What Is Xi Jinping Doomscrolling Now?
“Becoming Chinese” is trending in the US, but being Chinese has different rules in China.
There’s more than Xi Jinping Thought on Chinese social media.
Photographer: Kyodo News/Kyodo News StillsThis is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a meme-filled mimesis of Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. Sign up here .
This week, I wrote a column about a meme that has influencers going on and on about the health benefits of tai chi, rice porridge, warm slippers and sipping hot water — all part of their “becoming Chinese.” It’s been around for about a year and still percolating, glomming onto lifestyle and fashion as well as wellness. It’s an intriguing, if inchoate, response to China’s growing power — both hard and soft — by netizens in the US and the West. Memes and web trends can often act as a kind of collective subconscious before they fade away from overuse.