

David Beckham got himself into a bit trouble with his Hong Kong fans recently following a seemingly innocent social media post that he captioned “Great 48 hours in China.”

The post included a video featuring a medley of clips taken from his recent visit to Shanghai and Hong Kong. However, all the clips in the video appear to have been recorded in Hong Kong, and some Hongkongers didn’t take kindly to being referred to as “China.”

And thus, Beckham’s Facebook and Instagram pages have erupted into a fierce flame war between Hong Kong and mainland social media users, debating the familiar question of whether Hong Kong is or is not China. Here’s a sample of the ongoing intellectual debate:

“Please change to ‘Great 48 hours in Hong Kong’. We have our own government, currency, even Football Team!”



“This is Hong Kong not China. Thank you for visiting us David. I like you, but sorry, Hong Kong is Hong Kong. We are totally different from China!”

“This is Hong Kong which ruled by British before, not China, China cannot access facebook.”

“David you may go to China next time but this time your were in Hong Kong.”

“The full name of Hongkong is Hongkong Special Administrative Region of People’s Republic of China, Yes Hongkong is part of China, live with that.”

“Hmmm…serious problem with HK’s education. Many youngsters these days don’t know/recognise their nationality and history of HK.”

“Without us,HK’s economy will be worse and worse,just be wise,don’t be stupid.”

Smoothly trying to avoid further controversy, Becks has since diplomatically changed the caption to read: “Great 48 hours in Shanghai and Hong Kong.”

Great 48 hours in Shanghai and Hong Kong ❤️ A post shared by David Beckham (@davidbeckham) on Mar 25, 2017 at 5:58am PDT



Last week, we had wondered what exactly the British footballing legend was doing in Shanghai. Well, turns out he was in town to promote AIA, a Hong Kong life insurance giant that he’s the new global ambassador for. While he may be off to a bit of a bumpy start, we think his Hong Kong fans will somehow find it in their hearts to forgive him.

