Chinese fans gathered to China’s social media to call U.S. skater Nathan Chen a “traitor” for winning gold for Group U.S.A. in Beijing.
Fans in China leapt to Weibo– China’s variation of Twitter– to attack the Utah-born skater as “too white,” and some even told him to “get out of China” after taking gold in the males’s songs complimentary skate and ending up being only the 3rd American to win gold in Beijing.
Chen, born in 1999 to Chinese immigrants in the U.S., stated, “It’s simply a whirlwind right now,” after winning gold on Thursday.
BEIJING, CHINA– FEBRUARY 10: Gold medallist Nathan Chen of Group United States celebrates during the Figure Skating Men Single Skating medal event on Day 6 of the Beijing 2022 Winter Season Olympic Games at Beijing Medal Plaza on February 10, 2022, in Beijing, China.( Image by Richard Heathcote/Getty Images )”Whatever’s happening so quick. That program was a lot of fun to skate. Simply had a blast out there, and I’m actually grateful,” he added.
“I can’t even describe it,” he stated. “You can’t even picture what it may feel like. It’s simply fantastic.”
But Chen has actually been poking a finger in the China hornet’s nest for several years since he debuted at the 2018 Olympics and carried out to a tune from the film Mao’s Last Dance, a movie about a Chinese dancer who defected to the U.S.A. in the 1980s.
BEIJING, CHINA– FEBRUARY 10: Nathan Chen of Team United States skates throughout the Guy Single Skating Free Skating on day 6 of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games at Capital Indoor Arena on February 10, 2022, in Beijing, China. (Image by Lintao Zhang/Getty Images)
Chen declared he was not knowledgeable about the political undertone of his option of music, however he has likewise irate Chinese sports fans by refusing to provide interviews in Mandarin, a language he learned from his parents. Chen has claimed he isn’t proficient enough in Mandarin to speak it during an interview.
Regardless, Chen has actually refused to respond to the Chinese attacks.
“I don’t have social networks here. So I most likely have actually been really protected from that. And I do not plan on looking at social given that in some cases social (media) can be a little poisonous,” he said.
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