China Arrests Woman in Beijing for Allegedly Insulting Olympic Athletes

A female resident of Beijing, identified only by her surname, “He,” was arrested for allegedly making “defamatory claims” about a Chinese Olympic athlete and her coach.

Police in the Daxing district of Beijing said on Tuesday that they made the bust in response to “reports from the public” about “some internet users” making defamatory comments after the women’s singles table tennis final on August 3.

“Our investigation revealed that this person maliciously fabricated information and blatantly defamed others, with an adverse impact on society,” said the Daxing Public Security Bureau.

As is often the case in authoritarian China, the speech police did not specify exactly what the detained suspect said or what might have been objectionable about it. 

Radio Free Asia (RFA) did a little sleuthing on Chinese social media on Wednesday and concluded He was probably arrested for spreading rumors that one — or both — of China’s female table tennis champions was sleeping with the coach.

The match on August 3 pitted Chinese table tennis champion Chen Meng against her teammate, Sun Yingsha, also a top-rated player worldwide. Chen ended up winning the match four to two, successfully defending her gold medal with exactly the same score she racked up against Sun when she won the gold at the Tokyo Olympics.

Sun, 23, was actually the higher-ranked player in 2024, giving 30-year-old Chen the pleasure of an underdog victory.

“This gold medal feels more valuable. In Tokyo, I was at the peak of my career, but in the past few years I’ve suffered a lot of losses and injuries,” Chen said after her victory.

“I don’t know if this is going to be my last Olympics, so I want to cherish the opportunity as best as I can,” she added. She consoled Sun with a hug after the final results of the match were announced.

This lovely sportsmanship was not entirely reflected in the crowd or on social media, where the world of top-level table tennis can apparently grow quite acrimonious. Spectators in Paris booed Chen every time she scored a point, and the cameras caught one crowd member flipping the middle finger at her. Ugly rumors swirled that Chinese Communist Party leaders had decreed Sun would be the winner, but Chen refused to throw the match as instructed.

“This country, where food and drink are fake, votes in the Great Hall of the People are fake, and even sports events are staged isn’t worthy of her,” one of Chen’s fans groused on social media, advising the gold medalist to emigrate to a country more worthy.

One reason so many people thought the match was fixed was because a Chinese public relations firm ran a video in Beijing celebrating Sun as the winner before the match even concluded. The firm claimed the video was broadcast accidentally during a test to debug its equipment.

The younger Sun has an enormous following on social media, and her fans seemed eager to see her defeat Chen and take her place as the new champion of women’s table tennis. Chen, on Thursday, called on fans of all Chinese athletes to be more polite and considerate.

“Of course, when it comes to competitions, everyone naturally hopes their favorite athlete will win,” Chen said. “However, in every match, there will always be a winner and a loser. So I hope that (fans) can focus more on appreciating the spirit of struggle and perseverance that athletes display on the field.”

Chinese censors swung into action as the table tennis debate raged, deleting more than 12,000 posts and 300 accounts from Weibo, the tightly controlled Chinese microblogging platform.

Many of these posts ostensibly defamed Chen or Sun by claiming they were sleeping with the coaches, which is apparently a weapon of choice in Chinese flame wars. Plenty of other insults were hurled, including a Sun fan who hoped Chen might be tested and disqualified for doping — a rather daring use of verbal artillery at the moment, given how hypersensitive the Chinese Communist regime is to doping allegations.

Chinese officials instructed their subjects to avoid “spreading negativity and inciting conflict” by indulging in vulgar “cheering culture.”

Cheering culture does not just mean toxic sports fandom — the Chinese Communist Party officially detests celebrity worship, especially when Chinese youths become infatuated with celebrities from a certain other Asian nation. 

China actually has laws against creating fan clubs, passed after a remarkable number of young fans began physically and electronically stalking their celebrity crushes. The exception to these rules is dictator Xi Jinping, whose subjects are encouraged to worship him passionately, although stalking is still frowned upon.

The Chinese Ministry of Public Security pledged on Wednesday to “severely crack down on chaotic sport-related fan circles.”