Chinese flag-wavers call in London cops over YouTuber's livestream

A group of people holding Chinese flags at a London railway station called in the police after a YouTuber told them he was allowed to film them in a public space, sparking concerns over China's " Wolf Warrior" diplomacy and long-arm enforcement of its laws overseas.

Members of the group, who said they were in the station shopping mall to celebrate the Lunar New Year, appealed to police after Brendan Kavanagh told them he wouldn't stop filming, as there was no expectation of privacy in a public place.

Kavanagh, who plays boogie-woogie tunes on the YouTube channel "DrKboogiewoogie," began his Jan. 19 livestream from a public piano at London's St Pancras Station by referring to the group repeatedly as "Japanese."

As he starts playing, they initially appear to have no issue with being on the fringes of his shot, but then, during a break in playing, Kavanagh's cameraperson pans across to the group just a few meters away. Kavanagh once more calls the group "Japanese," and tries to get one of the women to dance for him.

"British girls are more fun," he says, when she looks embarrassed and refuses to comply.

Shortly afterwards, a man and a woman from the group approach him and ask him to remove their faces from the shot and not to film them any more, which Kavanagh refuses to do. The woman tells him she is British.

"We’re here for Chinese TV – did you film all of us in your cameras?" the woman asks.

"I don’t know – are we allowed? We’re not allowed?" responds Kavanagh, whose livestream of the incident had garnered more than 4 million views by 12 p.m GMT on Tuesday.

"You’re not allowed because we’re for Chinese TV, so this is not disclosable," the woman tells him.

"Will we get in trouble with the Chinese government? So, according to Chinese law we’re not allowed to film here?" Kavanagh counters, adding: "We are in Great Britain, we are not in China."

UK law on privacy rights

Under U.K. law, nobody has the right to ask another person to stop taking photos in a public place, according to a post on the official website of the Avon and Somerset Police.

While privacy rights are protected by the U.K. Human Rights Act 1998, they only apply where there is a "reasonable expectation of privacy," which doesn't typically extend to public places, Hayleigh Bosher, senior lecturer in intellectual property law at Brunel University London wrote in a Nov. 2022 article for The Conversation.

The man continues to request that Kavanagh "not put our face on TV. Just don't do it, please."

He later yells at Kavanagh "Why are you touching her? Stop touching her! You are not the same age – don't touch her!" when the pianist gestures towards the Chinese national flag the woman is holding, calling it "the communist flag."

"I didn't touch her – I touched the flag," he responds.

Then the police turned up, with one officer telling the man: "You’re in a public place. If they’re filming, they have a right. If they’re filming and you’re in a public place, your face could be on that video."

But another officer asked Kavanagh to stop filming her conversation with him, and tried to get him to promise not to air the footage on YouTube.

"This is not to go on your channel by the way – this is me talking to you," she says.

Kavanagh replied: "Listen, we’re in Britain, we’re in a public space, it’s a free country," and accused the officer of acting as a "private security guard" for the Chinese flag-wavers.

One of the women present at the incident said in a video response uploaded to Douyin, China's version of TikTok, said the group didn't want their images shared around the world, as they were engaged in making a Lunar New Year greetings video for social media platforms back in China.

She said it was "impolite" of Kavanagh to describe the Chinese national flag as a "communist" flag, and claimed that he had "deliberately" described them as Japanese when he knew they were Chinese.

She said his attempt to pull the flag in the hand of the other woman was disrespectful.

"We have to take care of the flag, even if it's a child-size one, use it reasonably and with dignity ... and not damage it," she said.

Influenced by ‘brainwashing’

Political YouTuber Mr. Shen said the confrontation showed that the flag-wavers didn't understand the laws of their host country, and that they were deeply influenced by "Chinese Communist Party brainwashing."

"These people yelling ... are very typical of the Wolf Warrior mentality," Shen said. "A lot of Chinese Wolf Warrior diplomats do this, and they are following suit."

He said the people had been drilled in patriotism without understanding that values in democratic countries are different.

"They wind up getting laughed at by everyone," Shen said.

In September 2018, British police arrested Chinese state TV journalist Kong Linlin on suspicion of assault after she was accused of slapping a volunteer during a fringe event of the ruling Conservative Party conference in Birmingham. The charge against her was later dropped.

Chinese rights lawyer Wu Shaoping said the St. Pancras group likely had little respect for human rights or the rule of law, and that such people expect to be obeyed simply because they hail from the political elite in China.

"In China, anyone with a certain social status is above the law, so they think they are superior," Wu said. "They are bringing these habits, that kind of personality developed in mainland China to the U.K."

"It's typical of the way that the Chinese Communist Party wields power ... they believe that when they go to another country, they are superior and can disregard their laws," he said.

Current affairs commentator Sang Pu said it is possible that the group could have gotten in trouble with their bosses back home for appearing in a publicly available video.

"Maybe they are worried about getting into trouble with their own Communist Party supervisors for exposing their faces," Sang said. "Some individuals may be undercover, as agents for the Communist Party, so they don't want to be exposed."

Translated by Luisetta Mudie . Edited by Roseanne Gerin.