As 2024 draws to a close, CDT editors are compiling a series of the most notable content (Chinese) from across the Chinese internet over the past year. Topics include this year’s most outstanding quotes, reports, podcasts and videos, sensitive words, censored articles and essays, “People of the Year,” and CDT’s “2024 Editors’ Picks.”
CDT’s “Quotes of the Year” are a mirror of China’s national mood in ten comments. The five quotes presented in this post (the first of two) reflect displeasure with coerced rosy perspectives on China’s economy; despair over senseless deaths observed in silence; the enduring importance of Tiananmen remembrances; disillusionment with the country’s “Red” turn under Xi; and anger over the raising of the national retirement age. The quotes—all translated from Chinese—are representative of broader strains of commentary that CDT editors have observed over the past year. They are organized chronologically, with a brief explanation for context after the original quote:
#1: On a Novel Theory of Economic Growth
January 12: “In other countries, the three main engines of economic growth are investment, trade, and consumption. Daddy Xi, though, has invented three new ones: the National Bureau of Statistics, the Propaganda Department, and the Ministry of State Security.” – Social media user “Study the Wall Nation” [a pun on the Xi Jinping Thought app “Study the Great Nation”], joking that China’s economic growth is a statistician’s fabulation, propped up by propaganda and policing of dissenting opinions
China’s economy has struggled over the past year. Nonetheless, the Chinese state has deployed the twin tools of propaganda and policing to prop up a rosier narrative that prospects for the economy are bright, and naysayers are a national security threat. Since late 2023, the Propaganda Department has “sung” about “bright prospects theory,” while the Ministry of State Security has warned that other tunes are “narrative traps” to be dealt with according to the law, a fuzzy formulation intended to stifle criticism. That cheery view of the economy has been advanced time and time again by Party organs and state-media outlets such as People’s Daily, whose February op-ed “The Whole Country Is Filled With an Air of Optimism” had to be retracted after the headline became fodder for online mockery. Economists who have rebutted those rosy narratives—or questioned the manipulated statistics used to back them—have seen their speeches censored and WeChat accounts shut down.
#2: On Mass Deaths Observed Passively
January 22: “[The death of] thirteen third graders doesn’t even merit a hashtag.” – Weibo user “Tsui_WINGKit,” lamenting the censorship of news about a school dormitory fire in Henan
The Party-state’s perturbing penchant for censoring news of accidents has continued into 2024. In 2023, Beijing’s deadliest fire in decades went unreported for eight hours, subject to a near total news and social media blackout. The death of 13 third-graders in a school dormitory fire on January 19, 2024 in rural Henan was subject to similar speech controls. A hashtag about the fire briefly trended on Weibo, only to be censored. Media coverage was similarly sparse: three large Henan media outlets did not run a single news item about the fire on their WeChat accounts. The media’s quiescence enraged Tsinghua law professor Lao Dongyan, who wrote: “To not even republish the Henan Fire Department’s official notice? This is a step beyond mere ‘censorship.’ It must be a conscious choice, born of an internalized habit.” Lao’s post, too, was censored.
#3: On Remembering June 4, 35 Years Later
June 2: “Question: In what context should one use the word ‘duty?’ Answer: While riding a bike.” – From a censored Q&A on Zhihu, in which both asker and answerer allude to the young man who, in 1989, said “It’s my duty” after being asked why he was pedaling to a protest in Tiananmen Square
Thirty-five years after the Tiananmen Massacre, the nationwide 1989 pro-democracy movement and its bloody denouement remain much discussed (and censored) topics on the Chinese internet. The June 4 anniversary of the crackdown has become, in the words of one Gen Z censor, “an internet folk festival” in which netizens and censors engage in a cat-and-mouse to remember, on the one hand, and forget, on the other. The list of “sensitive words” surrounding 1989 grows ever longer. Joining long-banned staples such as explicit mentions of the military crackdown; the now-suppressed annual vigil in Hong Kong’s Victoria Park; and images of tanks (or even “objects in a row”) are references to medals awarded to PLA soldiers who “defended the capital” in 1989; the search terms “date + today”; and the numbers “62 + 2,” among others.
State-imposed censorship is but one of the many reasons Tiananmen remains taboo. The enduring power of “public secrecy,” Margaret Hillenbrand’s term for the cult of self-interested silence that surrounds the most traumatic instances in modern Chinese history, also represses memory of Tiananmen. This year, an interview conducted by Chai Jing with a now-famous author who once informed on his friend’s democracy activism in 1989 provided an illuminating example of public secrecy. During the interview, rather than admit to having set up his friend, the author remained on the line for 11 minutes of uncomfortable silence, before eventually hanging up. Despite the repressive powers of censorship and secrecy, the memory of Tiananmen persists. This year, Chinese magazines based abroad published mainland-based people’s recollections of those days and vigils were held in cities around the world. While those stories and vigils cannot yet be published or held within China, CDT founder Xiao Qiang calls Tiananmen a “future event,” waiting for its chance in the light.
#4: On the Limits of “Red” Power
July 7: “‘Red’ power can’t plug a leaky dike, but a ‘red letterhead document’ can plug people’s mouths.” – Anonymous netizen
Since the days of Yu the Great, flood control in China has been intimately tied to political power. In July, the failure of a dike on Dongting Lake, China’s second-largest body of fresh water, caused catastrophic economic and political damage. Local authorities denied that the dike breach led to any fatalities, and then issued a document forbidding local cadres from “leaking” any information to the public. In one particularly galling moment, state media aired montages of workers waving red flags after repairing the breach, a demonstration of “red power” reminiscent of bygone eras. Despite such performances, flood relief efforts were hampered by a lack of donations caused by the erosion of public trust in local governments and charities. Disillusionment with the government’s response to the floods was captured in a poem that contrasted the media’s celebration of national Olympic glory—the Games were taking place in Paris at the same time— with those left to fend for themselves amid the flood waters: “Those fleeing the waters waited for rescue boats, supplies, / And good news of newly captured Olympic gold. […] The orderly rows of corpses were like / Orderly rows of gold medals.”
#5: On Raising (or Abolishing) The Retirement Age
September 15: “One guy who doesn’t want to retire is making all of us work longer too.” – Anonymous netizen
In September, China raised its retirement age, a change that will take effect in 2040. The long-expected move was nonetheless met with an outpouring of public anger. While there was mass disgruntlement with the reforms, one man seems content to stave off retirement: Xi Jinping. Subtle calls for him to step down are constantly being censored. Even an essay calling for Joe Biden to drop out of the 2024 presidential election was censored, perhaps for its opening line that held: “The greatest contribution some men can make to their party, country, and people is to surrender power, exit the political stage, and head home to hug their grandchildren.” Nonetheless, calls persist for Xi to step down. Rearranging the books on store shelves has become an increasingly popular way to express displeasure with Xi, in one famous instance by displaying the novel “Changing of the Guard” next to the 2023 edition of “Study Outline for Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics.”
Any hint of Xi’s actual retirement could be a “seismic shock” to China’s political system. Stepping down is a perilous maneuver for dictators: 41% of autocrats are exiled, imprisoned, or killed within a year of leaving office.
