Creative Intellect

Censorship and China

As I rushed to finish my PowerPoint tonight,I "interviewed" two friends. I met the first (she's a sophomore in high school now) last year: she just moved from China, and we met through a mutual friend. The second "interview" came from Robyn is PUBLISHED! . I'm glad I did not deactivate my account earlier this year, her insight was particularly helpful!

Some points I found fascinating after pestering her with questions:

The Three "T"s - Tibet, Tienanmen Square, and Taiwan- they're all taboo topics!
          "If anyone talks about the three Ts (or anything that openly and deliberately comes down on the country) - and a government official, or a friend of an official, hears you - it could result in immediate deportation." - Wow! This really sounds like 1984 all over again!

"Around June, the internet is a nightmare to navigate. Sites are randomly blocked and search engines are monitored (with key words being impossible to search)."

"Batman cut out a 1 minute clip because Christian Bale and Micheal Cains's characters were talking about re-ordering the Batman masks they ordered from China because they were poorly made."

"The entire beginning of Pirates of the Caribbean 3 was cut out because it painted Asians "in a bad light" forgetting the fact the scene didn't even take place in China). They had a scrolling
review on the screen about what was missed, then the movies started when they were sailing along the froze ocean."- Not that it actually matters, but Chinese or English?


Here's something I found online:

An Australian diplomat who specializes in Chinese affairs called the massacre a "myth". He wrote an article on it in the Japan Times, and it is posted on his website.  
          Also, interestingly enough, "Tiananmen as a myth" is what you will get if you search "Tiananmen Massacre" on Baidu, one of China's search engines. They will not acknowledge Tiananment as a massacre. "Only a few people died from that," the searches say.