Edison electrifies China
Feb. 29th, 2008 12:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomusYesterday Hisae was telling me about the Edison Chen photo scandal in China. She'd read about it on Japanese bulletin boards, and joined the millions who'd downloaded the photos to see what all the fuss was about. Brief recap: Canto-Pop star / rapper / playa / actor Edison Chen took his pink Apple laptop in to get fixed at Elite Multimedia in Hong Kong, where he'd bought it. A repairman there, Sze Honchun, found up to 10,000 explicit images of Edison fucking various famous Chinese singers and actresses (Gillian Chung from Twins, actresses Cecilia Cheung and Bobo Chan, and others), copied them, and started releasing them on the internet to make money. Arrested on charges of dishonest gain, Sze is currently out on bail, awaiting trial.
The scandal has thrown the careers (not to mention the personal lives) of some of China's biggest stars into turmoil. It's also focused the attention of Asia, if not the world, on sexual mores. Is China sexually conservative? How widely is porn viewed there? Which is more sexually permissive, ex-colonial Hong Kong or ex-communist mainland China? How do the Hong Kong stars' public images differ from their private behaviour?
Some amazing stats have emerged. When the photos were posted on mainland Chinese chatroom Tianya.com, they were downloaded up to 20 million times a day. The government didn't take any steps to remove them initially -- although they censor political or religious stuff severely, the Chinese authorities don't seem to care much about sex images. "Web sites on the mainland are usually more sensitive to political issues than to pornography," says the Wikipedia entry, "and for several weeks major sites such as Baidu permitted the images to be disseminated, attracting Hong Kong users". Eventually, on February 18th, the official Beijing Network News Council held a meeting about what they rather charmingly called "the romantic pictures", rebuking search engine Baidu for spreading them.
By this time -- three weeks after the first photo appeared online -- it was too late to stop the images from circulating. Hong Kong media outlet Wen Wei Po sent a questionnaire out and found that 40% of high school and primary school kids had already seen the sex pictures. Some were even trying it for themselves. For people of all ages, there was stigma involved in not having seen the images. Japanese bulletin boards hosted discussions in which people criticized the shape of Edison's penis (too smooth, straight and veinless, thought the Japanese, with too small a head) or gave it new names (the "Edison sausage").
Western media coverage was contradictory and somewhat confused. Used to treating mainland China as a conservative, censorious place, the West seemed surprised that people in Hong Kong had had to use mainland Chinese servers to access the images. "We tend to imagine Hong Kong as a free-wheeling, anything goes kind of place," said Foreign Policy. "But in many ways, it still reflects the conservatism of the mainland."
Maybe they should have said "in many ways, it still reflects the conservatism of the West". Daisann McLane, a Hong Kong-based freelance journalist, told the LA Times: "In many ways, Hong Kong preserves a lot of Confucian ideals that got swept away on the mainland," she said. "There is a disjuncture between public image and what's in the pictures."
On this last point -- the disconnect between what the Japanese call omote and ura, public face and daily life -- there was more agreement. "The shock many Hong Kong residents felt at seeing images of the stars nude and having sex either online or in print with certain body parts strategically blocked -- including some adorned with stuffed animals, police uniforms, fishnet lingerie and bikinis -- was compounded by the fact that several of the female stars have been marketed as ingenues," continued the LA Times.
This obviously interests me -- a couple of days ago I was telling you how Emmy the Great's style reflected a Hong Kong ingenue mode. "What made the scandal especially shocking was that some of the female stars in the photos have built their careers on "innocent girl" images," remarked Foreign Policy.
While I agree that this makes the images exciting, I don't think it's in any way contradictory. People in the West have a tendency to focus too much on things being logical opposites, which in our minds makes them not mutually-creating complementaries but mutually-banishing irreconcilables. Something must either be guilty or innocent; it cannot be both. As a result, unable to hold opposites in its mind at the same time, the West tends to be rather too quick to charge people with hypocrisy. Asia is much more dialectical in its thinking. A dialectical view of the ingenue is that her innocence is in dialogue with its opposite, is a theatrical representation. If this is true of ordinary people, it's even more true of actors and singers, who have not only the public / private split, but also a whole series of fictional personalities and audience projections overlaid onto their natural contradictions.
It's very simple, and very complex. An ingenue is someone who pretends to pretend not to know her own sexual power. Or, to make it even more simple and complex, who pretends to pretend to pretend to pretend, in order to gain sexual power, not to know her sexual power. An ingenue, in other words, is not a victim, or a hypocrite. She's a powerful sexual actress.
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Here's a video of Gillian Chung weeping at a press conference apparently held impromptu in a public railway station following the publication, last year, of nude photos of her shot in Malaysia. Now these are very complex tears, with onion layers of meaning. They might represent real pain because people saw her naked, but they might also be a way to re-establish a conservative public ingenue persona after being caught in private in a rather different mode. Caught doing something much "worse", Gillian hasn't cried in public this time (though she may well be crying about the cancellation of her Olympic opening performance). Her statements, this time, have been terse and unemotional. She was foolish, she said, and has grown up since Edison snapped her. Here she is acting the part of a schoolgirl, with Edison as the only boy student in a girl's school:
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It seems real Hong Kong schoolgirls have also grown up rather quickly in the last month. But maybe their innocence was always somewhat more dialectical than we presume.
The scandal has thrown the careers (not to mention the personal lives) of some of China's biggest stars into turmoil. It's also focused the attention of Asia, if not the world, on sexual mores. Is China sexually conservative? How widely is porn viewed there? Which is more sexually permissive, ex-colonial Hong Kong or ex-communist mainland China? How do the Hong Kong stars' public images differ from their private behaviour?
Some amazing stats have emerged. When the photos were posted on mainland Chinese chatroom Tianya.com, they were downloaded up to 20 million times a day. The government didn't take any steps to remove them initially -- although they censor political or religious stuff severely, the Chinese authorities don't seem to care much about sex images. "Web sites on the mainland are usually more sensitive to political issues than to pornography," says the Wikipedia entry, "and for several weeks major sites such as Baidu permitted the images to be disseminated, attracting Hong Kong users". Eventually, on February 18th, the official Beijing Network News Council held a meeting about what they rather charmingly called "the romantic pictures", rebuking search engine Baidu for spreading them.
By this time -- three weeks after the first photo appeared online -- it was too late to stop the images from circulating. Hong Kong media outlet Wen Wei Po sent a questionnaire out and found that 40% of high school and primary school kids had already seen the sex pictures. Some were even trying it for themselves. For people of all ages, there was stigma involved in not having seen the images. Japanese bulletin boards hosted discussions in which people criticized the shape of Edison's penis (too smooth, straight and veinless, thought the Japanese, with too small a head) or gave it new names (the "Edison sausage").Western media coverage was contradictory and somewhat confused. Used to treating mainland China as a conservative, censorious place, the West seemed surprised that people in Hong Kong had had to use mainland Chinese servers to access the images. "We tend to imagine Hong Kong as a free-wheeling, anything goes kind of place," said Foreign Policy. "But in many ways, it still reflects the conservatism of the mainland."
Maybe they should have said "in many ways, it still reflects the conservatism of the West". Daisann McLane, a Hong Kong-based freelance journalist, told the LA Times: "In many ways, Hong Kong preserves a lot of Confucian ideals that got swept away on the mainland," she said. "There is a disjuncture between public image and what's in the pictures."
On this last point -- the disconnect between what the Japanese call omote and ura, public face and daily life -- there was more agreement. "The shock many Hong Kong residents felt at seeing images of the stars nude and having sex either online or in print with certain body parts strategically blocked -- including some adorned with stuffed animals, police uniforms, fishnet lingerie and bikinis -- was compounded by the fact that several of the female stars have been marketed as ingenues," continued the LA Times.
This obviously interests me -- a couple of days ago I was telling you how Emmy the Great's style reflected a Hong Kong ingenue mode. "What made the scandal especially shocking was that some of the female stars in the photos have built their careers on "innocent girl" images," remarked Foreign Policy.While I agree that this makes the images exciting, I don't think it's in any way contradictory. People in the West have a tendency to focus too much on things being logical opposites, which in our minds makes them not mutually-creating complementaries but mutually-banishing irreconcilables. Something must either be guilty or innocent; it cannot be both. As a result, unable to hold opposites in its mind at the same time, the West tends to be rather too quick to charge people with hypocrisy. Asia is much more dialectical in its thinking. A dialectical view of the ingenue is that her innocence is in dialogue with its opposite, is a theatrical representation. If this is true of ordinary people, it's even more true of actors and singers, who have not only the public / private split, but also a whole series of fictional personalities and audience projections overlaid onto their natural contradictions.
It's very simple, and very complex. An ingenue is someone who pretends to pretend not to know her own sexual power. Or, to make it even more simple and complex, who pretends to pretend to pretend to pretend, in order to gain sexual power, not to know her sexual power. An ingenue, in other words, is not a victim, or a hypocrite. She's a powerful sexual actress.
[Error: unknown template video]
Here's a video of Gillian Chung weeping at a press conference apparently held impromptu in a public railway station following the publication, last year, of nude photos of her shot in Malaysia. Now these are very complex tears, with onion layers of meaning. They might represent real pain because people saw her naked, but they might also be a way to re-establish a conservative public ingenue persona after being caught in private in a rather different mode. Caught doing something much "worse", Gillian hasn't cried in public this time (though she may well be crying about the cancellation of her Olympic opening performance). Her statements, this time, have been terse and unemotional. She was foolish, she said, and has grown up since Edison snapped her. Here she is acting the part of a schoolgirl, with Edison as the only boy student in a girl's school:
[Error: unknown template video]
It seems real Hong Kong schoolgirls have also grown up rather quickly in the last month. But maybe their innocence was always somewhat more dialectical than we presume.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 11:24 am (UTC)I don't know; Britney Spears' handlers made a brief career out of her as a virgin-slut. Now she's apparently insane, but I'm sure this has more to do with being unallowed to have a normal family than anything else.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 11:51 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 12:07 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 11:51 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 11:52 am (UTC)HER INNOCENCE MAY BE MORE DIALECTICAL THAN WE PRESUME! (dribble) LET US LOOK AT THE EVIDENCE VERY CAREFULLY! (dribble) AGAIN!(dribble)HOLD HER STILL! (dribble)
Do you think Emy is wondering what SHE did to deserve you dribbling all over her? No scandal to be punished for there.
gekko
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 11:55 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 11:56 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 12:08 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 12:11 pm (UTC)Later, a little more knitting.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 12:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 12:19 pm (UTC)And Darling? Maybe a cup of tea? Oh. And please dont forget the downloading.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 12:39 pm (UTC)(no subject)
From:(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 12:22 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 12:32 pm (UTC)People like yourself, for instance? You're eternally positioning "the West" and "Asia" in such mutually banishing binaries. I'm not even sure what "the West" and "Asia" are supposed to represent when it comes to sexuality. Is Malaysia a part of that "Asia"? What about Thailand? Likewise, is Albania part of "The West"?
I dispute the idea that the female "ingenue" in the West (I guess you mean America) is not a sexual figure. Quite the contrary. Once again you've got this idea in your head, about Asians being able to believe seven contradictory things before breakfast, and you've shoehorned it into a current news story. Actually when you compare this story to similar ones in America, I think it tells us a lot more about how America has changed and how it has moved away from a public/private model that used to be there fairly recently but has been eroded.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 01:10 pm (UTC)Have a gander at the cultural psychology research (http://www.cogsci.rpi.edu/csjarchive/Proceedings/2003/pdfs/136.pdf) which shows that Asian culture is more dialectical because of its greater emphasis on collectivism and context.
I actually don't see the ingenue model much in today's West. Not outside of France, anyway. If the ingenue is a woman who pretends to have no control in order to have some, the Heather Mills model of Western femininity sees women pretending to have control when they actually have none. And, to be binary about this, I see the Eastern ingenue model as being about the power specifically embodied in femininity (as culturally enacted, the power of mothers and lovers, a power that exists in specific social roles and contexts) whereas the Western model assumes that only masculine power is real power, and that women have to become phallus-free men to have it. I think the West is more misogynistic for that reason, though it inevitably portrays itself as the zenith of gender enlightenment.
(no subject)
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From:"but you never played the mother/virgin like so many others..."
Date: 2008-02-29 12:49 pm (UTC)I'm sorry you're a n00b to the Madonna/whore characterisation of women that is the poison of Western culture.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go shower for an hour now, to get this squick out of my skin.
Re: "but you never played the mother/virgin like so many others..."
Date: 2008-02-29 03:58 pm (UTC)While the Madonna / whore thing shares with the omote / ura thing a certain tolerance of paradox, I think these can't be mapped to each other. The Madonna / whore thing is the right men reserve to label women according to whether they like them or don't, or whether they need a mother or a lover at any given moment. The omote / ura thing is basically any individual's choice to present him or herself as clean or dirty, guilty or innocent, upstanding or sleazy, as and when he or she sees fit. The difference is between being a passive object of someone else's labeling, or being an active subject with the agency to choose a particular self-presentation.
Now, clearly the reason that this control of omote / ura broke down in this case is that control of images taken consentingly by Edison and his women in private was taken over by a third party who had no right to intrude, and who was motivated by money: the repair man. I would have no sympathy at all for someone who supported his actions using the argument that "these people had it coming, there was a big gap between their public personae and what they got up to in private". That gap is perfectly legitimate, and it's for them to control.
(no subject)
From:(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 12:49 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 01:16 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 01:02 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 01:15 pm (UTC)It's an odd sort of picture, isn't it? But it gets you off the hook of looking at your own attitudes to gender if you can just say it's all a problem in my completely immoral (yet oddly happy) relationship, presumably.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 01:16 pm (UTC)http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=01f9a2d108987b6009d44fc8df6891bf
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 01:38 pm (UTC)This isn't porn, it's pictures of women having sex taken without their knowledge, and released by the utter creep they slept with - I don't believe for a second that he 'accidentally' left them on his machine when he sent it to get fixed, nobody's that stupid. The fact that they were stupid to sleep with him is beside the point (have you seen his blog? good freakin' lord, what a turd) and so is their 'innocence' or lack of it. I hope the Triads get him.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 01:55 pm (UTC)As for them being "stupid enough to sleep with him"...what makes you think the girls are so much better?Stupid people fucking other stupid people makes porn happen. I don't understand why we must convince ourselves that something exploitative was happening. Just enjoy it...or not.
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From:charity purgittory
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Date: 2008-02-29 01:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 01:47 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 01:44 pm (UTC)Edison is Canadian and I'm pretty sure he moved to Asia since he knew he could use his Westerness to enchant girls. But I don't blame him for that, and considering this probably would NEVER have happened in Canada, who can blame him for taking pics? This was a virtuous amount of trysts with some admirable (and consenting) scores. Bravo!
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 02:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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From:trapped in the nerd cage
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From:Much appreciated
From:(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 03:56 pm (UTC)I feel bad for Edison. He looks like the asshole when it's really that dickwad at the computer shop. The only thing he's guilty of is vanity and a severe lack of imagination... I was hoping for something darker but really the sex seems just as wholesome as their public persona.
I remember that 2006 clip of Gillian Chung crying. She actually says, "I feel sorry for me". Complex, sure, but perhaps as a female HK-er I could see right through her act and in fact, everyone in HK could. That's what's fascinating; we are all aware of the multi-layered pretense, yet happily buy into it. How do you explain that phenomenon, a cultural blind man's bluff?
Here's a translation of Gillian Chung's 2006 clip you've posted:
Host: Let's hear what Gillian has to say about dealing with the difficult situation of being secretly filmed.
Gillian: I really feel sorry for me.
Narration: Aww, poor thing! There are suspicions that Gillian was secretly filmed changing clothes backstage during a gig in Malaysia. Just talking about it makes her break down and cry.
Reporter: Poor thing; don't cry.
Charlene (the other Twin): That's actually against the law. It's to do with privacy. Our company is in discussion with lawyers...
Reporter: So the photos have been sent to your record company and they will decide whether to take legal action?
Charlene: Yes.
Narration: Charlene and the company are all in support of her but the incident has traumatised our main female protagonist.
Gillian: There's so much pressure, I mean, taking those photos of me changing clothes.
Reporter: Now that it has happened, what will you do in the future to prevent that?
Charlene: We're very careful...
Gillian: ... it's them who are filming secretly.
Charlene: Yes.
Narration: Not only that, but people are saying that she was changing clothes in public, her body available for all to see. That angers Gillian all the more.
Gillian: I think there was planning involved with those pictures. That room was meant to be a dressing room too and therefore safe for us to change in. It's not like I kept the door open or just changed in any old place.
Charlene: (some boring stuff about how the room was set up)... She's so innocent.
Gillian: There was so much stuff in that cabinet, our clothes, our tools and presents from our fans. Just looking at it, you wouldn't know any different. We did check but if they had their intentions, you can't prevent that.
Charlene: It's not like we forgot our shorts on stage - in which case it would be our fault - but this is a place where we thought we could feel safe. If you purposely film us, then it isn't our fault.
Gillian: Luckily two of my dressers were standing around me and covered me up a bit so that it's less embarrassing. Even though we were in a room of just girls, it's still quite embarrassing.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 04:11 pm (UTC)Thanks for the translation! I'd be curious to know, as a Hong Konger, Sunshine, what you think of the point about HK and the mainland and their comparative sexual morality standards. Is HK more or less conservative when it comes to sex than the mainland? Has, as one of the experts stated, HK got stuck in some kind of Confucian timewarp while the mainland has rushed ahead into an age of sexual (if not political) permissiveness? Let a thousand porn flowers bloom?
(no subject)
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Date: 2008-02-29 04:36 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 04:55 pm (UTC)[Error: unknown template video]
Rumour in Japan has it that there are explicit images of her on the computer too.
The TV Date show just clangs with irony now. "Edison, you must have many girlfriends in Hong Kong!"
"No, no, not at all..."
'Honne & Tatemae Vs. Western Ideas of identity' debate No. 23154
Date: 2008-02-29 05:07 pm (UTC)In Japanese culture, you have a front you put on for the world at large (tatemae) in order to function within society, and true feelings and desires (honne) that at times need to be hidden so they dont conflict with the honne front.
I think you're misunderstanding the nature of this aspect of Asian culture personally, Momus.
To me, Honne & Tatemae makes perfect sense and most westerners (when they've had this concept explained to them properly) agree that it does. Anyone who claims they act exactly as they please all the time is a liar -- I'd love to roll out of bed at 3pm every day, tell some of my clients they're being unreasonable, difficult fuckheads and spend the rest of the evening having fun. This is my honne side, the problem is, I know if I act like this I'll never be hired again.
So I put on my tatemae side -- I turn up on time when I'm due to meet them, smile and tell them "No, I understand" when they tell me for the 3rd time a design's not quite right even though I followed their specfications to the letter, and I make sure that the majority of my work is completed on time.
So far, so good. Everyone agrees this is normal behaviour and part of becoming a functioning adult.
Sometimes however, some non-Japanese people have a hard time accepting the honne-tatemae system when it's applied to personal relationships. "putting on a front is fake" they'll say, When in actuality, we all put on a front in every aspect of our lives. Ever told a white lie to save someone's feelings? Ever sent someone a christmas card more out of obligation than because you actually wanted to send it? Everyone has. honne-tatemae makes perfect sense.
The problem I have with your interpretation of this however, Momus, is I dont think you understand how people in the east interpret the honne-tatemae system themselves.
You seem to be making the case that if a girl sells herself to the public as innocent, but behind the scenes is a complete slut, in the west shes a hypocrite but in the east people understand and accept this behaviour as "dialectical" - honne & tatemae.
What I think youre misunderstanding is that honne & tatemae is merely an explanation of conflicting behaviour, its not an excuse for it, or a way of proving asian culture more open minded. Your Honne isnt automatically different to your tatemae. If what your tatemae shows is a kind, gentle girl, and your honne is the same, this is a very desirable trait in eastern society. If your tatemae shows a kind, gentle girl but youre actually a spoilt, loud bitch on the inside, the Japanese would find this just as repulsive and hypocritical as the west.
In the west we'd think "Wow, shes nothing like the innocent girl she claims to be! what a slut."
in the east, they'd think "wow, Her honne is nothing like her tatemae! what a slut".
Theres very little difference between these two views -- the Japanese just have words for it, were as in the west we dont.
***Edit: I wrote honne instead of tatemae in the top example***
Re: 'Honne & Tatemae Vs. Western Ideas of identity' debate No. 23154
Date: 2008-02-29 08:07 pm (UTC)here's another proof of the poverty of the english vocabulary :-O
the irony is that while the japanese do have the vocabulary to conceptualize their own behaviour (they hardly actually do unless probably asked by eager japophile gaikokujin mainly because the ura is not really that 'hidden' and dialectically opposed to the omote. it's all pretty transparent throughout) they tend to see western communication patterns as a sort of true honne/tetemae dynamic ('i love you dad' - after your dad gives you twenty bucks etc.)
Re: 'Honne & Tatemae Vs. Western Ideas of identity' debate No. 23154
From:Re: 'Honne & Tatemae Vs. Western Ideas of identity' debate No. 23154
From:(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 05:32 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 05:58 pm (UTC)The shelf life of an ingénue
Date: 2008-02-29 06:44 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 06:49 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-29 06:49 pm (UTC)momuguru (http://lrc.reviewcanada.ca/index.php?page=In-the-Garden-with-the-Guru)
(no subject)
Date: 2008-03-03 07:00 am (UTC)