Guangdong’s Nanfang Daily newspaper reported in August 2011 that Zhou Donghua (唐剑威), the head of the Luogang (萝岗) District branch of Agricultural Bank of China in the city of Guangzhou, and Tang Jianwei (唐剑威), the branch client services manager, were arrested and charged with corruption for allegedly stealing 59.5 million yuan in land requisition compensation funds for agricultural land — funds that ordinarily would be given to farmers losing their land to make room for development. The charges said the men had used the funds for gambling and other illegal activities. In this cartoon, posted by the Kunming-based studio Yuan Jiao Man’s Space (圆觉漫时空) to QQ.com, two officials with bags reading “land requisition compensation fund” slung over their shoulders, roll the dice at a casino table. The cup they hold bears the logo of the Agricultural Bank of China.

Doubts and questions about China-Africa Project Hope (中非希望工程), a charity run by a private Hong Kong-registered company and the China Youth Development Fund of the Chinese Communist Youth League, are mounting in China’s media today, and at the center of this latest charity-related storm is Lu Xingyu (卢星宇), 24, the executive chairman and secretary-general of the project and the daughter of Chinese billionaire Lu Junqing (卢俊卿). [You can find our recap yesterday here].
Unlike Guo Meimei (郭美美), the young woman who was at the center of the scandal rocking the China Red Cross Society back in June, Lu Xingyu — who has been given the nickname Lu Meimei (卢美美) by web users — has shown much more mettle. She has accepted a number of interviews with media to explain the charity and drum home her point that everything is above board.
Many serious questions remain, despite Lu’s reassurances. But right now we’d like to share an interview with Lu that appears in today’s edition of Shanghai’s Oriental Morning Post:

[ABOVE: Lu Xingyu (left) is pictured at a forum of the Chinese Eminent Business Leaders Association.]

Oriental Morning Post: When you saw what web users were saying about you, what was your reaction?
Lu Xingyu: My first reaction was to turn red, seeing that I had turned into an overnight celebrity.
Oriental Morning Post: At the time, did you think of Guo Meimei [the woman at the center of the China Red Cross Society scandal in June]?
Lu Xingyu: I didn’t think of Guo Meimei, but I’ve already seen of course the way web users are pouring on the abuse.
Oriental Morning Post: You don’t worry about becoming another Guo Meimei?
Lu Xingyu: That’s not possible. I’m completely serious, unlike Guo Meimei.
Oriental Morning Post: Why did you later delete your microblog account?
Lu Xingyu: I am a second-generation rich. I enjoy great food. And there are lots of pictures of that kind on my microblog . . .
Oriental Morning Post: You were afraid others would see you as “flaunting your wealth”?
Lu Xingyu: I decided to delete [my account] because others didn’t want to see that side of me. Besides this, I had lots of photos of myself and my friends, and I didn’t want to impact them in any way. I wanted to protect others, and also to express my respect to those web users who like me.
Oriental Morning Post: Why are people attacking you?
Lu Xingyu: There are a number of reasons. The first is the Guo Meimei incident, and everyone has this attitude of despising the rich (仇富心态). I am a post-80 girl [born after 1980], and I am a second-generation rich girl [whose father is a billionaire]. The second reason is that Beijing closed 30 schools for migrant workers. The third reason is because there has been a lot of bad news lately about the China Red Cross Society and other charities, and people have a feeling of mistrust toward the charity sector.
Oriental Morning Post: And right now the public doesn’t trust you.
Lu Xingyu: That’s right. But our charity work is real charity work, 101 percent charity. Actually, we are anti-corrupt.
Oriental Morning Post: Anti-corrupt?
Lu Xingyu: That’s right. I was the first to give one million yuan [to the charity], all my own pocket money, my allowance money. All of the money in our company goes to charity work, not a cent is reimbursed [or expensed] (报销).
Oriental Morning Post: Who put up the money for you to go on a mission to Africa?
Lu Xingyu: My dad. And I have some money too.
Oriental Morning Post: Can you be sure that your father has never expensed [ie, taken money earmarked for charity]?
Lu Xingyu: No, I’m sure of that.
Oriental Morning Post: At the age of 24 you are already the executive chairman of China-Africa Project Hope. Is this a reflection of your own abilities or has you father helped you along?
Lu Xingyu: This is a platform provided by my father, but you can’t deny my ability. The collection of donations and dealings with leaders in foreign countries is all handled by me. I have the ability to serve as executive chairman.
Oriental Morning Post: Do you have such a huge social network yourself?
Lu Xingyu: Of course I have used many of my father’s resources, I don’t deny that.
Oriental Morning Post: Was it your father’s idea for you to go into charity, or was that something you wanted? Lu Xingyu: It was all me. I really admire my father. He has always taught me to be responsible.
Oriental Morning Post: If it weren’t for your father, if you weren’t a second-generation rich, would you still do charity work?
Lu Xingyu: But the fact is that this is my father, and I have the capacity to go and do charity work.
Oriental Morning Post: Why do you do charity work?
Lu Xingyu: I think it’s my responsibility. Right now there are so many misunderstandings about second-generation rich. I want to take this cap, ‘second-generation rich’, and transform it into the hat ‘second-generation benevolent’ (仁二代).
Oriental Morning Post: So getting to China-Africa Project Hope, what is your mode of operation?
Lu Xingyu: We rely on private donations, only collecting donations from the World Eminent Chinese Business Association (WECBA). It’s not like they’re spitting out online, us taking money from here and there. Entrepreneurs donate of their own free will, so we are justified, open and above board. We have nothing at all to hide.
Oriental Morning Post: With the outside world casting so much doubt on you, do you regret doing charity work?
Lu Xingyu: I don’t regret it. Doing charity is about one’s conscience.
Oriental Morning Post: Is that enough, relying on conscience?
Lu Xingyu: I have a clear conscience. This is about responsibility.

Another great big mess is brewing in the world of Chinese charity. Just weeks after the cooling off of the Guo Meimei (郭美美) case, in which a young woman’s extravagant lifestyle touched off a firestorm over alleged corruption at the China Red Cross Society, web users have singled out another young woman for infamy.
Lu Xingyu (卢星宇), 24, is reportedly the executive chairman and secretary-general of the China-Africa Project Hope, a charity whose goal is to build 1,000 primary schools in Africa over the next 10 years. But web users and now traditional media journalists, have been probing into the project, asking the same sorts of questions we saw in the Guo Meimei case? What kind of charity is this? Is the money being used properly? Is proper oversight being exercised?
It seems that the Lu Xingyu story was first broken by CMP fellow and Xinmin Weekly journalist Yang Jiang (杨江), who made the first post on Sina Microblog at 10:06pm on August 16. That post, which was widely shared, was deleted by Sina, and prompted Lu to change the name of her microblog account (“Lu Xingyu — Vampire Mermaid”).

[ABOVE: This photo of Lu Xingyu has circulated widely on social media in China today.]
As with the earlier Guo Meimei case, this one is a hornet’s nest of questions and accusations. The question now is how many threads the media will pull before the axe falls. With the recent furor over the government mishandling of the July 23 high-speed train collision in Wenzhou, following on the heels of the Red Cross Society of China fiasco, leaders are probably anxious to prevent another bomb from going off this summer.

[ABOVE: In this video also shared widely on social media today, the young Lu Xingyu talks about her charity work and talks about the “second-generation rich”, or the sons and daughters of China’s wealthy, becoming the “second-generation Benevolent” (仁二代).]
We’ll move quickly to one of today’s news stories to give readers a taste of what this story is all about. But here are a couple of threads explored today.
Web users revealed, and the Southern Metropolis Daily newspaper apparently confirmed, that the World Eminent Chinese Business Association (WECBA) of which Lu Xinyu is a member, and which is an organizational founder of China-Africa Project Hope, is not registered, as required of all organizations in China, with the Ministry of Civil Affairs. The association is actually a private business registered in Hong Kong, the paper said. The China Youth Development Fund, which is operated by the Chinese Communist Youth League, confirmed to Chinese media yesterday that China-Africa Project Hope was jointly created by the Fund and the (unregistered) WECBA.
This is not of course the first time the China Youth Development Fund’s charity actions have been under the spotlight. Prior to the recent scandal involving the China Red Cross Society, one of the biggest charity scandals on record in China was corruption at Project Hope, a project administered by the CYDF to support individual school fees for poor Chinese children. A report by CMP fellow Zhai Minglei in 2001 exposed fraudulent practices at Project Hope for Southern Weekend newspaper, and a subsequent report by Southern Weekend, killed under government pressure but eventually posted to the internet, implicated top Project Hope officials on the basis of testimony from a senior whistleblower.
Web users and media are also making much of the fact that China-Africa Project Hope skims off 10 percent of all donations as a “management fee” for administrative purposes, but views differ over just how improper (or not) that is. In this series of videos, Lu Xingyu directly answers the doubts of web users and asks: “What are you doing? Are you actually going out there to help others, or are you just chattering online?”
The following is a portion of a news story appearing today in the Zhejiang Evening News and on QQ.com.

After Guo Meimei, another celebrity has emerged on the microblogs.
Born in 1987, a graduate of California State University, the executive chairman and secretary-general of the China-Africa Project Hope, secretary-general of the Global Chinese Business Future Leaders (全球华商未来领袖俱乐部), and a member of the second-generation rich (富二代) . . . Add these all together and you get Lu Xingyu (卢星宇), the latest hot person on the internet.
On August 16, the “China-Africa Project Hope Primary School” (中非希望小学) became a hot word on microblogs, and this low-profile project and its “second-generation rich” manager Lu Xingyu became the focus of widespread attention by web users. Web users called Lu Xingyu “Guo Meimei 2” (郭美美二代), [in reference to the you woman at the center of the Red Cross Society of China scandal in June], and said she would “usurp Guo Meimei to become the latest red-hot person on the Web.” The point of interest in paying attention to Lu Xingyu is attention to a topic that has lately been a focus in society — corruption in the charity sector.
Yesterday, this reporter interviews Lu Xingyu by personal correspondence via microblog, and at 5pm that day Lu Xingyu openly answered several major questions of concern to journalists and web users.
The “China-Africa Hope Primary School” Suddenly Goes Hot
On August 16, some media reported that many schools for the children of migrant workers in Beijing were being demolished, news that affected around 30,000 students in Daxing, Chaoyang and Haiding [districts]. This news drew a lot of attention and was a point of sore disappointment. As their attention was drawn to news related to “hope schools” [operated by the government-run charity Project Hope], some web users discovered the “China-Africa Hope Primary School” project, and they posted this information online. This was how the project came into the view of web users — and the convoluted family relationships of the project’s presidium [of top managers] also stunned people.
According to a June 13 report from Xinhua News Agency, “China-Africa Project Hope” plans to fund the construction of 1,000 Hope primary schools in Africa in the next 10 years, spending around two billion yuan [US$310 million].
Web users discovered quite quickly that China-Africa Project Hope executive chairman and secretary-general Lu Xingyu had set up a microblog in her real name, her ID “Lu Xingyu — Vampire Mermaid” (卢星宇-吸血鬼美人鱼), and her verified information: executive chairman and secretary-general of the China-Africa Hope Project, and secretary-general of the Global Chinese Business Future Leaders.
One web user wrote on their microblog: “Lu Xingyu has become famous overnight, covering right over Guo Meimei! So it turns out that this little sister born in 1987 is responsible for this project in which China is spending 1.5 billion to build 1,000 Hope primary schools in Africa. The charity organization she runs, just like the China Red Cross Society, take 10 percent of total donations as a management fee, so that’s 150 million yuan. No wonder she’s so keen on going and making sure African kids can go to school, while children in her own country can’t go to school.”
Lu Xingyu’s Background is Uncommon
After this was exposed, Lu Xingyu’s information, photos and other material became the focus of much attention, and they drew gusts of discussion from web users. Related information shows that Lu Xingyu is just 24 years old, and is the daughter of billionaire Lu Junqing (卢俊卿), the chairman of the China Merchants Association (华商500强俱乐部主席), chairman of the board of directors of Tianjiu Confucian Business Investment Group (天九儒商投资集团), acting chairman of the World Eminent Chinese Business Association (WECBA/世界杰出华商协会), and a recipient of a gold medal from the Global Charity Federation (全球公益慈善联盟). Lu Xingyu is a graduate in media studies from the California State University.
Yesterday afternoon, this reporter dialed the three separate number provided on the official website of “China-Africa Project Hope” [apparently not now available]. Two of these were never answered, the third was answered but the person on the other end said it was not the China-Africa Hope Project and hung up the phone saying “you dialed the wrong number.”
The reporter saw on the official website of China-Africa Project Hope that this fund is a special charity foundation set up by and enterprise legal person (企业法人), a social organization legal person (社会团体法人) and a natural person (自然人) with contributions from the Youth Development Fund [of the Chinese Communist Youth League, which administers the charity Project Hope in China]. [The project] has already up to now built primary schools in Tanzania, Kenya and other countries, supporting poor students. The project’s income is derived from donations from the organizers, donations from members of Global Chinese Business Future Leaders, and donations from the World Eminent Chinese Business Association and donations from other enterprises. And 10 percent of donations are applied as administrative costs of the the project’s services and management.
This project’s executive board consists of 9 members, it’s executive chairman being Lu Xingyu. Additionally, people have suspected that this fund is essentially a family enterprise, and two young members of the executive board are the son and daughter respectively of the president and co-president.

Two days ago, rumors began circulating on social media that there were troubles at Window on the South (南风窗), a Guangzhou-based news and current affairs magazine with a distinguished 26-year history and a reputation as one of the leading lights of professional journalism in China. It is now confirmed that Zhao Lingmin (赵灵敏), one of the publication’s top editors, has been suspended from her duties (停职).
The action is the latest in a number of disciplinary actions against journalists in the past year. Most recently, China Central Television producer Wang Qinglei (王青雷) was suspended after his program was outspoken in its criticism of the government’s handling of the July 23 high-speed train collision in Wenzhou.
It seems that the chief reason for Zhao’s suspension is an article called “China Has Risen, We Must Say Goodbye to the Foreign Policy of Revolution” (中国要崛起，必须告别革命外交), which she wrote for a recent edition of the magazine [more from the SCMP]. This article is still available on a number of blogs and chatrooms, but has been deleted from most other sites. The original link at the Window on the South website now results in an error message:

The following is a translation of Zhao Lingmin’s letter to colleagues concerning her suspension from Window on the South:

Dear Colleagues:
After a meeting yesterday I had already accepted a notice from the board [informing me] a termination was to be carried out and that [I was to] undergo self-examination. Beginning from today, I have already been released from all editorial work on this publication. The second half of the year is a crucial time for circulation and advertising for next year, and I already had many ideas and plans in place for the next few months, but none of these can now be done. Window on the South no longer requires my thoughts and consideration.
As to the “errors of political guidance” (政治导向错误) represented in the article “China Has Risen, We Must Say Goodbye to the Foreign Policy of Revolution” (中国要崛起，必须告别革命外交), I naturally see this in a different way [from authorities], but clearly right now there is not an atmosphere or opportunity for the discussion of issues on the basis of facts and principles. As the writer of this piece and as the editorial head (采编中心主任), I feel deeply sorry for the negative impact this piece has had on this publication, but magazine publishing has its own process and I can only take on the responsibility I am meant to take on. They way things are now being handled, heaping all of the burdens on the writer and on the publisher who has no direct connection to the article, magnifying the problem as a question of principle, targeting people rather than issues and selectively and brashy handling this matter — clearly, this is something I cannot countenance.
I have passed seven full happy years at Window on the South. Having made the journey from a point where I was a new hand too timid even to pick up the phone to interview someone up to this point today, I offer my heartfelt thanks to Window on the South for giving me this opportunity and nurturing. I am also thankful for the support I have received from all of you. At the same time, I feel I have given my utmost in my work, and there is nothing on my conscience. Particularly in the recent three years, as demanded by my position and my sense of responsibility, I have put perhaps all of the time and energy I could into work, to the point where it has been difficult to have a full personal life. If it had not been for this incident, I might not perhaps [anyway] have continued this way of life for too many more years. But now, in this accident, I have at last been disengaged, and I have an opportunity to live a normal and relaxed life. This morning, I discovered for the first time upon crawling out of bed that I no longer have to think about things for the sake of work. While this feeling is unfamiliar, it seems not so bad.
Over the past few months what has most gratified me is the way that most members of our editorial team have found their own independent characters and judgement, that they don’t fawn and slavishly accept things. In my view, it is on the basis of this spirit that Window on the South has stood tall these 26 years, and it is also the reason why so many colleagues have been able to press on year after year even as they are full of complaints about the situation of hte magazine. The inertial force of this spiritual community is something that no material bounty or connection could ever replace. While it may be buffeted by a larger climate and local environment that grow narrower by the day, I really hope everyone [at the publication] will continue to push on with this independent character and judgement [NOTE: By “environment large and small” Zhao is referring to larger national trends, such as tightening ahead of next year’s Party Congress, and the specific environment facing the publication, including management and local leaders]. I also hope that our department in charge (主管部门) [which administers the publication] and those in charge will respect the time-honored legacy, culture, atmosphere and values of Window on the South, having an attitude of caution and responsibility toward history in operating and managing this magazine with such a brilliant past.
I thank everyone for their concern over the past two days. I am fine, and I hope all of you take care as well.
Zhao Lingmin (赵灵敏)
August 16, 2011
各位同事：
昨天早上会议之后，我已接获社委会通知，进行停职反省。自今天开始，我已退出本刊所有采编业务和工作。下半年是明年广告、发行的关键时期，我本已对未来几个月的内容有了很多的设想和筹划，但现在都做不了了，《南风窗》已不需要我再为它设想考虑了。
关于《中国要崛起，必须告别革命外交》一文的所谓“政治导向错误”，我自然有不同的看法，但目前显然并没有一个从事实和道理上讨论问题的氛围和契机。作为本文的作者和采编中心主任，我对此文给本刊造成的负面影响深感抱歉，但杂志出版是有流程的，我只能承担自己应该承担的责任，像目前这样把所有板子打在作者和与此文无直接关联的社长身上，进行上纲上线、对人不对事的选择性和扩大化处理，显然 并不能服众。
在《南风窗》，我度过了非常快乐和充实的7年。从一个给采访对象打电话都战战兢兢的新手起步走到今天，我由衷感谢《南风窗》给予我的机会和培养，也感谢各位的支持和帮助。与此同时，我在工作上也尽了最大努力，自认问心无愧。特别是最近3年来，出于工作岗位的需要和责任感，我将几乎所有能拿出来的时间和精力都投入到了工作中，以至于很难有完整的个人生活。如果不是此次的事件，我大概还会将这样的生活方式继续很多年，但现在，以这样一个始料不及的方式，我终于解脱了，有机会过更为正常和轻松的生活了。今天早上，我7年来第一次在起床后发现不需要再为工作想东想西了，这样的感觉虽然陌生，但似乎很不错。
过去几个月，最让我感到欣慰的，是采编部门的大部分同事所表现 出来的独立人格和判断力，遇事不阿附，不盲从。在我看来，这种精神力量是《南风窗》能够屹立26年的根本，也是很多同事即便对杂志的现状啧有烦言、但仍一年年坚守下来的根本原因。这一精神共同体的向心力，是任何物质上的恩惠和拉拢所不能替代的。虽然这种独立人格和判断力，在今天日益逼仄的大环境和小环境面前简直弱不禁风，但我还是期望大家能勉力坚守。也盼望我们的主管部门和新的主事者，能够尊重《南风窗》长期形成的历史、文化、氛围和价值观，以审慎和对历史负责任的态度经营和管理这本有光辉过去的杂志。
感谢大家这两天来对我的关心，我很好，大家也保重。
赵灵敏
2011年8月16日

On August 13, China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported on a document ostensibly from the State Administration of Taxation that explained new personal income tax rules in China. Gearing up to parse the document — “State Council State Administration of Taxation, Notice 47, 2011” (国家税务总局公告2011年第47号公告) — Xinhua asked: “So how are the old tax rules and the new tax rules connected? On [August 13], the State Administration of Taxation accepted an interview with our reporter. . . ”
The same day, Guangzhou Daily, the official party-run newspaper in the southern city of Guangzhou, was the first major print publication to run a report on the “new rules,” offering a detailed explanation.
Well, that official document, it turns out, was fake.
That’s right. An official government policy release, and it was apparently completely fabricated, though no one bothered to check. The State Administration of Taxation stepped out yesterday and officially said so, leaving many state media red-faced with embarrassment.
So where did Document No. 47 come from? That is now under investigation, authorities say. But in a report on the front page of today’s The Beijing News newspaper, Yue Shumin (岳树民), a professor of finance at People’s University of China, remarked the expertise with which the counterfeit official notice was made. “Looking at the text of the fabricated notice, it’s clear it is done with a definite level of expertise. If the fabricator didn’t have a good command of finance and taxation it would have been difficult to mislead the media and the public in this way,” said Yue.
Government authorities — yes, real ones — have stated their determination to hold those responsible to account. But beyond the question of who, there lingers the great big question of HOW.
Exposing its own mouthpiece reflex, the official Xinhua News Agency didn’t just report the fake notice as news — it claimed to have interviewed the “relevant responsible person” in the notice. This is typical of the way state media routinely take hand-off official releases from Party and government organs and repack them as reported news.
Here is the official China Central Television reporting the “news” of Notice 47 on August 14, complete with graphics calculating how the new policies will impact the average Joe. They even go out on into the city to interview the Man-on-the-Street about the new rules. So at least they did their footwork, right?

The timing of these revelations could hardly be more interesting. Over the past two weeks a debate has simmered in China over the issue of “rumors” on social media and the question of the truth and credibility of information.
Much of the chatter has centered on the so-called “anti-rumor league,” or piyao lianmeng, a group of online rumor busters who have advertised themselves as truth-seeking vigilantes out to identify and neutralize untruths in China’s burgeoning microblog sphere. The group’s crusade was trumpeted by state media. On August 3, China Central Television’s “Morning News” program reported under the title “Where is the ethical bottom line on microblogs?” the story of how one user on QQ Microblog called “Guo Yao” (郭瑶) had impersonated the relative of a July 23 crash victim.
But critics pointed out justifiably that the “anti-rumor league” focused excessively on popular rumor, turning a blind eye to misinformation by the government. Many harbored a suspicion that the League and the whole attack on microblog rumors was an attempt black-wash social media as a problem, particularly in the wake of the furor over the handling of the July 23 Wenzhou train collision, in which microblogs played a crucial role. Others pointed out that the real root of rumor and misinformation is the government’s own policies of news and information control.
Look, then, at the way commercial media today have pounced on the story of Notice 47, drawing it into the larger debate over rumor and truth. Here is today’s Southern Metropolis Daily newspaper. The large bold headline across the top, above the image of Hu Jintao visiting Guangzhou, reads: “Premium Allocation Tax Assessment? It’s Fake! The State Administration of Taxation Document Was Fabricated.”

And here is the front page of Morning News, a commercial spin-off of the official Sichuan Daily, which reads across the top, “Anti-Rumor Announcement,” or piyao shengming (辟谣声明). The big black characters read, “This is fake,” referring of course to the widely disseminated Notice 47. But for any reader savvy enough to have followed the recent debate over “rumor,” the words piyao (or “rumor-busting”) in the headline will almost surely recall the ethical attack on social media.

Clearly, rumor and fabrication are not issues confined to social media. And this particular revelation of rumor is probably something the “anti-rumor league” never saw coming.

[EDITOR’S NOTE: After a second round of propaganda directives on July 29 effectively brought an end to a week of feverish discussion of government negligence in the handling of the July 23 train collision in Wenzhou, much attention in China turned to the issue of how the ensure the quality and reliability of information on China’s social media. This debate seemed to cap a summer in which platforms like Sina Microblog and QQ Microblog have had a dramatic impact on such stories as the Red Cross Society of China (“Guo Meimei”) scandal and problems facing China’s high-speed rail network. But much of the doubting about the ethics of social media angered Chinese internet users, who saw attempts to broad-brush platforms like Sina Microblog as rumor mills as just the latest action to control information. Some of the most intelligent writing on the issue of “rumor,” “truth” and social media has been that of CMP fellow and Peking University professor Hu Yong (胡泳), who has drawn a clear line between official press control policies, the crisis of credibility facing official news, and the general appeal of hearsay. The following is a partial translation of an essay by Hu Yong that appeared in the August 12 edition of the Economic Observer. The points Hu makes are of particular relevance to the prevailing silence now over protests yesterday in the city of Dalian. As controls were strictly in force over this story, social media provided the only source of information.

This is an age pervaded by rumor. On July 28, People’s Daily Online summed up eight big rumors surrounding the Wenzhou train collision. On August 3, China Central Television’s Morning News program reported under the title “Where is the ethical bottom line on microblogs?” the story of how one user on QQ Microblog called “Guo Yao” (郭瑶) had impersonated the relative of a crash victim.

In the CCTV report, a member of the so-called Anti-Rumor League, [identified as] “a group of self-organizing enthusiastic web users working as rumor busting volunteers,” endorsed the idea of a “moral bankruptcy” (沦丧) in the ethics of microblogs. This group, formed on May 18 [this year], says that it has thus far been involved in the busting of more than one-hundred [online] rumors. But it was in the midst of the incident of the [Wenzhou] train collision [on July 23] that the group was cast into some doubt, accused of “selectively busting rumors” (选择性辟谣) and “only busting popular rumors, not busting official rumors” [or falsehoods] (只辟民谣，不辟官谣). Some even suggested in the fiercest of words that the Anti-Rumor League was “a platform carrying out directed attacks from a predefined political position as it hoists the signboard of rumor busting.”

Li Mu (李牧), a core figure in the League, also admits that it was wrong of the Anti-Rumor League to trust overly in the Ministry of Railways during the “7.23” incident. Excessive trust in the declarations of the government, and the use of official government news releases in countering many rumors is a major defect of the Anti-Rumor League.

The publicity slogan of the Anti-Rumor League is “serving the truth” (为真相服务), but there’s a little something about the operation of current politics that everyone is clear about, and that is that the government is not just a natural provider of the truth. Very often, it is the government that is guilty of the “original sin,” and harboring skepticism towards it is very reasonable.

As for the charge of “selectively busting rumors,” the principal founder of the Anti-Rumor League, Wu Fatian (吴法天), has responded: “The orientation of the Anti-Rumor League is about being a spontaneous organization of self-discipline among web users in the We Media age, and what it mainly does is issue accurate information about microblog rumors, so it works through microblog posting by the public.” At first glance, it seems this starting off point would yield few misgivings.

Microblogs are certainly not a clean and blameless territory, and spontaneous popular action to exercise self-discipline over speech on microblogs accords with the basic character of self organization in the We Media era. But if we look more carefully, the act of chiefly targeting “popular rumors” in rumor busting actually suggests a major deficiency of wisdom: it perhaps actively covers up or passively overlooks a hard fact of contemporary society, which is that official lies (官方的谎言) outpace popular rumors, constituting the greatest interference and obstruction with the truth.

When the goal of busting rumors is to get at the truth this is a good thing. But if rumor busters stand solely on the side of the government to blacken and attack popular public opinion, this isn’t in the interest of discovering the facts and the truth but in fact serves the goal of so-called channeling of public opinion (舆论引导), thereby serving as a tool aiding and abetting those people and organizations that endeavor to twist the truth.

In many online incidents, “strengthening channeling of public opinion” and “handling rumor according to the law” have appeared in the same directives [from press control authorities], and this is a tactic we have seen from the government for a long time. We can say that in fact it is the conduct of “strengthening channeling of public opinion” that has caused official information to be so wanting in credibility, which has in turn nurtured a rich soil for the transmission of “rumors.” On the one hand, the government has provided an environment conducive to the spread of rumors, and on the other it sternly lashes out against rumors, placing itself in the midst of an insoluble contradiction.

Since the SARS epidemic in 2003, the massive losses and risks that come with the suppression of media coverage of sudden-breaking incidents by relevant government departments have been illustrated again and again. As the media say nothing, or become representatives of the discourse of those in power, this inevitably becomes the principal reason for the spread of rumor and social panic.

Under [the policy of] “correct guidance of public opinion” the traditional media only selectively report major social and political events, and the standards are entirely within their hands. Whatever is regarded as negative (反面), destructive (消极), disturbing (添乱), discrediting (抹黑) is not permitted, and everything that is regarded as positive (正面), constructive (积极), encouraging (鼓劲) and praising (添彩) is openly proclaimed. Their basic criterion for deciding [what is positive or negative] is whether or not something poses a danger to social stability, and they care nothing for whether or not damage is done to the public’s right to know, or whether their actions might pose a grave danger to the life and property of the people.

When normal social communication mechanisms are crippled, abnormal communication mechanisms will be enlivened. Hearsay about sudden-breaking incidents is mostly transmitted by word of mouth, through instant messaging, online forums (and later added to microblogs), and communication much earlier than for formal releases in newspapers, television, radio and other traditional forms of media. People are much more inclined to believe rumors of uncertain provenance than they are to believe official news reports by newspapers, television and other mass media, which creates a situation in which “news looks like rumor and rumor looks like news.” Under the control of the government, transmission methods that are twisted by administrative power have exactly the opposite of their intended effect in an environment in which rumors are widely disseminated.

Posts began appearing earlier today on Chinese social media sites, most notably Sina Microblog (Weibo), saying that a mass demonstration was happening in the northern city of Dalian to oppose a chemical plant that has been placed near residential areas. Posts were quickly controlled, however, and now all related material is being scrubbed from the internet. While censorship of overt references and images of the protests themselves is plainly dampening the social media impact, however, anger over the chemical project is still quite visible, with many users posting “Get out Fujia PX!” messages.
Here’s more on the story from Jonathan Watts at The Guardian.
The following is a screenshot of my own Sina Weibo account showing recent posts. At the top is a post I re-posted earlier to my own followers that showed a picture of streets in Dalian filled with marching protesters. My comments and those of other to the original post with the photograph are still visible, but the original post has been replaced with a notice that says: “This microblog post has already been deleted by the user.”

Was this actually deleted by the user, or by the service? That’s a question to follow up later. This same user posted numerous times, first identifying Dalian as the place pictured, then removing mention of Dalian because keyword blocks were preventing the post. It’s hard to imagine this user then deciding on their own to delete successfully posted content. But this is of course just speculation.
The following are two photographs posted by the above-mentioned user that are apparently — but we can’t confirm this — of protests going on in Dalian. Readers should also look at the series posted by Chinese blogger Bei Feng to Google +, which suggest this is a very well organized demonstration, which pre-planned posters, t-shirts and some very savvy slogans (the symbol of the collective “middle-finger” may be the image of China in 2011).

Users on Sina Microblog have also been sharing an English news release on the protests that has been released by the official Xinhua News Agency. A Chinese release does not currently come up through a news search on Baidu, nor had anything been posted on Xinhua Online as of 4:16pm Sunday.
Other related terms on social media are being blocked. Here, for example, is a search I attempted using the word “stroll,” or sanbu (散步), which has become euphemism in Chinese for demonstration. Again, the notice says this content cannot be shown under relevant laws and policies.

Here is another image appearing on Sina Weibo on Sunday afternoon, again without any direct identification owing to keyword blocks.

Here is a recent re-posting of an August 8 post in which a user on Sina Weibo shared a screenshot of China Central Television coverage of the local opposition in Dalian to the PX project.

Some social media users, like this one in Shanghai, have replaced their profile photos with black signs that say, “Fujia PX, get out of Dalian!”

Signs like these are apparently being use in the Dalian protests, if we can assume, that is, that the following images shared on social media are authentic. The black square at the center of the four photographs reads: “Today let the whole country do its part for the residents of Dalian!”

The following image was also posted to Sina Weibo on Sunday evening around 5pm.

And another post shared Sunday evening included an image of what appears to be a message on someone’s iPhone that reads:

Just now a broadcast on the square shouted out that the governement will relocated the PX project as soon as possible, but to remove it scientifically will require some time, so an urgent notice will first be given to the enterprise to cease production. There was applause on the square, and this demonstrates that the public will has won out. People have gradually begun to leave the square, but 20 popular representatives are still posted outside the doors of the government.

If that announcement was made, perhaps these leaders, pictured standing atop an emergency vehicle in Dalian, were the ones to make it.

The following is a strip of photos from Dalian posted to a Sina Weibo account on Sunday evening.

The following set of photos was posted to Sina Weibo just after midnight, August 15, 2011.

The following image was posted by the “Newspaper Observer” microblog to Sina Weibo on August 15. It clearly shows a photograph of the actual morning edition of Dalian’s Peninsula Morning Post newspaper, with a large front-page article bearing the headline, “Fujian PX Project to Immediately Stop Production and be Relocated.” The underlined portion under the headline refers to city leaders “meeting with city masses yesterday.” But the paper’s online digital edition has apparently been cleansed, and shows instead an article about an upcoming vehicle expo.

The following photo of the August 15 edition of Dalian Evening Post also shows that coverage of the decision to relocated the PX project made the front page. Underlined portion is again reference to leaders meeting with the masses, which suggests the decision is in response to demonstrations, a highly sensitive issue.

The following interview with communications scholar, new media expert and CMP fellow Hu Yong (胡泳) was published yesterday by Time Weekly. As the controversy continues in China over the so-called “anti-rumor league,” a group of online rumor busters who have advertised themselves as truth-seeking vigilantes out to identify and neutralize untruths in China’s burgeoning microblog sphere, this interview provides one of the best and most comprehensive looks at the question of what constitutes a “rumor” and how China can best use social media to promote openness, engagement and truth-seeking.
Time Weekly: Recently the problem of “rumors” on microblogs has become something of a concentrated phenomenon and has drawn a lot of controversy. How should we view the relationship between rumor and microblogs?
Hu Yong: Actually, rumors are a very old form of language, with a strong word-of-mouth character to them. In some sense, in the internet age we’ve seen the return you might say of some forms of communication in the past. Microblogs particularly resemble village markets where everyone mills around and the threshold for speaking is quite low. This kind of media form is actually extremely suited to the spread of rumor and hearsay. The transmission chain is short, the speed rapid, and the scope wide. And so, it’s fundamentally impossible to completely get rid of rumor on microblogs.
Time Weekly: Well then, owing to the special characteristics of microblogs, we can’t see all nonfactual information as rumor. We need to separate “inaccurate information” (错误的信息) from “manufactured information” (捏造的信息), in which the former is erroneous (讹) and the latter is rumor (谣). But I’ve noticed that even some journalists don’t always differentiate between what is “erroneous” and what is “rumor,” but simply talk about all nonfactual information as “rumor.”
Hu Yong: That’s right. This certainly happens, and it’s important to recognize the difference. But we need to point out further that if we simply define “rumor” as subjective and deliberate fabrication (观故意的捏造) and then add to this judgement about motives, this is really problematic. Put another way, the reason the “anti-rumor league” has invited so much controversy is because many people believe that they often make conjectures about the motives of those they focus on.
People generally assume that rumor is fabrication, and then suppose that it involves some sort of nefarious purpose. It never occurs to them that rumor is not necessarily in and of itself pure fiction, that there might be a particle of truth. I’m personally very opposed to the idea of ascribing motive in the definition of rumor. We all know that the ascription of motive (动机论) or the attacking of others in argument on the basis of assumed motive (诛心论) have a longstanding and well-established history in China. In the process of verbal exchange, or in the process of discourse and argumentation, we often don’t direct our language toward the conduct or language of the other, but rather directly criticize the other — why did they say what they did, why did they act in that way. We make conjectures about the motives of the other. This kind of motive ascription as a way of thinking is actually the greatest obstacle to reasonable discussion, and in many cases its interest is actually throttling freedom of expression.
Time Weekly: This kind of form of discussion that doesn’t ascribe motive should be a basic principle established in public discussion on microblogs. I know that the French critic [philosopher, sociologist] Raymond Aron placed great importance on this principle and emphasized it again and again. He said that in collective action less attention should be paid to the intention of those taking action and more attention paid to the results of that action.
Hu Yong: We have a tradition of ascribing motive, including during the Cultural Revolution when everyone talked about “literary prostitutes” (文痞) [in accusing certain intellectuals]. What they used was what we often call the billy-club method. This method is in fact one of the most commonly used forms of ascribing motive. If you ascribe motive excessively in your analysis of rumor, it is quite easy to wipe these so-called rumors with your own ethical judgements and then occupy a moral high ground for yourself. When you use this sort of method to carry out a process of demonization on rumor, that actually means that what you’re wiping out is the validity of the public’s questioning of you, or the validity of the public’s resistance. In other words, I think that in the controversy over the “anti-rumor league” there is something that has to be said clearly, and that is that the notion of “dispelling rumor” [piyao] does not have natural validity within the context of contemporary China.
Time Weekly: The “anti-rumor league” and the motive-ascribing form of thought that they represent is something we have to be alert to and critical of. We can also see that if we lump what is said in error with rumor, this kind of thought demands that people have to be all-knowing, and this expects far too much of people.
Hu Yong: In a basic sense, any time something happens information is asymmetrical, and no one is like God, seeing and knowing all. So oftentimes information will emerge incomplete or even in error, and its difficult to dismiss it directly as “rumor.” In a deeper sense, rumor is one way and means by which we come to recognize our society, a form of knowing (认知方式). Because as an individual or community when you meet with uncertainty you will naturally undergo acts of social cognition, or you’ll act in a collective manner, working to eliminate uncertainties in the information process. In the research of rumor, social scientists believe that rumors are in an important sense part of social cognition, a tool with which social communities resolve problems.
Time Weekly: Yes. Information, this basic concept, has been defined as something that dispels the cognitive uncertainties of the receiver. For example, the July 23 accident [of the high-speed train in Wenzhou], this sudden-breaking incident, created a great deal of uncertainty. At the same time it also generated a craving for accurate and timely information. But the government was extremely negligent in providing information about the disaster, and even had a desire to cover it up. So then, rumors in the sense that you just described them emerged.
Hu Yong: That’s right. On this issue a lot of people have a very superficial understanding, and perhaps have a lot of warped views. As I just said, we can make a distinction within rumors about truthful content and fictional content. But many people believe that rumors must all naturally be false. What’s more, a great many people believe that rumors are a form of social malady. And so we see even a lot of media saying metaphorically that rumors are spreading like an illness. In fact, some of the actions of the “anti-rumor league” have this sort of problem.
When you understand “rumor” purely as a kind of sickness, you commit an error of presumptuous arrogance, assuming that the public consists of people who easily fall victim to illness, that they easily believe rumors and lightly disseminate them. But in fact as we just discussed, rumors are a normal part of society, a normal condition, and not a sickness. Functional rumors will emerge among communities in our society as they seek answers to events that they cannot explain.
Time Weekly: So once we understand the function that rumors have, how do we understand “rumor busting” organizations like the “anti-rumor league” on microblog platforms? Actually, I’d rather replace the strongly suggestive term “rumor-bust” with “clarify.”
Hu Yong: The “anti-rumor league” says itself that it wants to take on social responsibility in the era of We Media (自媒体), leveraging spontaneous forces to promote self-discipline in speech. This follows the pattern of self-governing organizations in the We Media age, but the problem lies chiefly in the way as everyone has criticized they selectively target rumors, avoiding government rumors and only focusing on rumors from the public. They say themselves that they are bearing a social responsibility, but we can see from the microblog account of the founder of the “anti-rumor league,” Dou Hanzhang (窦含章), that he has labeled himself as someone who “speaks on behalf of the government” (替政府说话的人). This tells us quite clearly that he has a position. In my view, to target popular rumor and avoid official rumor is a failure of intelligence, whether it’s an active attempt at cover up or passive neglect. In sum, they have overlooked a relationship, I call it the relationship between rumors and lies.
[Earlier coverage in Chinese of Dou and his affiliations: http://news.cn.yahoo.com/ypen/20110809/517859.html]
The slogan of the “anti-rumor league” is, “Serving the Truth” (为真相服务). Well then, we then have to ask, under China’s present circumstances what is the biggest obstruction to the truth? Is it lies, or is it rumors? This is a question they must answer.
Time Weekly: In the microblog sphere, the “anti-rumor league” has been subjected to widespread challenge [by users], and you might say it has even become the proverbial rat crossing the road [which everyone hates and abuses]. But objectively speaking, microblogs are in need of a mechanism for clarification, or an information settlement platform (信息澄清平台). What form would you hope this would take, or what kind of people would constitute such a thing?
Hu Yong: As to the mechanisms of clarification, I think we can say as the ancients did that “the art lies outside the poetry” (功夫在诗外). Which is to say we cannot just focus on microblogs and ask what the best mechanism for clearing up [information] is. In fact, the best possible mechanism for clearing up [information] would be for the government to realize openness and transparency of information, would be to resolve the problem of lies that we just touched on. After that, it’s about the media doing fair and comprehensive reporting.
As a form of media, microblogs naturally have their own capacity for self-correction, because many people participate in microblogs and every person has their own strengths, information sources and social network, and sometimes these people may be on the scene [to give eyewitness accounts], etcetera. This is something traditional media often cannot accomplish. This kind of assembling could possibly lead to the emergence of a group intelligence. And this group intelligence is in fact what constitutes the mechanism of self-correction in the microblog sphere. This is one of the great sources of vitality for microblogs.
Time Weekly: Still, some people may be concerned that this sort of self-correcting mechanism is not necessarily complete. Is it possible that it might have systematic flaws, or have collective blind spots?
Hu Yong: This actually boils down to the question of how you regard group thinking (群体思维). There has always been different views about this. One view is the one we’ve already talked about, the view that groups can give rise to intelligence and that this intelligence corrects through exchange. But there has always been another understanding and view that says that if individuals gather into groups the intelligence represented by those groups will not necessarily be superior to individual intelligence, or even will not just not give rise to group intelligence but will instead give rise to crowd foolishness (群体的愚蠢). There are many examples used to support this view, for example Hitler’s Germany, China during the Cultural Revolution, etcetera. The French thinker Gustave Le Bon wrote about this in his book The Crowd.

Yesterday the Party’s official People’s Daily newspaper ran an editorial by Yang Jian (杨健) addressing the issue of the so-called “anti-rumor league,” or piyao lianmeng, a group of online rumor busters who have advertised themselves as truth-seeking vigilantes out to identify and neutralize untruths in China’s burgeoning microblog sphere.
The informal group, which of course has its own microblog, has been around for more than two months. But in recent days they have been at the center of an ongoing controversy — playing out online, of course, but also in traditional media — about what counts for truth, and what constitutes rumor, in the messy world of social media.

[ABOVE: The official microblog account of the so-called “anti-rumor league” at Sina Weibo.]
While the group says its goal is to “do our bit to clean up the public opinion ecology of the microblogs,” many Chinese have accused them of official bias — the way, for example, they seem to turn a blind eye to falsehoods perpetuated in Party-run media. Others have voiced a more visceral objection to the term piyao itself, which reminds many of the way local government leaders in particular in China have long tossed out the accusation of “rumor” to cover up their own misdeeds.
The People’s Daily editorial, “In the Microblog Age, How Do We Refute Rumors,” is actually quite even-handed in discussing the rise of social media and its implications. The piece describes the advances in information and public opinion brought about by microblogs with a sense of acceptance and inevitability, noting that while some see them as pandering rumor mills, they “have undeniable characteristics of media” and “have already definitely become an important source for news for other media.”
There are now quite a few news stories and editorials out there in Chinese dealing with this issue from various angles. For example, a piece on the front page of today’s China Youth Daily newspaper (below), which argues that the business of rumor busting must itself be carried out in an “objective” and “neutral” manner.

[ABOVE: An editorial on the front page (below the large photograph) of today’s China Youth Daily newspaper, published by the Communist Youth League of China, argues that rumor-busting must be free of prejudice.]
In a further illustration of the circularity of information sharing and exchange in China today, the China Youth Daily piece itself has been widely shared and commented upon on microblogs today, as have other traditional media takes on the issue.
Not far behind this debate over the truth and over the power of social media is recent furor over the government’s handling of the July 23 high-speed rail collision in Wenzhou. While of course not the only recent story in which microblogs have played a crucial role, the public opinion storm that blew between July 23 and July 30 was a clear illustration — and for leaders, no doubt a concerning one — of just how instrumental social media now are in China.
It remains to be seen how Chinese leaders will balance their clear and uncompromising priority of maintaining controls on information — “guidance of public opinion” — against the emerging maturity of platforms like Sina Microblog. It is a delicate balance, to be sure.
On that note, we turn to an editorial in today’s edition of Guangdong’s Southern Metropolis Daily. The piece is a good look at some of the essential fault lines in this debate over rumor, truth and openness.
Readers should also note the reference at the end to the recently-released “Opinions Concerning the Deepening of Openness of Government Affairs and Strengthening Service in Government Affairs” (关于深化政务公开加强政务服务的意见).

“Bringing an End to Rumor in the Weibo Age Needs Freedom of Information”
On August 10, the People’s Daily ran an article on the recently hot issue of the “anti-rumor league” and offered its own affirmation of online public opinion’s “fair system of self-cleansing” (良好自净机), expressing the belief that microblogs had led the way in promoting the public’s right to know, right to express, right to participate and right to monitor. The arguments in the article were basically fair, quite different from a number of previous [writings and reports in the media] that cast blame on microblogs on the basis of so-called “rumors.”
Microblogs, and even the whole phenomenon of the internet, are already topics that are unavoidable in understanding and describing contemporary Chinese society. The internet has increasingly become a daily necessity of life for each and every ordinary person. All traditional social issues and discussions have already undergone a simple initial process of inscription whereby they are “reflected to some degree on the internet.” The internet now initiates, guides and promotes change in real society, something getting more and more common and taking on unusual importance. With the introduction and application of each form of new internet technology comes the hope that traditional bounds will be broken, and with the arrival of microblogs, this situation has accelerated in China. The personal media quality of microblogs . . . has allowed them within an exceptionally short period of time to become the principal tool by which Chinese internet users express their thoughts and feelings on current affairs and the world around them.
One topic of discussion that has perhaps never ceased [in the midst of these changes] has been how to judge the veracity of information as people use microblogs to comment, share and draw common attention (围观) to information. And when certain untrue information is broadcast and amplified on the internet, how can we clean up the negative impact of this? In this process, the single-handed “anti-rumor Party” has developed into the collective action of the “anti-rumor league” (辟谣联盟). which “by its own support” (自带干粮) has advertised itself as “serving the truth” (为真相服务). This behavior, which on the surface seems something that the vast majority of internet users might approve of, has been attended all along with controversy and reproach. It has been mocked, despised and doubted. But we must realize that this is not at odds with the desire everyone has for the truth.
In times when the truth is wanting, people will hunger even more for the truth. And at the same time as the internet has afforded people a new tool of expression and transmission [of information], one precondition of the opening up of expression is that mechanisms are found to ensure self-cleansing (自净). The objective of this online self-cleansing is making clear what information is objective, reasonable and neutral. But the path chosen by the “anti-rumor Party” is clearly different. The reason why the “anti-rumor league” has been subjected to so much denunciation is because it is selective in its rumor busting. It targets only “popular rumor” (民谣) and has no interest in “official rumor” (官谣), and in this process it takes official government formulations as the basis and starting point of its rumor busting. This fatal selective blindness has already become, and will possibly continue to be, the Achilles heel of the “anti-rumor league.”
. . .
Recently the General Office of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and the General Office of the State Council printed and distributed [the notice] “Opinions Concerning the Deepening of Openness of Government Affairs and Strengthening Service in Government Affairs” (关于深化政务公开加强政务服务的意见) emphasizing the importance of open information, and emphasizing especially that event of major sudden-breaking incidents and problems of concern to the people, the circumstances of the event must be released, answering public concerns in a timely, accurate and comprehensive manner. This policy released at a critical moment no doubt has clear guiding importance, and it answers from one angle the people’s demand to be informed of public information resources (公共信息资源), and it fits in its objectives with the consensus among people that they must themselves work in pursuit of the truth. Only in an environment in which information can flow freely can rumor and falsehood be stripped away. When society begins to respect and trust in the fact that everyone is entitled to make their own independent judgements about information, preserving the right to know and express for all, only then will the truth emerge.