The Chinese-Canadian superstar Kris Wu, better known as Wu Yifan (吴亦凡) in China, has been a trending topic on Chinese social media ever since he was first accused of pressuring women into sex.
The 19-year-old student Meizhu Du (都美竹) was the first to accuse Wu of predatory behavior, with at least 24 more women coming forward claiming the celebrity showed inappropriate behavior and luring young women into sexual relationships.
Although Wu denied all allegations, more than a dozen firms either cut ties or terminated contracts with him. As the scandal unfolded, various hashtags related to the story received billions of views on Weibo.
When news of Kris Wu’s detainment came out on July 31st, Weibo’s servers barely seemed to be able to handle the spike in traffic, and comments came pouring in.
At an earlier stage of this social media storm, China’s state-owned media outlet CCTV sent out a Weibo post on July 20 that called for “raising the bar” to become a celebrity.
The CCTV statement argued that celebrities need to uphold their social responsibility and that they should be “a person first, and celebrity second.” It also said that the entertainment industry plays a role in this, as it “should urge celebrities to improve their moral standards through rigorous self-discipline.”
The post echoes the Standards of Conduct issued by the China Association of Performing Arts in February of this year, which contained a list of moral guidelines and rules of conduct for Chinese performers.
According to the document, which also attracted media attention at the time, a special “Ethics Building Committee” (道德建设委员会) was established to emphasize the enforcement.
“Self-disciplinary measures” for performers.
According to the guidelines, “performers who violate the regulations will face boycotts by member units within a certain period of time.” It also states that performers who fail to comply with the guidelines could face a permanent ban from their profession – such a boycott will usually come from the top.
China has a thriving celebrity culture and celebrities have an enormous influence on Chinese social media and popular culture. Channeling public opinion and safeguarding social stability are priorities for Chinese authorities, and the influence of Chinese celebrities is often used to promote Party ideology and policies.
While authorities encourage Chinese celebrities to act as positive role models, negative news surrounding the country’s most famous stars is often perceived as having a “negative social impact” or a “bad influence on public morale.”
When Chinese actress Fan Bingbing was caught up in a tax evasion scandal, she was labeled as “not socially responsible.” After the dramatic and dirty divorce of Wang Baoqiang and Ma Rong topped all trending lists, China’s media watchdog announced it would guard against the hyping of these kinds of scandals due to their supposedly harmful impact.
These previous examples, the recent call by CCTV, and this year’s regulations for the performance industry demonstrate China’s determination to “promote a healthy entertainment environment” and to encourage the idea that Chinese artists should be “role models” who abide by the rules of “social morality.”
Since Kris Wu made his debut in 2012 as one of the members of EXO, his road to stardom over the past nine years overlapped the “internet age” (流量元年) in China. The blooming of digital media has changed the traditional Chinese entertainment landscape. With access to a huge population of fans and fast-growing social media, a strong public relations team can essentially guarantee public appearances and a stable flow of money. The rapid development of reality shows has also brought out seemingly endless opportunities for artists to become famous.
However, as the saying goes, “heavy is the head who wears the crown,” – most Chinese netizens seem to agree with the idea that society should set higher expectations for celebrities. The post by CCTV soon attracted over 5,3 million likes and nearly 180,000 comments.
“Public figures should take responsibility for their behavior. Once they break the rules, they will be criticized by society and the mainstream media. At the end of the day, the public will imitate the idols (and their behavior),” one Weibo user wrote.
After the recent surrogacy scandal of Chinese actress Zheng Shuang, Wu’s case has once again renewed discussions over the moral standards of celebrities. More and more people have started to question what makes someone qualified to be an idol and whether the bar for becoming a celebrity is set too low.
“The law is only the minimum standard for people’s code of conduct, the goal shouldn’t be just to obey the law, right?” one of the top-rated commenters wrote on Weibo. Others also argued that “the bar for becoming an idol is simply set too low!”
“The entertainment industry has become a place to shelter evil people, it’s rotten to the core. I don’t like any of it,” another commenter wrote, with someone adding: “Their standards are too low and they make money too fast.”
By August 2nd, the hashtag “Raise the Bar For Becoming a Star” (#把做明星的门槛提上来#) had received over 680 million views on Weibo.
In light of China’s enormous celebrity culture, online discussions over whether celebrities should hold themselves to a higher moral standard will undoubtedly continue. Despite the many online disagreements regarding the Kris Wu case, most netizens seem to agree that there should be more to Chinese celebrities than fame, money, and the latest scandal.
By Yunyi Wang
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