Eileen Gu Doesn't Care What You Think — And No One Else Should, Either

Eileen Gulla (Gu Ailing) on ​​ollut 15-vuotiaasta lähtien maali selässään.

The US-born freestyle skier of Chinese heritage announced in 2019 she would be competing for the People's Republic at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, a decision met with enthusiasm in China — for obvious reasons — but intense animosity on the other side of the Pacific. On social media, vile comments flooded in calling her every name under the sun. Gu was ungrateful, they said, and had spurned the country they felt was entitled to her labor.

That already venomous response shifted into overdrive this week, when Gu, now 18, won gold in women's freeski big air. Her miraculous run included a career-first 1620 in competition, barely edging out her nearest opponent and sending her name into the stratosphere.

Mutta se merkitsi myös entistä enemmän vastustajalehdistön tarkastelua, ja tuomitseminen oli nopeaa. Suuret tiedotusvälineet vaativat hänen kansallisuuttaan koskevia yksityiskohtia, ja jotkut rohkeammat kommentaattorit menivät niin pitkälle, että he pitivät häntä takkina tai palkkasoturina.

I'm afraid my initial reaction can't be printed in a family newspaper. Regardless, I have no interest in mincing words here: These people are scum.

Gu's connections to China should not be in doubt. Her mother, Gu Yan, is a first-generation immigrant; she introduced the younger Gu to skiing and nurtured her budding sports career. Eileen Gu is fluent in Mandarin and in pre-pandemic times made annual trips to Beijing. She may have been born and raised in the US, but has maintained a strong enough link to her mother's homeland to consider herself both American and Chinese. This is in no way unusual, yet here we are reading incredulous reports about it.

One fact has gone deliberately unmentioned in most of these "just asking questions" articles and their bile-filled comment sections — if the situation were reversed and Gu were competing for the US, she would be hailed as a hero. There would be no end to columnists waxing poetic about how she struck a "brave blow" against the "dastardly Chinese", or something to that effect. The hypocrisy would be stunning if it weren't so tediously commonplace. Instead, they are treating her decision as an extraordinary snub, as if she owes her talent to the US by virtue of being born there.

Meanwhile in the land of reality, this sort of thing happens all the time. To illustrate, let me move to a sport I actually know a little something about: Soccer. For much of the 2010s, the US men's national team was managed by German legend Jürgen Klinsmann. Under his stewardship, he and the team recruited a number of players who were born in Germany. This was possible in large part due to a continuing American military presence on German soil — which, to me, should be a much bigger moral outrage than anything getting dredged up about Gu — but that's a whole other can of worms.

Useat näistä pelaajista, kuten Jermaine Jones ja John Brooks, kutsuivat heidän syntymämaansa pelaamaan nuorten tasolla. Mutta lopulta he päättivät edustaa Yhdysvaltoja kansainvälisellä näyttämöllä. Tekikö yrityslehdistö tästä käytännöstä skandaalin? Kutsuttiinko niitä pelaajia pettureiksi? Oliko heillä suunnatonta halveksuntaa? Ei tietenkään. Jotkut harmittivat, mutta useimmat ymmärsivät, että näin on kansainvälisessä urheilussa yhä globalisoituvassa, monikulttuurisessa maailmassa.

These infantile attacks — made by people who could not begin to fathom her or anyone else's inner life — have only served to vindicate her decision. With so many viciously branding her a sellout, what regrets could she possibly have? In China she has a staggering level of support that will only grow as the Games continue. In the US she faces slander and charges of betrayal, behavior that chillingly echoes atrocities from the not-so-distant past.

Accusations of "dual loyalty" were and are a common refrain in hate speech, most notably in the treatment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. Those wounds have not even begun to heal, and they're festering again thanks to a pandemic-fueled spike in hate crimes against Asians of all ethnicities.

These perceptions of Asians as a disloyal fifth column didn't spontaneously emerge. The tenor of US rhetoric against China has shifted considerably in recent years, taking on more vulgar forms as it flows downward into the population at large. No longer is China portrayed as a friendly rival or competitor; in many circles it is now commonly perceived as a profound existential threat.

Kiinan kansalaisten lisääntyvä epäilys akateemisessa ja muilla aloilla on nyt politiikkakysymys, ja vain korkean profiilin{0}}toimittajat, jotka iloitsevat kiinalaisen vakoilun uhan nostamisesta yliopistokampuksilla ja julkisessa elämässä. Sanomaton merkitys on selvä: kiinalainen vakooja väijyy joka kulman takana, ja sinun pitäisi olla kauhuissasi. Luonnollisesti nämä samat hahmot teeskentelevät järkytystä ja huolestuneisuutta, kun heidän maailmankatsomuksensa looginen päätelmä nostaa rumaa päätään ja tavalliset ihmiset kärsivät siitä.

At its core, this is a refusal to accept an athlete at the top of her game might genuinely have an attachment to her homeland and a sincere desire to represent it. The possibility isn't even entertained; there must, simply must be some ulterior motive at play. We see this tactic used time and time again to discredit anyone who steps out of line — whether it's Westerners with anything positive to say about China or the Chinese people themselves, who in independent polling regularly declare high levels of trust in their government.

This whole shameful affair shows the US' much-ballyhooed belief in pluralism is nothing more than window dressing. Commitments to free expression are only valid, particularly for members of minority groups, so long as they align with the consensus spearheaded by Washington. After even the slightest diversion, any notions of agency go straight out the window. These attacks rob Gu of her very personhood. They reek of colonial paternalism.

Her reasons for making this choice are her own, and hers to share — or not share — when she sees fit. It's not the business of you, me or anyone else to interrogate her motivations or engage in armchair psychoanalysis.

Mutta jos tunnet silti tarvetta saada kiukku, mene kaikin tavoin eteenpäin.
I doubt she'll hear you from the top of the podium.