For his latest contribution to his CDT series, cartoonist Crazy Crab of Hexie Farm re-imagines that Gate of Heavenly Peace, or Tiananmen Gate, which holds a portrait of Mao flanked by the quotes: “Long Live the People’s Republic of China” and “Long Live the Great Unity of the World’s Peoples.” In Crazy Crab’s rendering, the ground is flooded, a reference to the recent devastating floods that hit Beijing, and Mao’s portrait is replaced with that of a pancake turtle. The Chinese name of this turtle, “wangba 王八” is also a curse word meaning “bastard.” The slogan has been replaced with “Sailing the Seas Depends on…” in reference to a famous revolutionary song, “Sailing the Seas Depends on the Helmsman [Mao Zedong].”
The government has claimed victory in dealing with the massive floods, which killed at least 37 people, but posts expressing citizens’ anger at the failure of the city’s drainage system have been deleted. Reports about the floods have been censored and authorities have ordered news organizations to “emphasize the power of human compassion over the elements.”
Read more about Hexie Farm’s CDT series, including a Q&A with the anonymous cartoonist, and see all cartoons so far in the series.
[CDT owns the copyright for all cartoons in the Hexie Farm CDT series. Please do not reproduce without receiving prior permission from CDT.]
