While China and South Korea enjoy smooth and prosperous relations in real life, online you'd think the two had been at war for generations. Minor issues get seized on by eager young nationalists on both sides, keen to fire new shots in their ongoing campaign. This leads to the ridiculous spectacle of, for instance, people arguing about whether ancient kingdoms were "Chinese" or "Korean." And if you really want to start a skirmish, bring up who invented the printing press.

The latest bone of contention is the Dragon Boat Festival. In reality, it's a concoction of various ancient traditions that ended up with distinct Chinese and Korean versions. Saying it "belongs" to either country is like saying that Christmas is German because they invented the Christmas tree, or English because they invented the Christmas card.

Fortunately, the only place this turns violent is in World of Warcraft and other online games, where mobs of angry youths from each side battle with virtual weapons. That they're fighting about a shared East Asia cultural legacy in a fantasy environment shaped by medieval Northern European mythology is an irony that entirely eludes them.

And who cares, anyway? If you celebrate a custom or a festival and it's important to you, it's yours whether it was invented by your ancestors 2,000 years ago or somebody else's ancestors 2,000 years ago. Trying to make claims about periods where the historical record is scattered, hazy, and often outright invented is ridiculous.

The history of culture is a history of successful sharing and spreading. Those who try to cling tight to their own petty nationalist paradigms will end up with xenophobic, isolated, weak culture. The English have Shakespeare, but when Japanese film director Akira Kurosawa adopted the plot of King Lear for his samurai movie Ran, we didn't complain. Instead, we were happy that another work of genius had come from our own.

And nobody in Europe tries to claim Easter or Christmas for their own. Instead, they're times when we come together, united by a shared cultural heritage and at the same time enjoying our own traditions. This Saturday's Dragon Boat Festival should be a chance for Koreans and Chinese to celebrate the shared aspects of their past.

The author is a British citizen living in China. opinion@globaltimes.com.cn