Macau Casinos’ Show of Communist Patriotism Leaves Many Scratching Their Heads · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

During the four-day training, members of the Ginggang mountains tour dressed like soldiers of the red army. Viral online photo.
A group of 60 employees from several Macau casinos took a four-day “patriotism training course” last week in the Jinggang Mountains, considered to be the birthplace of the Chinese Communist Party’s Red Army. The trip was coordinated by Beijing's representative in Macau, which is a special administrative region of China with a high degree of autonomy, and was meant to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Long March, a military retreat by the Red Army during the Chinese Civil War.
The casinos publicized the training course, but their odd show of patriotism was not well received — at home or on the mainland.
The course is offered by a school called China Executive Leadership Academy, whose major clients are from the corporate sector. Every year, the school gives about 30,000 certificates to graduates of the course, which is composed of a series of site visits, hiking, seminars about the revolutionary history of the Chinese Communist Party.
Representatives of the six casino groups, including SJM, MGM, Wynn, Melco PBL, Galaxy, VML, shared their patriotic education experience with the public in a press conference. Tour leader Daniel Fok said he expected participants would bring the spirit of the Chinese revolution, meaning solidarity and the will to victory, back to their personal and professional lives in Macao and spread it like “starting a prairie fire with a single spark” — a popular quote from late Chinese leader Chairman Mao.
While the restoration of so-called red culture has become part of the agenda of today's Chinese Communist Party, casino representatives speaking in communist revolutionary language is a rather strange sight, not to mention that about half of the casinos are American and Australian owned.
Of course, Macau, a former Portuguese colony handed over to China in 1999, could not have developed into the “Las Vegas of Asia” if the Chinese government had not given a green light to the entrance of foreign casino operators in 2003 and allowed millions of mainland Chinese gambling tourists to visit. With the growth of the gaming industry, Macau’s gross domestic product (GDP) jumped from US $7 billion in 2002 to US $55 billion in 2014, but it has also become a money laundering hub that facilitates the flight of capital out of mainland China.
Mainland China's anti-graft campaign, which began in 2014, has had a negative impact on Macau's casino revenue; Macau’s economy shrank 20% in 2015 and continued to contract in 2016. As the city’s economy is vulnerable to Beijing’s policies, it might be that the gaming sector sees pledges of loyalty like the patriotism training course as a last resort to save the industry.
However, their efforts fell flat. Thus far, no Chinese state and communist party media outlets have praised the casino trip to the Jinggang Mountains. A commentary from Beijing News even criticized them for disturbing moral harmony in mainland China and asked them to stop paying visits to the revolutionary site:
一个在内地人看来不务正业的赌徒或赌博组织，道德上可能就难以站得住脚，却去做一件貌似神圣的事情，或是亲近貌似神圣的事物，就会在心理上难以接受，说不出的怪味。难怪有网友说，“革命先烈被你们玩儿坏了”。
博彩业在澳门是合法的，不过，其在内地的活动还是要尊重内地的法律和文化。澳门博彩业屡屡去井冈山学习，气氛上不搭，观感上不协调，以后，还是不要去了吧!
Gambling and casinos are considered an indecent sector and morally wrong. But this sector is performing a sacred act. It is very difficult for people to accept such a strange performance. No wonder why some netizens said “You’ve ruined the imagine of revolutionary hero”.
Though gambling is legal in Macau, you have to respect the law and culture in mainland China. The gaming sector going to the Jinggang Mountains for [patriotism] education has destroyed the atmosphere. Don’t go there anymore in the future!
Outside mainland China, on Facebook Hong Kong and Macau netizens took the patriotism trip as a joke. Below is a selection of some random comments via Facebook search:
搶錢的土匪交流搶劫經驗……
The thugs (referring to the casinos and CCP) who mob others are exchanging their experience in robbery…
學習共產革命烈士精神，咁第一件事澳門賭場員工應該批鬥佢老細梁安琪呢啲腐敗資產階級，梁安琪等腐敗資產階級經營賭場剝削勞動階層權益，應該沒收梁安琪財產重新分配給人民，賭場係腐敗資本主義產物，違背共產革命烈士精神
To learn from communist revolutionary heroes, the first thing is to have a purge of the corrupt capitalist bosses like Angel Leung [a key figure representing the gaming sector] for their exploitation of the proletariat. Her property should be confiscated and redistributed to the people. Casinos are the product of corrupt capitalism and against the spirit of the communist revolution.
對唔住，井崗山冇共產主義學，佢地係去學大天二 / 土匪精神，誰曰不宜？
Sorry, there is no communism for anyone to learn in the Jinggang Mountains. It is absolutely appropriate for them to go there to learn the spirit of the thugs.