WEBVTT

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Helen Walters: Huang,
it's so good to see you.

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Thank you for joining us.
How's your 2020 been?

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Huang Hung: My 2020
started totally normal.

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In January, I went to Paris,

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did my interview
for the fashion week there,

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came back to Beijing on January 22nd,

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and finding things a little bit tense

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because there were a lot of rumors.

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Having lived through SARS,

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I wasn't that concerned.

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And on the 23rd, I had a friend of mine
from New York come to my house

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who had a flu,

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and we had dinner together,

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and another friend who came,

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who left the next day for Australia
for vacation on an airplane.

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So we were not taking this
terribly seriously

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until there was a lockdown.

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HW: And we've seen that echo
around the world.

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I think still some people find it hard
to understand the magnitude

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of some of the measures that China took.

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I mean -- what else are we missing
about China's response in all of this?

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HH: You know, historically,

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we're just two very different countries

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in terms of culture and history.

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I mean, these are two completely different
human experiences for its people.

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So, for China,

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when the lockdown happens,

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people are OK.

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People are OK with it,

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because they think that's what
a good parent should do.

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You know, if a kid gets sick,

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you put him in the other room,

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and you lock him up and make sure
that the other kids don't get sick.

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And they expect that
out of the government.

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But when it is outside of China,
from America, it becomes a huge issue

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of the right political thing to do

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and whether it's infringing
on personal freedom.

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So the issues that you have to deal with
in a democratic society

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are issues that one does not
have to deal with in China.

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I have to say that
there's a word in Chinese

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that doesn't exist in any other language,

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and the word is called "guāi."

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It is what you call a kid

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who listens to his or her parents.

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So I think, as a people,
we are very "guāi."

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We have this sort of authoritarian figure

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that Chinese always look up to,

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and they do expect the government
to actually take the actions,

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and they will deal with it.

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However much suffering there is,

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they feel that, OK, if big brother says
that this has to be done,

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then it must be done.

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And that really defines China
as a separate mentality,

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Chinese has a separate mentality,

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as, say, people in Europe and America.

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HW: That sense
of collective responsibility

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sometimes feels a little absent
from this culture.

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At the same time, there are,
I think, valid concerns

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around surveillance
and data privacy, things like that.

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What is the balance here,

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and what is the right trade-off
between surveillance and freedom?

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HH: I think in the internet age,

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it is somewhere between China and the US.

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I think when you take
individual freedom

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versus collective safety,

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there has to be a balance somewhere there.

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With surveillance, the head of Baidu,
Robin Li, once said

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the Chinese people are quite willing
to give up certain individual rights

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in exchange for convenience.

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Actually, he was completely criticized
on Chinese social media,

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but I think he is right.

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Chinese people are willing
to give up certain rights.

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For example, we have ...

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Chinese mostly are very proud
of the payment system we have,

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which is you can go anywhere
just with your iPhone

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and pay for everything,

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and all they do is face-scan.

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I think that probably
freaks Americans out.

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You know, China right now,
we're still under semi-lockdown,

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so if you go anywhere,
there's an app where you scan

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and you input your mobile phone number,

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and the app will tell the guard
at the entrance of the mall, for example,

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where you have been for the past 14 days.

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Now, when I told that to an American,

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she was horrified,

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and she thought it was
such an invasion of privacy.

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On the other hand,

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as someone who is Chinese

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and has lived in China
for the past 20 years,

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although I understand
that American mentality,

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I still find I'm Chinese enough
to think, "I don't mind this,

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and I am better, I feel safer
entering the mall

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because everybody has been scanned,"

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whereas, I think individual freedom
as an abstract concept

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in a pandemic like this

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is actually really meaningless.

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So I think the West really needs
to move a step towards the East

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and to think about
the collective as a whole

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rather than only think
about oneself as an individual.

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HW: The rise of antagonistic rhetoric
between the US and China

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is obviously troubling,

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and the thing is,
the countries are interlinked

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whether people understand
global supply chains or not.

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Where do you think we head next?

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HH: You know, this is the most
horrifying thing that came out of this,

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the kind of nationalistic sentiments
on both sides in this pandemic.

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Because I'm an optimist,

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I think what will come out of this

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is that both sides will realize
that this is a fight

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that the entire human race
has to do together and not apart.

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Despite the rhetoric,

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the global economy has grown
to such an integration

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that decoupling will be
extremely costly and painful

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for both the United States and China.

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HW: It's also been interesting to me

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to see the criticism that China
has received quite vocally.

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For instance, they've been criticized
for downplaying the death toll,

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arguably,

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also for trying to demonize Dr. Li,

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the Wuhan doctor who first
raised the alarm about the coronavirus.

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I just saw a report
in "The New York Times"

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that Weibo users have been posting
repeatedly on the last post of Dr. Li

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and using this as kind of
a living memorial to him,

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chatting to him.

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There's something like
870,000 comments and growing

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on that last post.

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Do you see a change in the media?

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Do you see a change in the approach
to Chinese leadership

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that actually could lead to China
swinging perhaps more to the center,

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just as perhaps America needs
to swing more towards a Chinese model?

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HH: Unfortunately, not really,

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because I think there is a way

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between authoritarian governments
and its people to communicate.

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The night that Dr. Li died,

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when it was announced that he died,

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the Chinese social media just blew up.

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Even though he was
unjustly treated as a whistleblower,

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he still went to work in the hospital

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and tried to save lives as a doctor,

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and then he died

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because he contracted the disease.

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So there was anger, frustration,

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and all of that came out

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in kind of commemorating a figure

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that they feel that
the government had wronged.

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The verdict

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and sort of the official voice on:

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"Who is Dr. Li?
Is he a good guy or a bad guy?"

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completely changed 180 degrees.

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He went from a doctor who misbehaved

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to the hero who warned the people.

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So under authoritarian government,

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they still are very aware
of public opinion,

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but, on the other hand,

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when people complain
and when they commemorate Dr. Li,

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do they really want to change the system?

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And my answer is no,

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because they don't like
that particular decision,

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but they don't want to change the system.

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And one of the reasons is because

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they have never, ever
known another system.

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This is the system they know how to work.

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HW: What is wok-throwing, Huang?

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HH: Oh, wok-throwing is when
you blame somebody else.

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Basically, someone who is responsible
in a slang Chinese

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is someone who carries a black wok.

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You are made to be the scapegoat
for something that is bad.

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So basically, Trump started
calling it the "Chinese virus,"

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the "Wuhan virus,"

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and trying to blame the entire
coronavirus pandemic

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on the Chinese.

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And then the Chinese, I think,
threw the wok back at the Americans.

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So it was a very funny joke
on Chinese social media,

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that wok-throwing.

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There's a wok-throwing gymnastics
aerobics exercise video that went viral.

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HW: But tell us, Huang:

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You're also doing dances on TikTok, right?

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HH: Oh, of course.

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I'm doing a lot of wok-throwing
aerobics on TikTok.

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HW: I mean, a potential silver lining
of all of this is that it has laid bare

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some of the inequities,
inequalities in the system,

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some of the broken
structures that we have,

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and if we're smart, we can rebuild better.

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HH: Yes. I think one of
the silver linings of this pandemic

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is that we do realize

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that the human race
has to do something together

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rather than to be distinguished
by our race, by the color of our skin

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or by our nationality;

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that this virus obviously
is not discriminating against anyone,

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whether you are rich or poor,

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important or not important

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or whatever skin color
or nationality you are.

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So it is a time to be together,

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rather than to try to pull the world apart

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and crawl back to our own
nationalistic shells.

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HW: It's a beautiful sentiment.

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Huang Hung, thank you so much
for joining us from Beijing.

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Stay well, please.

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HH: Thank you, Helen,
and you stay well as well.