That, and the people doing this cheered it on obnoxiously on social media.

This is IMO one of the factors that people who want us to be China hawks have missed; there isn't a huge industry of Chinese thought leaders being obnoxious in English on English-dominated social media. While the US powerful thought leaders like Elon Musk, Donald Trump, and (to a much lesser extent) Larry Ellison all own social networks which they use constantly to beef with the general public.