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Transcript:

 

Hi everyone, I’m Yuchen! Welcome to my channel, this semester, I learned a lot about the history of fashion, as well as the relationship between fashion and politics, economy and culture. Having said all the above, I have to mention the recent Xinjiang cotton incident. In this podcast, I want to talk about a brand that has benefited a lot from the Xinjiang cotton incident, "Li Ning".

 

The recent Xinjiang cotton incident has caused an uproar on China's major social media. On March 24, a statement published by the Swedish clothing brand H&M on its official website was widely spread on Weibo, arousing the outrage of Chinese netizens. The “H&M Group’s Statement on Due Diligence in Xinjiang” stated that H&M Group is “deeply concerned” about reports from civil society organizations and media reports, including the “forced labor” and “religious work” of ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. Stating that H&M does not cooperate with any garment manufacturing factory located in Xinjiang, nor does it purchase products or raw materials from the region.

 

On the 24th, topics such as "H&M Boycott Xinjiang Products" continued to ferment on Weibo. Netizens said, "I hope these companies that distort facts and want to make Chinese money will look out for themselves." "Xinjiang cotton do not taken this.". Many Chinese netizens advocate boycotting H&M, Nike and Adidas and other brands that do not support the use of Chinese Xinjiang cotton. As a new and popular Chinese sports brand, Li Ning has become a big beneficiary behind this incident.

 

What’s Lining? Lining is a professional sports brand company founded by Mr. Li Ning in 1990. Who is Lining? Li Ning was a well-known male gymnast in China in the 1980s. He is one of the most outstanding athletes in the 20th century. During his sports career, he has won 14 world championships and created a myth in the history of world gymnastics. Chinese called him "Prince of Gymnastics"

 

When I was in high school, Li Ning was a well-regulated sports brand in my impression, without any novel design or fancy advertising. But in 2018, "Li Ning" held a show at New York Fashion Week, which sounds incredible. Li Ning was successfully reborn in this fashion week, just like a small town girl who has "successfully plastic surgery".

 

It can be seen that this time Li Ning is cruel to wash away the old impressions, and also invited supermodels such as Lia Pavlova to help out the big show. The publicity has also spent bunch of money, specially inviting the American net celebrity Cameron Dallas and the new action actor Scott Eastwood as guests of the show. Since then, Li Ning has transformed from a traditional sports brand into a national fashion brand "China Lining" that is quite popular among young people.

 

After the Xinjiang Cotton Incident, Li Ning company also quickly voiced their support for Xinjiang Cotton. It is stated that Li Ning has not joined the Better Cotton Initiative (BCI). Xinjiang is one of the important raw material producing areas in Li Ning's supply chain system. At present, Li Ning's products using cotton from this producing area as raw materials are on the market. This caused Li Ning's sales to rise rapidly for a while, and the stock price also rose rapidly. On March 25, Li Ning's stock price rose by 7%, and the stock price was quoted at 48.4 Hong Kong dollars.

 

In my opinion, as a Chinese citizen, it is understandable to support the brand of my country. Li Ning does dare to innovate in design, combining Chinese culture with popular culture. But from Li Ning's design, it is still obvious that some elements plagiarize popular brands in other countries, which makes me feel it is undesirable. And many of Li Ning's products just pile up some popular elements, and don't really create their own style. And the brand should always put product quality at the forefront. Li Ning was once reported to have a problem with the design of badminton sports shoes, which caused three athletes of the Chinese national badminton team they sponsored to be injured, which affected their subsequent competition.

 

In fact, I always buy some Chinese brands with their own unique design styles and good quality, and I will still buy brands from other countries. I hope that everyone can be rational when they talk about patriotism, and have their own thinking while being surrounded by media, don’t blindly follow the trend and buy some so-called patriotic brands.

 

In the end, I want to say that blind boycott is never a sign of patriotism.