From the Mailbox: Huffington Post Runs Baiting Article about Chinese Eating Dogs

This e-mail came in from Frida:

The only reason I can think of for the very popular news blog Huffington Post to devote a whole story called “Chinese Astronauts Ate Dogs in Space” is to incite gawkers over how “weird” and “gross” Chinese eating habits are. It’s what I call “baiting”– a seemingly professionally written news story whose only true purpose is to incite tabloid-worthy disgust and wank.

The readership of HuffPo tends to lean left-wing, and you would THINK more open-minded. If you read the comments accompanying the story, the majority of comments are extremely ignorant and mocking. One commenter outright writes that “Chinese people are disgusting.” Please note that EVERY HuffPo comment has to be APPROVED by a HuffPo moderator, so someone at HuffPo absolutely okay’ed such comments.

PLEASE call out Huffington Post on their decision to run this story and for their moderators to “okay” comments that are blatantly insulting, racist and ignorant. This is just another example of yellow-peril, aren’t-Orientals-weird, Sinophobia, this time from a supposedly “liberal minded” website and readership.

Thanks for your help.

I’m don’t have to call out Huffington Post, because Frida just did. So question for you, 8Asians readers: is this whole “OH NOEZ CHINESE ASTRONAUTS EAT DOGS” story similar to this post about commenters balking on a photo of Taiwanese shaved ice? Why or why not?