Thanks to an astounding ability to land on their feet, cats have been said to have nine lives. Surviving as a political cartoonist on Chinese social media apparently requires a similar level of agility.
Kuang Biao (邝飚), one of China’s boldest and most original cartoonists, announced yesterday that his account on Sina Weibo had been shut down yet again. Kuang told the China Media Project that this is the 29th time his account has been shut down on the popular social media platform.

In his first Weibo post on his new account, “Brother Kuang Cartoon 28” (飚哥漫画28世), which already has more than 2,200 fans, Kuang wrote: “Goodnight my friends! Just now Brother Kuang Cartoon 27 was buried alive. . . I’m so fortunate to have been born in a nation of rule of law, where I experience the joy of democracy and freedom.”
The post was accompanied by one of Kuang’s earlier works (ABOVE), in which a monstrous figure squatting over a workbench prepares to plane a dissident so that they conform to his specifications.

[ABOVE: Cartoonist Kuang Biao sets up a new Weibo account after his latest was shut down on March 20.]

In its special “315 gala” for World Consumer Rights Day, the state-run China Central Television aired an investigative feature alleging unfair treatment by Apple of its customers in China. But the attention shifted back on CCTV after a Sina Weibo post from the account of a Taiwanese celebrity seemed to reveal a plan to have celebrities post about the segment soon after it aired. Many Chinese users on social media said they believed CCTV was guilty of foul play and was going after companies (including Apple and Volkswagen) that had not advertised with the network. In the above cartoon by Xiao Mao (小矛), posted to Sina Weibo on March 16,, a mob underling in a black suit and black tie looks at a list and says: “It looks like Apple, Volkswagen and a few others haven’t paid their protection fees yet.” Seated below, a white-haired mob boss grinds his teeth and says: “Let’s do a special gala and blacken their names. Perhaps we can air it at around 8:20!”

The following post by “Ma Jiming CN” (马霁明CN) saying that revolution is the only way to really root out rampant corruption in China, was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 8:42 a.m. today, March 19, 2013. “Ma Jiming CN” is a self-identified Maoist who currently has more than 19,000 followers, according to numbers from Sina Weibo. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre]

[Without a revolution, corruption can’t possibly be restrained] China is about to enter a rapid historical process of rot and “granulation” (沙化), and this can’t be stopped! There may be some moderation of official corruption now, but the corrupting trend of the rash and self-seeking drive for profit throughout our entire society will grow more an more severe. Even though weak ideological slogans and propaganda education will do their utmost to resist it, the “economic foundation will dictate the overall structure”, and aside from revolution all work is in vain.

The original Chinese language post follows:

【除非发生革命，腐败不可能遏制】中国将进入加速腐烂“沙化”历史进程，不可阻挡！官场腐败或许有所收敛，但整个社会私有化下的“自私自利、唯利是图和一盘散沙化”的腐败将越演越烈。尽管软弱无力的意识形态空口号和宣传教化会做出顽强抵抗，但“经济基础决定上层建筑”，除了革命都是徒劳无功的。

NOTE: All posts to The Anti-Social List are listed as “permission denied” in the Sina Weibo API, which means they were deleted by Weibo managers, not by users themselves.

In a segment aired last Friday night during an official televised gala to commemorate World Consumer Rights Day, China Central Television sharply criticized Apple, alleging that it offered substandard services to Chinese consumers.
But criticism quickly turned back on CCTV after it appeared that the network had organized a campaign against Apple on social media, timed to strike immediately after the segment aired. The controversy now centers on a post made just before 8:30 p.m. from the Sina Weibo account of Taiwanese actor Peter Ho. The message, in which Ho claimed he felt “hurt” by Apple’s actions in China, ended with a line suggesting Ho had been enlisted in a coordinated smear campaign: “Post around 8:20 p.m.,” it said.

There is heated discussion on Weibo today about Peter Ho’s post. It seems that the post indeed was sent, but Ho has claimed in a subsequent official statement that he did not send it. This is a curious claim, leaving a number of highly unlikely scenarios — such as someone maliciously accessing his account to send the message (with what possible motive?). [Here is another post including an image of the post from Ho’s account.]
By 8:45 p.m. on Friday the tide on social media had turned against CCTV. The possibility of a conspiracy to smear Apple was being discussed at least at hotly as Apple’s alleged unkindness to Chinese consumers.
At 8:55 p.m. Chinese writer Li Chengpeng posted a short essay to his blog criticizing CCTV for its actions. A partial translation of his piece follows:

It’s not that you can’t do some things on and off the air to go along with the fight against fakes. But you cannot use public power to make targeted strikes against those who aren’t your major advertisers. Of course you can criticise Apple, but you cannot let all of these domestically manufactured fraudulent goods off the hook when you could so easily investigate them, then turn a harsh and uncompromising eye on a mobile brand that leads the world in overall quality — even making it out to be something of great concern to the people, a form of national discrimination . . . The thing is, you’ve always done things this way. You act all the time like you don’t give a damn about your own face, and then you place the condom of state power over the instrument of your own private profit.
Those enterprises are bad, but what you’re doing is disgusting. A massive network like yours, with massive channel resources in your grasp and high-level contacts, but your creativity is such that you can only be compared to [propaganda] megaphone shouting over the countryside . . . .
You turn your eyes from knife attacks on our own children, but focus your attention on tragedies at schools overseas; you don’t criticize the way our own congresses have gathered like so many artificial limbs for 60-odd years, but always mock the way shoes have been thrown again in a parliament in some other country. You’ve never questioned why officials in our country don’t open up about their assets (great, so on this issue we must thank foreign reporters for asking this question at press conferences), but you take great joy in reporting about some government official overseas who got caught using public funds to buy a bottle of wine. Yes, there are certainly many untoward things happening outside China — poisonous foods, corrupt officials, poverty. But no matter how many of these dirty stories there are overseas, what the hell do these have to do with me? I don’t have family there. I criticize ugly things in China because these do harm to my own family (Oh, I see, so perhaps you criticize things overseas so much because you own relatives have already . . . ?). You are China’s national television network, so you should be criticizing more things happening right beside you. That’s how you contribute to your own country. Is it so hard for you to understand this simple concept?
Just look at the rest of the world. It seems that only our country uses public funds to host things like the March 15 gala (3.15晚会) [for World Consumer Rights Day]. The more evening galas we host here [on Chinese television], the more severe problems are, until in the end evening galas themselves become the problem. We don’t go and fix the actual problems, we just hold evening [television] galas, and more evening banquets. For our own pleasure, we plan evening banquets. In order to support the elderly, we hold Cheung Yeung Festival gala. In order to save ourselves from moral decline, we hold Study Lei Feng gala. In order to save ourselves from poor-quality products, of course we must hold a March 15 gala [for consumer rights].
One after another the dead pigs float down the Yangtze River, too many to count. And I’m in no mood to count them either. If you don’t care at all about this problem, I think I’ll add another to the count. It is a dead pig of morals that never speaks up.
What I’ve learned most from this latest episode [concerning Apple] is this: CCTV, you no longer have any right to teach me morals.

The following post by (蓝胖纸神行促织) was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 8:41 a.m. today, March 15, 2013. “I hope that soon he will receive his Honorary Oscar,” the post remarks on another post, non-sensitive and undeleted, showing Premier Wen Jiabao bowing out of office at the National People’s Congress, yielding the post to his successor, Li Keqiang. This is a reference to China’s Best Actor: Wen Jiabao, a book by dissident author Yu Jie published in Hong Kong in 2010 and alleging that while Wen Jiabao has cultivated an image as a leader who genuinely cares for the people, he was really a do-nothing figurehead. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre]

NOTE: All posts to The Anti-Social List are listed as “permission denied” in the Sina Weibo API, which means they were deleted by Weibo managers, not by users themselves.

In recent months, serious environmental and public health issues in China have drawn widespread concern from citizens — from poor air quality in Beijing and other cities, to thousands of pig carcasses appearing inexplicably in Shanghai’s main river. For many Chinese, these issues underscore the costs of rapid economic growth that has not been balanced with effective administration. In this cartoon, called “Searching,” posted by artist “Comic Smoke” (漫画食墨客) to Sina Weibo, the earth is a cracked and desolate place where only the stumps of trees are left. White doves (nations or people hoping for a solution?) fly in search of a sustenance, but they are tethered to a black hook driven into the earth.

In December 2011, a large-scale revolt in Wukan to protest a land grab by local officials catapulted this small, seaside village into world headlines. A rare negotiated settlement with provincial officials allowed Wukan villagers to hold democratic elections for a new village leadership on March 3, 2012 — what many called a new model for democracy in China.
This month I went to the village to see for myself how the “Wukan model” had progressed in the year since village elections. What I found was frustration, disappointment and exhaustion.

[ABOVE: A Wukan villager, still waiting for resolution of the land issues that sparked protest in late 2011. Photo by Anna-Karin Lampou.]
Villagers everywhere on Wukan’s streets echo the same refrain: “Still, our land has not been returned,” they say.
Land issues top the village committee’s agenda today as they did during elections last year. But committee members say their hands are tied by political forces beyond the village. While they represent the villagers who elected them, they must rely on Party superiors up the line to accomplish many of the things they originally set out to do.
Inside the village, division rankles. In October 2012, Zhuang Liehong, one of the elected committee members who had pledged most vocally to win back the village’s land, resigned his post, citing irreconcilable differences with Secretary Lin Zuluan and other committee members.
“It wasn’t personal,” Zhuang tells me over cups of oolong in the village teahouse he opened after his resignation. “We think differently. Right now it’s just impossible [for us to work together].”
In stark contrast to the unity Wukan showed the world in the midst of the protests, villagers now find it impossible to reach agreement even on how to use existing land. And evidence of the stalemate is everywhere.

[ABOVE: “Fully (Asia) Development,” a local knitwear factory, now sits idle outside Wukan. Photo by Anna-Karin Lampou.]
Surrounding the village, large stretches of land sit unused. Deserted factories, with smashed-out windows and rusty door frames, dot the village landscape. Posted outside an abandoned knitwear factory — “Fully (Asia) Development,” reads the sign at the gate — one security guard tells me he’s been keeping watch here ever since the factory’s boss absconded, after the village committee had demanded outstanding rent.
“He had a Hong Kong ID card,” the guard explains. “So they were never able to find him.”
Land disputes like Wukan’s have played out again and again in villages across China. According to a recent study, four million people each year in China have their rural land seized by the government. These land seizures drive an undercurrent of unrest. Sun Liping, a scholar from Tsinghua University, estimates that there were at least 180,000 land-related protests in China in 2012 alone.
For many, Wukan offered a solution — a model of democratic reform that could stem the tide of mass rural protests. Inside Wukan, that hope is at best a distant thought, crowded out by the immediacy of concerns over land.
When I spoke to one woman at a noodle shop about how things were going in Wukan, she talked at great length about how the village’s land still hadn’t been returned. When I asked her for her thoughts on democracy, she shrugged off the question: “I don’t really know about that,” she said.
I know the headlines have been down on Wukan in recent months. “Freedom fizzles out in China’s rebel town of Wukan,” read a recent Reuters report. “Is Wukan a failure?” a recent online post asked.
I’m not ready to say that democracy has failed in Wukan. There is positive progress, albeit small, towards a more open, transparent style of government. Locals told me they were happy they could now approach their local leaders, that they could voice their concerns and be taken seriously.

[ABOVE: A notice on the wall of a local school informs villagers about a renovation project, providing details such as the name of the contracted company. Photo by Anna-Karin Lampou.]
On the wall of a local kindergarten in Wukan, I came across a notice announcing a renovation project. It listed the name of the committee representative responsible for the project, including his phone number. It mentioned the company contracted to handle the renovation and the budget involved. That may seem like a small achievement. But this level of transparency is unusual in China, whether at the local level or the national level.
Behind the scenes, though, Wukan’s fragile experiment is exhausted. Yang Semao, the village committee member listed on the poster as being responsible for the renovation project, told me he is taking leave from the committee to deal with his failing health. The responsibilities and frustrations of the past year have left him physically and emotionally drained. He described himself as “near collapse.”

[ABOVE: Elected village committee member Yang Semao says he is exhausted by work and will be taking a period of leave from his responsibilities. Photo by Anna-Karin Lampou.]
A hand-written letter Yang shared with me, detailing the recent situation in Wukan and his reasons for taking leave, is a portrait of a village at an impasse. The frustration and fatigue are salient. But there is a thread of hope too. The village is trying to nurture its fledgling democracy, Yang says, educating its members about how to “express their demands rationally,” and preparing for elections down the road.
As for the insoluble issue of land — that may take several administrations to solve.
“The task is heavy,” Yang writes, “and the road is long.”

My Thoughts One Year On From My Election as Deputy Chairman of the Village Committee
Greetings to you all, respected [members of the] Provincial Work Group, Party and government leaders at various levels, departmental staff, friends in the overseas media, netizens who have watched [events in] Wukan, volunteers, and villagers of Wukan.
I thank you for your trust and support, which made possible my election as deputy chairman of the Wukan village committee, and which gave me the opportunity to serve the villagers of Wukan. However, as the weight of history and the expectations of villagers have been so considerable, and as my own experience has been inadequate, a great number of defects have emerged in my own work over the past six months. Progress on land-related appeals [made by the villagers of Wukan] has been laborious; negotiations over the [settling of] the boundary lands (四至边界); the procedures for livelihood projects (such as running water) have lacked consistency; village rules and regulations have not been readily followed (on illegal construction, for example); the pace of management of village affairs has been excruciating, and the course of democracy [in the village] now faces a serious predicament. The village bristles daily with criticism, and is has become difficult to establish the authority of the village committee. Facing the expectations of the government, of the villagers and of people of all walks of [Chinese] society, I feel a deep sense of shame.
Without question, my work has not been done well, but this is not out of lack of effort. In the year since I was elected (plus the six months of rights defense efforts) I have made a tremendous effort to address the demands and promote the development of my hometown. I have relented a single day, nor perhaps have I rested a single day. A few days ago the Bureau of Land Resources announced that our demands concerning our [village] land were at an impasse. The decision on the 124 mu of land [in question] has been delayed over and over again, and there are still obstacles to the restoration of the land title to the village of Wukan. Whenever this issue is broached, attacks come [from the authorities]. As for myself, I am perhaps psychologically near collapse. My constitution is now weak (I’m sick). In order that I do not perish of exhaustion and ill health, I have had no choice but to submit a request to the village committee for sick leave, allowing me some time to recover. If I recuperate for two weeks, I should be able to return to work. If the results are not as ideal as I expect, it might be necessary for me to take more time, or to resign my post in order to regain my health. I hope that in this I may have the support and understanding of the government and the people.
After I go on leave, many village affairs, including the land-related demands and livelihood projects, will depend upon the “two committees” (两委) — [the village branch of the Chinese Communist Party and the autonomous villagers’ committee] — the village affairs supervisory committee and the other various village work groups. I hope that all of you together support the work of Secretary Lin [Zuluan], that you unite around Secretary Lin, that you manage village affairs well, and that you do a good job of various livelihood projects and in promoting land-related demands — that you dedicate yourselves to the stability and development of Wukan Village. I will be back to join with you [in this work] as soon as I can.
On the question of land issues in Wukan Village . . . The task is heavy and the road is long. Owing to historical problems and other complexities, this issue is one that cannot be resolved in a single term by this village committee. It is an issue that will require several terms to achieve (and that of course also requires a capable village committee).
The current village committee has now begun to shift the center of its work to directing villagers toward a more rational expression of their demands and consolidating the democratic achievements we have made. [Our focus is on] progressively and gradually developing democracy and bringing stability to the social environment in Wukan, creating a favorable election environment for the next village committee term. As for the resolution of [outstanding] land issues, and promoting productivity and investment, these [tasks] can only await breakthroughs to be made by the next village committee.
Yang Semao (杨色茂)
March 3, 2013
(Translation by David Bandurski)

Authorities in the city of Shanghai reported on March 11 that at least 3,300 dead pigs had been found floating in the Huangpu River, which is the major source of water for the city’s 23 million population. The story shocked many Chinese, who worried understandably about the implications for public health and puzzled over the question of how farmers upstream were able to discharge such a large number of dead pigs into the river without notice. The above cartoon, posted by artist Du Shi Xiong (大尸凶的漫画) to Sina Weibo, is a mock movie poster referencing director Ang Lee‘s recent blockbuster Life of Pi. The poster pictures the film (and book’s) main character, Indian storyteller Pi Patel, drifting on his life raft not with the male Bengal tiger “Richard Parker” but with scores of dead pigs. The water all around him is also littered with dead pigs.
This cartoon is one of quite a few now circulating on Sina Weibo using the “Life of Pi” movie poster meme to explore the story of Shanghai’s dead pigs. The following is another posted by Gou Ben (勾犇漫画) today. In this one, Pi Patel wears a heavy-duty safety mask to protect himself from the smog (another health issue of great concern to the Chinese public) while the tiger “Richard Parker” leaps headlong into a river teeming with dead pigs and screams: “Here’s some meat to eat. If it kills me, at least I’ll die of a bloated stomach!”