BREAKING: Ma Long & Fan Zhendong boycott CHINA OPEN!

[Baal]

They are now just tasting the black art of "terrorism". Next come self criticizing .. been there done that!

That is the classic next step in China, isn't it? My colleague in the next door office -- a chemist from Peking University -- spent a couple of years picking rice and writing self-criticism letters before she eventually managed to leave China.

 

[tropical]

That is the classic next step in China, isn't it?.

You know it!

 

[Hailee Lee]

Here is a rough translation. Please ignore some grammar and spelling mistakes.

Letter of apology

On the evening of June 23, 2017, at the international table tennis federation world tour of China (Chengdu), men's singles table tennis open 16 into 8 games, Chinese table tennis coaches Qin Zhijian, Ma Lin, athletes Ma Long, Xu Xin, Fan Zhendong acted on impulse and dropped out of the race without permission as they did not fully understand the national table tennis team's management adjustment. For the effects of the incident, we are deeply aware of the seriousness of our mistakes, which have caused bad social influence; failed to live up to the social who love and support our team; damaged the Chinese table tennis team's image, which is adhering to the spirit of patriotism, collectivism, tenacious fight and win honor for our country.


The occurrence of this incident has exposed serious problems in the management of our team. We deeply regret and blame ourselves. We sincerely accept the criticism from all circles of the society, and sincerely apologize to the fans and the audience. Chinese table tennis team will draw lessons from this incident, profoundly reflection, strengthen the team's ideological style construction and strive for the excellent performance at the same time, inheritance and carry forward the Chinese table tennis team's spirit of hard work, indomitable, and win honor for the country.


The interests of the motherland are above all else. The Chinese table tennis team will repay the motherland and all the masses who care and cherish the development of the team and support the sports of China.


Chinese Table Tennis Team
Jun 24，2017

 

[NextLevel]

That is the same letter that rainneverever already posted. Kinda pathetic but understandable.

 

[Baal]

It reads better with the grammatical errors. Gives a better sense.

 

[rainneverever]

Now it is Ma Lin's turn. The same letter.

 

[rainneverever]

Qin Zhijian posted the same letter. Next one should be Xu Xin, in alphabetical order.

 

[rainneverever]

Xu Xin posted. Mission complete!

 

[Baal]

The same letter each time??? Will that make things better or worse? In the US it would fan the flames higher. Nobody would accept it as sincere. In China? Any predictions?

My wife predicts this kabuki theatee will get players off the hook publicly but they will be punished financially and in other ways we wont see. Some other people will be fired, LGL will stay fired, and CTTA will make the changes they wanted to make originally. It may be some of the changes were needed. Now the queStion is what will they release about LGL?

 

[ttmonster]

The "promotion" was a farce , the restructuring was a "farce" , the protest was genuine politically motivated or not, now we have an even bigger farce of an apology ... I would give this round to the players , even though they will lose eventually

 

[rainneverever]

The same letter was posted by 5 of them without changing a word and the date is yesterday.
People are supporting them and blaming GAS in the comments and shares.
For my understanding, they have to post this letter to make a gesture to the GAS.

The same letter each time??? Will that make things better or worse? In the US it would fan the flames higher. Nobody would accept it as sincere. In China? Any predictions?

 

[Baal]

Yes, the general netizens reactions will be interesting. Thanks for reporting all this.

 

[tropical]

I went to China 1st time in 2004. Brought some soft X Korean DVD's and got stopped at the Shenzhen/Hong Kong border. Without any translators, the border police made me watch 24 Korean soft porn dvd's and signed a letter of confession about damaging China's reputation. Finally they let me go and I didn't try to bribe them after 12 hour ordeal for such trivial thing. So think about this case, folks. It is no simple matter. These players made the organization/government lose face. Future is very bleak for them.

 

[jelt2359]

"We will do deep reflections on this matter and improve the team's patriotism, team-spirit, and thinking ability. We will create a law-abiding, professional, country-loving table tennis team. We believe that table tennis in China has strong traditions and ability, and will continue to achieve great results, and not disappoint the Chinese Communist Party nor the people of China."

That is chilling.

Actually no, that's the way it is in China. People forget that it is a Communist country... It may look very capitalist, but there are deep-rooted Communist/ Nationalist/ Patriotic beliefs still!

 

[jelt2359]

My wife's take is that the whole thing from top down is business as usual in China, and happens there daily. Except that in this case Ma Long, XX, and FZD are young elite popular professional athletes who travel a lot. Somebody expected that as usual they would obey and go along with the Program, and 99.999% of the time they would be right but this time they miscalculated. The athlete's response took them by surprise. And shit hit fan and now NOBODY is quite sure what to do from the top down because this territory is pretty uncharted.

100% right. But there's a playbook, and you can see it happening even right now. Whatever the facts of the case, it is being reported first and foremost in the Chinese media (read: reaches hundreds of millions of people) as a shameful loss of face to the nation. The serious Chinese fans (read: tens of thousands of people) may have a more nuanced view. But try asking the regular Chinese person if what they (ML, XX and FZD) did was justified; whether it's acceptable to give up having a Chinese winner of the China Open in Table Tennis for whatever reason;

And the answer is going to be, 'traitor'...

Also, LGL cannot win. The more this gets publicised, it looks like his face was more important than China's face (not individuals, not the CNT, but CHINA's face). That's not a battle you can ever win. He's done. The CTTA knows they're gonna have to do something to both punish and appease the CNT, but bringing LGL back is not going to be the answer.

 

[rainneverever]

First of all, LGL will not go back to CNT. If he does not resign, he will be one VP of CTTA.
Second of all, general people know nothing about these players support them and blame GSA this time. Blaming authorities are everywhere, especially this new director of GSA has done other stupid things in soccer, in education, and so on previously. He has a really bad reputation and instead LGL has a very good reputation in general.
Third of all, a lot of celebrities with way more fans than these players are expressing support to the players. And their followers agree.

BTW, there are some TT fans blaming the players who protested. Guess whose fans they are.

100% right. But there's a playbook, and you can see it happening even right now. Whatever the facts of the case, it is being reported first and foremost in the Chinese media (read: reaches hundreds of millions of people) as a shameful loss of face to the nation. The serious Chinese fans (read: tens of thousands of people) may have a more nuanced view. But try asking the regular Chinese person if what they (ML, XX and FZD) did was justified; whether it's acceptable to give up having a Chinese winner of the China Open in Table Tennis for whatever reason;

And the answer is going to be, 'traitor'...

Also, LGL cannot win. The more this gets publicised, it looks like his face was more important than China's face (not individuals, not the CNT, but CHINA's face). That's not a battle you can ever win. He's done. The CTTA knows they're gonna have to do something to both punish and appease the CNT, but bringing LGL back is not going to be the answer.

 

[jelt2359]

First of all, LGL will not go back to CNT. If he does not resign, he will be one VP of CTTA.
Second of all, general people know nothing about these players support them and blame GSA this time. Blaming authorities are everywhere, especially this new director of GSA has done other stupid things in soccer, in education, and so on previously. He has a really bad reputation and instead LGL has a very good reputation in general.
Third of all, a lot of celebrities with way more fans than these players are expressing support to the players. And their followers agree.

BTW, there are some TT fans blaming the players who protested. Guess whose fans they are.

Looking at a few sites, this is the kind of article there now:

http://sports.news.cn/c/2017-06/24/c_1121202612.htm
http://sports.sina.com.cn/others/pingpang/2017-06-24/doc-ifyhmtek7708839.shtml
http://sports.sina.com.cn/others/pingpang/2017-06-24/doc-ifyhmtek7733651.shtml

I don't doubt that the people who seriously follow Table Tennis in China have a more nuanced view. You are clearly one of them, who knows a lot.

I just think the general public will view it in a very simple lens. Especially now that the people involved are all 'apologising'.

 

[rainneverever]

I check Sina and Tecent news everyday. Most of the articles are not informative. They have very limited reads compared to posts of the same contents on social media like Sina Weibo.
Right now of the top hot searches of Sina Weibo, #2 is "the apology letter" (184k searches), #7 Ma Lin, #9 Wang Nan, #10 Wang Hao. There are thousands of new posts discussing the same apology letters right now, 2:30 am local time in the morning. And people are talking about this incident with their friends/colleagues on Wechat groups. Believe it or not, people think these 5 guys are against the authority and they love to see people against authority.
It is huge this time.
So far, 3 players did not show up publicly. They are scheduled to fly back to Beijing on Sunday. Let's see if they show up o time.

Looking at a few sites, this is the kind of article there now:

http://sports.news.cn/c/2017-06/24/c_1121202612.htm
http://sports.sina.com.cn/others/pingpang/2017-06-24/doc-ifyhmtek7708839.shtml
http://sports.sina.com.cn/others/pingpang/2017-06-24/doc-ifyhmtek7733651.shtml

I don't doubt that the people who seriously follow Table Tennis in China have a more nuanced view. You are clearly one of them, who knows a lot.

I just think the general public will view it in a very simple lens. Especially now that the people involved are all 'apologising'.

 

[jelt2359]

I check Sina and Tecent news everyday. Most of the articles are not informative. They have very limited reads compared to posts of the same contents on social media like Sina Weibo.
Right now of the top hot searches of Sina Weibo, #2 is "the apology letter" (184k searches), #7 Ma Lin, #9 Wang Nan, #10 Wang Hao. There are thousands of new posts discussing the same apology letters right now, 2:30 am local time in the morning. And people are talking about this incident with their friends/colleagues on Wechat groups. Believe it or not, people think these 5 guys are against the authority and they love to see people against authority.
It is huge this time.
So far, 3 players did not show up publicly. They are scheduled to fly back to Beijing on Sunday. Let's see if they show up o time.

What you think is 'non-informative' is exactly where the millions and millions of casual fans find their news. Anyway my point is- this type of smearing of their reputation can make life a living hell for these guys.

They went up against authority, yes. But they also lost the China Open. It's of course too early to say which is eventually going to be more important in the public's eyes, but my bet is on the latter. That's just my personal view.

 

[rainneverever]

By non-informative, I mean some articles are basically reporting a match result, without in-depth interview with the players/coaches. Some are just a copy from ITTF-Chinese or Table Tennis World Magazine. Some are a summary of several posts on Sina Weibo. Only a few journalists are trustworthy because they can meet the team in person.
Social media is taking over in China. TT fans get info from Weibo first, not from news website.

I am sure there will be a fine and/or ban. GAS will not give up at this point. However, after the apology letter, Sina Weibo stopped deleting posts which are in support of the players and related topics can be found in hot searches. People are angry about Sina Weibo deleting posts including a high profile Communist Party Magazine account (yes, Sina can delete posts from an account who represents the Party as along as Sina gets paid and GAS may have to pay the bill this time). People are not judging the behavior of the players now. They know these guys are #WR1,2,3 and win a lot of champions and they are brave. That's enough. Instead they are questioning more about GAS because of the same apology letters. Many new posts are about the appointment of LGL as CTTA VP because it violates CTTA regulations.

What you think is 'non-informative' is exactly where the millions and millions of casual fans find their news. Anyway my point is- this type of smearing of their reputation can make life a living hell for these guys.

They went up against authority, yes. But they also lost the China Open. It's of course too early to say which is eventually going to be more important in the public's eyes, but my bet is on the latter. That's just my personal view.