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| Shen Teng (Ace vs Ace), He Jiong and Xie Na (Happy Camp) |
It’s hard to keep on a happy face to celebrate the lunar new year when it’s overshadowed by an outbreak that’s left majority of the country in a standstill. As more cases of people affected by the Coronavirus are being reported, the China’s National Radio and Television Administration (NRTA) just announced its intention to leverage on provincial television station’s “audience reach” to provide citizens with real time updates about the virus and how to combat it.
To make way for this, television stations are being encouraged to lessen the broadcast of entertainment programs in lieu of public service broadcasts pertaining to the outbreak. Several stations like Hunan, Hubei, Anhui, Zhejiang and Chongqing TV have already heeded the government’s call with increased live coverage of the crisis. In fact, Hunan Satellite TV and Zhejiang Satellite TV have axed their uber popular variety shows such as Happy Camp 快乐大本营 and Ace vs Ace 王牌对王牌 originally slotted for broadcast during the lunar new year period along with other variety shows.
It’s quite hard nowadays to discern between real and fake news and you can be sure there’s a lot of the latter floating around in the past few days with things being so uncertain. As a person that appreciates “knowing” more than the unknown, having media outlets to keep folks informed and to share preventative measures to control the virus from spreading is definitely a good move by the government. I just hope that not everything will be cancelled – especially web dramas and all. With everyone urged to stay within the comforts of home, what better way to keep an entire nation busy and occupied than with an intriguing drama or two eh?
Anonymous
Why did the government think it’s a good idea to impose so much restriction on entertainment but gave so much leeway to safety food handling or eating exotic animals is beyond me? You would think that with the SARS outbreak, a ban on eating exotic animals would have been in place. Now that more people are being quarantined, the very same government tells people to not be entertained because when you’re at home with nothing else to do, it’s best that you watch and listen to depressing news to make you feel you live a very meaningful life.
If they do truly care about the people then they shouldn’t have deleted posts about people getting sick with SARS like symptoms at the end of Dec 2019. They should act on containing the outbreak in early January and not wait until almost Chinese New Year to quarantine Wuhan.
If a few people being stupid for doing the stuffs from an entertainment then it’s only affect those few people. But if food safety handling is not in place then hundred, thousands or millions of people are at risk. The government needs to stop concerning if people are being too entertain but should be more concern about the wellbeing of the citizens of China and the rest of the world by put in a better food handling regulation and tell the Chinese citizens to stop eating exotic animals. This is some bullshit that the world has to suffer.
Nano13
uncles censor doing what they best at…controlling everything…not surprise…
Anonymous
it doesn't hurt to show more compassion to those who suffer, i know we may not have candle light ceremonies, but let's hope that the spirit of humanity shows through for those sick to know that they're not forgotten.
Anonymous
I think China does have a ban on exotic, endangered and wild animals that comes with a hefty fine and possible imprisonment. Unfortunately, the greater the risk and scarcity, the more people will pay to get it. So the black market for such banned animals is very lucrative.
China has many issues regarding Human Rights, but I doubt they want their own citizens to die from an infectious disease. They probably didn't handle the situation well and tried to downplay the severity, but I do think China is doing what it can to find a solution.