Everything, it seems, is fake on the mainland, even sex scandals. Billed as exclusive sex pictures of Hong Kong singer and actress Stephy Tang Lai-yan, tabloid magazine Xin Wang has manufactured what it calls the greatest showbiz scandal since Edison Chen Koon-hei's bedroom photography came to light. It's headlined, 'It beats even [Cecilia Cheung] Pak-chi and Ah Gil [Gillian Chung Yan-tung]', in an apparent reference to the Chen scandal.
Many readers and internet users believed it, at least for a few days this week. Xin Wang itself is a direct rip-off of similar tabloids in Hong Kong, the city's paparazzi are models of journalistic integrity in comparison. It transpires that the woman in the pictures is a lookalike Japanese porn star. The resemblance is extraordinary but it's hard to imagine real Hong Kong starlets acting so passionately and emotionally involved, as in the pictures. That should have been a giveaway the whole thing was a hoax. But anything in print must be true, right?
The mainland is currently in the grip of one sex scandal after another. And newsrooms are falling over themselves to get to the next juicy one they can uncover, or make up. They have basically milked dry the fall of Shoushou, the nickname of Zhai Ling , dubbed China's No1 car-show model whose explicit video clips have made her more famous than she could possibly wish. The mainland media is now hunting for their next victim. Hong Kong actresses, watch out.