脑残, nao+can, brain damaged

“Adjective, pronouced “nan“. This character is a combination of the characters for 脑残 (”naocan” brain damage).

Naocan is online lingo, used to describe someone who is not capable of thinking straight; often those whose thinking is crippled by party ideology.”

五毛, wu+mao, five cent

“Noun, pronounced “wao.”  It is the combination of 五毛 (”wumao” fifty cents) Fifty cent party is another common online lingo for government-trained and paid “commentators” who do not reveal their real identity and pretend to be ordinary netizens to spin government messages.”

diang (党中央, dang+zhong+yang, Party Central Committee)

“Noun, adjective and exclamation,  pronounced “diang”  It is a combination of 党中央 (“dangzhongyang” – CCP Central Committee). Blogger hecaitou, author of the hugely popular “Diary of the Digital Ocean (比特海日志)”, interprets the character as “the ultimate, sacred, absolutely correct, cannot be questioned; you get the shit beaten out of you but cannot say a word.” “意思是至高无上的，神圣的，绝对正确的，不容质疑的，抽你丫没商量的。” ”

Diang, man! These nan waos must be working overtime.

From this CDT article.

In his reply, Peter Foster of the Telegraph accuses Mr. Whiteley of spinning propaganda for the Chinese government’s ‘mouthpiece’, China Daily. He contends that the White House opening a Facebook page to promote the Obama administration to young people is not propaganda, because “in America the young people are free to throw as many rotten tomatoes at Mr. Obama as they like”. For Foster, the freedom to reply makes what Obama’s party does on Facebook different from Communist party publicity campaigns.

I’m not trying to debate that here. The Chinese would name their government’s efforts and the Obama administration’s efforts with the same word — xuanchuan, 宣传. It’s a neutral word closer to ‘publicity’ or ‘dissemination’ and doesn’t carry the negative connotations that it does in English.

Mao Zedong found you through Friendfinder!

I’ll just say this. News outlets are organizations run by people, and it is in our nature to create spin. We’re not Vulcans; it requires immense effort for humans to actually remain neutral in their communications.

Now for my blanket-statement interpretations of what are perhaps truths, sometimes (don’t worry, I’ve seen the bumper stickers…don’t believe everything you think):

Westerners are amazed by the straightforward, blatant mandates the CP uses to promote itself: “Love China, Love Socialism”, etc. We marvel at those translations, thinking, ‘does the general population really think in those terms?’ The Chinese struggle to see their nation jabbed at under the spotlight of western media attention. ‘Do the westerners really think stripping something naked for all to see is the proper way to deal with its problems?’ Both wonder, ‘how can they be so hypocritical?’

As someone who once worked in the Publicity/Propaganda department (officially the 宣传与公共关系办公室) at a Chinese public university, and who has both Communist and WWII-era U.S. Navy and Marines propaganda hanging on the walls of her home…I have no real authoritative answers. In wars of loaded words, I can’t think of anyone who would. Maybe Spock.

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*Update: How about ‘torture’ and ‘harsh techniques’ for loaded words? Heretical Ideas Blog