Translations: Train Incident Becomes Metaphor for Principled Disobedience – “Smash That Window, and Take a Breath of Freedom!”
A man who used an onboard emergency hammer to smash a hole in the window of a stalled train to...
memes
Words of the Week: “Nepo Babies With Connections and Resources” (关系咖 guānxi kā, 资源咖 zīyuán kā)
The recent “4+4” scandal, which started with the public exposure of one doctor’s extramarital affairs and medical malpractice, has morphed into a broader societal discussion about medical and personal ethics, research fraud,...
Heavy Online Censorship of Articles Critical of Animated Chinese Blockbuster “Ne Zha 2”
Since it began screening in late January during the Spring Festival holiday, the Chinese animated blockbuster “Ne Zha 2” has smashed box office records, becoming the highest-grossing animated film in history, as well as one of...
Quote of the Day: “When Your Opponent Is Better Armed With Humiliating Memes, It’s Best Not to Provoke Them”
Chinese soccer team Shandong Taishan have raised eyebrows and fueled rumors with their sudden withdrawal from a match in the AFC Asian Champions League Elite, mere hours before they were due to take the field against South...
Netizen Voices on TikTok “Refugees”: “We All Know This Isn’t Going to End Well, so Let’s Enjoy This ‘Global-village Moment’ While We Can”
As the U.S. Supreme Court voted to uphold a law forcing either the sale or ban of ByteDance-owned TikTok, “TikTok refugees” continued flocking to the Chinese-language app Xiaohongshu, also known as RedNote. The influx of new...
Censorship Creeps Up on “TikTok Refugees” Fleeing to Chinese App Xiaohongshu
Pending a Supreme Court ruling, the U.S. government’s crackdown on TikTok might end the app’s availability in U.S. app stores this weekend. The looming ban has prompted American users to seek a new home in another Chinese app,...
Censors, Authorities Spooked by Halloween Celebrations
The specter of arrest has made Halloween extra spooky this year. In Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Wuhan, Halloween revelry has been marred by strict police curfews, the detention of costume-clad partygoers, and bans on organized...
Responding to Government Censors’ Crackdown on Online Slang and Memes, Chinese Internet Users Protest, “We Want to Speak Properly, but You Won’t Let Us!”
Chinese internet users are taking issue with a recent announcement that the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) and Ministry of Education are trying to standardize online speech by cracking down on the use of “irregular and...
Weibo Cracks Down on Posts About Weibo Crackdowns
Microblogging platform Weibo is cracking down on speech about crackdowns on speech. In a weekly “safety” digest published to an official Weibo administrators’ account, the platform announced that it had...
Word of the Week: Garbage Time of History (历史的垃圾时间, lìshǐ de lājī shíjiān)
When the result of a sporting match becomes a foregone conclusion and lesser players are subbed in to run out the clock, announcers often term it “garbage time.” The latest term to sweep the Chinese internet holds that nations,...
At Pro-Palestine Encampments, Chinese Students Find Space for Expression and Solidarity
Students from at least 174 colleges and universities across six continents have erected encampments in solidarity with Palestine. Their movement has sprouted over the past few weeks, as many administrators have rejected student...
Xi Jinping Explains “Without Switching Shoulders” Meme in Xinhua Report
Explaining a meme often takes the wind out of a joke’s sails. Not so in this case. A recent Xi Jinping quote published by Xinhua, China’s official state news agency, has breathed new life into a long-running meme...
Word(s) of the Week: Four Won’t Youth (四不青年, sì bù qīngnián)
“Four Won’t Youth” (四不青年, sì bù qīngnián) is the latest appellation for discontented youth, who in this case “won’t date, won’t marry, won’t buy a home, and won’t have kids.” Four Won’t Youth, like other similar terms...
A Meme Too Far? Weibo Bans Content about Imaginary University
Less than a month after the conclusion of China’s hypercompetitive annual university entrance examination (“gaokao”), a satirical meme about an imaginary university has been banned on Weibo. The meme and its censorship reveal...
Rats! Taobao Censors Toys, Vendors Cry Fowl
Toys riffing on China’s hottest online idiom, “calling a rat a duck,” were yanked from online shelves this past week, a sign of the idiom’s continued political sensitivity. The tongue-in-cheek saying “calling a rat a duck”...
Xi Jinping as “Compass-in-Chief”
There has been much discussion and dissection of the optics of the U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s recent visit to Beijing, during which he met with Foreign Minister Qin Gang, Director of the CCP Central Foreign Affairs...
Word(s) of the Week: “Objects Placed in a Row” (物体排成一排, wùtǐ páichéng yīpái)
The sight of a lone man standing before a row of tanks in Beijing is perhaps the most enduring image to emerge from the Tiananmen Protests of 1989. Photographs taken on June 5 of that year—one day after PLA troops crushed the...
Censors Delete Viral “Kong Yiji Literature” Anthem
Every movement needs its anthem. In the now-censored musical parody “Sunny Side Kong Yiji,” the emergent “Kong Yiji literature” wave seems to have found one of its own. “Kong Yiji literature” is a genre of self-deprecating...
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