China gets Sp!ked

China commentary just took a new turn … well several twists and turns, followed by a rapid descent into a mind-bending ideological vortex. Confused? That’s the point. No, really. That’s the point behind Sp!ked Magazine’s campaign against China-bashing in the media.

The campaign became high profile across the British media following editor Brendan O’Neill’s article And the gold medal for China bashing goes to … Since then he has recently weighed in on Bjork’s Shanghai outburst too. But why should articles attacking “yellow peril mongering” be so controversial. When they are veiled attempts to sabotage critics of environmental pollution, global warming and aggressive foreign policy at home.

Guardian journalist George Monbiot exposed the Sp!ked team in his piece Invasion of the Entryists. He details their start working for far-right think tanks such as the Centre for Policy Studies and their gradual infiltration of the media via writers like O’Neill, Mick Hume and Frank Furedi. O’Neill writes in his usual abrasive style using far right libertarian ideas masked as ‘new left’ ideas to bash his opponents especially on his favourite topic: that global warming from emissions is a scam.

Still confused? The political compass goes a little way towards clarifying the matter. Try it out.

Here’s O’Neill himself:

Here, even the most positive thing about contemporary China – its speedy, inspiring economic development – is discussed as something disgusting. What ought to be celebrated as a wonderful leap forward for mankind is seen as a threat both to the Chinese people and to the West itself. No doubt China is a smelly, smoggy, sooty place right now, but that is because it is experiencing the birth pangs of industrialisation. There is a powerful whiff of double standards when well-off greens in comfortable Western societies that were built on Industrial Revolutions moan about Chinese smog.

So what’s the upshot of Sp!ked magazine’s recent output on China? The immediate aim is to frame critics of policies they support as racist or reactionary by narrowing the discourse on popular current issues, such as China. Will we start to see their material creeping in to other China writing around the web-based media? These are card-carrying professional propagandists and they’ve decided to make China their latest battle.

Kind of like Nanheyangrouchuan, except for real.

Pictured: Sp!ked editor Brendan O'Neill