Virtual Chinatown: Exodus from Weibo, Self-Segregation on Twitter
A story of censorship victims pushing for self-censorship
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Do you still remember last month’s #nnevyy meme war on Twitter between the Milk Tea Alliance (Thai, Taiwanese and Hongkonger netizens) and outraged Chinese Little Pinks from inside the Great Firewall (GFW)?
The online war ended in a total victory of the Alliance, while Little Pinks suffered both the heavy defeat and their Chinese compatriots’ criticism of “embarrassing themselves and the country” in front of neighbouring countries.
That’s not the end of Chinese netizens’ aggression though, and another online war has just broken out. This time, Hongkonger and Taiwanese netizens, along with Chinese “rebels” (“反賊”, Chinese netizens who secretly oppose the CCP and criticize it on social media outside the GFW), are confronting a rare enemy: Chinese amateur creators.
They’re a rare enemy because they rarely participated in flame wars outside. Although they also use VPNs to get around the GFW, more often they only minded their own stuff on doujin art or fanfiction platforms, unlike the Little Pinks who have a habit of going on online expeditions (出征) against those who disrespect their Chinese motherland.
Despite many of them do share the strong national pride with the Little Pinks, they usually keep it within the Wall and had little interest in expanding China’s online political influence.
So what’s pushed them to fight for the country this time?
The story behind is pretty ironic: Last week, a Chinese amateur creator called for a mass migration of creators to Twitter on Weibo because of the worsening online environment for creators in China (nobody mentioned who caused this, of course). But it just took a few days for these refugees of Chinese Internet censorship to become frontline online warriors of Chinese territorial integrity.
Background: Tightening Censorship in China
Since Xi Jinping’s made himself lifetime dictator of the PRC, freedom of expression has been further tightened with more and more severe censorship policies.
Last month, Joshua Wong got the Nintendo game Animal Crossing banned in China with a single tweet, in which he posted a picture of his island in the game, which shows a Hong Kong protest slogan banner, and Carrie Lam and Xi Jinping’s portraits.
Meanwhile, a few days ago Chinese radical patriots also succeeded in pushing for an indefinite temporary closure of PlayStation’s online store in China, by reporting to the authority that the online store allowed users to access uncensored games through changing regions.
Hardcore political issues are not the only victim of censorship though. In recent years, male effeminacy and homosexuality have also become frequent targets of censorship in China.
An author was sentenced to jail for 10.5 years in 2018 for writing and self-publishing a homoerotic Boys Love novel which depicted gay sex scenes in details. In the same year, the National Radio and Television Administration started to campaign against effeminate images of male entertainers, claiming that the fashion of effeminacy makes Chinese men “weak”. The policy was tightened in 2019 when earrings worn by male entertainers are blurred on TV.
In late February, a clash broke out between fanfiction authors and fans of entertainer Sean Xiao. It’s started by Xiao’s fans who found out that some Chinese authors had posted Boys Love fanfictions between Xiao and another entertainer Wang Yibo on AO3 (Archive of Our Own), an American fanfiction site not blocked by the GFW then. Angered fans then reported the website to the authority as they felt those fanfictions would damage their idol’s clean image, resulting in AO3 being added to the GFW’s massive blacklist of the GFW. Some Chinese netizens thought Xiao’s fans were overreacting and called for a boycott of Xiao and brands he endorsed.
The blocking of AO3 eventually became a prelude to these illustrators’ exodus to Twitter, which in turn caused the new round of online battle.
How the battle occurred (in stages)
Stage 0: A Chinese amateur creator called for a migration to Twitter because of the worsening censorship which limited the freedom of artistic creations. An account @ACACsince5859 was then created on Twitter as a “catalogue” of creators who have moved to Twitter. It quickly amassed 10,000+ followers, and the creators tagged their artwork with the hashtag #ACAC. The initial pinned tweet above is translated as follows:
In light of the worsening online environment for creativity in China and the lack of Chinese (language) discussion environment outside the Wall, we’d like to be a lighthouse that reconnects Chinese creators who made their way out. This account is used as a catalogue of Chinese creators, and you may follow them through this account. We wish we can rebuild Chinese discussions on Twitter as before. #ACAC = A Catalogue of Artists from China.
Although many Hongkonger and Taiwanese amateur creators disagreed the claim that there’s a lack of Chinese discussion outside the GFW, at the beginning most adopted a wait-and-see attitude, keeping a close eye on whether the arrival of these creators will be accompanied by a new wave of pro-CCP propaganda.
Stage 1: Unfortunate but highly predictable, Taiwanese creators soon discovered some of these newcomers had already expressed their disgust with Hong Kong protest art and pro-Hong Kong/Taiwan independence tweets free-flowing on Twitter, within days after they fled Weibo for more freedom of expression. Some Chinese creators also complained that anti-CCP tweets and satire cartoons on Twitter would jeopardize them, and reiterated that they didn’t come to discuss politics.
Stage 2: At first, some Taiwanese and Hongkonger creators attempted to reason with their Chinese fellows who were not used to full freedom, that when they’re enjoying the freedom of expression and artistic creation on Twitter, others are also enjoying the same freedom, including the freedom to create artwork and make opinions with which Chinese creators may disagree, as this is the rule of free, uncensored Internet.
Many reminded that if they did flee Weibo for a censorship-free environment for artistic creation, they should tolerate artwork that stands for dissenting opinions on Twitter and shouldn't demand others to self-censor to keep them safe (from being caught for getting around the GFW).
But Chinese creators insisted while they’re apolitical, they can’t tolerate the pro-independence contents from “radical” Taiwanese and Hongkonger users.
Stage 3: Finding their attempts to keep the discussion rational futile, Hongkonger and Taiwanese creators started hijacking the hashtag #ACAC with protest art and satire cartoons. They noted that if Chinese creators can’t stand pro-independence contents, use of the hashtag by creators from Hong Kong and Taiwan should be welcomed.
Besides, in response to Chinese creators’ “apolitical” claim, Hongkonger creators recalled how Chinese creators insulted and harassed Hongkonger artist Little Thunder after she openly supported the protesters last November, despite some Chinese creators tried to spin with a satire cartoon of her in February, which protests the government’s denial to shut border checkpoints to China under the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The prerequisite of peaceful coexistence is mutual respect, as we all know how to block users. Actually most of us don’t care about your political stance. Little Thunder’s criticized not because of her political stance, but her artwork which humiliated COVID-19 patients. Can others’ loss of their loved ones be used for political satire? We hate her because she’s against humanity. Aren’t people too arrogant to blame others before understanding others’ feelings?”
“Open your eyes and give up your stereotypes. I don’t understand what’s wrong with Chinese creators moving to Twitter to tweet and post illustrations normally.”
Stage 4: It’s understood that the original Weibo account calling for the migration has been banned, and the hashtag #ACAC is now censored on Weibo. But the fight for #ACAC on Twitter is still going on, while debates between Chinese creators and their Hongkonger and Taiwanese counterparts have been spread back into the GFW.
Nobody can predict the final outcome. But one thing we’d unanimously agree is that the Chinese creators aren’t really looking for a genuine censor-free Internet environment, but they’re going to set up a cyber Chinatown on Twitter, as stated in their new bio.
A Virtual Chinatown
Unlike the “rebels” who want to break through the GFW, Chinese amateur creators seem to be satisfied with the general principle and operation of Internet censorship in China. Their only problem’s that the regime’s bottom line on “unacceptable content” is slightly different from theirs.
Similar to ordinary Chinese netizens, Chinese creators tend to think that Chinese sovereignty and territorial integrity are no politics but self-evident axioms, so it’s not inconsistent to be a strong opposer of Hong Kong and Taiwan independence and an apolitical ordinary creator at the same time. This difference in mindset has been one of the major sources of online conflicts between Chinese netizens and Hongkongers and Taiwanese.
They started the exodus because of politics (heavy censorship). They need a VPN to access to Twitter because of politics (GFW). They’re angry with unorthodox political stances because of politics (One China Policy). All these are the results of the successful political indoctrination of the CCP.
In reality, Chinatowns originated from Chinese migrants who fled China to make a living abroad who chose to live with compatriots in a small community in order to protect themselves from discrimination. However, as time flies, this self-defence mechanism has become a practice of self-segregation and non-assimilation. It’s incredibly easy to look for stories about descendants of Chinese migrants who spent their whole life within the Chinese community or even within a particular Chinatown, without learning the language(s) and traditions of the country.
And now we’re witnessing the same. The creators fled for more freedom of artistic creation, but then they found the outside world is too free and dangerous to them. But instead of demanding their regime to loosen censorship or trying to familiarize themselves with the cultures outside, they decided to segregate themselves and ask others to not disturb their virtual Chinatown.
Conspiracy theory
Interestingly, some “rebels” suspected this high-profile exodus of amateur creators might actually be intentionally allowed or even initiated by the CCP. As Twitter is blocked by the GFW, it’s per se illegal for them to grab a VPN to get access to Twitter, not to mention calling for a mass migration there. It just sounds too abnormal that such a call could stay online for days before ultimately getting censored — normally it only takes minutes, if not seconds, for the Chinese authority to take down illegal contents online.
If this was really a plot by the CCP, then what would be its objective?
The conclusion so far is that these creators can never be converted into “rebels”. Since they can’t take another pseudonym on Twitter (otherwise they can’t recognize one another), the CCP can easily trace them back inside the wall, and they’re probably also aware of this. What they can do is to stay apolitically pro-CCP as long as possible.
How about ourselves? As members of the uncensored Internet, what we should do is to stay politically anti-CCP as long as we could.
