A Chinese Censorship Scandal Is Spiraling Out Of Control

Southern Weekly has long been the most daring of Chinese publications, perhaps enjoying a lower level of scrutiny from Beijing due to its base in the city of Guangzhou, just north of Hong Kong.

The paper now finds itself, however, at the center of a battle over censorship in the country that is spinning wildly out of control. As The Atlantic's James Fallows notes, it could be a very important issue for China in 2013 or it could go nowhere, we don't really know yet.

The situation began over the New Year, when the newspaper staff prepared to publish an article titled "Chinas Dream, the Dream of Constitutionalism". The article, part of a yearly tradition, would this year openly call for reform in the country.

Between the editing and the publication, the core of the article was changed: the new title would be "We are closer than ever before to our dreams" and the article would have a very pro-government stance.

Staff at the newspaper were furious feeling that local propaganda boss Tuo Zhen had overstepped even China's strong censorship laws by editing the article after it was sent out to publication. Editors took to Weibo, China's popular microblogging service, to denounce the new article. An open letter was published on the service, accusing the censors of "raping" the newspaper's editorial judgement.

"We demand an investigation into the incident, which has seen proper editorial procedure severely violated and a major factual error printed," the open letter said, according to Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post (the letter has since been deleted from Weibo).

Two subsequent open letters were posted online, the second of which was signed and openly called for strikes.

By January 7th, the newspaper's staff were in the street protesting something unheard of at a major newspaper for over two decades, SCMP reports. Protests spread amongst universities in Guangzhou and Nanjing. Perhaps the best indication of the issue's spread is the fact that Weibo's most popular user, actress Yao Chen, posted a message in support of the strikes to her 31 million followers. "One word of truth outweighs the whole world," she said, quoting Soviet-era Russian dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.

Yao's words show how far a relatively wonky debate over censorship had gone in China.

"When a Chinese ingnue, beloved for her comedy, doe-eyed looks, and middle-class charm, istweetingher fans the words of Alexander Solzhenitsyn, we may be seeing a new relationship between technology, politics, and Chinese prosperity," Evan Osnos of the New Yorker observed this week.

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A Chinese Censorship Scandal Is Spiraling Out Of Control