Tzuyu Zhou's Taiwan Flag Waving Incident

About

Tzuyu Chou's Taiwan Flag Waving Incident" refers to the Chinese online backlash that erupted against the Taiwanese-national member of the K-POP group TWICE for waving a flag of the Republic of China during her appearance on a South Korean TV show in November 2015. The international controversy began in January 2016 after a pro-Chinese Taiwanese celebrity singer accused the teen idol of advocating radical separatism in a blog post that subsequently went viral on the Chinese microblogging site Weibo.

Background

In November 2015, four foreign-national members of the multinational Korean pop idol group TWICE made a special appearance in an episode of the Korean variety competition program My Little Television.^[11] During the filming of the episode, which was livestreamed exclusively on the Internet, Tzuyu Chou (周子瑜), a 16-year-old Taiwanese member of the group, was spotted on camera holding a Taiwanese flag along with a South Korean flag.

Legal Status of Taiwan

The legal status of Taiwan has been a complex and sensitive topic in cross-strait relationships between the ROC and the PRC.^[1][2] The current political status quo is neither a true independence nor a true unification, which often is a source of controversy, such as the meaning of "China" on the two sides of the debate. The usage of the Taiwanese flag in events have been viewed by the Chinese government as a challenge to the status quo. Earlier incidents involving China censoring the Taiwanese flag include singer-songwriter Deserts Chang being banned in China after a Manchester performance.^[8][9][10]

Notable Developments

Huang An's Blog Post

On January 8th, 2016, Huang An (黃安), a Taiwan-born 90s celebrity singer who has garnered newfound fame in China for his vocal opposition against the Taiwanese independence movement, ran a blog post in which he accused Chou of being a radical advocate of Taiwanese independence, citing a video clip of the teen idol waving a Taiwanese flag on the set of the Korean variety TV program. In the post, which was published on the Chinese microblogging platform Weibo^[3], Huang called on his followers to spread the word in a grassroot attempt to bar all activities of TWICE in China. Prior to this blog post, Huang has similarly accused other Sinophone artists of being "independence radicalists," including Taiwanese singer-songwriter Crowd Lu (盧廣仲) and Hong Kong actor Wong He (王喜).

Initial Fallout

After Huang's blog post went viral on Weibo, Taiwanese and Korean news outlets reported that images of TWICE had been quietly censored on the Chinese web, while plans of the group performing during the nationally televised Chinese New Year program were altered.^[14] Huawei, a phone company, retracted their original plan for Tzuyu to be a spokesperson for a new product. In an interview, Huang asked Tzuyu to admit that she is Chinese to prove that she is not a separationist.

Chou's Apology Video

On January 15th, 2016, the night before the 2016 Taiwanese general election, JYP Entertainment released an apology video from Tzuyu. Another statement was also released by the head of JYP entertainment.^[13] The video garnered 6 million views within two weeks.

大家好，我有話想對大家說。我是周子瑜，對不起，應該早些出來道歉，因為不知道如何面對現在的情況，一直不敢直接面對大家，所以現在才站出來。中國只有一個，海峽兩岸是一體的，我始終為自己是一個中國人而感到驕傲，我做為一個中國人在國外活動時，由於言行上過失，對公司對兩岸網友的情感造成了傷害，我感到非常非常地抱歉，也很愧疚，我決定中止目前中國的一切活動，認真反省。再次再次地向大家道歉，對不起。

Greetings everyone, I have something to say. I am Tzuyu Zhou, I am sorry, I should have apologized earlier, because I don't know how to face the current situation, I was afraid to face everyone, which is why I came out just now. There is only one China, the two sides of the strait are the same, and I have always been proud for being Chinese, me being Chinese, during activities outside of my country, because of the mistakes in my actions and words, have harmed the emotions to the company and netizens on both sides, for this I feel deeply apologetic and regretful. I have decided to halt all activities in China, and reflect upon this. Once again, I apologize deeply to everyone, I am sorry.

Taiwanese Netizens' Response

Unsurprisingly, Tzuyu's apology video sparked further outrage in Taiwan; many media outlets in Taiwan called the video "ISIS-like"^[4][5] and criticized JYP entertainment for forcing a girl to speak on a political issue to protect themselves, although a later statement indicated that this video was produced with permission from her parents, as she is a 16-years-old minor. In China, the media dubbed this a "complete victory by mainland Internet users over Taiwanese independence"^[6][7]. The New York Times reported that this incident "makes Taiwan people realize they are not the same as Chinese people"^[7]. The video caused great backlash, garnering support of people using the #StandByYu hashtag.

Soon afterwards, posts on Huang's Weibo got mass deleted and keywords surrounding this do not return results, which many speculate is the Chinese government enforcing so-called "harmonization" on related posts.^[12] CCTV has reportedly started showing songs of TWICE, effectively showing the end of her censorship.^[15]

Chinese Netizens Protest

In protest, Chinese netizens affiliated with Li-Yi Ba, an influential Baidu Teiba forum with over 20 million active users, organized a massive raid against Taiwanese media outlets and politicians on Facebook, which affected many Taiwanese Facebook pages with floods of cybervandalism using pro-China imagery and texts.

Search Interest

External References