The People's Daily, a popular newspaper in China, is building its new headquarters in Beijing and the half-constructed building looks just like a "Giant Penis". And the construction has caused the newspaper to become the butt of an international joke.
The building was completely ignored until some people noticed that its shape resembled the male genital. Pictures of the building started appearing on the Internet and went viral in China's most popular social networking site, Sina Weibo, reports MSN News.
The building triggered off instant chuckles among the public. One comment on the picture pointed out that it complements the nearby national broadcaster building, the China Central TV (CCTV) headquarters, which has been nicknamed "the Great Underpants". Someone took that comment seriously and morphed the two buildings, making the "penis-like" structure fit snugly between the "underpants" building via Photoshop, only adding to the sniggers. The morphing then went berserk with more and more explicit images being put up.
Some people have compared the structures together to be an embodiment of the famous "Yin and Yang" Chinese theory.
According to a blog post at HugChina.com:
"As the CCTV headquarters nicknamed as Big Underpants plays the role of Yin (negative, female) with large hole under the "two pants", the People's Daily new headquarters are the Yang (positive, male). The two key mouthpieces of CPC are really perfectly embodying the traditional Yin-Yang concept."
However, the Chinese communist party was not even amused with the spoof, especially since People's daily is the communist government's mouthpiece. The government rushed to censor the social networking site. It blocked searches with keywords "People's Daily" and "Building", reports News.com.au.
When people searched for the words, this message appeared:
"In accordance with relevant laws, regulations and policies, search results cannot be displayed."
However, it could not stop people from putting up comments about the building. While one comment said "Of course the national mouthpiece should be imposing", another sarcastically mocked at the newspaper's recent slogan saying, "It seems the People's Daily is going to rise up, there is hope for the Chinese dream."
The newspaper itself has been called "Raping People Daily" for its misleading and false chronicling and the half-built headquarters just personifies the moniker better, reports IB Times.
The 150 meter high building will look like a wedge once completed. Hopefully, it will shed the "Giant Penis" nickname then.
Check out some more "weirdly-shaped" buildings, here.