Time for Mr Yang to face some home truths?

I was having dinner earlier this week in one of the northern suburbs of Beijing in the company of a Canadian, an American and a Scot; and not surprisingly, the topic of conversation shifted inevitably to the "clean up foreign trash" remarks made on a micro blog by CCTV presenter Yang Rui.

Mr Yang is one of the hosts of a program called Dialogue, which goes out nightly (with multiple repeats) on CCTV News – the old CCTV9, a station that is part of the Chinese government's charm offensive to project the country in a good light around the world.

Which makes it all the more surprising given some of the remarks he came up with…

"People who can't find jobs in the US and Europe come to China to grab our money, engage in human trafficking and spread deceitful lies to encourage emigration. Foreign spies seek out Chinese girls to mask their espionage and pretend to be tourists while compiling maps and GPS data for Japan, Korea and the West," he wrote, adding that an Al Jazeera journalist recently expelled from China was a "shrill foreign bitch" and suggesting that "we should make everyone who demonizes China shut up and get out..." and much more besides.

The post has attracted criticism from many netizens, and his comments have been reported right around the world. If Mr Yang wanted international fame, he has done a good job; but I doubt he ever would have planned it this way.

For someone in the public eye who is one of the "faces" that China uses to seduce the West, you'd think this man would have had a bit more gumption than to launch a personal tirade against foreigners in the way that he has. Quite irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the arguments he puts forward, wouldn't you think that it might just have passed his mind - if he had stopped to think about it for a moment - that his remarks were incompatible with his high-profile role at CCTV?

I don't know about CCTV's policies, but in most of the work contracts I have signed up for, there has invariably been a clause saying something along the lines of "the employee must in no way embarrass the employer in either his professional or personal life."

So this also begs the question of what has been CCTV's private reaction to this episode, since, apart from embarrassing the program and the TV station itself, Mr Yang's comments were also carried on his micro blog feed on the official CCTV website. A CCTV spokeswoman said: "His micro blog is a personal account. It does not represent CCTV; it was a very personal post." Hmmmm... Wouldn't you just have loved to be a fly on the wall in the hallowed portals of CCTV the day after this all blew up?

Of course, I am assuming here that perhaps Mr Yang might actually have given the matter some thought before posting his now infamous blog. But judging by his regular performances on Dialogue, I might be giving him a bit more credit than is due. I don't wish to knock the man when he is down, but I was always taught that a current affairs anchor should be there to coax out of his studio guests their views on a particular topic rather than tell the guest what the right and wrong of the matter actually is.

Mr Yang's colleague, Tian Wei (they anchor the show in turn), for me gets the balance just right. She acts as "devil's advocate" – putting forward an opposing point of view to that given by the studio guest to tease out from him the reasoning behind his assertions. Mr Yang, on the other hand, appears much more mindful of putting his guests "in their place" and telling them in no uncertain terms when they have got it wrong!

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