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UFC women's strawweight champion Weili Zhang responded to Rose Namajunas' comments about her political views with class during an interview with BT Sport.
When asked what she thought of Namajunas' political comments regarding the system of governance in China and the fans' reaction to it, Weili Zhang said (via a translator) -
"Most of the Chinese fans are very rational. So, they might understand that Rose's comments came out of nowhere and make no sense. So, they are not getting too angry about it."
Weili Zhang's translator stated that she would love to have Rose Namajunas travel to China after their fight in order to experience what the culture of China is like first-hand. Weili Zhang even offered to pay for the flight tickets for 'Thug Rose'.
What did Rose Namajunas say about Weili Zhang?
Rose Namajunas recently made some comments regarding her motivation going into the fight with Weili Zhang. The former champion stated that in addition to winning back the title, beating Zhang is also important because of what the champion "represents".
The comments are linked to Weili Zhang's Chinese nationality. Namajunas shared that she draws inspiration from the documentary 'The Other Dream Team'. It details the Lithuanian struggle against communism, a form of governance that the People's Republic of China has been functioning under since 1949.
Meanwhile, with the champ choosing to keep silent about her own political views, ESPN reporter Ariel Helwani asked Namajunas whether her thoughts going into the fight had changed to apolitical. Acknowledging the absence of political comments from her opponent, Namajunas replied -
“Yes, that is true. And I don’t know what her beliefs are. But here’s the thing, it’s that, and this is a question maybe that we should ask her or whatever. But can we really even know what she actually believes? And from my experience, or not from my experience, but, you know, she may be being told what to say. You know, I don’t know, and do we know exactly what she believes...for me, and from my experience, you know, being in with communism, like, from what I know is that you can’t freely have an opinion. You can’t criticize your government. I can talk about America, and how imperfect it is, and how there’s just a lot of things messed up about us, and stuff like that. And I’m very grateful for that freedom to do so.?”
