China Seeking White Males, No Experience Needed

Rent a White Guy

www.theatlantic.com

Not long ago I was offered work as a quality-control expert with an American company in China I’d never heard of. No experience necessary—which was good, because I had none. I’d be paid $1,000 for a week, put up in a fancy hotel, and wined and dined in Dongying, an industrial city in Shandong province I’d also never heard of. The only requirements were a fair complexion and a suit.

“I call these things ‘White Guy in a Tie’ events,” a Canadian friend of a friend named Jake told me during the recruitment pitch he gave me in Beijing, where I live. “Basically, you put on a suit, shake some hands, and make some money. We’ll be in ‘quality control,’ but nobody’s gonna be doing any quality control. You in?”

I was.

And so I became a fake businessman in China, an often lucrative gig for underworked expatriates here. One friend, an American who works in film, was paid to represent a Canadian company and give a speech espousing a low-carbon future. Another was flown to Shanghai to act as a seasonal-gifts buyer. Recruiting fake businessmen is one way to create the image—particularly, the image of connection—that Chinese companies crave. My Chinese-language tutor, at first aghast about how much we were getting paid, put it this way: “Having foreigners in nice suits gives the company face.”

(visit the link for the full news article)



[edit on 25-6-2010 by joyride0187]

[edit on 25-6-2010 by joyride0187]

[edit on 25-6-2010 by joyride0187]

When I read this my first though was where do I sign up. After thinking about it, these people are being paid to be scapegoats in case anything were to go wrong. Being paid $1000 a week + fringe benifits to sit in an office and watch movies all day sounds great until some child in America decides to suck on a toy covered in lead based paint that was made by the company that hired you. Since you were hired to "act" the role of director or quality control, you will be the one facing the Chinese firing squad once the courts convict you of corporate neglegence....because you know...you were the "director" of the entire operation.

I wonder, do the Chinese recruit their own actors to do the same thing in other countries?



www.theatlantic.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

I'd do it- but for $1000 a week, they're GETTING a QC manager who will make Stalin look like a pansy. I'll make double blasted sure my butt is covered 56 ways to sunday WITH a 'dead man switch' documenting everything to most likely here.

I like to work for my $$.....

I'm just glad to know that being connected to the West is an aura Chinese companies still want to create.

Being paid $1000 a week for doing nothing, while in the same country and for the same companies there are workers slaving for next to nothing. It ceases to amaze me what people get up to. What happened to ethics?

Guys, do you want to laugh your arse off?

The global collapse explained, why america is so powerful and china's involvment!


Seriously the above video explains it all.

So as far as this "white males wanted" in china, expect to see more of that.
This is only the beggining.

reply to post by ModernAcademia


frighteningly true and horrifically hilarious..
thanks for the link.

~meathead

reply to post by ModernAcademia


Didn't laugh, much less laugh a body part off. But it was brilliant!

"Western fall guys wanted in China,we give you big living yes,then when the bubble burst it your fault on all the tv yes...not China fault.
$1000 plus extras-apply now yes"

Rough translation of the article.

Not for me thanks...

reply to post by joyride0187



Sounds good to me, sounds like a really good job for the money.
So count me inn!

reply to post by ModernAcademia


HA,HA,HA,HA

Oh My tummy.....it hurt.....so...funny!

Thanks for posting that video Man.

While attending to business in China I was asked, by a recruiting Company, if I would be able to help them recruit other Westerners that I know for weekend work doing promotions.

I wasn't able to get much of a straight answer as to what these people would have to do, so I suggested that I attend one of their event to see what happens. They told me they had something coming up that would require a Western male of about my age group. So I agreed.

I asked what I would need to do, and was told "nothing" just stand around in a suit and be "western".

On the appointed day, I was picked up by a van and was driven to the gig along with four young and attractive female westerners. Once there, we went to a Hotel and sat around for about half an hour. We were then picked up by a convoy of black Audis and BMWs and driven to the real venue.

I was surprised to find that I was seated, in the car, next to the CEO of a Chinese company that has about 400 stores across the country. I was asked to behave as though we were old friends and business associates when we arrived...and, oh by the way, I was going to be asked to say a few words.

We arrived at a new retail location for this Company, part of a French franchise...and before I knew what was happening I had to give a speech to about 100 people - pretending to be the President of this Company who had flown in from France for the occassion.

I did my speech in English...nobody understood a word I said anyway.

Needless to say, after that ambush I had no further dealing with this promotion company - but this type of thing is apparently quite common.

The long-term "expats" in China call this White Monkey work

Sounds good, where do I apply?

They wouldn't be able to hold you responsible for anything.

reply to post by mobiusmale


Sounds familar, the monkey bit anyway...I worked for one company for several years...my workload was far from heavy, and the pay very good.

Whenever the company had a meeting with new potential clients - often which had nothing to do with my area of work at all - they'd wheel me out just to show they had a real, live, walking, talking gweilo, or laowei (foreigner) in their midst.

When the meeting was done, I would go back down into the basement (lower floor of the company) to the corner where cobwebs (figuratively) were growing and forgotten about until the next show and tell.

Suited me fine. I was left to my own devices, and paid well to boot.

Chinese quality control is an oxymoron.
Anything made in China will not last for very long, including these jobs.
If they go out of their way to make cheap knock offs, their intent is to screw people over, and these jobs are no different.

Applicant beware!

geez, where do I get a gig like this?
I got a suit and tie and make wonderful
speeches and in english can even tell
some good humor
Where do I sign ????

And that sums it up, people. Illusion. Smoke and mirrors.

The face that China's communist elite present to the world as her people still work for pennies while breathing foul air and slaving for the masters.


[edit on 27-6-2010 by ~Lucidity]

Very amusing, and i must admit that my first thought was how to get on the gravy train.

But thinking about it, it would take a lot of guts to fly over to China and prostitute yourself like that. Especially with the knowledge that the people doing the hiring probably regard you with the contempt that you would deserve!

reply to post by Silver Star


Yeah, "White Monkey" about says it all...

It is odd that on one hand they like to have a foreigner around to show off...like a status symbol of some kind...but on the other hand they have just about no respect for Westerners, firm in their belief that they are superior to us.

The new national pastime is cheating unsuspecting lao wei. This runs from the simple (overcharging on clothes or taxi fare) to the complex (tricking multi-national corporations into thinking that if they invest in China, they will actually get a piece of the 1.3 billion people market pie).

They are very courteous and friendly on the outside, but very underhanded and discourteous in reality (as noted by one of the other posters...and confirmed by many other Western friends of mine who know enough Chinese to know what they are really saying about them at meetings...because they think we are too stupid to be able to learn their language or culture).

You think 1000 dollars is good money for a weeks work? Ha Ha. After my post, this thread might be shut down for good and deleted, such are many of my supra-logical rantings.

This is what to you if you are hired to be a “White Monkey”.

Record the entire event on video on your cell phone. If you are inspecting an area, demand to be taken off the tour and record the entire event. You can't be arrested, you can't fired, because you aren't an employee of those escorting you, remember? Actually inspect what is going on, take samples of the production lines and then demand to be taken to the airport immediately, no stops.

While on the way to the airport call ATS and download all the video that you have secretly taken to their servers. Email it to yourself as well. Then, unscrew your watch battery compartment and toss the battery, take out some of the innards of your watch as well if need be and store the micro SD card from your phone in the watch. Go to the nearest US embassy in china and claim to have hidden secret video proving the latest in Chinese manufacturing tampering (do not go to the airport). From there go home and sell your story and books to the news, movies, and amazon.