By Claudia Lee
When a resident of Wuhan, China wrote an online diary criticizing the government’s response to Covid-19, authorities retaliated by launching a disinformation campaign and propelling online hate toward her. This weaponization of the internet for political purposes parallels the information wars that occurred in the United States during the pandemic, said UCLA Chinese culture professor Michael Berry at a recent talk at UC Santa Barbara.
“Who gets to control the narrative?” he asked the audience.
UCSB’s Center for Taiwan Studies hosted Berry, a world-recognized translator and author, for a lecture in its “Taiwan Talks” series. Berry was also the director of the East Asia Center at UC Santa Barbara from 2012 to 2016, before moving to UCLA.
His most recent book, Translation, Disinformation and Wuhan Diary: Anatomy of a Transpacific Cyber Campaign, explores the relationship between the COVID-19 outbreak, Fang Fang’s Wuhan Diary, and China’s disinformation campaign.
Berry said he regards the “Wuhan Diary” by Fang Fang, as the first “raw document of what was going on” in China during the early COVID-19 outbreak. Fang Fang is a Chinese writer in Wuhan, where the global outbreak began. Her online posts mainly detailed the changes the lockdown brought to daily life, such as how to get food when grocery stores were closed.
But her blog garnered the most attention when she called out the Chinese government, urging it to take accountability for mishaps that arose during the lockdown, such as initially claiming the Covid-19 virus was not contagious, and silencing the Chinese whistleblower Dr. Li Wenliang, who raised the alarm about a new SARS virus in December 2019.
UCLA Chinese culture professor Michael Berry spoke at a UCSB Center for Taiwan Studies event about his new book, Translation, Disinformation and Wuhan Diary, about the COVID-19 outbreak and China’s nationwide disinformation campaign.
The “Wuhan Diary” is globally recognized as the “voice of China” and the “Conscience of Wuhan,” Berry said.
But when Fang Fang’s posts went viral, they caught the attention of the Chinese government, raising her risk. Outspoken reporters and doctors had “quietly disappeared,” according to the professor. Zhang Zhan, a critical independent reporter who exposed the government’s attempt to hide the severity of Covid-19, mysteriously went missing in May 2020. She had posted a total of 122 video clips online, some revealing overcrowded hospitals and crematoriums running non-stop.
Once Fang’s online diary received global attention due to Berry’s translation, the Chinese government refrained from arresting the blogger. Instead, it launched a nationwide disinformation campaign, to undermine the diary’s influence.
Authorities first targeted Fang Fang’s credibility, tainting her with conspiracy theories such as that she was colluding with the United States to undermine the Communist Party of China. Officials also attacked the validity of the “Wuhan Diary” for its lack of specifically named sources, because Fang Fang often cited Wuhan doctors as “my doctor friend,” to protect their identities.
“There’s a reason for that,” Berry said. “If she exposed the names of these doctors, they too would be pulled into [the massive backlash].”
The government used social media as a weapon. Millions of online trolls planted the theory that translator Berry was the true author of the “Wuhan Diary” and said the blog’s call for accountability was a US government effort to derail China. Not all of the trolls were real people, Berry explained. “Some are bots. Some are paid individuals called the 50 Cent Party who get paid for every attack post they put online.”
Berry described becoming the target of hate comments and showed a direct screenshot from his social media accounts that prompted students and professors in the audience to widen their eyes in shock.
“Die, white pig,” Berry read aloud. “It was the tip of the iceberg, compared to Fang Fang… it was not just a vulgar attack, but a form of intimidation.”
UCLA professor Michael Berry answering students’ questions about the Chinese government’s policies during the pandemic at a recent UCSB event hosted by the Center for Taiwan Studies.
In addition to excessive hate comments, death threats, and intimidation tactics toward Fang Fang, nationalist youth and the government also mass-produced propaganda, political art, and big-character posters that defamed her and identified her as a national enemy.
The “Wuhan Diary” and its subsequent backlash created a deep divide within China, with citizens confused about whether to support or hate Fang Fang. “I personally know families where children weren’t talking to their parents or brothers and sisters weren’t talking to each other because they stood on different sides of these issues,” Berry said. “It served as a lightning rod for discussion about civil society.”
Meanwhile, there was a surge of disinformation spreading in the US, with Donald Trump labeling hydroxychloroquine as a “miracle cure” for Covid-19 and undermining the efficacy of the mask mandate.
The similarities between China and the US did not stop there, but also could be seen in racial bias that was unleashed during the pandemic, Berry said. “Residents of Wuhan were being targeted and singled out for prejudice when they traveled to other parts of China,” the UCLA translator noted. “They were seen as infected. Diseased.” At the same time, Asian Americans were blamed for bringing the virus to the United States, causing a spike in anti-Asian hate crimes. “There’s a lot to learn from China’s situation,” he said.
But Berry put a positive spin on his and the diary’s story, saying it provoked dialogue about how to create or maintain an open society.
“If Fang Fang in an authoritarian environment can stand up and do the right thing, I think it's a call for all of us to rise up and do the right thing,” Berry said.
Claudia Lee is a third-year communication student at UC Santa Barbara who is pursuing a Professional Writing Minor. She covered this event for her Digital Journalism class.