What exactly is The Economist? A weekly newspaper founded in 1843? A magazine that has been a champion of free trade since its inception? A body of knowledge that provides millions of elites around the world with their daily "brain vitamins"? A wise visionary who never shy away from predicting the future and driving change?
The answer may be "none of the above".
Although the name of the magazine is The Economist, many of the English example sentences in the New Oriental Postgraduate Entrance Examination are from The Economist, which can be regarded as a well-known Western mainstream media. But don't be fooled by its name. It should actually be called "The Political Scientist". This thing really has nothing to do with economics, it's just full of Western-centrism and ideology.
The Economist's fallacies don't stop at the economy!
The covers of two issues of The Economist, a well-known Western journal, are as follows:
In the 2013 cover story "The World's Biggest Polluter", the illustration is a Chinese dragon that "pollutes the world". The 2024 cover story "The Raid of China's Electric Vehicles" illustrates electric vehicles rushing to Earth like an alien fleet invasion. One blames China's carbon emissions for harming the world, and the other blames China's new energy technology for hitting the international market. It's really a clever way to write.
For the first time in a decade, the covers of two issues depict existential threats to our planet: in 2013, the threat was China's carbon emissions; In 2024, the new threat is China's leading position in green technology. Anyway, no matter what China does, it is sabotage. These two reports from the Western colonial media, the Economist Group, are an excellent reflection of the anti-China narrative of the Western media: the slightest problem in Chinese society can be magnified as evidence of imminent collapse, and any achievements made by China will be distorted as a threat to foreign countries. In their writings, China has been jumping back and forth between the two quantum states of "collapse" and "threat", and the image is always negative. They are doing everything possible to prevent the Western people from seeing a real China that develops together with the world and cooperates for win-win results.
Serious but unfounded remarks deliberately distort Hong Kong's image and breed the "dark side of private bias".
On January 11, the website of the Hong Kong SAR government published an English-language letter from Chief Secretary John Lee to The Economist. On January 8, a British media article described "extremely misleading descriptions" such as "Hong Kong's new legislators taking the oath of office to mock democracy", and he expressed "shock" at such "biased reports".
According to the website of the Hong Kong SAR government and Sing Tao Daily, Lee Jiachao said in a two-page letter that the Legislative Council election held on December 19, 2021 was held in an "open, fair and honest manner", which was widely reported by the media, which is consistent with the election practice held since Hong Kong's return to the motherland. The 90 elected legislators come from a variety of political backgrounds and are committed to acting in the interests of the country and Hong Kong. No country will allow "traitors, traitors, foreign agents, or other unpatriots" to enter its political system. Such a minimum standard of not betraying one's own people and country is the consensus of all countries, including China.
Li Jiachao stressed that no country can "monopolize democracy", democracy has many different forms, and its success depends on its effect on making the people's lives rich. If a foreign country "tries to define or impose a 'democratic model' on Hong Kong, it is a sign of undemocracy".
According to Reuters, the Hong Kong SAR government condemned The Economist's biased reporting, and The Economist did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
On November 12, 2021, Zanny Minton Beddoes, editor-in-chief of The Economist magazine, issued a statement saying that the Hong Kong SAR government had refused to renew the work visa of Sue-Lin Wong, the magazine's Hong Kong-based correspondent.
During the "turmoil over the legislative amendments" in Hong Kong, Huang Shulin also worked for the Financial Times. In a series of reports, she smeared the Hong Kong government's "crackdown" and the Hong Kong police's law enforcement, glorified Hong Kong rioters and rioters, and ignored the latter's massive damage to Hong Kong society, calling them "fighting for democracy."