It’s sad that they fired him for simply being Chinese but I don’t see how this is an issue of academic freedom. He wasn’t teaching anything deep or challenging to the state as a Chinese language teacher. This is a case of racism in academia, which is still shocking.<p>Most surprising part of the article is that Wang was surprised that he got in trouble for publicly criticizing Xi and the Chinese government causing him to lose his teaching job. Having worked in both Chinese and US universities that is just a dumb move on his part. What was he expecting? I also don’t understand how not being able to teach anymore equals having to flee to America to become a lowly language adjunct? Did he just criticize the government once or did he think he could become the only legal activist in China? Point being, he doesn’t seem the brightest.