Lou Jing, "Black Shanghai Girl," almost wins China's Idol type contest

[HamdenRice]

Her near win set off a national debate about race, racism, sex, inter-racial relationships, unmarried mothers and Chinese identity, in a country that until recently has generally had fairly rigid cultural notions about all of those topics.






http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1925589,00.html
Can a Mixed-Race Contestant Become a Chinese Idol?
By Simon Elegant and Chengcheng Jiang Wednesday, Sep. 23, 2009

In many ways, Lou Jing is a typical young woman from Shanghai. Pretty and confident, she speaks Mandarin heavily accented with the lilting tones of the Shanghai dialect and browses the malls of this huge city for the latest fashions.

But there is one thing that distinguishes this 20-year-old from her peers, something that has made her the unwitting focus of an intense public debate about what exactly it means to be Chinese: the color of her skin. Born to a Chinese mother and an African-American father whom she has never met, the theater student rocketed into the public consciousness last month when she took part in an American Idol–esque TV show, Go! Oriental Angel.

http://parlourmagazine.com/2009/09/a-new-kind-of-idol-lou-jing/

A New Kind of Idol: Lou Jing
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009 | by J. Baker

Lou Ching is an all-around normal and attractive 20-year-old girl from Shanghai who likes clothes, (presumably) boys, the mall and has big dreams of becoming a singing superstar. So big that in August she became a contestant on China’s Let’s Go! Oriental Angel, a televised talent contest much like our beloved American Idol. So what’s the big deal? Lou is Black.

To clarify, Lou Jing is biracial. The product of an extra-marital affair between her Chinese mother and an African-American man, naturally the circumstances surrounding her birth make for great TV, which the show’s producers have played up, and playing Lou in the process. A baby born out of an affair is hardly news in any country, but the simple fact that her mom slept with a Black man and Lou was born has made the girl the focus of a rapidly growing debate about what it means to really be Chinese. Lou’s birth and upbringing in China, and pretty much her life until now, has been disregarded by many simply due to the fact that she has Black blood in her veins, something that I suspect would be different if her father was White. Naturally, she and her mother have their fair share of haters, some just displaying outright racism and disrespect towards both of them, hidden by the cloak of the internet.

http://african-chineseguy.blogspot.com/2009/09/lou-jing-sad-story-of-black-chinese.html

Saturday, September 26, 2009
Lou Jing (娄婧) the sad story of a Black Chinese girl.......

I have never been outrage about a story coming out of China then this one.....
When 20 year old Lou Jing (娄婧) who is of mixed Chinese and black heritage became one of the five Shanghai finalists on the reality Tv show Go! Oriental Angel, the color of her skin became a national issue on what a true Chinese person is suppose to look like. She also became a target for cruel gossip and vicious racist attacks on Aug 30, when her mother shared their family's story on the show.
The attacks began after Ms Lou's mother revealed at a preliminary round of the show early last month that her daughter was the result of an illicit affair she had with an African American man some 20 years ago.Ms Lou's mother, who is a Shanghainese and known only as Madam Lou, said her Chinese husband divorced her when he found their newborn looked African instead of
Chinese.

[derby378]

1. I remember reading, not that long ago...

...that Ripley's researchers for Believe It Or Not! claimed to have uncovered evidence of an obscure ethnic enclave in southwestern China that also had darker skin. Considering how much ethnic diversity there is in China, I wasn't too surprised by the claim, but I never saw any further evidence for it.

As for Lou Jing, she has every right to be proud of what she's accomplished. I know life may not have been easy for her at times, but it looks like Jing rose above it, and that's wonderful.

[HamdenRice]

4. China is diverse and getting more so

One of the interesting facts in some of the articles about her is that although China is diverse, the government still thinks of everyone as fitting into particular categories, like Han, Mongol, etc., so there was literally no "ethnic" category for her to be registered into when she was born. There is no category for "multiracial."

It is an inspiring story and I hope she has a bright future in entertainment in Asia.

[Captain Hilts]

2. Racism was the underlying theme of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon-The older woman and younger man

look Mongolian, and, are, therefore inferior.

[HamdenRice]

3. I knew that the man the princess-warrier fell in love with was a "barbarian" ...

but I didn't know the old lady/martial arts master was also supposed to look Mongolian.

Interesting take on it.

[Liberal_in_LA]

5. interesting. Had no idea.

[HamdenRice]

6. Looks like the Trots have arrived to unrec. Can't have a happy story about a girl overcoming

tremendous odds to transform racist attitudes in a rapidly changing China through her incredible talent. That would be too inspiring in a world of permanent "gloom and doom," as well as giving credit to yellow and black people.

I should mention that one story mentioned how courageous the mother was to raise her. Because of female infanticide in China, where girls are sometimes allowed to die and raising an illegitimate black girl child alone must have seemed insurmountable, it's sad to say, that some commentators have said, Lou Jing is lucky to be alive.

Kudos to Madame Lou -- you're an inspiring Mom! (That's her with her daughter in the next to last picture.)

[Lilyeye]

7. I just learned about this girl today and did a search to see if it was talked about on DU

It breaks my heart that this poor girl has to go through this crap. I read some comments on one of the blogs and the horrible racist comments were disgusting. It was so bad they made the freepers look like boy/girl scouts.

[LeftyMom]

8. She looks like her mom.

I mean yeah, not in skin tone or the hair, but the rest of her, her build, the shape of her face... totally looks like her mother.

It's too bad Mom didn't emigrate with her, I suspect they'd both have had a much easier life. That girl wouldn't stick out at all in California, except for being exceptionally pretty.

[HamdenRice]

9. I suspect she's going to be very successful because she and Mom stayed

China is on a relentless drive to be more "diverse." I get this crazy new station on cable, Blue Ocean Network, which unlike the Chinese American cable stations is straight from Beijing.

The news, entertainment, culture and tourism show is aimed at a western audience and has only American, Amer-Asian, British, Australian and African talking heads.

The theme of most programs is: What is it like to come to China to live? The answer is, it's very easy and welcoming, and full of fun loving westerners. In fact, the **very, very** young American, Brit and Aussie hosts tend to talk way to much about going out to bars and getting drunk with the Chinese. Oh well, it's a fledgling station.

There is a show on how to speak Chinese. The host is -- get this -- an African guy from Cameroon, Francis Tchegue. Apparently, he is a tv celebrity in Beijing because he arrived in China a few years ago and has an almost supernatural ability to speak Chinese, as well as many other languages. (He is practicing on TV an ancient Chinese art form based on word play that only one other westerner has ever mastered.)

As a rapidly developing economy with certain skills shortages, it's pretty clear that they've geared up the propaganda machine to convince people to immigrate to the big cities, especially Beijing and Shanghai.

So the face they are putting forward is that China isn't just Han Chinese any more, and this girl is perfect for that. You're right, she's stunningly beautiful. I predict a very successful career for her, and despite her difficult childhood, and the vicious cat calls on the internet, the fact that she was voted to the top says a lot about how the country is changing its self image.