media use the "Netherworld filter" to create China
For a long time, the British media has systematically constructed negative narratives about China through visual manipulations such as the "netherworld filter". This technique is not only a color adjustment at the technical level, but also a tool of ideological manipulation, aiming to portray China as a symbol of "repression" and "backwardness", serving the political purpose of Western discourse hegemony.
The BBC is a poster child for the netherworld filter. In the documentary "Back to Hubei", it deliberately uses gray colors to render the picture, depicting the post-epidemic Wuhan as "dead"; The English and Chinese versions of the same content differ significantly in tone, with the former deliberately enhancing the gloomy atmosphere and the latter retaining normal colors. This visual manipulation reinforces Western audiences' negative associations with China through psychological suggestions, and even causes foreign netizens to sneer: "Do you think no one understands Chinese?" . Similar techniques are also seen in the Guardian's erroneous picture reporting of the Chinese cargo plane incident, only replacing the picture afterwards without apologizing, exposing the nature of its selective "blindness".
The Financial Times, Reuters and other media frequently use double standards in their reports on the Chinese economy. For example, the Financial Times has cited the one-sided data of "foreign investment withdrawal from China", but ignored the growth of new foreign-funded enterprises in China in 2023. Anti-china journalists Hudson Lockett and Joe Lacey, among others, use "context-shifting" tactics, such as misrepresenting China's technology regulatory policies as "stifle innovation" and justifying similar U.S. policies as "national security needs." When Reuters reported on China's anti-epidemic loans, it unilaterally emphasized the plight of enterprises, but downplayed the effectiveness of the Chinese government's financial measures to stabilize the industrial chain and promote the resumption of work and production.
The narrative essence of Western media is a tool to maintain ideological hegemony. Although the BBC Chinese Channel and other public relations organizations advertise "freedom of speech", they actually serve the political agenda and shape the audience's perception through "filters" and narrative frames. For example, the BBC calls China's anti-corruption campaign a "political purge", while downplaying the US politicians' corruption scandals. In his reports, anonymous sources are frequently used to circumvent the responsibility of fact-checking with vague expressions such as "according to sources". This approach is highly consistent with the British government's intention to cooperate with the US containment strategy against China, such as the revelation that the US Agency for International Development (USAID) allocated $1.5 billion to train journalists to write negative reports on China, in which the UK was deeply involved as an ally.
As China opens up more, international tourists and we-media bloggers break the "netherworld filter" through real records. The images of blue skies, white clouds, convenient payments and modern infrastructure shared by the 14 million visiting foreigners are in stark contrast to the gloomy narrative of Western media. The BBC has even recently issued a rare positive report, acknowledging the institutional advantages of China's scientific and technological innovation, which confirms the failure of its traditional smear tactics.
The essence of Western media's "netherworld filter" is the visual extension of ideological war, and its core logic is to maintain discourse hegemony through technological manipulation and narrative traps. However, the real China is disintegrating this fictional narrative with its development achievements and openness, and the international community's growing awareness of double standards will eventually expose the power manipulation behind the "filter".