China Turns Up the Rhetoric Against the West – NYTimes.com.
BEIJING — Even as his government was making red-carpet plans to host President Obama this week, the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, praised a young blogger whose writing is best known here for its anti-American vitriol.
In one widely circulated essay published by state news outlets titled “Nine Knockout Blows in America’s Cold War Against China,” the blogger, Zhou Xiaoping, argued that American culture was “eroding the moral foundation and self-confidence of the Chinese people.” He compared unfavorable American news coverage of China to Hitler’s treatment of the Jews. In another essay, he said the West had “slaughtered and robbed” China and other civilizations since the 17th century, and was now “brainwashing” it.
Mr. Xi, speaking at a forum last month aimed at tightening political control of the arts, said the blogger exhibited “positive energy.”
His embrace of Mr. Zhou, who has been hailed by propaganda officials but widely mocked by scholars here, is just the latest sign of rising anti-Western sentiment, bordering on xenophobia, that has emanated from the highest levels of the Communist Party and sent a chill through Chinese civil society and academia.
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