Whenever someone meets a violent death, it is unsettling.
But this story has several frightening elements to it besides the death. Not only was Diana O’Brien followed home, robbed, and then murdered when she fought back, but according to the new story:
“The slaying embarrassed police, who waited two days after O’Brien’s body was found to release a statement — a brief two sentences — about her death.”
Oh, I’m sorry. Did that woman’s pesky death get in the way of your local pride?
Another disturbing element is that this young woman was a model, and was “uncomfortable with her work in Shanghai” because she “faced requests to dance at bars to attract customers and work corporate parties.” She had planned to cut her contract short and return home to Canada.
The story says that China’s modeling industry has no “strict regulation,” and so situations sometimes arise where clients ask models to “sleep with them, to sleep with their clients, to go to karaoke”.
That sounds less like “modeling” and more like “trafficking” to me.
But that nasty little word with all of its scary implications doesn’t come up in the article once, not even when it’s revealed that “Worse cases [of industry abuse] include agencies that take away a model’s passport”.
Also creepy: the Shanghai-based agency that hired O’Brien, JH Model Management, has disappeared: the story says the agency’s website has been taken down.
It all just leaves a bad feeling in your gut.
Well, looking at China’s track record on human rights in other industries – - this doesn’t really come as much of a surprise.
Well, if nothing else, the Olympics this year are really shining light on China and uncovering somethings the regime there is embarassed by.
Diana O’Brien’s death is tragic and the sketchy nature of China’s modeling agency business should be criticized.
Unfortunately, your snide comment:
and the unhelpful trollish comment by commenter #3 remind me of how even many supposedly “enlightened” White-dominated progressive movements tend to fall into the trap of stereotyping non-Western societies into orientalist caricatures derived from Western Colonialism’s gaze.
Though I know that was not the intent of the post, that snarky remark was not helpful as it could facilitate such oversimplistic stereotyping of China as the 3rd commenter has already done.
First of all, why single out the Shanghai police and local governments when the same types of coverups happen in many “more civilized” western societies like the USA as the recent Eastern Michigan University rape coverup illustrates??
Second of all, #3′s comment is so overgeneralized as to be practically incoherent and useless. It reminds me of those “I hate [X] race/nationality so much that anything associated with it is the embodiment of all that is bad and evil”.
Third of all, there has been a long unfortunate history of Western stereotyping of Chinese culture as the “inferior other” to the point of orientalist caricaturing, especially from the incursions of Western/Japanese imperialism in the 19th century up to the very present. That is one reason why many Chinese locals may be embarrassed about this….they’re perfectly aware that the Western MSM is more than happy to report bad news in such a way as to justify and reinforce the prevailing orientalist caricatures and stereotypes common in the Western popular consciousness.
Lastly, would this have even made it to Western MSM if the model concerned was Chinese or otherwise non-White and/or from a non-Western country? I very much doubt it judging by what bloggers on this very site and other progressive sites have posted in the past.
Just noticed that the commenter#3 I referred to has been deleted. Some Dr. John somebody who was making overgeneralizations about China, fairness and justice…
Yeah, sorry about that exholt — I deleted it before I saw your comment responding to it. It was racist and unnecessary, and he posted a follow-up question under a different name that was even more racist and unnecessary, so I took them both down.
Well, at least we can be pretty sure that justice will be swift & sure for the asshole who killed her. No endless appeals, no bleeding heart or born again BS… just a single hollowpoint to the head. Sense and simplicity.
Jill: Thanks for taking down those comments before I had a chance to see them.
Exholt: I don’t disagree with you that authorities in many other countries (and even in our own country) display an appalling lack of “doing what’s right” on a regular basis . Nor do I disagree with the fact that violence against women of color in other countries is only newsworthy in the western media when it buttresses western political agendas, racism, Islamophobia, Orientalism, or other characterizations of people in other countries as “inferior” to the West.
But I wasn’t posting about those examples; I was posting about this particular incident. What happened in Shanghai is not any more disturbing because of it’s happening in Shanghai, nor are similar acts less reprehensible when they occur in other countries.
Forgive the snarkiness; it was my first reaction to the sentence in the story. The story implies that the fact that the police waited two days is acceptable or forgivable because of their embarrassment. I am not okay with that idea. If it’s standard routine to wait a certain amount of time before releasing a report about any occurrences such as this, that’s a different story. I admit that I’m not familiar with Shanghai police procedure.
The story here (http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5imBjZNraLXtLMh_jvqaDd72q8FSAD91RL6R80) says that “The killing of a foreigner so close to next month’s Beijing Olympic Games was an embarrassment for Shanghai police…” The reason they were embarrassed is because she was a (white) foreigner (backing up your idea that a Chinese model’s death would not have made Western headlines). That’s not okay, either. It implies that (white) foreigners are more important and/or should be handled with more care than the city’s own residents.
Oh and FYI, Exholt, the Chinese are no longer some poor oppressed backward pseudo-colony; they’re a rising economic and military superpower that could very kick our ass someday, so no need to get all PC n shit. They’re playing in the big leagues now, so it’s ok to insult them.
Uh, no, #8. It’s NOT okay so insult anyone (in the “big leagues” or not) based on their ethnicity/nationality. It’s still racism, no matter how much money they have.
Exholt was objecting to the centuries-old Western characterization of Chinese as inherently “inferior” to the west because of their race and culture, and pointing out that the Chinese officials are aware of how that characterization may come up in international coverage of this murder.
I’d like to point out that the modelling industry really is nast everywhere, I’m thinking Karen Mulder…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karen_Mulder#Depression.2C_Breakdown.2C_and_Suicide_Attempt
And I remember a news bit back then about other models coming up with similar allegations, and some said they had literally been pimped out to clients at parties etc. where it suited the agencies. Mostly though, the fashion world reacted with shock and horror, because you just don’t talk about these things!
I am a Canadian and yes this story is tragic however we all know why this story is BIG NEWS in Canada and the reason why is drum roll please…..because IT IS THE DEATH OF A PRETTY YOUNG WHITE CANADIAN WESTERN WOMAN IN ASIA. So once again, the white female is placed at the “center” while the issue of violence against women is not.
However, does this blog or the Occident write about the fact Chinese women and Asian women are sexually exploited and murdered in Asia a lot? I doubt it. Oops I forgot this blog focuses on WHITE FEMALE ISSUES. Chinese models encounter oppression, sexual exploitation, and yes murder all the time yet I don’t see this website reporting about that. However, when a pretty, white Canadian model dies it is international news. One of the problems I have with this blog is the REFUSAL of the blog OWNER to OWN UP to the issue of WHITE SKIN PRIVILEGE and the issue of RACISM IN THE MAINSTREAM FEMINIST MOVEMENT. Yes, I wrote this in capital letters because this is a SERIOUS ISSUE and it pisses me off! Also, the blog writer’s comment about “pride” of the Chinese police is a snide yet RACIST statement. How dare you! You refuse to look at the cultural differences between China and the West. I am not excusing the actions of the Chinese police. However, I don’t think you are helping matters perpetuating RACIST sterereotypes.
Orville and Exholt: The statement was an inappropriate one, and I am sorry for it. As one who is often the victim of Orientalism applied to Muslim and Middle Eastern women, I understand the the difference between how things are and how the Western media presents them. My aim was to critique an institution, not a race or culture, and I regret that it is any way other than this.