China’s official state media and users on Weibo, a social media site censored by the Chinese government, mocked President Joe Biden’s lackluster performance at Thursday night’s presidential debate, with one user joking that they were worried Biden might suddenly die.
The Chinese Communist Party tightly controls the flow of international news into the country and censors all comments on Weibo that contradict the party’s official positions on a range of issues. According to multiple reports, Beijing allowed lively discussion on Weibo about the debate. State media provided detailed summaries of Biden’s debate with former President Donald Trump, telling Chinese readers that Biden “struggled to convey his full thoughts,” and sharing direct quotes from Biden when he declared that he “won Medicare.”
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Courtesy of CNN Presidential Debate
Biden and Trump met in Atlanta on Thursday night in a debate hosted by CNN. Most of the US mainstream media coverage of the debate highlighted Biden’s apparent missteps, including his various incoherent responses to Trump and his failure to convince Americans that he has the energy and mental fortitude to continue governing the country despite being in his 80s. While some Biden supporters tried to defend the president by claiming that he had a cold, the talk on the US left on Friday morning was focused on the possibility of the Democrats trying to remove Biden from the presidential race with just five months to go until the election.
Translations of multiple publications of Chinese-language conversations on Weibo, China’s largest legal social media micropublishing site, showed that the government has allowed users to openly mock Biden, despite his documented extensive business dealings with China. Business Insider translated comments comparing Biden to a “robot.”
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Courtesy of CNN Presidential Debate
“I’m worried that Deng will suddenly die during this debate,” one user reportedly wrote, referring to Biden by his Chinese nickname. Weibo users often give nicknames to American politicians, such as “nation-building comrade” (in Trump’s case) or “comrade in national construction.”River Founding), the joke is that Trump has done so much damage to America that it has helped China thrive and become a beloved Communist ally.
Spanish Newspapers El Mundo I found some even more vicious comments about this debate on Weibo.
“The debate reminds me of the scene where two old men visit a brothel, fall in love with the same prostitute and try everything to prove to the woman who is better and stronger than them,” said one comment translated by the newspaper.
Another person similarly mocked both Trump and Biden, saying, “One old man trying to convince people he’s not crazy, the other old man trying to convince people he’s not demented.”
As is common in Chinese media, many other commentators also used the debate to argue that China’s totalitarian communism is superior to free societies.
“This just points out a fundamental problem with American democracy: Americans don’t choose their president, they choose who’s right to play president on TV,” wrote one Weibo commenter. Newsweek.
Chinese state media was preparing to ridicule the event even before it happened. Global Times newspaper Published An article on Thursday previewed the debate, claiming it was “like a reality TV show” and exposed the frivolity of the American free political system in contrast to the superiority of totalitarian communism.
“The focus on age highlights the phenomenon of gerontocracy in American politics, experts said, and also exposes serious flaws in the self-proclaimed democratic political system,” the state-run propaganda agency said.
One such expert, researcher Lu Xiang, argued that American viewers weren’t watching the games to hear policy differences, but that “what people are actually worried about is how they will behave physically.”
“There is no doubt that there is talented people in both parties, but the current party culture makes it difficult for them to emerge. This is a clear sign of the slowness, rigidity and lack of vitality of American political institutions,” said another government-recognized “expert.”
of Global Times Articles decrying American “gerontocracy” fail to mention that Chinese dictator Xi Jinping is 71 years old and that he has deliberately placed elderly people on China’s Politburo, its most powerful body, to deliberately block the rise of younger, more charismatic rivals.
After the debate, Hu Xijin, a Chinese state propagandist and former top editor of a Chinese newspaper, said: Global TimesHu condemned the debate as “low quality.” Hu sought to equate Biden’s poor performance with Trump’s, claiming the debate exposed “two old men” and was “negative propaganda for Western democracy.”
Personal attacks, hazy memories, mutual ridicule… this debate was highly entertaining for many Chinese. #Debate2024
Objectively speaking, the poor performance of these two old men was a negative advertisement for Western democracy. pic.twitter.com/ktzOh2z2x3
— Hu Xijin (@HuXijin_GT) June 28, 2024
Hu also failed to mention that most of China’s Communist Party leaders, including Xi, are elderly.
Xinhua News AgencyChina’s state-run news agency, China Daily, only provided a summary of the debate but included specific details of the exchange between Trump and Biden, indicating that the Chinese government wants its citizens to know what happened.
“Democratic incumbent Biden and Republican rival Trump engaged in a heated exchange for about 90 minutes without even shaking hands and frequently trading personal attacks,” Xinhua said. Biden called Trump a “loser” and noted that Biden “made multiple speech errors and was unclear at times in his speech.”
“Many television viewers took to social media to air their dissatisfaction, describing the debate as a ‘disaster,’ a ‘catastrophe’ and a ‘waste of time,’ and expressing concern for the future of America,” Xinhua reported.
China Dailyas well as other government agencies. Explained Biden’s performance is poor.
“Biden mostly just stared ahead and listened to Trump, sometimes struggling to get his thoughts across,” the paper said. “Biden stumbled early on, misstating how many jobs had been created during his term and contradicting himself by saying, ‘We finally defeated Medicare.'”
