Photo: Text & sun (Qingdao, July 2021), by Gauthier DELECROIX – 郭天

Text & sun (Qingdao, July 2021), by Gauthier DELECROIX – 郭天 (CC BY 2.0)

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/08/photo-text-sun-qingdao-july-2021-by-gauthier-delecroix-%e9%83%ad%e5%a4%a9/

Translation: Everyone Can Sense That a Profound Transformation is Underway!

In recent days, a number of major state and Party media outlets have simultaneously republished a relatively obscure essayist’s screed on sissy-boy celebrities, get-rich-quick capitalists, and lessons that the collapse of the Soviet Union might hold for China.

Li Guangman, a Guangcha columnist and former editor of the trade publication Central China Electric Power, first published his opinion piece, “Everyone Can Sense That a Profound Transformation is Underway!,” to his public WeChat account @李光满冰点时评. People’s Daily, Xinhua, Guangming Daily, and other prominent state media platforms promptly picked up the piece. While it is unclear whether the move was coordinated with Li beforehand, it is not unprecedented for state media to elevate nationalistic bloggers who echo, or even foreshadow, national policy. In 2014, Xi Jinping promoted Zhou Xiaoping, an ultra-nationalist blogger with a particular distaste for the U.S., as a model for other writers at the Beijing Forum on Literature and Art, in a speech evocative of Mao Zedong’s 1942 “Talks at the Yan’an Forum on Literature and Art.”

Li’s sweeping, impassioned essay used an ongoing celebrity culture “clean up” campaign as a launching point to argue that the United States “is waging biological warfare, cyberwarfare, space warfare and public opinion battles against China, and is ramping up efforts to foment a ‘color revolution’ by mobilizing a fifth column within China.” In his vigorous conclusion, Li dismisses recent reforms as superficial, arguing that it is time for a more radical transformation. 

Below is CDT’s full-text translation of the essay heralding “a profound revolution”: 

China’s entertainment industry has never lacked for scandals that stink to high heaven. Taken together, the recent back-to-back scandals involving Kris Wu and Henry Huo, Zhang Zhehan’s “devil worship” at Japan’s Yasukuni Shrine, and now the rape allegation against Hunan TV host Qian Feng have made people feel that the Chinese entertainment industry is rotten to the core. Without a swift crackdown, entertainment will not be the only thing that rots—the arts, literature, culture, performance, film and television spheres will all follow suit.

In the past few days, yet another storm has struck the beleaguered world of entertainment: the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) launched a heavy crackdown on celebrity “fan clubs,” the State Taxation Administration (STA) fined actress Zheng Shuang 299 million yuan [$46 million] for tax evasion, and Zhao Wei and Gao Xiaosong were banned and deplatformed. What does this heavy blow against the entertainment world portend?

On August 25, the CAC issued ten guidelines aimed at cleaning up chaotic celebrity fan clubs: first, cancel celebrity and artist rankings; second, optimize and adjust ranking rules; third, strictly regulate entertainment agencies; fourth, standardize fan group accounts; fifth, ban doxxing; sixth, clean up groups that violate regulations; seventh, ban enticing fans into making purchases; eighth, tighten programming regulations; ninth, strictly control participation by minors; and tenth, standardize fan fundraising. The guidelines specifically call for [all localities] to improve their political stance while ensuring political and ideological security online, creating a “clean” cyberspace, and advancing the work of cleaning up chaotic fan clubs. As this is obviously a political action, all localities must view this rectification campaign from a larger political perspective. 

Not coincidentally, on August 27, the STA announced their decision in actress Zheng Shuang’s tax evasion case. Their investigation found that Zheng Shuang signed a 160 million yuan contract to star in the 2019 television series “A Chinese Ghost Story.” She was subsequently paid 156 million yuan in two installments. She falsely reported the first installment of 48 million yuan as corporate income rather than personal income, thus evading taxation. For the second installment of 108 million, the producers signed a fake contract with a company controlled by Zheng Shuang and made payments structured as “capital injections,” enabling her to avoid industry regulators’ oversight, receive “sky-high remuneration,” conceal her income by filing false reports, and evade taxation. Over the course of “A Chinese Ghost Story,” Zheng Shuang evaded 43.027 million yuan in taxes, and underpaid another 16.1778 million yuan in owed taxes. The investigation also found that, after the film and TV industry revised its income and taxation structures in 2018, Zheng Shang again disguised 35.07 million yuan in performance fees by falsely reporting them as corporate income rather than personal income. The facts are that Zheng Shuang evaded 2.2426 million yuan in taxes, and underpaid another 10.3429 million yuan in taxes. In total, from 2019 to 2020, Zheng Shuang failed to report 191 million yuan in personal income, evaded 45.27 million yuan in taxes, and underpaid another 26.52 million yuan in taxes. 

In accordance with the relevant laws and regulations, Zheng Shuang has been ordered to pay 299 million yuan in combined taxes, late fees, and penalties: 71.7903 million of this is unpaid taxes and 8.8898 million is late fees. For the portion of her income that she misrepresented in order to evade taxes, she was fined 30.6857 million yuan, or four times the misrepresented amount; for the portion of her income that she attempted to conceal by falsely reporting it as a “capital injection,” she was fined 188 million yuan, the maximum penalty of five times the falsely reported amount. According to the Criminal Law of the People’s Republic of China, the tax agency will hand her case to the police should she fail to pay in time. The National Radio and Television Administration subsequently issued a notice requiring TV broadcasters at all levels to stop airing any programmes in which Zheng Shuang appeared, and to ban her from participating in future productions. Lately, Zhao Wei [Vicky Zhao], no stranger to the headlines, is in trouble again. On August 26, Zhao Wei’s “super topic” page disappeared from Weibo and her name was deleted from the credits for “My Fair Princess,” “Romance in the Rain,” and various other films and television series on Tencent and iQiyi.

By rights, Zhao Wei should have disappeared from the Chinese public eye twenty years ago, but instead, she has thrived. Twenty years ago, she became the target of an internet-wide crusade for wearing a dress emblazoned with the “rising sun” flag of the invading Imperial Japanese Army. But rather than being banned, she somehow became a mover and shaker in China’s capital markets, hailed as China’s “female Warren Buffet.” Back when she was rubbing shoulders with Jack Ma, Wang Lin, and other titans, she was able to control public opinion and routinely had unflattering news stories about her scrapped before publication. Later, when she directed “No Other Love,” she cast the die-hard Taiwan independence advocate Dai Liren [Leon Dai] as the male lead and the anti-Chinese actress Kiko Mizuhara—who supports praying at Yasukuni Shrine—as the female lead, thus incurring the public’s wrath. What strikes one as odd is that the whole thing blew over so quickly. Recently, Zhang Zhehan, an actor signed to Zhao Wei’s production company, appeared at Yasukuni Shrine multiple times, performed a Nazi salute, and cozied up to Japanese right-wingers, triggering a national uproar in China. The question remains how Zhao, despite so much negative publicity, was not toppled sooner. It was puzzling, but now we can look back and see: retribution had to bide its time. 

Gao Xiaosong, another American whose works were deplatformed at the same time as Zhao Wei’s, has long been broadcasting programs such as “Xiao Speaks” and “Xiaosong Pedia” on Chinese television and the internet. He spouts utter nonsense about history, bends the knee to worship America, and has hoodwinked a certain group of Chinese into becoming his fans.

What sort of feeling do we get, just by looking at the events of the last two days—the crackdown on fan groups, Zheng Shuang being fined, and works by Zhao Wei and Gao Xiaosong being banned and deplatformed? If we take a broader political perspective on this series of events, we can discern a historical and developmental trend. 

Consider the suspension of Ant Group’s IPO, the central government’s antitrust policies and reorganization of the economic order, the 18.2 billion yuan fine levied on Alibaba and the investigation of Didi Global, the grand commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party, the proposed path to common prosperity, and the recent series of actions to clean up the mess in the entertainment industry. What these events tell us is that a monumental change is taking place in China, and that the economic, financial, cultural, and political spheres are undergoing a profound transformation—or, one could say, a profound revolution. It marks a return from “capitalist cliques” to the People, a shift from “capital-centered” to “people-centered.” It is, therefore, a political transformation in which the People will once again be front and center, and all those who obstruct this people-centered transformation will be left behind. This profound transformation also marks a return to the original intent of the Chinese Communist Party, a return to a people-centered approach, and a return to the essence of socialism.

This transformation will wash away all the dust: capital markets will no longer be paradise for get-rich-quick capitalists, cultural markets will no longer be heaven for sissy-boy stars, and news and public opinion will no longer be in the position of worshipping western culture. It is a return to the revolutionary spirit, a return to heroism, a return to courage and righteousness. We need to bring all forms of cultural chaos under control and build a vibrant, healthy, virile, intrepid, and people-oriented culture. We need to combat the manipulation of capital markets by big capital, fight platform-based monopolies, prevent bad money from driving out the good, and ensure the flow of capital to high-tech companies, manufacturers and companies operating in the real economy. The ongoing restructuring of private tutoring organizations and school districts will clean up the chaos in the educational system, bring about a true return to accessibility and fairness, and give ordinary people room for upward mobility. In the future, we must also bring high housing prices and exorbitant medical expenses under control, and completely level the “three great mountains” of education, medical care, and housing. Although we are not trying to “kill the rich to aid the poor,” we need to find a practical solution to a worsening income gap that allows the rich to keep getting richer while the poor keep getting poorer. Common prosperity means allowing ordinary workers to enjoy a larger share of the social distribution of wealth. This transformation will bring a breath of fresh air to our society. Current efforts to crack down on the arts, entertainment, film and television spheres are not nearly robust enough. We must use all the means at our disposal to strike down various forms of celebrity worship and fan culture, stamp out “pretty-boy” and “sissy-boy” tendencies in our national character, and ensure that our arts, entertainment, film and television spheres are truly upright and upstanding. Those working in the arts, entertainment, film and television must go down to the grassroots, and allow ordinary workers and citizens to become the protagonists, to play the leading roles in our literature and art.

China faces an increasingly fraught and complex international landscape as the United States menaces China with worsening military threats, economic and technological blockades, attacks on our financial system, and attempts at political and diplomatic isolation. The U.S. is waging biological warfare, cyber warfare, space warfare and public opinion battles against China, and is ramping up efforts to foment a “color revolution” by mobilizing a fifth column within China. If we rely on the barons of capitalism to battle the forces of imperialism and hegemony, if we continue our obeisance to American “tittytainment” tactics, if we allow this generation of young people to lose their mettle and masculinity, then who needs an enemy—we will have brought destruction upon ourselves, much like the Soviet Union back in the day, when it allowed the nation to disintegrate, its wealth to be looted, and its population to sink into calamity. The profound transformations now taking place in China are a direct response to an increasingly fraught and complex international landscape, and a direct response to the savage and violent attacks that the U.S. has already begun to launch against China.

Every one of us can sense that a profound social transformation is underway, and it is not limited to the realm of capital or entertainment. It is not enough to make superficial changes, to tear down what is already rotten; we must go deeper, and scrape the poison from the bone. We must clean the house and clear the air to make our society a healthier one, and to make all members of our society happy in body and mind. [Chinese]

Introduction by Joseph Brouwer; translation by Alex Yu and Cindy Carter.

Related CDT Chinese post:

喀秋莎的信｜Who is Li Guangman?

 

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/08/translation-everyone-can-sense-that-a-profound-transformation-is-underway/

Celebrity Culture “Clean Up” Campaign Targets Stars and Fans Alike

One of China’s most famous actresses has been summarily wiped from the internet as part of a “clean up” campaign aimed at celebrity culture. Zhao Wei, who starred in the über-popular TV drama “My Fair Princess,” became a billionaire through investing in Alibaba, and was the face of Italian high fashion brand Fendi in China, was digitally disappeared overnight without explanation. Her erasure happened in the middle of a Cyberspace Administration of China “special operation” against celebrity worship, which has both targeted celebrity misbehavior and imposed strict new controls on fan interaction with “idols”:

In June the office of the central cyberspace affairs commission announced a two-month special operation targeting fanclub culture, known as fan quan, which it said negatively affected the mental health of children.

[…] The 10-point list “to rectify chaos in the fan community” also included an order to “strictly regulate” celebrity managers and firms running fan pages and other online activities that “cause fans to bully each other”, as well as previously flagged bans on fundraising activities and participation by children.

[…] In June the commission said children were being induced to contribute to fundraising or voting campaigns for celebrities on competition programmes, that verbal abuse, online bullying and harassment and doxing were taking place, and that people were being encouraged to show off wealth and extravagance. It also said public opinion was being interfered with by bots or social media trends that were hijacked to boost celebrities’ profiles. [Source]

* controls to discourage fans from spending money on votes for their idols
* controls on the level of participation from minors
* clean up any illegal fundraising/crowdfunding

— Fergus Ryan (@fryan) August 27, 2021

The new regulations have banned publishing lists ranking celebrities’ popularity and warned that discussion groups that channel online mobs will be shut down. The fan groups are being targeted in part due to their role in the Kris Wu rape case. Fan groups rallied to his defense, attacking his accusers and demanding that brands maintain their relationships with him. In response, the CAC “deleted 1,300 fan groups, disabled 4,000 online accounts, and removed more than 150,000 ‘toxic’ remarks.” At The New York Times, Alexandra Stevenson, Amy Chang Chien and Cao Li reported on the Party’s effort to combat “fan culture,” which it believes poses a threat to young minds and social harmony:

Chinese video sites have quickly fallen in line with the government’s crackdown. The popular video platform iQiyi canceled its idol talent show this week, a move that its chief executive said was aimed at “drawing a clear boundary on unhealthy tendencies in the industry.” Earlier this year, the show came under criticism after fans of various contestants bought milk from Mengniu Dairy, a sponsor, to earn more points for their idols, then dumped large quantities of it into sewers.

[…] The move to clean up unruly fan clubs and discipline celebrities is the latest example of the increasingly assertive role that China’s governing Communist Party under Xi Jinping, an authoritarian leader, wants to take in regulating culture. Mr. Xi said in 2014 that art and culture should be made in the service of the people, and in the years since, the entertainment industry has emerged as an ideological battleground, whether it is in the censorship of themes deemed pernicious or in reining in celebrity influence.

[…] The crackdown on fan clubs is a reversal of Beijing’s view of the industry only a year ago. State media outlets used to praise fan culture for promoting spontaneous “positive energy,” citing a fan club in 2019 that was created around a fictitious character who came to the defense of Beijing’s policies during the protests in Hong Kong. [Source]

The push for control has extended into other already tightly regulated cultural spheres. In October, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism will publish a blacklist of karaoke songs that “endanger national unity, sovereignty or territory integrity; violate China’s religious policies and spreads cults and superstitions; and advocate obscenity, gambling, violence and drug-related crimes or instigating crimes.” Hong Kong will begin censoring films—and even reviewing old films for subversive content—“to safeguard national security.”

It is unclear why Zhao Wei was censored. There are two prevailing theories, both unconfirmed: her ties to actors and directors blacklisted for their ties to Japan and Taiwan and her business relationship with Alibaba. Zhao signed Zhang Zhehan, an actor recently blacklisted and censored for taking a photo at Japan’s Yasukuni Shrine, to her company last year. She also once cast Leon Dai, a Taiwanese director reviled by Chinese ultra-nationalists, as a lead in a film she directed. At The South China Morning Post, Mandy Zuo reported on speculation that Zhao ran into trouble over scrutiny about her opinions on geopolitics:

An agency owned by Zhao represented Zhang Zhehan, who was an up-and-coming actor until he was also blacklisted after an old selfie he took at Japan’s Yasukuni Shrine in 2018 emerged online. The Yasukuni Shrine honours Japanese soldiers who died fighting for the country and is a particularly sensitive political touchpoint in China.

[…] Outside of business, Zhao courted controversy in 2001 when she wore a dress that resembled Japan’s imperial Rising Sun flag during a fashion shoot in New York.

Her political stance was again questioned in 2016 when a film she directed, No Other Love, was attacked for inviting Taiwanese actor Leon Dai to be a leading character. Chinese web users regarded Dai as an advocate of Taiwanese independence. Zhao was ultimately pressured to change him. [Source]

Somewhat surreal to see all cast members of the massive hit TV drama My Fair Princess (還珠格格), leaving top star Zhao Wei out! Even Fan Bingbing, who also faced major controversy, is still listed there. pic.twitter.com/9ASBurynyA

— Manya Koetse (@manyapan) August 27, 2021

At least she'll still have her friends right? Uhm. Famous 'friends' Huang Xiaoming, Yang Zi, Yang Mi, Li Bingbing, &others reportedly all deleted online pics of them together with Zhao. Their hastiness in showing they're not associated with her makes it seem like they know more pic.twitter.com/Ey0syEPgz5

— Manya Koetse (@manyapan) August 27, 2021

Still unknown why the name of Zhao Wei has been removed from several major platforms but she has been entangled in several controversial incidents. In 2001 she was under fire for posing in outfit with Japanese flag. She has a close personal relationship with #Alibaba’s #JackMa…

— Qingqing_Chen (@qingqingparis) August 27, 2021

It's reported this stemmed from her wearing a dress with Japan's rising sun flag from years ago. pic.twitter.com/o924Yoqc5w

— 38jiejie (@38jiejie) August 26, 2021

Others speculate that the cause may lie in Zhao’s ties to Alibaba. The company and some affiliated with it have been in hot water: in mid-August, the Party’s anti-corruption agency announced an investigation into Hangzhou Party Secretary Zhou Jianyong (once thought to be a member of Xi’s “New Zhejiang Army” faction) while directing cadres to conduct self-examinations on their business ties—heavily implying that Alibaba had undue influence in the city. Bloomberg News reported on Zhao’s relationship with Alibaba and other business dealings:

Zhao, who has served on a jury at the Venice International Film Festival and owns a wine chateau in Bordeaux, has also built a fortune through investments including an early stake in Alibaba Pictures Group. Her husband Huang Youlong in 2015 partnered with e-commerce billionaire Jack Ma, founder of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. on a private equity deal.

In 2018, Zhao and her husband were banned by the Shanghai Stock Exchange from acting as senior executives for any listed companies for five years due to irregularities related to a failed takeover bid in 2016. [Source]

Other celebrities were targeted too. Actress Zheng Shuang, who earlier this year was embroiled in a controversy over surrogate pregnancies and subsequently targeted in a hushed-up tax investigation, was fined $46 million for tax evasion. The staggering fine pales in comparison to actress Fan Bingbing’s $130 million fine on similar charges in 2018. Both used “yin-yang contracts” to fraudulently claim lower income for tax purposes. Global Times framed Zheng Shuang’s tax penalty as consistent with Xi Jinping’s push for “common prosperity.”

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/08/celebrity-culture-clean-up-campaign-targets-stars-and-fans-alike/

Pandemic Control Strategy: A Subject for Debate, and Debate Suppression

In recent months, a spirited debate about COVID-19 pandemic control strategy has emerged online, but is actively being suppressed through post deletion and other censorship, intimidation, personal attacks, and retaliation for speaking out. Whether the commentator is an esteemed infectious disease specialist, a well-intentioned local teacher, or an attorney with qualms about the vaccine, there have been swift consequences for daring to question, debate, or even make suggestions regarding the government’s “total eradication” pandemic control strategy.

CDT Chinese has archived a number of posts and stories related to the debate. Below are summaries and translations drawn from a selection of this content.

The Expert Opinion

After a July 10 international flight from Moscow to Nanjing touched off an outbreak of the highly infectious COVID-19 Delta variant, a local lockdown was imposed and millions of Nanjing residents underwent numerous rounds of testing. The rapid response succeeded in muting the worst of the outbreak, but was not sufficient to stop it from spreading to 17 of China’s 23 provinces. The global spread of the Delta variant, the rise of other variants, and the possibility of waning immunity have led many experts to conclude that long-term coexistence with COVID-19 is an inevitable reality.

On July 29, esteemed virologist Dr. Zhang Wenhong weighed in with a Weibo post in which he discussed the Nanjing outbreak and its implications for coexistence and pandemic control policy:

The Nanjing outbreak has prompted a nationwide “stress test,” and given us much to ponder about future epidemic prevention and control. […]

1. Will the outbreak in Nanjing worsen or spin out of control? […]
2. In the midst of the Nanjing outbreak, is it time to start paying more attention to the protective effect of vaccines? […]
3. What we’ve been through is not the hardest part: even harder is finding the wisdom to coexist with the virus in the long run. 

More and more people have come to believe that the epidemic will not end in the near future, nor even in the distant future. The vast majority of virologists now recognize that this is a longstanding virus, one that the world must learn to coexist with. The Nanjing epidemic has once again shown us the omnipresent nature of the virus. Like it or not, the future will always hold risk. As to how the world will coexist with the virus, each country will offer up its own answer. China once had a perfect answer to this question, but after the outbreak in Nanjing, we certainly have more to learn. China’s future choices must ensure a shared global future, intercommunication with the world, and a return to our normal way of life, while at the same time safeguarding our citizens from fear of the virus. China surely possesses the wisdom to do this.

We have already beaten the novel coronavirus once, and we will certainly find a way to triumph over it in the long run. [Chinese]

Although the post was not deleted or censored, the mere mention of “coexistence” with COVID-19 was enough to trigger attacks by state media outlets and some social media users, who accused Dr. Zhang of politicization, capitulation, and even being a traitor to the nation: 

A skewed, unscientific online poll asking users to vote on whether Dr. Zhang is a traitor: 23% chose “not a traitor (already decided),” 62% chose “is a traitor,” and 14% chose “let history be the judge.” [Chinese]

As the internet exploded with debate over the respective merits of zero-sum virus eradication versus long-term coexistence, economist and former Minister of Health Gao Qiang published a strongly-worded op-ed, via a People’s Daily channel, in which he repudiated the notion of coexistence with COVID-19 and branded its supporters “capitulationists.” Although he did not mention Zhang Wenhong by name, many read it as a personal attack and an attempt to discredit Zhang’s ideas.

The day after Gao’s editorial appeared, news media outfit Mr. Middle (中产先生) mounted a direct challenge to Gao and the zero-sum strategy, arguing for a “middle-of-the road approach” to managing COVID-19. The post was censored the next day, and Mr. Middle’s WeChat public account was suspended until September 9. CDT has archived a copy of the Chinese article and translated it in full. Here is a short excerpt from the translation:

One faction advocates total eradication of the virus; the other advocates coexistence with it.

The internet has already erupted into arguments about these two different approaches.

The divide was made especially clear in a statement issued yesterday [August 9] by Gao Qiang, the former health minister:

“Coexistence” is completely unacceptable. Humankind and the virus are locked in a life-and-death struggle. Ultimately, victory will rely on medicines that can kill the virus. At this stage, we cannot relax, and in fact must increase our efforts. We must “cast the virus from our borders” and drown it in the vast ocean of the People’s War.

This statement has emboldened the “eradication faction.” The original proponent of “coexistence,” Zhang Wenhong (a top infectious disease expert), was savaged and tarred with accusations by a bunch of Weibo users with little more than a middle school education. [Source]

Social media users who mocked or criticized Gao Qiang’s statement found their posts quickly deleted. One such post, “An Open Letter to Comrade Gao Qiang,” was deleted from WeChat:

Greetings, Comrade Gao Qiang!

I have read, with great respect, the highly influential article you published in recent days. […] I felt it might be best if I wrote you a letter. Even with my limited knowledge and proficiency, I can tell that this article of yours is very likely to bring disaster upon the scientific community.

Firstly, I don’t know why you take this attitude toward our nation’s doctors. It stands to reason that you and these doctors are a part of the same system: if you have opinions or suggestions for a certain doctor, surely there are channels through which you can communicate with him. […] Yet you chose to publish a broadside like this in the official media. If I’m honest, your article has some literary merit—each word a gem, dripping with dispassion, bombarding the mind, yet leaving no trace behind. And though you name no names, we all know exactly who you mean. Given your immense stature and power, how could a humble doctor withstand your barrage? 

To the best of my knowledge, the doctor you refer to is a scientific researcher. His statement that “the world must learn to coexist with this virus” was simply his professional opinion: whether it was right or wrong is a matter for debate. However, you elevated his statement to the level of politics, to the level of individualism, and instantly transformed an academic difference of opinion into a conflict between enemies, a clash between systems. In doing so, you made that doctor a target of criticism by lumping him in with the governments of Western countries you criticize, such as the U.S. and the U.K. If we were to turn the clock back a few decades, an article such as yours would be enough to condemn that doctor as a counterrevolutionary or a traitor in service of a foreign power. He’d be flayed alive, and lucky if he survived.

“The master sergeant kills with the stroke of a pen,” as the saying goes. Your article is bound to bring disaster upon the scientific community. Based on your argument, who would dare to engage in scientific research in the future? Who would dare to come up with innovative scientific ideas? How would it even be possible to continue normal academic exchange, write about popular science, or attract foreign researchers to China? Most importantly, that doctor won’t have fallen fighting on the front lines of the pandemic, nor cowered before the ravages of the virus, but will have been destroyed by your pen, taken down by the article you wrote. [Chinese]

On August 15, Dr. Zhang’s alma mater, Shanghai’s Fudan University, announced that it was launching an investigation into his doctoral dissertation, published in 2000, after a recent plagiarism complaint. As the AFP reports, the investigation was widely viewed as being politically motivated, a form of retaliation for his comments on coexistence:

[…] [His] thesis, published in 1998 in the Chinese Journal of Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases, had a review with a total of about 3,700 words, according to Changanjie Zhishi, a social media account operated by Beijing Daily.

Professor Yan Feng, from Fudan University’s Chinese literature department, said the accusers had deliberately confused a review and the main body of research, and also deliberately did not talk about the difference between academic norms 20 years ago and today.

“Using this as a tool for the attack, then who will dare to speak out and act according to their professional judgment in the future?” Yan said on his microblogging account. [Source]

The academic retaliation and personal attacks inspired many people, ranging from esteemed doctors to ordinary citizens, to defend China’s most prominent virologist’s right to express his informed medical opinion on the pandemic, described here by CNN’s  Nectar Gan and Steve George:

Ning Yi, a public health expert, posted on Weibo a photo of himself and Zhang in support, commenting: “If we can’t protect an expert as selfless as Zhang Wenhong, then our society is doomed.”

Yan Feng, a Chinese literature professor at Fudan University, warned of the potential chilling effect of the political witch hunt against Zhang. “Who will dare to speak out, who will dare to take responsibility, who will act according to their professional judgment in the future?” he asked.

Some Weibo users said the attacks on Zhang are reminiscent of the Cultural Revolution, during which scientists — along with intellectuals and artists — were subject to public humiliation and savage attacks by the Red Guards for their perceived political unreliability. [Source]

CDT has reprinted and archived a Weibo essay by news blogger Wei Zhou (维舟) titled  “If Zhang Wenhong Can No Longer Speak Out”:

[…] In this society, we all know how frightening such defamatory accusations can be: they are more than harmless nonsense; they have the potential to cause serious harm. While someone of Zhang Wenhong’s stature might emerge unscathed, many others, witnessing this cacophony of attacks, will stay silent out of fear. To be honest, it even frightens me.

We can’t expect everyone to be a saint—unblemished, eternally correct, unerring in their personal convictions—which makes it all the more essential that everyone have the right to speak. Zhang Wenhong is one of the very few public figures who can still express a differing opinion. As to whether his opinion is correct or not, I fear that the majority of people are in no position to judge, but one thing is certain: he can offer an expert perspective.

If someday he is no longer able to speak out, some will consider it a victory, but it will be a loss for all of us. [Chinese]

On August 18, Dr. Zhang resurfaced after several weeks of media silence to post an update on his Weibo account, reassuring the public that he was fine and had simply been busy with his medical responsibilities. He also walked back his previous post a bit, averring that China’s current “total eradication” efforts were “the most suitable” policy. On August 23, as SCMP reported, Fudan University announced that it had concluded its investigation, clearing Dr. Zhang of any academic misconduct: 

[…] In a brief statement on Monday, Shanghai’s Fudan University said it found no evidence of academic misconduct in the doctoral thesis of Zhang Wenhong, who became a household name in China for his advice on the coronavirus pandemic.

The university said it did not find any malpractice, only some minor irregularities in the review section of the thesis, which did not affect the quality of the research or amount to academic misconduct.

[…] His reappearance in social media was read as a sign that the controversy over his “coexistence” remarks was over. Some of his supporters left messages online saying his critics owed the doctor an apology. [Source]

CDT has also republished an article titled “Zhang Wenhong is saved; Zhang Wenhong has lost,” that explores the chilling effect this saga might have on future debate. Below is a partial translation:

[…] But this wave of personal attacks has still been effective, because it proves that Dr. Zhang is not perfect. Now that he has “a stain” on his record, will people still find his opinions credible?

My attitude is that Dr. Zhang’s opinions are as credible as ever, and all too rare. It’s just unfortunate that he may not feel free to make these “off-the-cuff remarks” in the future.

Zhang Wenhong posted an update on Weibo a few days ago about what he’s been doing during the media firestorm: treating patients at the outpatient clinic, participating in a pandemic prevention conference in Shanghai, and fulfilling his duties and obligations as the leader of the Shanghai Medical Treatment Experts Group. It was also a way to let everyone know that he was safe. Although he mentioned nothing about the personal attacks against him or complaints about his thesis, the public still felt a sense of relief to know that Dr. Zhang was “well.”

But some people may have carelessly overlooked the last part of his Weibo post.

My interpretation is that the sentence, “We must remain staunch in our convictions,” is his response to former Minister of Health Gao Qiang’s criticism of “capitulationism.” In this passage, Zhang Wenhong agrees that China’s current “eradicationist” pandemic prevention policy is ideal, appropriate and should be staunchly maintained.

At the same time, he also claims that he rarely posts on Weibo, and that it is typical for him not to post: it would be easy to interpret this to mean that he will not be making any more off-the-cuff remarks on Weibo in the future.

[…] It appears that this whole long process—the huge controversy touched off by Zhang Wenhong and the clamour of accusations against him—may soon be coming to an end. If this is true, there is one final risk: that we will have lost something of inestimable public value. In the process of “saving” Zhang Wenhong, the people may ultimately have “lost” him—that is, if he retreats to his consulting rooms and does not speak out anymore. [Chinese]

The Well-intentioned Suggestion

Lesser-known individuals and ordinary citizens have also faced retaliation for posting opinions, criticisms or suggestions that diverge from the government’s preferred pandemic-control policies.

CDT has archived a deleted WeChat post from Zhu Xuedong about a teacher in Jiangxi province detained by police for 15 days for posting an innocuous comment in an online discussion thread:

Excuse me, Fengcheng Police: Is Talking About “Coexisting With the Virus” Just Cause for Arrest?

In Fengcheng city, Jiangxi province, a teacher named Zhang has been detained for 15 days for posting a humbly-worded online comment suggesting that the government ease up on strict pandemic prevention measures and try to “coexist with the virus.”

This is such a bizarre story.

The story came to my attention on August 11, when I noticed a brief item in the @丰城发布 [Fengcheng Announcements] official WeChat account:

On August 10, a teacher with the surname Zhang—under the user name @无线观察 [Online Inspection]—posted an inappropriate comment related to the pandemic on a news story, causing an adverse social impact. Our municipal Public Security Bureau responded promptly, placing Zhang under a 15-day period of administrative detention in accordance with the law. After posting the offending comment, the teacher deeply regretted his mistake, voluntarily deleted the comment and posted an apology from the same account to his fellow netizens.

[…] Zhang has already deleted the content, but if the screenshots of other netizens are accurate, his “inappropriate comment” was as follows:

Yangzhou is not that large or populous. Couldn’t we try easing up on strict pandemic prevention measures and coexisting with the virus, then see what results are? That way, the whole country could benefit and learn from Yangzhou’s experiment. This is just a suggestion, so don’t attack me.

[…] Government power overstepping its boundaries is a terrible thing. […] [E]ven if this teacher Zhang from Fengcheng did post a comment that was sarcastic or problematic, what law did he break? If there isn’t even space for that kind of speech, what kind of future do we have to look forward to? [Chinese]

The story of the teacher’s 15-day detention garnered a lot of attention and posts on WeChat, Weibo, Twitter and other social media, with many commenters dismayed by the overreaction of the police:

江西丰城市一名教师张某良，因在今日头条发表言论，以极其谦卑的语气提议政府允许扬州放弃严防死守的防疫思路，试行“与病毒共存”，被处拘留15日。 pic.twitter.com/nOIz1lX4DW

— 中国文字狱事件盘点 (@SpeechFreedomCN) August 12, 2021

@SpeechFreedomCN: In Fengcheng City, Jiangxi, a teacher named Zhang posted a comment on a news thread making a humbly-worded suggestion that the government allow Yangzhou to get rid of some of the strict pandemic containment measures and try “coexisting” with the virus. For this, he was detained for 15 days.

今天看到这个新闻傻掉了，按这个标准感觉自己离吃牢饭的日子不远了

— 鱼戏莲叶 (@malbv2gHA2jzZz8) August 12, 2021

@malbv2gHA2jzZz8: I saw this news today and was floored. By this standard, my days of eating prison slop aren’t far off.

现在国内的言论环境就是这样了，就连建议都成了不当言论，呵呵了

— 雾里清风 (@acme790228) August 12, 2021

@acme790228: That’s the environment for speech in our country nowadays—just making a suggestion has become “making inappropriate comments,” lol

The Statement of Vaccine Concerns

The space for online debate about COVID-19 vaccines is also constrained, despite public concerns about issues ranging from vaccine efficacy to lack of transparency or official accountability when it comes to pandemic policy.

On August 10, Xie Deping, a lawyer in the city of Mianyang, Sichuan Province, wrote a statement to the secretariat of his local lawyers’ association explaining his reasons for not wanting to receive a COVID-19 vaccine at this point in time. The statement was widely circulated after one of Xie’s colleagues, unbeknownst to him, posted it online.

The story gets stranger. On August 15, Xie received a call from the local police station inquiring about the statement. Although he confirmed that the call was, in fact, coming from the station, it was a confusing conversation, exacerbated by local dialect and the caller’s unwillingness to provide any information about himself, such as his full name, job description, or official title.

CDT has archived a now-deleted WeChat post that details the story and includes photos of Xie Deping, a copy of his statement and a transcript of the puzzling telephone call. After confirming Xie’s name and address, the purported police officer broached the subject of the “viral” statement:

Police: You posted something on the internet that said, “I don’t want to be vaccinated against the novel coronavirus at this stage,” right?

Xie: Well, I sent an image [of that] to a group of lawyers.

Police: Huh?

Xie: I said I sent the image to a group of lawyers.

Police: You recently posted a thing that said, “I don’t want to be vaccinated against the novel coronavirus at this stage.”

Xie: I said I sent the image to a group of lawyers.

Police: Your voice sounds a bit…have you been drinking? Drinking at noon?

Xie: What?

Police: Have you been drinking today?

Xie: No, I haven’t been drinking! […] 

Police: Can I tell you why I’m calling today? Because you live in our jurisdiction. Our national vaccine management law has now authorized the vaccine for emergency use, all right?

Xie: Uh-huh.

Police: Can I tell you another thing, another reason I’m calling? If you publish something on the internet, it must be positive content. And you ought to be aware that the country is now promoting the vaccine. If you post something like this, and people repost it, and it has a certain impact, that’s definitely bad. Right?

Xie: How could it be bad?

Police: I told you how just now. Let me put it this way: how could it not be bad?

Xie: Are you really calling from the police station? [Chinese]

The call lasted just over three minutes. After multiple attempts by Xie to confirm the caller’s full name and rank, the person simply hung up. Later inquiries to the police station proved fruitless. 

Xie Deping isn’t sure if the police will take any further measures against him, but he says that he doesn’t feel that he did anything wrong, and has no regrets. He plans to continue to “wait and see” before deciding whether to get the vaccine.

A vaccine-related joke on NetEase has also disappeared from social media:

Posted everywhere: “If you refuse the vaccine and cause an outbreak, you will be held strictly accountable!”

Response: “So if I take the vaccine and still get infected, who can I hold accountable?”

Related CDT Chinese posts:

• 八点健闻 | The Delta Strain Has Spread to 17 Provinces: Is it Time for China to Consider Coexisting with COVID-19?

• 冰川思享号 | You’re Working Awfully Hard to Discredit Zhang Wenhong

• Dragon TV Host Luo Xin Banned From Weibo for “Inappropriate Remarks”

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/08/pandemic-control-strategy-a-subject-for-debate-and-debate-suppression/

English Takes a Backseat to Xi Jinping Thought

China’s nearly 300 million students will be studying “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era” this coming school year, according to guidelines published by the Ministry of Education on Tuesday. The announcement follows dramatic new limits on the private tutoring industry, ostensibly aimed at wresting back control over education from private capital, but which some observers suspect might be “a pretense to monopolize education and centralize brainwashing.” At Reuters, David Stanway reported on the new guidelines:

China will incorporate “Xi Jinping Thought” into its national curriculum to help “establish Marxist belief” in the country’s youth, the education ministry said in new guidelines published on Tuesday.

The Ministry of Education said Chinese President Xi Jinping’s “thought on socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era” would be taught from primary school level all the way to university.

The move is aimed at strengthening “resolve to listen to and follow the Party” and new teaching materials must “cultivate patriotic feelings”, the guidelines said. [Source]

Earlier this summer, the Central Propaganda Department, working in tandem with a host of other departments, rolled out 200 new public WeChat accounts to promote Xi Jinping Thought among students and “strengthen and improve ideological and political work” in accordance with Xi’s wishes. In July, the Ministry of Education published a Xi Jinping Thought Reader for school use. Global Times broke down how the study of Xi Jinping Thought will differ across age groups:

Primary schools will focus on cultivating love for the country, the Communist Party of China, and socialism. In middle schools, the focus will be on a combination of perceptual experience and knowledge study, to help students form basic political judgments and opinions. In college, there will be more emphasis on the establishment of theoretical thinking.

Studying Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era is the primary political task of the Communist Party of China and of the country, read a statement published on the MOE website on Tuesday. To cultivate the builders and successors of socialism with an all-round moral, intellectual, physical and aesthetic grounding and a hard-working spirit, we must arm students’ minds with Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, said the statement. [Source]

At Voice of America, Bo Gu solicited expert commentary on the incorporation of Xi Jinping Thought into school curriculums:

Perry Link, an expert on contemporary Chinese politics and a distinguished professor at the University of California, Riverside, agreed, telling VOA Mandarin, “It’s time that we call a spade a spade. This is brainwashing.”

[…] This is not the first time a Chinese leader’s thoughts and vision for the country have been incorporated into textbooks. Works by former leaders Hu Jintao, Jiang Zemin and Mao have been included in elementary and secondary school syllabi.

[…] “Ever since Xi Jinping took power, especially in the last few years, not just in school history textbooks but also the party’s own history archives, have had more exposure of Xi,” said Yang Jianli, founder of the U.S.-based rights group Citizen Power Initiatives for China. [Source]

New demands that schools teach Xi’s interpretation of Marxism have coincided with efforts to pare English from school curriculums. Chinese leaders and prominent professors have publicly scoffed at the importance of studying English, calling for it to be removed from China’s college entrance exams. At Nikkei Asia, Naoki Matsuda reported on the move away from English courses and “unapproved” foreign books in Chinese schools:

A new textbook on “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era” will be required reading in Shanghai elementary, middle and high schools starting in September, for classes on morality and the rule of law in lower grades and ideology and politics for high schoolers. Students will likely be expected to memorize notable quotes from the president.

Meanwhile, the city announced last week that primary schools should administer final exams for only math and Chinese for students from third through fifth grade, removing English from the list. City authorities also banned midterm tests for these grades, limiting exams to the end of the year only.

[…] Beijing on Monday announced a ban on the use of unapproved foreign textbooks in primary and junior high schools. With the ideological conflict between the U.S. and China likely to drag on for years to come, authorities apparently aim to instill positivity toward the Communist Party among young people, as well as nip any potential for Hong Kong-style activism in the bud. [Source]

The cutbacks and changes have thrown many teachers in the private tutoring industry out of work. VIPKid, an online tutoring service that claimed to employ over 100,000 American and Chinese tutors, shut down with little notice in order to comply with changing regulations. “It just felt like the rug was yanked from under us,” one teacher told EdSurge, an ed-tech focused news organization. On the ground in China, China Labour Bulletin’s strike map has charted a significant increase in labor protests among tutors employed by small education firms that shut without paying employee salaries. Bloomberg News interviewed Aidan Chau, a researcher at CLB, on the origin and future of teacher protests:

There have been eight protests involving workers in the nation’s education sector so far in August, the most in monthly data compiled by labor watchdog China Labour Bulletin going back to January 2019. There were another two incidents in late July in the days after the overhaul was announced.

One of the protests involved a company in Shanghai that helps students prepare to study overseas whose management fled without paying its employees. Similar episodes were seen in cities such as Beijing, Changsha and Nanjing. The crackdown exacerbated the financial problems many schools were facing because of the pandemic, said Aidan Chau, a researcher at the Hong Kong-based organization.

[…] He called on the official All-China Federation of Trade Unions to help the educators get their pay and resolve other issues. “If the official union does nothing, then when the workers decide to take action themselves,” the Communist Party or the union won’t have an excuse, he said. [Source]

“Although there are some problems with the after-school trialing institutions, the way they (the government) are doing now is a little bit too strict,” the 31-year-old Beijing-based instructor said. “They need to hear the voice of the industry.”

— Colum Murphy (@Colum_M) August 23, 2021

Families have also been thrown for a loop by the new restrictions, although many weary parents have welcomed the change: “It hurts my head just thinking about managing both of their schedules,” said one mother of two. Others have expressed fear that their children might fall behind: “As the curriculum gets more difficult in high school, […] it’s important for her to get an extra boost from these tutoring sessions.” Efforts to reform extracurricular education may founder on loopholes discovered by enterprising parents and local governments. Chief among these is the “Hengshui model,” pioneered by real estate developers in Hengshui who sought to woo homebuyers by founding exclusive private schools attached to new residential compounds. Graduates’ high scores on the National College Entrance Exams, which proponents attribute to the schools’ notoriously brutal academic standards, have enticed buyers, raised property prices and spurred a building race. Despite Xi’s call to reign in capital in both the real estate and education markets, the Hengshui model remains wildly popular. From Sun Yu at The Financial Times:

“Beijing may not be happy about the Hengshui model, as it creates a property bubble and exacerbates education inequality,” said Dan Wang, an economist at Hang Seng Bank in Shanghai. “But local governments are keen to adopt the practice to boost the economy.”

[…] Thanks to highly qualified teachers earning above-average salaries, and rigorous curriculums, Hengshui’s private schools now churn out students who excel at exams. In 2019, the city’s No 1 High School, owned by a local developer, accounted for 61 of Hebei’s top 100 college entrance exam results in Hebei.

[…] Hengshui is now exporting its education-led growth model across the country. Over recent years Hengshui developers have opened schools in more than a dozen cities, most of them also under-developed. [Source]

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/08/english-takes-a-backseat-to-xi-jinping-thought/

Translation: Wei Zhou Returns to Wechat, Vowing “I Will Always Come Back”

“Reading and writing is what keeps me alive,” wrote prolific essayist Shen Maohua in his first piece back from a 15-day WeChat suspension. Shen, who writes under the pen name Wei Zhou, was temporarily booted from the platform after writing about 14-year-old diver Quan Hongchan’s record-shattering Olympic victory. In interviews, the young Olympian said she was driven by wanting to help pay for her mother’s medical bills. Visitors soon mobbed her rural hometown searching for the star and offering to help. In his typically rangy style, Shen examined the relationship between Olympic success, fame’s impact on family, and the limits of “Chineseness,” eventually concluding with a paraphrase of Lu Xun’s famous adage on medicine and the nation, “Diving can save mom, but it cannot save the Chinese people.” The piece earned him a 15-day ban, which in turn inspired his reflections on writers’ responsibility to write. At turns playful and solemn, in the essay below Shen concludes that it is impossible to tip-toe around the elephant in the room, thus he must risk bumping into it. Again like Lu Xun, Shen rejects the somnolency of the iron house in favor of writing on in the face of censorship. To his fans and his censor alike, Shen writes, “Believe me, I will always come back”: 

At 5:09 p.m. on August 8, while chatting with friends over tea, I got a notification from WeChat that my public account, “Wei Zhou,” had been banned for 15 days. The culprit was an essay I’d published that day, which had upset some readers.

“Diving can save mom, but it cannot save the Chinese people” [Read the original Chinese essay here]

30,000 people read the post during the five hours it was live. 

I only know this because the person or people who reported me left messages on both my Douban account and my alternate account with less followers (I’m not sure if it was the same person). They disagreed with my argument and conclusion. This is all quite common. But out of a sense of righteousness, they struck back by reporting me. I’m left speechless by their shamelessness. What’s even harder to understand is: they’d already punished me by getting my account banned, yet they still pushed on to discover my alternate account to leave message after message (I can’t block people on my alternate account’s message board). What has possessed them? 

I’m not new to having accounts muted or banned. I’ve experienced much. To tell the truth, my first reaction wasn’t rage. I just felt like it was pointless. It was only a different opinion. If you don’t want to read it, then don’t read it. The essay that led to my account getting shuttered has been reposted without edits on other accounts and is still sitting pretty. 

Li Ling [a prominent historian] once said that some probe a question out of curiosity, in search of the joy of learning, while others do it in pursuit of victory, to eliminate all dissent: 

When it comes to studying, I advocate for play. I’ll use athletics as an example. I prefer individual sports over team ones. I like competitive sports least of all. I believe that studying is a way to entertain oneself. To teach is to impart joy. If you don’t think of it as a high-brow profession, just treat it as a way to make a living, or to clear your mind and pass the time. All good, too. 

The people I hate the most are like Wen Suchen from “Yesou Puyan” [a Qing-dynasty epic novel]. He didn’t like monks, so he vowed to kill each and every last one of them, all the way down into Southeast Asia. If people like Suchen want to purify all under heaven and go into academics, they can be terrifying. They “study without complaint” in order to “tirelessly destroy others.” They wipe out others on sight, under the impression that under all of heaven, only their corner of academia is academia, others’ work is not up to par. They think, “if you’re not a champion, get off the pitch.” This is called making a fool of yourself. They’ve made academia meaningless for themselves, and for everyone else. And so scholarship and humanity are both destroyed.

Of course he’s talking about academia, but lots of people defend their own opinions in similar ways, if not worse. Because to those rich in righteousness, it is not simply a divergence in perspective, but rather indicates one’s incorrect views on “cardinal truths.” This makes it even more impossible to reason with them, as it is no longer a question of “reason,” or at least not a “reason” that can be discussed. 

To be honest, I did feel a bit of regret after my account was suspended. I’m well aware that the atmosphere is getting more suffocating by the day. At present it’s best not to use provocative titles like mine that invite people to give you trouble. Although this is slightly reminiscent of victim-blaming, akin to “women blaming themselves for being humiliated,” many people have told me that “carrying on with life is more important than anything else.” 

No matter how careful, in an environment suffused with politics, it’s impossible to completely avoid the elephant in the room. It’s so big that it’s easy to bump into it just by turning around. Although some say, “In my 20 years on the internet I’ve never met another person as cultivated and genteel as Wei Zhou,” others say my criticism is already pretty “extreme.”

A friend told me, “They’re fighting about you on Douban.” The strange thing is some think, “The ones taunting Wei Zhou on Douban have the wrong politics,” while another group thinks the opposite. Although during my years online I’ve never cursed anyone out, I’ve been taunted and blocked quite a few times. Whether I care or not is neither here nor there, it’s just that spending any effort on the topic is too great a waste of energy. Over the past few years the feeling that I’ve not got the time to waste on such meaningless things has grown even stronger. 

The public discourse is so cacophonous that it can create the misperception that it is nearly everything in life. But real life is much more vast. There is no need to brawl in a mud pit. I don’t even write to convince anyone. I just say what comes to mind. If some people think “it’s a little interesting,” that’s all there is to it. 

After my public account was closed, my Douban account was muted for seven days for the same reason. During this time, I saw a dear friend of mine delete their account in despair. Two other friends were forced offline after stepping on red lines. Some say, “I feel that the Relevant Organs suspending an account is a mark of their affirmation. Could they at least present us with a banner when they ban our accounts? Then we wouldn’t have died in vain.” 

A number of people wrote to Douban pleading their cases, as can be expected. But from the looks of it, I fear that the platforms have their hands tied. I’m afraid that those issuing the commands don’t know or care about the people they suspend, or how much time and effort they’ve spent creating. Finding the smallest of issues is enough. While watching “Journey to the West” as a little kid, I didn’t understand why Sandy was exiled simply for destroying a vase. Now I do. 

I’ve seen that many people are already discouraged. A couple of days ago I saw a widely shared article titled “The Goodbyes Have Begun. Take Your Leave and Treasure the Memories.” That tone recalls English diplomat Sir Edward Grey’s famous words at the beginning of World War I: “The lamps are going out all over Europe, we shall not see them lit again in our life-time.” 

My account has been suspended for 15 days twice in the last three months. Added together, I have been unable to speak for one third of that time. Over the past two weeks, I’ve been lucky that I can still speak out on my alternate account, even though two of my essays have been deleted within the last ten days. My alternate account is called, “Wei Zhou’s Ark.” Someone straight up told me, “The way I see it, your main account will be permanently banned sooner rather than later. You need an ark for your ark.” 

To avoid losing contact, please follow this alternate account.

I once wrote, “If Zhang Wenhong Can No Longer Speak Out,” and wrote in the conclusion, “If someday he is no longer able to speak out, some will consider it a victory, but it will be a loss for all of us.” Some readers responded:

“I’m more afraid of when Wei Zhou can no longer speak out.”

“If Wei Zhou can no longer speak out, it will also be a loss for all of us.”

One reader told me, “I beg you to stop writing. Those who can understand what you’re writing will understand it forever. But those who don’t understand can’t understand, and they will never understand. Social discourse has really transformed.” 

He’s not the only one thinking this way. Someone else spent even more effort trying to dissuade me from writing because she had personally seen terrifying consequences: “Someone as good-hearted as you has no reason to take such big risks.” Later, she became upset with me: “Those readers of yours, the ones supporting you as you barge ahead, I don’t think they’re good people. Mull it over! Bye!”

How should I put it? It’s not that I’m ignorant of my current position. I also know they all came to me in good faith. It’s just that now that I’m 40 years old, I’ve come to believe that the most important thing in life is staying true to yourself. Reading and writing is what keeps me alive. They are the essence of life. Of course I will be careful. But if I do not continue, then I will no longer be myself. 

A couple of days ago, a reader told me, “No matter what happens, no matter where you end up writing, I will go there to read your work. As long as you keep writing, I’ll keep reading.” I thank her, and I thank all of those who’ve continued to follow along. Believe me, I will always come back. We will stand fast together. [Chinese]

For more of Shen’s work, read CDT’s recent translations of his essays on the ultra-marathon tragedy in Gansu, “empathy for authority” amid the Xinjiang cotton boycotts, and his examination of Chinese people’s two selves: the simultaneous national optimist and personal pessimist. 

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/08/translation-wei-zhou-returns-to-wechat-vowing-i-will-always-come-back/