With half the world confined to their homes, the debates and disputes on social networks have become, even more, the daily bread in much of the planet. But in Asia a new level has been reached. Tens of thousands of Internet users from Thailand, Hong Kong and Taiwan have formed the first digital transnational union: the “milk tea alliance”. A slogan, referring to the common fondness for this drink, after which they denounce the authoritarian tactics of the Chinese regime, which tries to refine its image in the midst of a pandemic.
It all started a few weeks ago as a discussion without apparent significance. Then, several Chinese users began to scrutinize the social media profiles of Thai actor Vachirawit Bright Chivaaree and his girlfriend, model Weeraya Sukaram - whose online name is Nevvy - upon realizing the relationship between the two. Bright has gained fame in China for her role in the television series 2gether: The Series, a romantic drama that has garnered success in the world's second largest economy since its premiere in late February. Such has been the impact of the program, that an article by the official Global Times assured that "it would improve cultural communication between China and Thailand."
Nothing is further from reality. The optimistic omen did not anticipate the relentless scrutiny of social networks. Bright and Nevvy did not escape the screen. She was accused by Chinese users of sharing a Twitter message defending that the coronavirus had emerged in a Chinese laboratory, which Washington says to investigate and Beijing denies, and also to suggest in a photo on Instagram from years ago that Taiwan is not part from China. For his part, he was attacked for liking a comment in which Hong Kong was identified as a country, anathema to the communist regime, which defends its sovereignty over the former British colony and the island under the principle of " one China. "
Although Bright did apologize, while Nevvy quietly answered, there was no truce: On Weibo, the Chinese Twitter, requests to boycott the Thai show were shared millions of times. An army of pro-China users also started using the hashtag #nnevvy both on Twitter, censored by the Asian power and only accessible through a virtual private network (VPN), and on Weibo to demand that the young woman who asked for forgiveness, while Chinese and Thai users exchanged reproaches of the most varied nature: from innocuous attacks on the culinary tastes and traditions of each country, to low blows recalling some of the most tragic episodes of the last century.
Specifically, a Chinese user published the 1976 photograph in which a far-right man hits a university student who had previously been hanged with a chair during the repression of the pro-democracy protests that year in Bangkok, emphasizes Efe. In response, Thai users alluded to China's official silence on the 1989 Tiananmen massacre, and, instead of being outraged at some Chinese users' criticism of the Thai regime and its monarchy - protected in Thailand by one of the The most punitive laws of majesty on the planet - many joined them. "Say it louder!" Exclaimed an Internet user from Thailand, a country in which the most liberal opposition movements have had the support of the young population, usually the most assiduous on social networks. Many users resorted to memes to mock attempts to insult them by attacking a government with which they themselves disagree. And to whom, since General Prayut Chan-o-cha staged a coup d'etat in 2014 and won, surrounded by controversy, last year's elections, they see each time closer to China.
Thus, the hashtag #nnevvy became monopolized by criticism of the opposing “side”, to which users from Hong Kong and Taiwan, including the Philippines, began to join, forming the so-called “tea with milk alliance”. Some illustrious, such as the young Hong Kong pro-democracy activist Joshua Wong or his colleague Nathan Law. “It is a lot of fun to see how the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) online army tries to attack Bright. They think that every Thai should be like them, who worship Emperor Xi (President Xi Jinping), ”said Law.
The mayor of Taoyuan, Taiwan, Cheng Wen-Tsan, included the hashtag #nnevvy to thank the "friends of Thailand", expressing her desire to increase tourist ties after the covid-19 epidemic. , the "alliance" has formed a Facebook group with more than 80,000 followers in which the Chinese government's propaganda and some of its maneuvers in the region are attacked, such as its expansion through the South China Sea, which it claims practically in its all, or the construction of dams in the upper course of the Mekong, in the face of the pressing drought of a river that runs through China and much of Southeast Asia (Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam).
The unprecedented union of Asian users against the regional superpower has not done well to Beijing, immersed in an image cleaning campaign after the worldwide reach of the coronavirus. The Chinese Embassy in Thailand released a statement on April 14 on Facebook in which it assured that the " online noise " does not represent either the position of the Thai Government or the general opinion of its population, in addition to reiterating the principle of "one single China".
If external criticism annoys China, especially at a time like the present, what worries the Asian giant the most is that they resonate in its territory. And if the “milk tea alliance” has revealed anything, it is that the censorship imposed by Beijing in its digital space has limits in the global era. Even on Weibo, many more recent comments discussed no longer about the Thai actor or the different accusations made, but about the failure of the "little pinks" expedition as it is known in the digital space to the Chinese nationalists.
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