Exploitative Expat Explosion
Last week, I added the short documentary my classmates and I made for our class last semester to Letterboxd's database. Subsequently, my friends asked me to send them the video. The general reaction was very positive; however, one comment truly stood out to me. Cait, my beloved Welsh friend, mentioned that "it doesn't feel exploitative at all; it feels so genuine and has integrity." This remark made me think about my previous attempts to make a short video about China, and there was a pattern: I am not visible in any of those videos. Our documentary was about public square dance (广场舞), a phenomenon that none of us had seen in our countries before coming to China. Yet, apart from the narrator, there is no "foreign presence" inside the video. Besides, I did not use my own image or voice in the short video I made last year about my life in Shanghai. My opinion is that when it comes to foreigners' content in China, there is usually an unavoidable factor, one that reproduces an exotic encounter.
During the infamous summer program (which hopefully will end this weekend), I noticed an undeniable sway from many foreigners to be present in the video they are making about China. No matter what the topic is, from dating robots to strange Chinese food, there is a decisive intention to reveal that there is a foreigner behind this content. In some cases, the situation is somewhat more absurd. We have to produce two short videos as our final task, and one group, led by a Chinese middle-aged man, is trying to create content about "misconceptions of foreigners about China." I thought ok, this sounds nice, till they interviewed me and I had to say, "I thought all Chinese people drink boiled water 24/7, always wear slippers, and sleep early." Apart from this being a staged interview, I am quite sure that I did not have those misconceptions before arriving in China. I was confused why someone would try to challenge something that does not exist to begin with, but I guess this is how some locals battle the stereotypes.
I do not believe all the foreigners who create content have that exploitative bigotry, or that their content is propagating those racial agendas, but I can see there is a huge market for that genre, and to some degree, even Chinese content creators foster the demand for something that is against them at its core. I was talking with another participant regarding whether foreigners actually care about Chinese festivals and traditions, and we both came to the conclusion that maybe they do, but the way that numerous organizations are trying to frame it is not really professional, as in some cases, it seems like they see the presence of those foreigners in activities as a reason for evaluating the importance of it. It is the equivalent of Americans asking foreigners to participate in a burger-eating competition and then cheering their presence as a significant factor for elevating the weight of the event.
I wrote a post about how I feel about my photos in China almost a year ago, and now going through this self-reflection after the shenanigans of the program seems like opening a new chapter for not producing Chinamaxing slop in a time when the demand for Chinese content is more than ever.