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Anti-French Boycott Falters in China
Anti-French Boycott Falters in China1. May 2008, 21:34 UhrWorld
Newsadmin
BEIJING =97 They came. They expressed patriotic fervor. Then they
shopped.
On Thursday, the first day of a planned boycott against Carrefour, a
French retail chain here, there were a few low-key protests around the
country, but many Carrefour outlets did a healthy business in peanut
oil, petit fours and family packs of litchi juice.
In the grass-roots boycott call, publicized through text messages and
popular Web sites, Chinese consumers have been urged to avoid the
stores as a way to punish France for what China considers its shabby
reception of the Olympic torch. During the Paris leg of the relay last
month, pro-Tibetan agitators lunged at a Chinese torch bearer in a
wheelchair. The images that captured her shocked and wounded
expression have fueled a backlash against Western countries that many
here believe are seeking to spoil China=92s Olympic moment of glory.
It did not help that the Paris City Council followed up by making the
Dalai Lama, Tibet=92s spiritual leader in exile, an honorary citizen.
Many Chinese believe that the Dalai Lama was responsible for anti-
Chinese rioting in Tibet in March.
On Thursday, the start of a three-day national Labor Day holiday here,
there were re****ts of small rallies at a dozen Carrefour outlets
around the country, but the absence of any mammoth groundswell, and
the presence of throngs of unapologetic shoppers, suggested that
nationalistic fury may be fading.
=93Politics is one thing, but the people have to eat,=94 said Zheng Wu,
55, a Beijing housewife whose shopping cart was loaded with a 12-roll
bundle of toilet paper, two large sacks of rice, a box of corn flakes,
three pairs of pink-flip flops and a plunger.
The government has also been working hard to dampen the anti-French
zealotry. In recent days, government ministers have gone on television
reminding people that the 40,000 employees at the nation=92s 112
Carrefour stores are Chinese. Newspaper editorials have hinted that
bygones may as well be bygones, urging citizens to heartily embrace
foreign friends, about 1.5 million of whom will be arriving here in
August for the Olympics. =93We Smile to the World=94 read an editorial
headline in The People=92s Daily celebrating the 100-day countdown to
the Games.
In case that did not do the trick, state censors made it hard for
organizers to get the word out. In recent days, some text messages
championing the boycott have been blocked; on Thursday, typing
Carrefour into Chinese-language search engines returned blank pages
explaining that such results =93do not conform to relevant law and
policy.=94
Still, a few protests drew hundreds of people to Carrefour stores in
Xian, Chongqing, Shenyang and Changsha, although the police made sure
the rallies were brief. A demonstration in Fuzhou drew 400 people,
according to Xinhua, the official news agency, with students carrying
Chinese flags and banners saying =93Oppose Tibet Independence=94 and
=93Love=
China.=94 The authorities quickly dispersed the crowds and hauled away
those who refused to yield, Xinhua said.
Here in Beijing, which has nine Carrefour outlets, store clerks said
the crowds were noticeably thinner, especially for a holiday. The only
protest that was re****ted in the capital was at a Carrefour near the
city=92s university district, where despite a heavy police presence, a
young man rushed up to the entrance holding aloft a sign that said
=93Boycott Carrefour, Denounce CNN.=94 (The reference to CNN reflected
popular anger here over what the Chinese consider its unfair coverage
of the Tibet protests.)
The man, who wore a white mask and a T-****rt covered in nationalistic
slogans, was quickly bundled away by police. A few people in the crowd
grabbed his sign and struggled against the police to hold it up.
Onlookers cheered them on with chants of =93Go China!=94 and =93Go
Beijing!=
=94
But as a few hundred others looked on with evident curiosity, the
police managed to wrest the sign away and lead several young men into
white police vans. Then they told the crowd to disperse, saying it was
for =93everyone=92s safety.=94
At the opposite end of town, shoppers at another Carrefour were happy
to fill their carts without interference. A handful of older people
said they had not heard of the boycott call, but others, clearly taken
aback by a re****ter=92s questions, insisted they had bought only a few
low-cost necessities.
=93We should oppose Westerners who try to bring down China,=94 said Li
Chen, 22, a biology student, as he left the store with a week=92s worth
of staples. He then opened his bags to prove he had avoided foreign-
made goods. Asked about the bottles of Pepsi, he said, =93These days,
everything is made in China.=94
Many shoppers, however, said they were opposed to the protests and
condemned those they blamed for fomenting xenophobia at a time when
China is eager to embrace the outside world. Guo Sheng Zhang, 26, who
recently quit his job as a hotel worker, said a boycott would only
damage China=92s image and potentially mar the Olympics. =93This is so
stupid,=94 he said. =93We=92re only hurting ourselves. And what about the
Chinese employees who will lose their jobs?=94
**** Anbin, a professor of media studies at Tsinghua University in
Beijing, said he thought anti-French sentiment would quickly subside,
and not just because of government intervention. He noted that French
officials had tried to make amends for the torch debacle by
dispatching the president of the French Senate, Christian Poncelet, to
personally apologize to the disabled fencer in the wheelchair who was
attacked in Paris. President Nicolas Sarkozy invited the athlete, Jin
Jing, to a state visit. In recent days Carrefour executives have given
interviews in the Chinese press expressing their horror at the
incident and denying rumors that their company provided financing for
Tibetan independence groups.
Noting the longstanding and warm relation****p between China and
France, Professor **** attributed the anti-French outburst to the acute
rage one feels when insulted by a friend. =93I think the French
understood that what happened with the torch in Paris was a loss of
face,=94 he said. =93And they made sure to resolve it quickly.=94
As she stood in the checkout line of a Carrefour in Beijing, Wang
Junyu, 41, a waitress enjoying her day off, said she worked too hard
to pay attention to boycott campaigns and anti-foreign demonstrations.
She was, however, quite pleased with her shopping excursion. =93Look at
this,=94 she said, holding aloft a tub of ice cream. =93I don=92t know
much
about the French, but this is a really good price.=94 Source: NYT
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