Western media producers and
providers have learned one thing in at least this decade: China is a big market
for their content. They also learned that China is a finicky market that is
partly steered by the Communist government that has absolute say over what
overseas media sees the light of day in their cinemas and TV. Anything Chinese
censors deem to reflect negatively on the government gets either a censor or a ban,
and condemnation from their public as a result. When an NBA team manager spoke
of support for the anti-Beijing protests in Hong Kong, Chinese backlash led to
the league issuing an apology that rubbed Americans wrong.
As The Hollywood Reporter tells it, social media has been taken aback
by the extent of damage control the National Basketball Association (NBA)
undertook following a Sunday Twitter post by Houston Rockets general manager
Daryl Morey expressing his solidarity with the Hong Kong protests. The tweet
generated the expected backlash from mainland China, which normally counted the
Rockets as their favorite NBA team for being the one-time squad of their
basketball hero and current Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) president Yao
Ming. Local NBA carriers like Tencent and CCTV even threatened not to air
Rockets games.
It was understandable that the
Rockets and the NBA itself would take steps to assuage any hurt feelings from
one of their biggest markets in Asia and the world. But for many, the method
done by the league went somewhat beyond appeasement and into excessive
kowtowing to the Chinese Communist Party. Two official NBA statements were
released, one in English and the other in Chinese. The English statement
expressed regret for Morey’s statement but noted the NBA is committed to
individual freedom of expression. The Chinese statement on the other hand
expressed stronger language against the Houston GM for hurting feelings of
Chinese basketball fans.
Observers of Chinese news noted
that the word syntax used by the NBA in their Chinese-language apology to China
is almost verbatim what the CCP uses whenever it speaks out against foreign
media and personalities they feel undermine the party’s authority over nearly many
aspects of life in China. For the moment, other NBA figures and celebrities
have been quiet over the issue; but it has stirred heated discussion from US
Senators and Democratic Party presidential candidates. Houston Rockets owner
Tilman Fertitta already announced that Daryl Morey’s statement is his own and
does not represent official opinion of the franchise.
The ongoing pro-democracy protests
in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR) that Morey referenced in
his Tweet has been the subject of much downplaying and compartmentalizing by
mainland China, with the government opining that the protesters have foreign
backing.
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