhanVirus #Coronavirus #Pandemic #COVID19
https://bit.ly/33dCDLi