> He often logs on to the Weibo webpage, not as a censor but as an ordinary user. On Weibo, his username is Ordinary Fascist (普通法西斯). It’s a satirical name but

> He often logs on to the Weibo webpage, not as a censor but as an ordinary user. On Weibo, his username is Ordinary Fascist (普通法西斯). It’s a satirical name but Liu is unsure whom it satirises. Oof. This sort of black self-aware humor was quite common in the Soviet Union, too. > In spring 2014, the Chinese government begins to purge influential Weibo users, the so-called big V – as in, verified – accounts. A journalist at the People’s Liberation Army Daily is so impassioned that he publishes a post on Weibo calling all big Vs vermin who must be dealt with severely This reminds me of the Musk purge of verified accounts, the old blueticks, mostly because they were liberal journalists, replacing them with the meaningless "I paid for my bad posts to be promoted" badge. Is being appointed a personal censor dystopian, or is it less dystopian than posting to youtube etc. knowing that you may have your posts deleted and be banned but never have the opportunity to speak to your censor? > prohibits university-level teachers from discussing seven topics in class: universal values, freedom of the press, civil society, civil rights, historical mistakes of the Communist party, powerful bourgeoisie and judicial independence. side-eyes Columbia university > None of the participants foresees that, in 10 years, half the people around the table will be in jail. Some, like me, will be living in exile. Those still in Beijing will have long been silenced and will not utter a word. Oof. > Some of the orders are unbelievable. One variety show compere says he almost “died laughing”. In subtitles, the word “died” must be put inside double quotation marks, otherwise it is a breach of regulations. It’s as though viewers are considered not intelligent enough to understand an extremely simple phrase See "Unalive". Although the Chinese and Japanese languages have stronger taboos than English about death words.