An austere greeting on the airport tarmac in Beijing sans a red carpet. A stone-faced handshake from China’s top foreign policy official. A seat looking up at the Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, perched at the head of a long table.

To international audiences, the optics of Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken’s two-day visit to Beijing barely raised any eyebrows. Foreign ministers are rarely, if ever, met with much fanfare at the airport. And an audience with a head of state alone is a sign of great importance and respect.

But to nationalist-leaning audiences in China, especially on social media, the scenes tell a different story. To them, Mr. Blinken arrived only after months of pleading for an invitation. And during his visit, he was schooled on respecting China’s interests and played supplicant to Mr. Xi. Chinese social media users gleefully noted that Mr. Blinken arrived on Father’s Day, the implication being — using the parlance of the internet — that Mr. Xi was America’s daddy.

[Is this really a matter of perception? While Blinken was kissing up to Xi in Beijing, Biden was doing the same thing by publicly arguing that the Chinese spy balloon just accidentally passed over and paused around sensitive military sites in the US. I don’t think this humiliation was a matter of perception. — Ed]