Baizuo

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Baizuo (Chinese: 白左; pinyin: báizuǒ, Mandarin pronunciation: [pǎɪ.tswò]; literally "white left") is a derogatory Chinese neologism used to refer to Western liberals and leftists and to their values, especially in relation to refugee issues and social problems. The term originated in the 2010s, probably initially to mock American and Western communists who traveled to China to support the communist revolution and has since come into widespread use due to Chinese netizens' criticism of Western liberal to leftist ideologies and of European governments, particularly Angela Merkel and the German government, for their alleged over-tolerance to immigration issues, and to netizens' praise of Donald Trump's populist policies. The term has begun to be widely used in English as well, most notably by American conservatives.

Etymology

The word is made up of two Chinese morphemes,

LGBT rights; of tolerating the "regressive values" of Islam for the sake of multiculturalism; of supporting the welfare state at the expense of tolerating lazy people; and of being "ignorant and arrogant westerners" who "pity the rest of the world and think they are saviours".[4] The initial popularity of the term has been attributed by several surveys to overseas Chinese communities, often high-technology practitioners or small business owners. As a result of their lack of education in humanitarian equality, per Yinghong Cheng, and their life experience of hard work in the West, they are uncomfortable and even hostile to new concepts and doctrines in religion, gender, sexuality and family.[5]

Three meanings of the term have been specified through analysis: the term represents a perceived racial distinction in the global racial hierarchy by the Chinese people; through the term, the racial other has been identified as a racial traitor; the term refers to a group of people who are perceived to have a destructive influence on developed civilizations, including China, and Chinese nationalists must take the side of the global rightists against the damage leftists allegedly cause to civilization.[6] It is also related to another term, shèngmǔ (simplified Chinese: 圣母; traditional Chinese: 聖母; pinyin: shèngmǔ; literally "Holy Mother"), a reference to those whose political opinions are perceived as being sympathetic towards immigration. These words have analogies with English words like libtard, but they also partially encompass the Chinese view of classical Western culture.[7]

Usage

2015 European migrant crisis

The European migrant crisis stirred up intense debate among Chinese netizens, as well as increased use of baizuo.

The term comes up often under topics related to the

politically correct" to mock Merkel or other "leftist" politicians on Weibo because of their moderate platforms for refugees.[9] Amnesty International's paper elicited a fierce reaction, and an ensuing Global Times poll showed that 90.3 percent of Internet users did not want to accept refugees, leading Global Times to call Amnesty International's survey "peculiar" and an attempt to "incite antagonism against the government among the public".[10]

The white left have turned the beautiful and affluent Sweden into a notorious 'rape capital' ... I feel so lucky that I am Han Chinese (hanzu): our nation can never be assimilated by the inferior culture of extreme Islam, past, present, or future.[11]

from a post on the Zhihu platform, December 19, 2017

Communist Youth League created a similar questionnaire asking netizens if they were willing to support the Chinese government's acceptance of Middle Eastern refugees and this time, only about 0.5 percent said they did.[13] On June 23, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, in a meeting with the Lebanese Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil, stressed that refugees are not migrants and that they will all eventually return to their home countries. On June 26, Yao apologized and expressed her agreement with Wang's view.[14]

Several nationalist narratives—some of them identical to the

anti-elitism, opposition to mainstream media sentiment, identitarianism, national rejuvenation, nativism, social Darwinism and pragmatism,[15] with the term being used as a key rhetorical device to chain these ideas together.[11] Chinese netizens have adopted the narrative that intervention from the United States and the West instigated the Syrian civil war and caused the refugee crisis and therefore accuse Western countries of hypocrisy on the refugee issue.[16] In addition, due to the one-child policy implemented in China, the introduction of immigrants is more likely to be seen as an act, at least in the imagination, of displacing the majority ethnic groups.[17]

Donald Trump 2016 presidential campaign

Red Guards in 1967.
Black Lives Matter protest in 2014.
The Maoist agenda is an important part among debates of leftist agendas in China. Liberal intellectuals who are critical of baizuo, for example, contend that there are similarities between the Red Guards (left) and Black Lives Matter activists (right).

big character poster or struggle session. They draw the conclusion that the "white left" is wreaking devastation on America through these analogies. The latter, though, connect Trump's populism to Maoism.[21]

Similar to the case during the 2015 European migrant crisis, the support for American right-wing populism has also been seen as a result of Chinese pragmatism.[22] For nationalists, the use of the term is accompanied by expressions of China's rise and sense of competition.[1] For liberal intellectuals, the criticism of the "white left" and the praise of Trump also represent their non-nationalist sentiment and pro-market sentiment.[23]

Usage by American conservatives

In fact, they have a name for our self-hating professional class. They call them baizuo. The rough translation from Mandarin is 'white liberal', and it is definitely not a compliment.[24]

Tucker Carlson, March 20, 2020

Since the popularity of the term in China, conservatives in the United States, especially nationalist conservatives, have also begun to use the term. Prominent conservatives Tucker Carlson and Rod Dreher have used the term to criticize American leftist and liberal ideas. In March 2020, Carlson introduced the term on his television show, while Dreher used "baizuocracy" to describe "white leftist government". The use of the term has been described as embodying a shift in the attitudes among a section of the American right that now expresses admiration for China and believes that it will prevail over the liberal-leaning United States.[25] There are claims that American conservatives misuse the term and ignore the debate about Chinese nationalism and "geopolitical Darwinism".[24]

Laissez-faire in usage

Despite its possible

cyber-nationalism on the Chinese internet.[26] Zhang Chenchen believes that this laissez-faire is due to the government's tolerance and even encouragement of discussions that portray the West as divided and in decline as a result of democratic politics. She states this means that the government wants to see netizens portray Western politicians as hypocritical and self-serving on human rights issues.[27]

See also

Look up 白左 in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Notes

  1. ^ simplified Chinese: 西方"白左"和中国"爱国科学家"的伪道德; traditional Chinese: 西方"白左"和中國"愛國科學家"的偽道德; pinyin: Xīfāng báizuǒ hé zhōngguó àiguó kēxuéjiā de wěidàodé
  2. ^ According to Li Shuo's original article, he refers to Erwin Engst and Joan Hinton.
    • Li 2010: "古人云"来而不往非礼也"，天朝不但在物流上被美帝非礼，一船船的货真价实的商品运到美国去，换来的却是堆积如山的冥币（见《人民币？人冥币！》），人流上也被美帝非礼，一飞机一飞机货真价实的的知识分子运到美国去，换回来的是零星的"爱国科学家"以及更为罕见的"白左"，前者以钱学森、钱伟长、萧光琰为代表，后者以阳早、寒春夫妇为代表。" [As the old saying goes, "It is impolite not to reciprocate," but not only is the Celestial Empire being treated impolitely by the American Empire in terms of logistics – a boatload of genuine goods shipped to the United States, in exchange for a mountain of hell money (see "People's Currency? People's Hellish Currency!") – but also being treated impolitely in terms of people – a plane of genuine intellectuals were shipped to the United States in exchange for a smattering of "patriotic scientists" and the even rarer "white left", the former is represented by Qian Xuesen, Qian Weichang and Xiao Guangdian, and the latter by Erwin Engst and Joan Hinton.]

References

Citations

  1. ^ a b Huang 2021.
  2. ^ a b Wang 2019, p. 69.
  3. ^ Xu 2020.
  4. ^ Zhang 2017.
  5. ^ Cheng 2019, p. 284.
  6. ^ Cheng 2019, pp. 280–281.
  7. ^ a b Gan 2020, p. 25.
  8. ^ Gan 2020, p. 25; Zhang 2020, p. 96; Lin 2021, pp. 95–96.
  9. ^ Shen 2020, p. 26; Zhang 2017.
  10. ^ Zhang 2017; Gan 2020, p. 21.
  11. ^ a b Zhang 2020, p. 100.
  12. ^ Shen 2020, pp. 26–27; Gan 2020, p. 26.
  13. ^ Shen 2020, p. 28.
  14. ^ Wang 2020, p. 130.
  15. ^ Gan 2020, p. 25; Zhang 2020, pp. 101–104.
  16. ^ Shen 2020, p. 29; Zhang 2020, p. 101.
  17. ^ Wang 2020, p. 137; Shen 2020, pp. 29–30.
  18. ^ Lin 2021, pp. 85–86; Zhang 2020, p. 96.
  19. ^ Lin 2021, p. 86; Zhang 2020, p. 96; Carlson 2018.
  20. ^ Chen 2022, p. 176.
  21. ^ Hendriks-Kim 2023; Lin 2021, pp. 88, 95–96; Gao 2023, pp. 27, 39–40.
  22. ^ Zhang 2017; Lin 2021, p. 86.
  23. ^ Lin 2021, p. 90.
  24. ^ a b Wong 2022.
  25. ^ Wong 2022; Weigel 2021.
  26. ^ Zhang 2020, p. 108; Chen 2022, pp. 175–176.
  27. ^ Cheng 2019, p. 285.

Sources

Further reading
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