Why is China really afraid of Lady Gaga?

Posted By Suzanne Merkelson Thursday, August 25, 2011 - 1:41 PM Share

Last week, China's culture ministry added 100 songs to an internet blacklist, including hits by Lady Gaga, Beyonce, and the Backstreet Boys. Chinese music websites have until Sept. 15 to remove the offending songs, unless record labels submit the songs for official approval. The ministry hopes to regulate the "order" of the Internet music scene, noting that songs that "harm the security of state culture must be cleaned up and regulated under the law."

Two years ago, in an attempt to crackdown on China's widespread illegal downloading, the culture ministry also declared its intentions to keep "poor taste and vulgur content" off Chinese internet airwaves.

Most of the newly-banned songs are from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Japan. Lady Gaga leads the American pack with six banned songs off her new album, Born This Way (although curiously, the LGBT-friendly title track was not included on the list).

Of course, one can hardly blame the Chinese government for looking to keep these subversive songs far away from Chinese ears. Let's take a look at what's so particularly offensive about these newest banned tunes.

Katy Perry's "Last Friday Night (TGIF)"

While ostensibly, the culture ministry might have wanted to keep Chinese youth away from Perry's flippant attitude regarding "ménage a trois" and "blacked out blur[s]", the truly offensive lyric is a celebration of American fiscal irresponsibility:

Last Friday night/ Yeah we maxed our credit cards

China, the single largest holder of American public debt, has some qualms about the voracious American appetite for debt. It makes sense that the government would want to discourage such behavior at home. China's strategy of intensive exports, with minimal domestic consumption, has been a boon to its burgeoning economy and it's not about to let an American pop singer threaten 30 years of Socialism with Chinese characteristics. Deng Xiaoping trumps Smurfette.

Lady Gaga's "Hair"

Whenever I'm dressed cool my parents put up a fight   /   And if I'm hot shot, mom will cut my hair at night   /   And in the morning I'm short of my identity   /   I scream, "Mom and dad, why can't I be who I wanna be, to be?

Gaga doesn't do much here to show respect for her elders. Famed Chinese philosopher Confucius once described old age as a "good and pleasant thing" which caused one to be "gently shouldered off the stage, but given a comfortable front stall as spectator." With the advent of the one-child policy, Chinese parents, who could traditionally expect that their children would take care of them through old age, now find themselves at the whim of their little emperors. For all the good Gaga does for one's self-esteem, this song clearly refutes centuries of ancestor worship.

Beyonce's "Run the World (Girls)"

My persuasion can build a nation/Endless power, with our love we can devour/ You'll do anything for me ...Who are we?/What we run? The world (who run this motha, yeah)

At the start of the 21st century, China's leaders articulated a policy known as the peaceful rise, an attempt to alleviate global fears about China's growing economic and political power. In 2004, Chinese premier Wen Jiabao said China's rise "will not come at the cost of any other country, will not stand in the way of any other country, nor pose a threat to any other country." Beyonce's aggressive attitude toward world domination is not what Wen had in mind.

Backstreet Boys "I Want it That Way"

I want it that way

Maybe "That way" = democracy? Who cares if the song is 12 years old?

SAM YEH/AFP/Getty Images

EXPLORE:CELEBS, CHINA, CULTURE, FUN STUFF
 

J.LAW

4:22 PM ET

August 25, 2011

Why is China really afraid of Lady Gaga?

I don't think china is afraid of Gaga. I think that with her talents and celebrity status that she can really do something inspirational to change people across the globe, not just in China. If only I could buy her with my Bill My Parents debit card then I would rule the world hahaha. That would be a blast!

 

MICO SARTO

4:54 PM ET

August 25, 2011

I have to agree with J.Law,

I have to agree with J.Law, she blow the wind of change, with her people think they can do everything. I love her, like her i love fashion, and i think she can change the world, and even china :)

 

MARTY MARTEL

7:23 AM ET

August 27, 2011

China is NOT afraid of 'Lady Gaga'

China is NOT so much afraid of ‘Lady Gaga’ as it wants to make sure that ‘Lady Gaga’ does not impede the creation of a new super power to replace U. S. and for China’s drive to dominate the world through coming economic juggernaut.

With its ever increasing foreign currency reserves while the world meekly watches, China had already become a lender of last resort to many a companies and many a countries in the world.

Yuan is already on its way to replace dollar as the world’s currency of choice.

If U. S. had an upper hand against Soviet Union in the first ‘cold war’, then the creditor China has an upper hand against the debtor U. S. in this second ‘cold war’.

Let us toast the genius of Nixon-Kissinger to hasten China’s rise to super power.

Afterall China was a pariah country in the world just like today’s North Korea until Nixon’s 1972 visit. All the West European and East Asian countries stayed away from China following the US lead until 1972 and embraced China after Nixon’s visit. While US would not give MFN status to Soviet Union (remember Jackson-Vanik amendment?) unless Russia shed Communism, it had no problem giving it to China’s Communist dictators with a capitalist mask. Trade with China expanded by leaps and bounds during 12 years of Republican rule beginning in 1981. After campaigning against butchers of Beijing in 1992 elections, even Bill Clinton became enthusiastic supporter of trade with China once he took lessons in foreign policy from Nixon in early 1993 during a special Whitehouse-arranged meeting. US also promoted China to a super power status by accepting it as a permanent UNSC member.

Had it not been for that Nixon embrace in 1972, China’s rise to super power status would have been far more slower with all the US, West European and East Asian markets closed to cheap Chinese products. Had it not been for that Nixon embrace, China’s technological progress would have been far slower in the absence of West’s technology transfers. Had it not been for that Nixon embrace, China’s military progress would have been far slower in the absence of huge forex reserves that China accumulated from the massive exports of cheap Chinese products and China used those forex reserves to acquire latest military technology.

Now China has US by the tail - US businesses are hooked to huge profits that cheap Chinese products generate for them as a walk through any Walmart, Home Depot, Sears and Macy’s filled with Chinese goods prove and US government is hooked to huge investments that China makes in US governmental securities from the sales of cheap Chinese products to US businesses.

China’s rise to super power status to challenge US is a fitting monument to the much-celebrated foresight of Nixon-Kissinger to embrace China to counter Soviet Union in 1972 just as 9/11 attacks is a fitting monument to the Reagan embrace of Islamic fundamentalists to counter Soviet Union in 1980s Afghanistan.

 

KEYBASHER

6:29 PM ET

August 27, 2011

Don't bet on China just yet

When ever a one-party state hosts an Olympics, then years later that state circles the drain if it isn't already down it. To wit:

1936: Berlin Olympics / Garmisch-Partenkirchen Winter Olympics
1946: Allied Occupation

1980: Moscow Olympics
1990: Collapse of Communism

1984: Sarajevo Winter Olympics
1994: Yugoslav Civil War

2008: Beijing Olympics
2018: ?

Remember, you read it here first.

 

GUSHUNGO

2:11 PM ET

August 28, 2011

America's secret weapon

Don't be fooled, this is serious stufff. Yes Beyonce is the successor to Trident. It's no surprise that her real birthday is not known and we are told that it is 1981 to deflect us from the fact that it is really 1982 - the year that the Polaris agreement was updated to allow the UK to have Trident.

So those clever Chinese have rumbled us whilst our own youth mistakenly believe that she is a pop star.

 

EZONLINEATM

3:35 AM ET

August 29, 2011

http://Smart-Investing-Made-Easy.com

I love the Chinese ... they are smart and hardworking.

And they want to limit the exposure of their people to
the low moral standards of the Americans!

Unfortunately, the more you try to stop them from
listening to these songs, the more they will want to
hear these songs - the law of supply & demand!

Start investing smartly - never lose your money!
http://Smart-Investing-Made-Easy.com/?tid=fp

 

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