[造谣] 前美国驻成都总领事林杰伟FB全文

In 2020, our family, like so many others, faced a host of challenges: some were more dramatic-　an order from Washington to evacuate my family from China, the abrupt closure of Consulate Chengdu. Others were more prosaic: lockdowns and on-line school, the uncertainty of COVID, an extended separation from my family. Like everyone else over the past year, I've shared many of these challenges on social media with friends and family. But there is one challenge that I haven't shared, and it is the one that has in many ways been the most difficult.
In July，my wife，Tzu-l，suddenly became the target of a vile smear campaign that began on Chinese social media but has now spread to American social media platforms as well. Following the closure of the Chinese Consulate in Houston，Chinese trolls，commonly known as　五毛，（wu mao-"fifty centers" because they reportedly get paid 50 cents by the government for each post）began attacking Tzu-I as a spy，a whore，and a closet revolutionary who used her popularity as a food writer and musician to lay the seeds for a color revolution in China. Many of them went into painful details about wanting to rape her，kill her，abuse our kids，and hurt our family. These attacks quickly caught fire，even more so after her, abuse our kids, and hurt our family. These attacks quickly caught fire, even more so after the PRC government forced us to shutter the U.S. Consulate General in Chengdu. It wasn't just the trolls, many of the so-called big Vs (verified social media accounts with hundreds of thousands or millions of followers) also joined in, sifting through Tzu-I's social media posts, cutting and pasting lines out of context to incite the attacks. Voices brave enough to defend her were quickly shouted down or "disappeared" by Chinese censors. Many of her friends have been harassed.

For most of August,　I was still in Chengdu, tying up loose ends and helping my American and local Chinese staff process the closure of our consulate. Although Tzu-l and I spoke every day, she faced this wave of hate more or less alone. I urged her not to respond. That the last thing you want to do is feed the trolls and give oxygen to fuel their rage, or feed into Chinese propaganda. That in time, these trolls would find other targets and leave her alone. But l was worried sick about her safety and the safety of our kids, especially when it appeared that some people on-line were trying to figure out where we lived. Tzu-l is a very strong woman. I supported her decision to stop posting on Weibo, China's Twitter equivalent, where she had over 650,000 followers, and to keep her head down while the attacks raged. So, the attacks followed her to Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram. Imagine if every time YouTube, and Instagram. Imagine if every time you turned on your phone or opened your social media accounts you were greeted by a curse or a threat. Week after week, month after month, the attacks, hate, and vile comment swear you down. This kind of attack is not unique in modern Chinese history. It's just been updated for the digital age.


The more outrageous and salacious the lies, the more shocking the language, the more attractive to the social media trolls. Tzu-l is certainly not the first or only person to be attacked this way. Fang-Fang, the author of the Wuhan Diaries, has also been a target. The New Yorker's excellent Jiayang Fan detailed her horrific abuse at the hands of Chinese social media trolls in a September article https://www.newyorker. com/magazine/2020/09/14/how-my-mother-and-i-became-Chinese-propaganda.　A good friend who worked at the U.S. Consulate in Hong Kong was also the object of this wave of hate. Strangely, I have never been a target. It seems these trolls prefer to attack women. As the months passed, the pace of attacks did seem to slow, though they never fully stopped. As 2020 closed, we hoped that 2021 would be a better year.


Alas, it appears we are not through yet. Following a post on Facebook thanking those people who helped her through the many months before I could return home, a new people who helped her though the many months before I could return home, a new series of lurid rumors started circulating -that Tzu-I and I were never married and that she was assigned by Taiwan intelligence to accompany me to Chengdu as a sex slave, with a mission to foment a color revolution in China.　That she entered China as my domestic servant, rather than on a diplomatic visa as my wife. That I have another family in the U.S. and that I discarded her and our boys as soon asl got back home, leaving her alone and homeless. That she is a professional prostitute who lets anyone use her so long as she can promote Taiwan, Hong Kong, or Tibetan independence. It's almost too ridiculous to get upset about. Yet it's been circulating like wildfire across Chinese social media, spurred by those big Vs, for whom the rumor has everything they want: debased sex, politics, and a strong dose of nationalism. It's particularly galling that it erupted the day after Tzu-I and I celebrated our 15th anniversary. And as always, it's accompanied by more hate: a recent example, roughly translated, "I hope your mongrel kids get bitten by dogs, run over by a car and die like dogs."This person clearly has a thing about dogs. These days, we laugh at these kinds of attacks. It's either laugh or spend our days angry and depressed.

I know that these social media trolls don't represent the many wonderful and inspiring people we met in China. And given all that's happening in the U.S. and in the world right now, our problems are small. But we have all seen very clearly what happens when lies are allowed to circulate without contradiction. They keep spinning and spreading uｎtil it's hard for some people to tell the difference between lies and truth. So,　I want to share the truth.　I love my wife and I am very proud of all she has accomplished. We really are married! She is from Taiwan, but she's not a spy or a revolutionary. She has a deep appreciation for Chinese food and culture. My position made her a target and for that I'm sorry. I've been silent up to now in the hope that these attacks will just burn out．But it seems like this is something we're just going to have to live with. And we agree, we're not going to let this wave of hate prevent us from living our lives to the fullest. Of course,I do hope someday these attacks will stop, but in the meantime, they've just forced us to grow thicker skins, to value our real friends, who refuse to believe the lies about us, and we have a deeper appreciation for the bravery of those who stand up for the truth.