Chinese Anger Diverted by the Saga of a Hoodlum’s Girlfriend

A pro-China protester tore a Japanese flag at a rally outside the Japanese consulate in Hong Kong on Thursday.

BEIJING — Perhaps topics like the beautiful moll of a multiple-murdering hoodlum just shot dead by police will always fascinate more than politics — even issues that bristle with anger like territorial sovereignty.

Or are China’s netizens so cynical about their own government that they’d rather discuss a criminal’s girlfriend than a clash over land with their historic enemy, Japan?

Genuine anger built online in China on Thursday over the detention the previous day of 14 Chinese activists by the Japanese coast guard on the Diaoyu islands, which China claims but Japan controls. China demanded that Japan immediately release the activists, something that may happen soon, as my colleague Martin Fackler reports.

Hitoshi Maeshiro/European Pressphoto AgencyA Chinese activist in shackles was in Japanese custody on Okinawa.

Inflaming tempers, two Japanese government ministers — the National Public Safety Commission chairman, Jin Matsubara, and the land minister, Yuichiro Hata — visited the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo on Wednesday to mark the anniversary of Japan’s capitulation in World War II. The shrine honors Japan’s war dead, including 14 declared war criminals. Many Chinese harbor deep resentment of what they perceive as Japan’s refusal to acknowledge its war crimes in China.

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