A rare moment of international solidarity and celebration was marred by racially charged nationalism in some corners of western media on Tuesday, when Chinese-American skiing star Eileen Gu won gold in the big air competition in Beijing.
Gu, 18, opted to compete for China in these Games back in 2019, citing her mother's Chinese heritage, despite growing up largely in the Bay Area.
With her star rising, the photogenic Gu's decision has come under increasing scrutiny since the start of the Olympics, and the sentiment was renewed with ugly fervor after her triumph on Tuesday.
Speaking with a pool of international reporters after she captured her first career Olympic gold, the Stanford-bound teen was asked about the criticism she faced.
"Here's the thing: I'm not trying to keep anyone happy," said Gu. "I'm an 18-year-old girl out here living my best life. I'm having a great time. It doesn't really matter if other people are happy or not, because I feel as though I'm doing my best. I'm enjoying the entire process, and I'm using my voice to create as much positive change as I can to the voices who will listen to me, in an area that is personal and relevant to myself.
"So, I know that I have a good heart, and I know my reasons for making the decisions I do are based on a greater common interest, and something that I feel like is for the greater good. And so if other people don't really believe that's where I'm coming from, then that just reflects that they do not have the empathy to empathize with a good heart, perhaps because they don't share the same kind of morals that I do, and in that sense, I'm not going to waste my time trying to placate people who are, one, uneducated, and, two, probably are never going to experience the kind of joy, gratitude and love that I have the great fortune to experience on a daily basis.
"So, yeah, if people don't believe me and don't like me, then their loss. They're never going to win at the Olympics."
While the majority of responses to Gu's victory seemed to be positive, a few notable figures and outlets took a decidedly negative stance.
Former US Senator Claire McCaskill, a former top Democrat and frequent contributor on MSNBC, was among those leading the charge in criticizing Gu.
Meanwhile Sports Illustrated published a patronizing article by Michael Rosenberg, baselessly asserting that Gu was being manipulated.
"Gu got her gold medal and China got its pawn," Rosenberg wrote. "It is not clear whether Gu fully understands how thoroughly she is being used."
Writing for Yahoo Sports, journalist Jay Busbee needlessly noted the Mandarin rendering of Gu's name - Gu Ailing - and suggested she was being fed talking points by the Chinese government.
"It’s a quote China couldn’t have scripted any better," Busbee wrote about Gu's response to a question about Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai, whose vague social media post about her former lover in the Chinese government was intentionally misrepresented by western media as a case of sexual assault.
Gu, without addressing the specifics of the Peng case, said she was pleased Peng was in attendance. Peng was accompanied by IOC President Thomas Bach, who has met and spoken with Peng several times since her alleged "disappearance" and subsequent resurfacing.
The conservative finance outlet The Economist saw the occasion as a chance to resurface an old piece about Gu, suggesting her fame and wealth had been "amplified" by the Chinese government in exchange for "silence."
The Associated Press, in its recap of Gu's gold, also intimated that her decision was motivated by financial gain, and that she had provoked an "army of cynics."
"The decision seems to have been a lucrative one for Gu, whose second passion is modeling," wrote Jake Seiner. "Her face is on advertisements across Beijing, and she’s been photographed for Vogue, Victoria’s Secret, Louis Vuitton, Tiffany and more."
Other conservative-leaning, mostly white men had similarly denigrating and chauvinistic responses:
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