Chinese skater Zhu Yi has been “mocked” by the US media for falling in two competitions, causing concern. In response, Eileen Gu, an athlete who also competes for China, fired back.
On the evening of February 7, Beijing time, the American media “Insider” posted a photo on the social media platform Instagram of Chinese female figure skater Zhu Yi tearing up at the Beijing Winter Olympics, with a text: “After falling at the Winter Olympics, she gave up her American nationality and Zhu Yi, who is competing for China, is suffering from attacks from Chinese social media users.”
In response, Chinese athlete Eileen Gu criticized back directly in the comments section.
Eileen Gu replied in the comments section, “As someone who actually uses Chinese social media, I would like to say here that over 90% of the comments are positive and encouraging. It’s part of the movement and everyone understands that.”
Eileen Gu is a California-born women’s freestyle skier who began representing China in international competition in 2019 and is a model.
In the women’s short program of the team competition on Feb. 6, Zhu Yi played out of order, making a mistake and falling, followed by a mistake in the jump stepping off and finishing at the bottom of the rankings.
On the morning of Feb. 7, Zhu Yi was the first one to enter the competition in the women’s single skating free skating in the final of figure skating team competition. Soon after the skating started, Zhu Yi had two consecutive falls. Following the fall, Zhu Yi made a mistake in one of the ice drops.
In the end, the Chinese team ended the competition in fifth place, but also made a new history for the Chinese skating team.
The hashtag “Zhu Yi made a mistake” and “Zhu Yi fell” were once popular topics on Weibo.
Zhu Yi was born in 2002 and started skating at the age of 7. In 2018, at the age of 16, Zhu Yi won the women’s singles championship in the rookie category of the All-American Figure Skating Championships with a score of 35 points beyond the 2nd place.
In the same year, China’s figure skating team appointed Chen Lu, a famous skater, as the head coach and started the “Morning Road Program” to train ice dance and women’s singles in preparation for the Beijing Winter Olympics. China’s figure skating team extended an olive branch to Zhu Yi, who became a naturalized member of China in 2019 and began officially representing the Chinese team in figure skating events.
After this missed Winter Olympics debut, some netizens also pointed the finger at Zhu Yi’s family background, saying that his selection to the Chinese national team was all about his scientist father’s connections.
The company’s father, Zhu Songchun, was born in Ezhou, Hubei, and received his doctorate in computer science from Harvard University in the U.S. He is an award-winning artificial intelligence scientist. In November 2020, Zhu Songchun became the dean of the School of Artificial Intelligence at Peking University, and led the experimental class on general artificial intelligence at Peking University and Tsinghua.
Regarding Zhu Yi being criticized by netizens, Hu Xijin, the former editor-in-chief of China’s official media “Global Times”, commented on Weibo on February 6 that if she has an opinion, she will take her emotions against the young individual athlete. When she makes mistakes, she will be on social media. Blatantly slandering people, cyberbullying, this is going too far anyway.
Regarding the doubts about Zhu Yi’s family background on the Internet, Hu Xijin wrote, “I don’t know who Zhu Yi’s father is, and I don’t think it matters, but the only female figure skating competitor in the Winter Olympics can be selected by ‘going through the back door’. This kind of speculation is too high, and those who take this rhythm have a very precise grasp of populism.” Source