I’m not a big fan of China Daily, China’s national language newspaper but I do read its website occasionally when there’s nothing better available for work. I recently noticed one thing at the bottom of the each news story, a massage ad.
Now I thought that was something only The Shanghai Daily did — and even then the ads appeared in the back of its classified section not on the news stories of its website. Maybe I’ve still got my sense of idealism from journalism school but it seems to tarnish the work of the journalists that write for the paper to have the ads placed there.
But forget about me for a second, let’s think about the Chinese government. They’re trying to create an image of a modern China. Aren’t they sending home most of the migrant workers in Beijing and closing most of the brothels there? If that’s the case then why would The China Daily pick now of all times to put massage girl ads on their website? Is this just another case of the government unintentionally shooting itself in the foot? I sure hope not or there is going to be one clumsy image of China presented to the international attendees at the Games.
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It is amusing to have ads like that next to an article. But, even government-run newspapers need to pay the bills with advertising. And this one really isn’t the fault of the paper, it’s a Google ad–which means China Daily didn’t set any regulations for that space. Also didn’t know Google hosted such ads.
I can’t get anything more interesting or racy than “Rick Jones Pianos” when I view the page… I tell ya, I’m a bit let down. 🙁
I’ve noticed these ads for a while now myself. Apparently they target the “China, Beijing” keywords and can be seen on many web-sites where google adsense is displayed. And it’s not google to be blamed, but the owners of the web-space. I for once do not care, but that is probably the answer to the closed brothels.