Anger over China's draconian censorship regulation sparked by propaganda authority's interference with newspaper's editorial
Hundreds of protesters gathered in front of the headquarters of a southern newspaper on Monday in a rare display of public anger over China's draconian censorship regulations. Many held signs calling for greater press freedom and expressing support for the newspaper's editorial employees, some of whom have gone on strike against the provincial propaganda authority's interference with a recent editorial.
"I feel the ordinary people must awaken," demonstrator Yuan Fengchu told the Associated Press outside of left-leaning newspaper Southern Weekend's office in Guangzhou. "The people are starting to realise that their rights have been taken away by the Communist party and they are feeling that they are being constantly oppressed."
Late last week, employees at Southern Weekend – also known as Southern Weekly – wrote an open letter to the provincial propaganda department demanding the resignation of one of its highest-ranked officials, Tuo Zhen. They accused Tuo of surreptitiously revising the editorial, which urged China's leaders to adopt a constitutional form of governance.
"In this era where we see growing open-mindedness, his actions are muddle-headed and careless," said the letter, which was briefly posted to the internet before it was taken down by censors![ext]()
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The public weighed in quickly and forcefully. Prominent intellectuals have rallied behind a strongly-worded open letter denouncing top party officials. Widely circulated pictures on microblogs show large groups of young people holding up handwritten anti-censorship messages and grappling with police. Many of the paper's journalists have gone on strike, according to unsubstantiated online accounts.
This incident could mark the "first time in more than two decades that the editorial staff of a major newspaper have openly staged a strike against government censorship,"reported the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post![ext]()
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The newspaper's supporters extend far beyond Guangzhou. Pictures posted online show demonstrators at a pedagogical university in Nanjing holding up handwritten signs that say: "Go Southern Weekend!" One widely-circulated photograph shows a woman holding a sign reading: "I may not agree with every word you say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it."Some demonstrators carried chrysanthemums, a Chinese symbol of lamentation![ext]()
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"In other cities, we've seen people march, but most of the time they are protesting environmental pollution or people's livelihood issues," one protester, Guangzhou-based writer and activist Wu Wei, said. "Here they are asking for political rights, the right to protest. The Southern Weekly incident has provided an opportunity for citizens to voice their desires."
How the Communist party's newly-appointed top leader, Xi Jinping, manages the backlash could be indicative of his leadership style and attitude towards dissent. Calls for transparency and honest politics have become a definitive mark of Xi's early tenure, and analysts have expressed hope that he will spearhead political reform.
Yet, so far, China's censorship apparatus has responded to the controversy with characteristic heavy-handedness. Propaganda authorities have commandeered the newspaper's microblogs and forbidden other media outlets from reporting on the conflict. The terms "Southern Weekend" and "New Year's Greeting" have been blocked on Sina Weibo, the country's most popular microblog with over 400 million users.
"No matter whether these people are happy or not, common sense is that it is impossible to have the kind of 'free media' they dream of under China's social and political reality today," said an editorial in the Chinese-language version of the state-run Global Times. The Communist party mouthpiece People's Daily offered a cryptic warning on its Sina Weibo account: "Tonight stars and clouds are changing, temperatures are drastically dropping, with a piercing cold," it said. "People need to be careful wherever they go, and be aware of their feelings."
Southern Weekly's original editorial, headlined: China's Dream, the Dream of Constitutionalism, urged China's leaders to adhere to the country's 1982 constitution![ext]()
– a bold proposition in China, given the document's promises of free speech and freedom of assembly. The revised column, with the headline: We are Closer than Ever Before to Our Dreams, was about half the length of the original, brazenly pro-Communist and laden with factual and typographical errors.
An open letter signed by 18 prominent Chinese intellectuals castigated Guangdong propaganda officials for spurning the ideals of reform and opening, a 1980s-era ideology which Guangdong – perhaps China's most enlightened province because of its proximity to Hong Kong – holds especially dear. It reiterated Southern Weekly's calls for Tuo Zhen to step down.
Authorities' control over the media in Guangdong has ramped up in recent years, according to Zhang Ming, a political science professor at Renmin University in Beijing and one of the letter's signatories. "It has reached the point that they can't even run the newspaper," he said.
Two famous Chinese actresses – festival darling Li Bingbing and Yao Chen, who has over 31 million followers on Sina Weibo – have expressed support for the paper on their microblogs; their posts have been forwarded tens of thousands of times. Celebrity blogger Han Han wrote: "My support today is not only for my favourite newspaper and its respectable editors and journalists, but also for the media and media people who are in even worse situations and receive worse treatment." The post has since been deleted.
The controversy may have also exacerbated divisions within the newspaper group, as Communist party-affiliated overseers come to loggerheads with more independent-minded staff. While the newspaper's official Weibo account asserted that Southern Weekend editors had penned the revised New Year's editorial, it didn't take long for staff members' individual Weibo accounts to repudiate the claim.
"Southern Weekly statement that its Weibo account was taken away was retweeted 21,372 times in 13 minutes. Then the statement was gone," tweeted Yang Guobin, a professor in the Department of Asian and Middle Eastern Cultures at Barnard College in New York. Reported by guardian.co.uk 13 hours ago.
Hundreds of protesters gathered in front of the headquarters of a southern newspaper on Monday in a rare display of public anger over China's draconian censorship regulations. Many held signs calling for greater press freedom and expressing support for the newspaper's editorial employees, some of whom have gone on strike against the provincial propaganda authority's interference with a recent editorial.
"I feel the ordinary people must awaken," demonstrator Yuan Fengchu told the Associated Press outside of left-leaning newspaper Southern Weekend's office in Guangzhou. "The people are starting to realise that their rights have been taken away by the Communist party and they are feeling that they are being constantly oppressed."
Late last week, employees at Southern Weekend – also known as Southern Weekly – wrote an open letter to the provincial propaganda department demanding the resignation of one of its highest-ranked officials, Tuo Zhen. They accused Tuo of surreptitiously revising the editorial, which urged China's leaders to adopt a constitutional form of governance.
"In this era where we see growing open-mindedness, his actions are muddle-headed and careless," said the letter, which was briefly posted to the internet before it was taken down by censors
.The public weighed in quickly and forcefully. Prominent intellectuals have rallied behind a strongly-worded open letter denouncing top party officials. Widely circulated pictures on microblogs show large groups of young people holding up handwritten anti-censorship messages and grappling with police. Many of the paper's journalists have gone on strike, according to unsubstantiated online accounts.
This incident could mark the "first time in more than two decades that the editorial staff of a major newspaper have openly staged a strike against government censorship,"reported the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post
.The newspaper's supporters extend far beyond Guangzhou. Pictures posted online show demonstrators at a pedagogical university in Nanjing holding up handwritten signs that say: "Go Southern Weekend!" One widely-circulated photograph shows a woman holding a sign reading: "I may not agree with every word you say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it."Some demonstrators carried chrysanthemums, a Chinese symbol of lamentation
."In other cities, we've seen people march, but most of the time they are protesting environmental pollution or people's livelihood issues," one protester, Guangzhou-based writer and activist Wu Wei, said. "Here they are asking for political rights, the right to protest. The Southern Weekly incident has provided an opportunity for citizens to voice their desires."
How the Communist party's newly-appointed top leader, Xi Jinping, manages the backlash could be indicative of his leadership style and attitude towards dissent. Calls for transparency and honest politics have become a definitive mark of Xi's early tenure, and analysts have expressed hope that he will spearhead political reform.
Yet, so far, China's censorship apparatus has responded to the controversy with characteristic heavy-handedness. Propaganda authorities have commandeered the newspaper's microblogs and forbidden other media outlets from reporting on the conflict. The terms "Southern Weekend" and "New Year's Greeting" have been blocked on Sina Weibo, the country's most popular microblog with over 400 million users.
"No matter whether these people are happy or not, common sense is that it is impossible to have the kind of 'free media' they dream of under China's social and political reality today," said an editorial in the Chinese-language version of the state-run Global Times. The Communist party mouthpiece People's Daily offered a cryptic warning on its Sina Weibo account: "Tonight stars and clouds are changing, temperatures are drastically dropping, with a piercing cold," it said. "People need to be careful wherever they go, and be aware of their feelings."
Southern Weekly's original editorial, headlined: China's Dream, the Dream of Constitutionalism, urged China's leaders to adhere to the country's 1982 constitution
– a bold proposition in China, given the document's promises of free speech and freedom of assembly. The revised column, with the headline: We are Closer than Ever Before to Our Dreams, was about half the length of the original, brazenly pro-Communist and laden with factual and typographical errors.An open letter signed by 18 prominent Chinese intellectuals castigated Guangdong propaganda officials for spurning the ideals of reform and opening, a 1980s-era ideology which Guangdong – perhaps China's most enlightened province because of its proximity to Hong Kong – holds especially dear. It reiterated Southern Weekly's calls for Tuo Zhen to step down.
Authorities' control over the media in Guangdong has ramped up in recent years, according to Zhang Ming, a political science professor at Renmin University in Beijing and one of the letter's signatories. "It has reached the point that they can't even run the newspaper," he said.
Two famous Chinese actresses – festival darling Li Bingbing and Yao Chen, who has over 31 million followers on Sina Weibo – have expressed support for the paper on their microblogs; their posts have been forwarded tens of thousands of times. Celebrity blogger Han Han wrote: "My support today is not only for my favourite newspaper and its respectable editors and journalists, but also for the media and media people who are in even worse situations and receive worse treatment." The post has since been deleted.
The controversy may have also exacerbated divisions within the newspaper group, as Communist party-affiliated overseers come to loggerheads with more independent-minded staff. While the newspaper's official Weibo account asserted that Southern Weekend editors had penned the revised New Year's editorial, it didn't take long for staff members' individual Weibo accounts to repudiate the claim.
"Southern Weekly statement that its Weibo account was taken away was retweeted 21,372 times in 13 minutes. Then the statement was gone," tweeted Yang Guobin, a professor in the Department of Asian and Middle Eastern Cultures at Barnard College in New York. Reported by guardian.co.uk 13 hours ago.