The media in China and in the West (let’s take Germany, for example) are very different. But to what extent do they really represent the public opinion? Or do they rather belong to the realm of politics?

Everyone seems to get mad

Let’s look at two statements:

- German people get mad at Chinese media coverage of China.

- Chinese people get mad at German media coverage of China.

That seems a bit weird, doesn’t it?

Different concepts

Here’s the thing: the concepts of “media” in Germany and China are fundamentally different:

- Chinese media answer to the government. They often bow to censorship. Most of the time, they will try to make the government look good, thus creating a feeling of pacification within the population. “Harmonious Society” (和谐社会) is the key.

- German media answer to their readers. They often bow to hysteria. Most of the time, they will try to make things look way more dramatic than they really are, thus creating an interest in their coverage. “Bad News is Good News” is their mantra.

Many people seem to get this confused.

Yellow Spies vs. Governmental Coverups

- When a major German magazine published  a title in 2007 about “The Yellow Spies”, referring to potential corporate espionage, readers from China felt hurt. Was this really the opinion of the German government and the German people?

No, it wasn’t. It was the creators of a magazine trying to come up with an interesting story. To them, spectacular headlines meant better sales than a more boring version of the truth.

- When Chinese media failed to adequately cover the shortcomings in the wake of the Sichuan Earthquake of 2008, many people all around the world were unhappy. Thousands of children had died in poorly constructed schools, so where were the Chinese media when they were supposed to raise hell?

Well, they were working with the government, trying to stabilize the situation. To them, maintaining their version of a harmonious society was obviously more important than the truth.

Is China good or bad?

Long story short, I think China, naturally, has a lot of room for improvement. There has been a huge change for the better over the last thirty years, but rather than being a steady incline, this development has been an undulating wave.

Right now, things have gotten more tense. This is probably due to a series of stressful events over the last few years: the Snow Storm, the Tibetan riots, the Sichuan Earthquake and the Olympics of 2008, the Uyghur riots of 2009, the World Expo of 2010. And the so-called “Arab Spring” of 2011.

The truth within the news and the net

While China is being bashed by the foreign media and praised by her own, I think that the truth is somewhere in between, and I am very interested in what’s going to happen in the future.

If everything goes according to plan, we will see a new generation of leaders in 2012. That would be next year. Who knows what direction the development of the country will be taking then?

Additionally, I’d like to address the so-called “netizens” who seem to be understood as indicators of the public opinion online: most of them, sadly, are just idiots who like to speak loud and remain anonymous.

It doesn’t matter if they are German or Chinese.