Pulling your eyes out while saying "Ni hao" ("Hello" in Chinese) with an "Asian" accent, a racist or banal gesture?
This is the question that has ignited social networks since the broadcast on Tuesday August 16 of a program devoted to relations between Taiwan and China on the continuous news channel, LCI.
The manager ?
Sergueï Jirnov, a former secret agent a priori of the KGB, invited on the set of the journalist presenter, Darius Rochebin.
Everyone noticed these acts, deemed racist, but no one dared to reframe Sergei Jirnov, preferring to laugh with him about it.
Despite the rain of messages of indignation, the TF1 group channel has still not removed this passage from its YouTube account.
Contacted, she has not yet responded to our requests.
For many Internet users, the imitation of Sergei Jirnov is unforgivable.
Anonymous are indignant on Twitter like Michael TNR questioning the message: “How can we still invite someone in 2022 and let them make a racist gesture live on TV without apologizing?
Félix, another Internet user, agrees.
For him, it is "everyday racism".
Hello @LCI @TF1Info, how can we still invite someone in 2022 (here a certain Sergei Jirnov) and let him make a racist gesture live on TV without apologizing?
#StopAsianHate #racism cc @SOS_Racisme https://t.co/Wf32a0DoVz pic.twitter.com/xNKPT5w8yI
— KC Michael (@michael_tnr) August 19, 2022
Anti-racism associations have been alerted and are up against this columnist.
SOS Racisme declares to seize the Arcom (Audiovisual and digital communication regulatory authority, the former CSA) and asks “the channel to condemn this unacceptable racist gesture”.
The association of Young Chinese in France supports this decision and also calls for the "withdrawal of this sequence and public apologies".
In a sequence broadcast on @LCI on the #Taiwan crisis, a columnist causes hilarity at the end of the program by pulling his eyes and imitating an "Asian" accent.
We take the @Arcom_fr and ask the channel to condemn this unacceptable racist gesture!
https://t.co/aMY9y7DoAQ
— SOS Racisme - #NonAuRacisme (@SOS_Racisme) August 19, 2022
An apology from Sergei Jirnov?
It's not for tomorrow… He spoke on his Twitter account on the night of Friday to Saturday.
The speaker claims to have imitated an extract from a show by comedian Michel Leeb.
Video of the sketch in support.
He does not hesitate to be ironic when responding to the association Jeunes Chinois de France: “Have you asked for the withdrawal of all the sketches by Michel Leeb that I imitated?
According to him, this is a "buzz" created by this wrestling organization for the sole purpose of making them known.
It seems that my little imitation of Michel Leeb's sketch offended some sensitivities at @ajcf_fr who demanded an apology and the withdrawal of the video.
Apologies, I offer them.
For the video, they will have to stop relaying it themselves.
Nobody noticed it before!
https://t.co/UzDGnog1ge
— Sergei Jirnov, former KGB/SVR spy, consultant (@SergueiJirnov) August 19, 2022
Affirmation that he does not hesitate to reiterate in the comments under his tweet.
Despite a short sentence of apology from him, lost in the middle of other satirical assertions, Internet users are still outraged.
