China 'virtual idol' avatars mocked and removed amid coronavirus crisis

The Chinese Communist Party's Youth League removed a pair of anime-like characters this week after their introduction in the midst of the coronavirus outbreak unleashed a storm of criticism and mockery online. The fictitious brother-and-sister duo, dressed in traditional attire and named after characters in poems by Mao Zedong, was rolled out on Monday as "virtual idols" in an apparent attempt to lift spirits as China deals with an outbreak that has infected tens of thousands of people and killed more than 2,000.

Many negative comments, some of which received thousands of "likes" on the Youth League's account on the Twitter-like Weibo, were removed during the day on Monday. By the end of the day, the post with the avatars had also been removed. "Instead of spending time crafting the idols, I'd rather you make some real contribution to help with Wuhan," one person wrote in a Weibo post that has since been deleted, referring to the city at the center of the virus outbreak.

The administrator of the Communist Youth League's Weibo account did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment on Wednesday.