http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/24/world/asia/china-qiu-shaoyun-korean-war.html 2016-09-23 12:56:23 For Mocking a Martyr, Chinese Blogger Runs Afoul of Beijing Court The court ordered the offender to apologize for a post that compared a Korean War hero to barbecued meat, and his blog has gas gone offline. === BEIJING — Once again, a Beijing court has ruled that tampering with the official narrative of a Communist hero is off limits. The hero this time is The offender is Sun Jie, a blogger who has attracted more than nine million followers with his often-sarcastic social commentaries. In 2013, he “Because Qui Shaoyun lay in the fire without moving, consumers refused to pay for meat grilled on just one side,” he wrote. “They preferred the barbecued meat of Lai Ning.” Lai Ning Within hours, Mr. Sun, who publishes on Weibo under the name Zuoyeben, or Exercise Book, deleted his post, but it had already gone viral. Then, last year, the issue re-emerged, when an herbal drink producer, Jiaduobao, posted an appeal to Mr. Sun, saying, given his barbecue fame, “We support you becoming the C.E.O. of a barbecue shop,” and offering to supply the store with 100,000 cans of herbal tea. Mr. Sun replied: “Thank you. I’ll certainly open a barbecue shop. But I haven’t decided when. Anyone who leaves a comment here can drink it for free.” Commenters were quick to make the connection with Mr. Sun’s earlier joke about national heroes as grilled meat, and some vowed to boycott Jiaduobao. The company, which is based in Hong Kong, quickly said that it was unaware of that joke and that it had asked many celebrities to promote its products. Mr. Sun published his own apology, saying his original remarks were inappropriate. Too late. The brother of Mr. Qiu filed a lawsuit against Mr. Sun and Jiaduobao, claiming that the posts had infringed on Mr. Qiu’s reputation and demanding “the immediate cessation of the infringement” as well as an apology and payment of the symbolic compensation of 1 renminbi, or about 15 cents. This week, the Shortly after the ruling on Tuesday, Mr. Sun posted that he accepted the verdict and apologized. “I was wrong,” he wrote. Jiaduobao The case comes after another court in Beijing punished a challenge to some of the most celebrated heroes of the Communist pantheon. In August, the Xicheng District People’s Court in Beijing ruled that a historian, Hong Zhenkuai, On Wednesday, Zhang Li, one of the lawyers who represented Mr. Qiu’s brother in his suit against Mr. Sun, said in an interview that Mr. Sun’s post in 2013 constituted “very bad behavior.” “No matter how Qiu Shaoyun died, his family wouldn’t want him to be insulted like this,” Mr. Zhang said. But Qiao Mu, a journalism professor at “He used inappropriate words,” Mr. Qiao said of Mr. Sun. “But does that mean historical figures can’t be questioned or ridiculed? The question is whether there is any freedom of speech on this.” Court rulings that punish comment stifle the search for historical truth, he said. “It doesn’t resolve anything. We don’t know what truth really is. But the trend of politicizing such cases is worrying.” Online, reaction to Mr. Sun’s apology has been divided. Some commenters said that Mr. Sun crossed a line by not showing respect for the war dead. Others wondered whether North Korea would exist today if Chinese soldiers had not come to its aid after it invaded South Korea in 1950. “All the dead should be respected. This is the bottom line,” a user who identified as “Why do we praise cannon fodder?” asked a person with the handle Another user,