On March 19, Fox News host Tucker Carlson spiritedly disparaged U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken for supposedly embarrassing the United States in his lack of aggression during his meetings with Chinese delegates. Later in his segment, Carlson belittled Rep. Jerry Nadler of New York for cautioning against spurring hate crimes against people of Asian descent through the use of the term “China virus.” All this built up to Carlson’s introduction of the term “baizuo,” which he claims—in part by misrepresenting scholar Chenchen Zhang as part of Chinese state media—is what Chinese people call weak, impressionable U.S. liberals, and he warns that China’s government perceives U.S. weakness and seeks to take advantage of it.
Baizuo (白左, literally “white left”) has been around for 10 years or so—but it rose to greater prominence in the wake of Donald Trump’s ascension to the presidency in 2017. It means something like “woke”—as said in a sneering tone by conservative critics of progressives. Today, it is a ubiquitous insult used on China’s internet, hurled at anyone whose views can be framed as laughably naive or directly in conflict with social stability and national security. But depending on which side of the Pacific Ocean—or of the U.S.-China conflict—you’re on, just which nation you’re talking about can differ sharply.
