China’s state-run Global Times on Friday threw a fit over Australia’s News.com describing 14-year-old Olympic gold medalist diver Quan Hongchan as “pokerfaced.”
News.com reported on Friday that Quan “has not cracked a smile despite her impeccable performance,” and said she showed little emotion until her gold medal was confirmed:
Supporters went wild in the crowd when she received nothing but 10s across the board for her incredible round two dive, but Quan’s face told a different story.
Remaining entirely pokerfaced, the teen athlete didn’t crack even the slimmest of smiles.
Viewers were shocked at Quan’s reaction to her perfect dive, which all but guaranteed her a spot on the podium.
The article was accompanied with a photo of Quan with a dour expression and included quotes from unnamed posters on social media who begged her to crack a smile after notching a perfect score.
“It wasn’t until Quan’s gold medal was confirmed that she broke into a smile as her team celebrated around her, with her coach holding her aloft like a trophy,” News.com concluded, providing a photo of Quan doing exactly that.
The article also noted Quan’s inspiring life story, as she began diving at the age of seven so she could win money to help pay her mother’s medical bills. Quan dedicated her gold medal to her mom in subsequent interviews and said her goal is to “make enough money to support her.”
According to the South China Morning Post (SCMP), Quan’s parents are farmers from a rural community. Her mother was injured in a traffic accident several years ago and has been “hospitalized multiple times” since then.
“My mum is ill. I don’t know what illness she has got. I just want to make money to get her medical treatment, because my family needs a lot of money to cure her illness,” Quan told reporters, declining to answer further questions on the matter.
She also commented on her joyless facial expression during competitions, saying her coach advised her to remain calm and emotionless while performing.
Quan became a sensation in China after her gold medal victory, whetting the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) appetite for national heroes. The SCMP suspected this might explain the Global Times going berserk at News.com for calling her “pokerfaced,” even though Quan explained that she tries very hard to maintain that poker face while competing.
The Global Times carried on as if the Australian news site had just compared Chinese dictator Xi Jinping to Winnie-the-Pooh:
Despite of Quan’s exciting smile and a big hug with her coach after the final score came out, news.com.au wrote on Thursday that Quan “remained entirely pokerfaced [and] did not crack even the slimmest of smiles. Viewers were shocked at Quan’s reaction,” it claimed.
The news site even said in the caption of a picture in the article that Quan “looked devastated after being given a perfect score” which was obviously not the case and, in a lack of basic human touch, tried to describe this young gold medalist as an odd, taciturn teenager. The news.com.au article sparked anger among some Chinese netizens on Thursday who criticized this Australian media outlet for slandering Chinese athletes with misinformation and bias.
“Are the employees of the news site blind? Are they professional journalists?” one netizen wrote on social media “Shame on them for groundlessly attacking a young diving talent with such malicious remarks. Must apologize,” other added.
“Defaming Chinese people is a customary tactic of some racist Western media outlets, which like to describe Chinese as either ‘mobsters’ or soulless ‘machines,’” the Global Times howled, throwing in a side jab at the New York Times for daring to publish a “prejudiced” article last week entitled “The Chinese Sports Machine’s Single Goal: The Most Gold, at Any Cost.”