A football star’s joke costs him a country’s endorsement
A single phrase leads to a commercial and political fallout in China.
The story
Kylian Mbappé apologized for a comment that seemed to refer to Mao Zedong as a 'Chinese dictator,' leading to backlash and loss of endorsements from three Chinese companies.
Source: fortune.com
Our reading
Mbappé’s comment about a ‘Chinese dictator’ was apparently a joke about a meme, but it was enough to make three Chinese companies drop him. The irony is that the same companies that now reject him once used his face in ads, including one where he speaks in Chinese. Now, they’re erasing him from their campaigns, as if he never existed.
It’s not just the companies that are reacting—social media is also purging him, with his RedNote account banned from gaining new followers. The same platform that once promoted him is now policing his presence, as if his words could somehow be unspoken. The companies didn’t say exactly what he said was offensive, just that it hurt ‘national sentiment.’
So, the man who once smiled for Chinese advertisers is now a cautionary tale about the power of a single phrase. The companies that once paid him are now the ones deciding what he can and cannot say, even if they don’t explain why. It’s a strange kind of respect.
