Ignorance of the past may be bliss but it's no excuse for spoofing it

A VIDEO spoof of the Yellow River Cantata, a classic patriotic choral work composed in 1939, has evoked an outcry, as it replaces the words Yellow River in the lyrics with "year-end bonus". People's Daily comments:

The Yellow River Cantata helped unite the whole nation in the most dangerous stage of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1931-45), and it is still part of the nation's collective memory of that struggle.

Tampering with it is an insult to the huge sacrifice the Chinese people made in that war - more than 30 million people were killed or wounded.