How About a Code of Conduct for Indian Celebrities?

SOMETIME EARLY IN NOVEMBER, China banned all celebrities from endorsing a range of products and banned those with “lapsed morals” from endorsing anything, as part of an ongoing drive to align society with the country’s “core socialist values”.

- Sandeep Goyal

The regulations, announced by state regulators barred Chinese celebrities from publicly endorsing or advertising health, education and financial commodities, including e-cigarettes and baby formula. Regulators went on record to say that the push was to ensure China’s society was “guided by Premier Xi Jinping’s thought on socialism with Chinese characteristics for a new era”, referring to the sweeping ideology underpinning the rule of the Xi-led Communist party. “Celebrities should consciously practise socialist core values in their advertising endorsement activities, and endorsement activities should conform to social morals and traditional virtues,” the new regulations specifically stated.

While the new regulations may just have kicked in, China has been active in disciplining celebrities for quite a while now. In 2021, the actor Zheng Shuang was fined nearly 300m RMB ($46m) for tax evasion and banned from being invited on to entertainment programmes of any kind. Around the same time, Fendi brand ambassador Zhao Wei had her name removed from all works on major entertainment platforms for unknown reasons. Several companies or celebrities were also punished for their endorsements of bad or fraudulent products. Last year, the standup comedian Li Dan was fined about $134,000 over a women’s underwear ad that was deemed insulting to women. In September 2021, Chinese authorities banned some reality TV talent shows and ordered broadcasters not to promote what it derogatorily referred to as “sissy” men. A two-month regulatory operation also banned the ranking of celebrities and cultural products in an effort to rein in the “chaos” and monetisation of online fandom.