Jin Jing ( zh, c=金晶, p=Jīn Jīng; born 1981 in

Hefei Hefei is the Capital city, capital of Anhui, China. A prefecture-level city, it is the political, economic, and cultural center of Anhui. Its population was 9,369,881 as of the 2020 census. Its built-up (or ''metro'') area is made up of four u ...

Anhui Anhui is an inland Provinces of China, province located in East China. Its provincial capital and largest city is Hefei. The province is located across the basins of the Yangtze and Huai rivers, bordering Jiangsu and Zhejiang to the east, Jiang ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

) is a Chinese female

Paralympic The Paralympic Games or Paralympics is a periodic series of international multisport events involving athletes with a range of disabilities. There are Winter and Summer Paralympic Games, which since the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Kore ...

fencer. She was a torchbearer carrying the

Olympic torch The Olympic flame is a Olympic symbols, symbol used in the Olympic movement. It is also a symbol of continuity between ancient and modern games. The Olympic flame is lit at Olympia, Greece, several months before the Olympic Games. This ceremony s ...

amid political protests during the 2008 Summer Olympics torch relay in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

. According to ''

ABC News ABC News most commonly refers to: * ABC News (Australia), a national news service of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation * ABC News (United States), a news-gathering and broadcasting division of the American Broadcasting Company ABC News may a ...

'', she fended off protestors who "threw themselves" at her; most were wrestled away by French police but at least one reached her wheelchair and tried to wrench the torch away. Jin has gained national fame in China because of the incident, but was attacked on Chinese internet bulletin boards for her stance in the following call to boycott French retailer

Carrefour Carrefour Group, S.A. (, ), is a French multinational retail and wholesaling corporation headquartered in Massy, Essonne, Massy, France. It operates a chain of hypermarkets, grocery stores and convenience stores. By 2024, the group had 14,000 ...

that resulted from public anger toward France. In contrast, Western media concentrated on how the incident involving Jin Jing ignited Chinese nationalism and claimed that the incident was exploited for propaganda purposes by the state media."Jin Jing, la handicapée médaille d'or de la guerre des images", ''Marianne'', April 26, 2008, p.22

Family and personal life

Jin Jing's parents are wage earners. Her father, Jin Jiansheng (), is a sent-down youth who moved from

Shanghai Shanghai, Shanghainese: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: is a direct-administered municipality and the most populous urban area in China. The city is located on the Chinese shoreline on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the ...

during the

Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a Social movement, sociopolitical movement in the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). It was launched by Mao Zedong in 1966 and lasted until his de ...

, where he met and married Liu Huayao (). Jin was born in 1981, in

, Anhui, She has a younger sister, Jin Renyu (). Jin had part of her right leg amputated in 1989 when she was in elementary school after a

malignant tumor Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal ...

was found on her ankle and later underwent a year of

chemotherapy Chemotherapy (often abbreviated chemo, sometimes CTX and CTx) is the type of cancer treatment that uses one or more anti-cancer drugs (list of chemotherapeutic agents, chemotherapeutic agents or alkylating agents) in a standard chemotherapy re ...

. She moved to

with her family in 1995 and studied

information technology Information technology (IT) is a set of related fields within information and communications technology (ICT), that encompass computer systems, software, programming languages, data processing, data and information processing, and storage. Inf ...

in a technical secondary school. After graduation, she worked as a telephone operator in a hotel in Shanghai. Jin got married in Shanghai in September 2013.

Career

On July 13, 2001, the day when

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

was elected the host city for

2008 Summer Olympics The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXIX Olympiad () and officially branded as Beijing 2008 (), were an international multisport event held from 8 to 24 August 2008, in Beijing, China. A total of 10,942 athletes fro ...

, Jin Jing became a member of the Shanghai Wheelchair Fencing Team. Later on she joined the Chinese National Wheelchair Fencing Team. Her career as a fencer is summarized in the following table: On May 6, 2008, Jin Jing was named as the ambassador of a Paralympic cheering group to help publicize Paralympic sports worldwide in the runup to the

2008 Summer Paralympics The 2008 Summer Paralympic Games (), the 13th Summer Paralympic Games, took place in Beijing, China, from September 6 to 17, 2008. As with the 2008 Summer Olympics, equestrian events were held in Hong Kong and sailing events in Qingdao. It was ...

in Beijing. On September 6, she brought the Paralympic torch into the Bird's Nest stadium during the

Opening Ceremony An opening ceremony, grand opening, or ribbon-cutting ceremony marks the official opening of a newly constructed location or the start of an event.

of the Paralympic Games. On this occasion, she "made headlines in the Chinese media", according to the

Agence France-Presse Agence France-Presse (; AFP) is a French international news agency headquartered in Paris, France. Founded in 1835 as Havas, it is the world's oldest news agency. With 2,400 employees of 100 nationalities, AFP has an editorial presence in 260 c ...

2008 Summer Olympics torch relay

In 2007, Jin Jing turned up for a selective trial, titled ''You Are the Torchbearer'', which was organized by

China Central Television China Central Television (CCTV) is the State media, national television broadcaster of China, established in 1958. CCTV is operated by the National Radio and Television Administration which reports directly to the Publicity Department of th ...

, and was chosen to be an Olympic torchbearer. On April 7, 2008, she was the third torchbearer carrying the Olympic Flame during the relay in Paris, amidst protests and physical attempts to snatch the torch by demonstrators. According to ''

'', "Protesters denouncing Chinese policy in Tibet threw themselves at Jin. Most were wrestled away by police but at least one reached her wheelchair and tried to wrench the torch away." Jin was quoted by the state-run newspaper ''

China Daily ''China Daily'' ( zh, s=中国日报, p=Zhōngguó Rìbào) is an English-language daily newspaper owned by the Central Propaganda Department of the Chinese Communist Party. Overview ''China Daily'' has the widest print circulation of any ...

'' as saying that she "would die to protect the torch." The

International Olympic Committee The International Olympic Committee (IOC; , CIO) is the international, non-governmental, sports governing body of the modern Olympic Games. Founded in 1894 by Pierre de Coubertin and Demetrios Vikelas, it is based i ...

president Jacques Rogge commented on the incident, saying, "What shocked me most is when someone tried to rob ''(sic?)'' the torch off a wheelchair athlete, a disabled athlete who was unable to defend the torch. This is unacceptable." On her arrival back to

, after the Paris relay, Jin was interviewed by ''

Sohu Sohu, Inc. () is a Chinese Internet company headquartered in the Sohu Internet Plaza in Haidian District, Beijing. Sohu and its subsidiaries offer advertising, a search engine (Sogou.com), on-line multiplayer gaming (ChangYou.com) and other se ...

''. Of her experience of the relay, she said: Commenting on Tibet itself in interviews, she said she knew little of politics before encountering the demonstrations in Paris, and had never heard of the pro-Tibet independence movement. When asked by the UK's ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was found ...

'' she also said, "My opinion before was that Tibet was an inseparable part of our country, now I hold this point more firmly than before." Jin has been celebrated first on internet bulletin boards and soon in Chinese media. She was treated to a hero's welcome upon her return to

and China's news reports described her as the "Smiling Angel in Wheelchair" and the "Most Beautiful Torchbearer". According to Canada's ''

The Globe and Mail ''The Globe and Mail'' is a Newspapers in Canada, Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in Western Canada, western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of more than 6 million in 2024, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on week ...

'', initially the state

media of China The mass media in the People's Republic of China primarily consists of television, newspapers, radio, and magazines. Since the start of the 21st century, the Internet has also emerged as an important form of mass media and is under the direct ...

censored all reports on the torch protests and the incident involving Jin Jing, but it soon reported on the protest and portrayed China as the victim, thus appealing to patriotic sentiments. The UK's ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'' wrote that Chinese media coverage of the Paris leg of the relay was "reminiscent of the

when propaganda organs were able to whip up the public into a frenzy of rage over an issue of their choice." '' The Associated Press'' wrote that Jin is "now known as a defender of China's dignity" and joins "a list of heroes promoted by the communist government's propaganda authorities", while ''

The Sydney Morning Herald ''The Sydney Morning Herald'' (''SMH'') is a daily Tabloid (newspaper format), tabloid newspaper published in Sydney, Australia, and owned by Nine Entertainment. Founded in 1831 as the ''Sydney Herald'', the ''Herald'' is the oldest continuous ...

'' called her a "new heroine in China" by whom Beijing "is trying to claw back one or two propaganda points from the torch's recent rocky progress." The French magazine ''

Marianne Marianne () has been the national personification of the French Republic since the French Revolution, as a personification of liberty, equality, fraternity and reason, as well as a portrayal of the Goddess of Liberty. Marianne is displayed i ...

'' devoted a full page to her in its 26 April edition, and commented that the Chinese flame attendants were "strangely" absent when Jin carried the torch, leaving it up to the French police alone to guard Jin and her companions. But according to the interview Jin gave to ''Sohu'' on April 9, she was waiting to accept the flame as the third torchbearer, and security was "relatively light" around her, when the protestors "began lunging" at her. ''Marianne'' wrote that Jin's story had become a "legend skillfully propagated" by the Chinese media: "Images of Jin Jing holding the torch against her heart, her eyes closed in her lovely face, are being shown over and over on

CCTV Closed-circuit television (CCTV), also known as video surveillance, is the use of closed-circuit television cameras to transmit a signal to a specific place on a limited set of monitors. It differs from broadcast television in that the signa ...

and are inflaming the Chinese Internet," making Jin famous for "hundreds of millions of Chinese viewers and netizens." The French newspaper ''

Le Figaro () is a French daily morning newspaper founded in 1826. It was named after Figaro, a character in several plays by polymath Pierre Beaumarchais, Beaumarchais (1732–1799): ''Le Barbier de Séville'', ''The Guilty Mother, La Mère coupable'', ...

'' published an analysis of what it referred to as "the Jin Jing phenomenon": "The media have been drumming into people's heads the story of this young woman who became, in the space of an incident in Paris, the symbol of Chinese pride in the face of Western hostility. The actions of the media bore their fruit, and the 'angel in a wheelchair' has generated unprecedented enthusiasm in China and among Chinese communities all over the world." The event involving Jin Jing in Paris sparked outrage around China, and Chinese citizens started to urge on the internet for a boycott of French goods and businesses, and touted to "hunt down" the protester who accosted Jin and "teach him a lesson." On April 21, two weeks after the incident, Jin received a personal letter from French president

Nicolas Sarkozy Nicolas Paul Stéphane Sarközy de Nagy-Bocsa ( ; ; born 28 January 1955) is a French politician who served as President of France from 2007 to 2012. In 2021, he was found guilty of having tried to bribe a judge in 2014 to obtain information ...

, delivered by Senate President Christian Poncelet. In the letter Sarkozy referred to the attack as "intolerable", and said he "condemns it with the utmost force." Xinhua reported that Jin was "very glad to be invited by President Sarkozy to France" and that she "hope to contribute her own efforts to cementing the Sino-France friendship"."French Senate President conveys Sarkozy's sympathy note to Chinese torch bearer"
Xinhua, April 21, 2008 However, Jin also expressed her disappointment to the press later that Sarkozy "expressed regret, shock and condemnation but no apology." On September 18, 2008, Jin was received by President Sarkozy at the Palais de l'Elysée. Sarkozy publicly stated that he was "very happy to greet er, and praised her "exemplary courage".

Reuters Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide writing in 16 languages. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world. The agency ...

, describing Jin as a "nationalist icon", reported that the incident in Paris had "caused a diplomatic rift between China and France that Sarkozy has been at pains to mend ever since", and that his hosting of Jin at the Elysée palace was a means of "heal ng herift".

Boycott of Carrefour

In April 2008, amidst calls in China to boycott French retailer

to show anger towards France and the experience Jin Jing had in Paris, Jin said she does not want people to boycott

since most of its employees are Chinese and they will be first affected. She also spoke in support of "Chinese people's friendship with the French", wished the best for French athletes at the Beijing Olympics, and added: "We Chinese people will certainly welcome French people and athletes to China with a tolerant, friendly and passionate attitude." She had received strong personal attacks on Chinese bulletin boards, though her popularity is still considered very high. So far, she is still called "The Angel in Wheelchair".

References

External links