Beijing just took its South China Sea propaganda machine to a bizarre, incredibly offensive new low.
State-run outlet China Daily posted a minute-long, AI-generated video depicting Filipinos as a ragged cartoon monkey. The character—dressed in a traditional Filipino shirt (barong) and wearing a traditional salakot hat—is pushed onto a karaoke stage by disembodied arms draped in US and Japanese flags. After being called "stupid" and forced to sing lyrics about the South China Sea arbitration, the monkey gets flung from a catapult directly into a Chinese coast guard water cannon blast.
It's not just lazy propaganda. It's flat-out, mask-off racism.
Manila did not hold back. Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro slammed the video as "contemptible propaganda" and "a disgrace to any State that claims to exercise responsible regional leadership". On July 17, 2026, the Philippine government lodged a formal diplomatic protest, demanding the immediate takedown of the video from China Daily’s platforms.
This incident exposes a much deeper issue. When a global superpower resorts to AI-generated schoolyard racism to defend its maritime claims, it is not acting from a position of strength. It's acting out of sheer desperation.
The AI Weaponization of Old Colonial Tropes
Using monkey imagery to dehumanize Southeast Asians is one of the oldest, most tired tricks in the colonial playbook. Seeing a major state-media organ of the Chinese Communist Party unironically deploy it in 2026 shows how morally bankrupt Beijing’s public relations strategy has become.
What makes this video particularly egregious is how it trivializes real-world, life-threatening violence.
Over the last few years, the Chinese Coast Guard has repeatedly blasted Filipino resupply vessels with high-pressure water cannons. These aren't harmless squirt guns. They shatter windshields, rip steel off decks, and severely injure Filipino sailors. Reducing this dangerous physical aggression to a comical, AI-animated punchline targeting a caricatured monkey is sickening.
As Secretary Teodoro put it, the video's "glorification of violence against the Filipino people and soldiers" exposes the intellectual bankruptcy of China's propaganda machine.
Why Timing is Everything
This video, titled "The Philippine Politicians Karaoke Show," didn’t drop in a vacuum. It was published around July 10 to intentionally mock the 10th anniversary of the 2016 Arbitral Award.
For context:
- The Ruling: Ten years ago, the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague completely dismantled Beijing’s expansive "nine-dash line" claims, ruling they had zero legal basis.
- The Anniversary: To mark the decade milestone, the Philippines and 13 other nations—including the US and Japan—issued a joint statement reaffirming that the 2016 ruling is legally binding.
- China's Reaction: Beijing has spent a decade pretending the ruling doesn’t exist. Yet, this hysterical AI video proves the ruling still gets under their skin.
If China's legal claims were actually solid, they'd argue them with facts, maps, and treaties. Instead, they hired animators to make a monkey caricature.
Pure Hypocrisy on the Diplomatic Stage
The sheer irony here is glaring.
The Chinese government is famously thin-skinned. Beijing routinely flies into diplomatic rages over the slightest perceived insult to its leaders or its culture. In January, China filed an official diplomatic protest because Philippine Coast Guard spokesperson Rear Admiral Jay Tarriela gave a presentation that featured a compilation of comical images of Chinese President Xi Jinping in the background.
"One caricature of their leader, and they cry and file a diplomatic protest," Tarriela pointed out on social media. "But here, in this video, they are insulting and belittling the very identity of the Filipino people!"
It is a classic bully tactic. They demand absolute, fragile respect while actively dehumanizing their neighbors.
What This Means for the Region Moving Forward
Don't expect the Philippines to back down. Under the current administration, Manila has adopted a strategy of transparency—filming and exposing Chinese maritime aggression in real-time. This racist AI video has only solidified domestic resolve and galvanized international support for the Philippines.
If you are following the geopolitical shifts in Southeast Asia, here is what you should expect next:
- More Digital Disinformation: China’s use of AI tools to generate cheap, mocking propaganda will likely increase. It's fast, low-cost, and easily distributed.
- Stronger Allied Alignments: By portraying the Philippines as a mindless puppet of the US and Japan, China is actually pushing Manila closer to its security partners. Expect joint naval patrols to ramp up.
- Counter-PR Offensives: Manila will continue to win the international narrative war by taking the high road and letting China expose its own malice to the world.
If China’s goal was to make the Philippines look weak, they failed miserably. They only succeeded in showing the world how little they have to offer when the arguments are stripped away.
