She has a chance to win three medals at these Winter Games, works as a fashion model for Louis Vuitton, and strings together millions of contracts with sponsors. And oh yes, she also studies at Stanford. There’s nothing that freestyle skier Eileen Gu can’t seem to do. Except to calm the political storm that has arisen around her switch from the American to the Chinese national team.
Gu takes up the big air qualifying rounds today, where skiers slide down a slope and perform stunts on their jump. Later in the Games, she will compete in halfpipe and slopestyle, which will require more jumps and tricks to be performed. She is tipped for three medals, two of which are gold. The 18-year-old Gu is the reigning world champion in halfpipe and slopestyle, and won two golds and one silver at the 2020 Youth Olympics.
But with great achievements comes great attention, including topics Gu prefers not to talk about: like her decision not to compete at these Games for the United States, where she was born and raised, but for China, where her mother is from. comes. At a time of mounting tensions between the two superpowers, Gu’s move has been a source of controversy. Numerous American media devoted lengthy articles to it.
Born in San Francisco
Eileen Gu – in Chinese: Gu Ailing – was born in San Francisco and raised by her Chinese mother and grandmother, in the absence of her American father. She spends her childhood in California, but spends her vacations in Beijing, where her family is part of the party elite. She is perfectly bilingual and sees herself, like many ABCs (American Born Chinese), as a child of two cultures.
In January 2019, Gu records her first World Cup victory, then as a member of Team America. Five months later, she announces that she will be skiing for China. “This is an incredibly difficult decision,” she wrote on her Instagram account. Gu’s explanation is that in China, where winter sports are still in their infancy, they can have more impact than in the US. She can inspire millions of Chinese girls.
In China, Gu’s move has been met with acclaim. China has never won more than eleven medals at Winter Games, with Gu there could easily be more. The fact that Gu is letting mighty America out of the blue also makes her a favorite in nationalist circles in China. State media portray her as a patriot in documentaries. Gu is also embraced on Chinese social media: on Western Instagram she has 250,000 followers, on Chinese Weibo 1.4 million.
Commercially, the choice for China is a bull’s eye. Gu takes the covers of the Chinese editions of vogue, Elle and Marie Claire, and gets a line of sponsors behind him, from sports brand Anta to telecom company China Mobile. According to the newspaper Beijing News she earned $15 million last year (13.4 million euros), making her the highest-earning female athlete after tennis players Naomi Osaka and Serena Williams.
Tennis star Peng Shuai
But Gu’s country change has also brought her criticism and social media hate messages and even death threats. The rivalry between the US and China is mounting, and in the US there is great outrage over Chinese human rights violations in Xinjiang and Hong Kong and the silence on the MeToo charges of tennis star Peng Shuai. Critics believe that Gu is serving a totalitarian regime.
Traditional media also give the issue a lot of attention. The Economist In a long article – under a headline with cold war connotations – Gu describes how in January 2019 Gu is still singing the American national anthem and a month later has a photo with Chinese President Xi Jinping. It almost sounds like treason. Right-wing TV channel Fox News calls Gu “symbolic of the sell-off of many American companies to China.”
The Wall Street Journal questions Gu’s nationality. The skier is American by birth, but it remains unclear whether she has given up that nationality. The Chinese government does not allow dual citizenship, but may have made an exception to those rules. Gu’s refusal to clarify this has also sparked murmurs in Chinese nationalist circles, who question her patriotic purity.
Defenders of Gu feel it is inappropriate to put the weight of a geopolitical squabble on the shoulders of an 18-year-old. They call Gu’s move a personal matter. But critics point out that Gu is politically engaged in the US for women’s emancipation, Black Lives Matter and against anti-Asian violence, but makes no mention of Chinese human rights violations. Her sponsor Anta even boasts of using cotton from Xinjiang.
Gu thus faces the same problem as many Western companies in China: the political compliance required in the Chinese market clashes with moral credibility in the West. Gu seems to have made her choice. When other athletes express their support for tennis star Peng Shuai, she remains silent. “Where’s Eileen Gu?” asks a commenter on Twitter. ‘You wanted to inspire Chinese girls? Here’s your chance.’