The following post by Jing Hai Xin Yu (静海心语), a repost on a much earlier post from another user about ousted Chongqing secretary and prominent princeling Bo Xilai, was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 7:19am today, January 18, 2013. Jing Hai Xin Yu currently has just over 3,800 followers, according to numbers from Sina Weibo. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre]
The original post from January 12, as yet undeleted, includes a picture of marchers apparently holding up a red sign that reads, “We will forever support the people’s secretary, Bo Xilai.” The photo is below. The text on the original post reads: “Even though Bo Xilai has been removed from his post, the ordinary people still believe he is a good [Party] secretary.”

The original post also links to a blog on the Sina platform that kicks up a message saying the post has already been deleted.
It is interesting to note that this topically sensitive original post about Bo Xilai on Sina Weibo is still available, but that the blog post and the re-post from Jing Hai Xin Yu have been deleted. Why would that be? One possible explanation is the fact that Jing Hai Xin Yu has more than 3,000 followers, while the original poster of the Bo Xilai text has just four followers.
The original Chinese-language post follows:

【抗命中宣部 新京报社长获中国年度传媒大奖】有风骨者，才会真正有影响力！日前带领报社挺《南方周末》、对宣传干预新闻自主说不的《新京报》社长戴自更，荣获金长城传媒奖2012中国传媒年度影响力人物。@南方周末@新京报@记者刘向南 @徐昕 @左小祖咒 @袁腾飞

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.

Early this month, on the eve of the Southern Weekly incident, news came that a number of prominent Weibo users had had their accounts suspended. They included Cheng Yizhong, the former editor-in-chief of Southern Metropolis Daily, activist Ran Yunfei, investigative reporter Shi Feike and cartoonist Kuang Biao. This week Kuang Biao has returned to Weibo with a new account. His first post, “Tea”, is a drawing of an empty interrogation chair, with a blazing naked bulb overhead casting the dark ominous hole of a shadow underneath. On the chair sits a cup of tea, a reference to “invited to tea,” a phrase that become synonymous with dissidents being taken in by state security for questioning and intimidation..

The following post by China Strange News (中国奇闻) was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 6:45am today, January 17, 2013. The post shares the news reported by a number of overseas Chinese websites this week that Dai Zigeng, the publisher of The Beijing News recently rumored to have resigned in a stand-off with propaganda officials, has been given a mainland press award. China Strange News currently has just over 10,000 followers, according to numbers from Sina Weibo. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre]

【Resisting the Central Propaganda Department/Publisher of The Beijing News win media prize】Only those with strength of character can have true influence! Recently, the publisher of The Beijing News, Dai Zigeng (戴自更), who led his paper in supporting Southern Weekly and said NO to the propaganda officials, won the 2012 Influential Media Figures honor at the Golden Great Wall Media Awards (金长城传媒奖).

The original Chinese-language post follows:

【抗命中宣部 新京报社长获中国年度传媒大奖】有风骨者，才会真正有影响力！日前带领报社挺《南方周末》、对宣传干预新闻自主说不的《新京报》社长戴自更，荣获金长城传媒奖2012中国传媒年度影响力人物。@南方周末@新京报@记者刘向南 @徐昕 @左小祖咒 @袁腾飞

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 talk here at the University of Hong Kong more than a month ago, I made the modest suggestion that two initial steps toward political reform in China might be more tolerant treatment of the media and greater respect for the rights of ordinary Chinese. In the discussion that followed several people objected to the feebleness of these hopes. “Shouldn’t we expect more?” they asked.
But over the past week, even these “feeble” hopes have faced powerful resistance in China. And never would I have guessed that the first test, and China’s first major news episode of 2013, would unfold at my old newspaper, Southern Weekly.
The standoff now dubbed the “Southern Weekly New Year’s greeting incident” (南周新年献词事件) was ignited by the callous intrusion of provincial propaganda authorities in Guangdong into the production of the newspaper’s New Year’s edition. In the backlash that followed, censorship was singled out for criticism.
For people who want to better understand the Southern Weekly incident, there are two pieces in particular that I recommend. The first, “The Party’s Suppression of the Media is Exposed” (中共钳制媒体揭秘), was written by former Southern Metropolis Daily editor-in-chief Cheng Yizhong (程益中). The second, “Who Revised the New Year’s Greeting at Southern Weekly” (究竟谁删改了南方周末新年献词), was written by Zeng Li (曾礼).
Zeng, in fact, was assigned to Southern Weekly as a content reviewer (审读员), and in the midst of the crisis he published a blog post that struck a counterblow to suggestions that provincial propaganda leaders had not been responsible for the blow up at Southern Weekly. Zeng offered conclusive evidence of censorship.
To be exact, China does not have (or typically has not had) the kind of censorship over copy that was the practice under the Kuomintang. Under Mao Zedong, the message in the media was entirely unified. In the Deng Xiaoping era there was at last talk of news reform (新闻改革), and one deputy propaganda minister even said at the time: “What newspapers do and don’t publish should be decided by newspapers themselves.”
In the aftermath of the June Fourth crackdown in 1989, however, media returned to a state of strict control. In the Jiang Zemin era, daily controls on news media were mostly exercised as “prior orders and bans” (事前禁令) and as “ex post facto punishment” (事后追惩).
Ban and Punish
When I served as executive deputy editor-in-chief of Southern Weekly from 1998 to 2001, I witnessed numerous “orders and bans” and repeated instances of “punishment.”
Orders and bans essentially delimit and confine your work before publication. They tell you what you can and cannot cover, and how. They may tell you also what you must cover. Punishment is generally meted out by the News Commentary Group (阅评组) of the propaganda department, which monitors media content, sending orders for discipline when “problems” are discovered after the fact.
During my time at Southern Weekly we routinely received ten or more “news commentaries” each year from the Central Propaganda Department. Each time this happened, the leaders up top — at our mother paper, the official Nanfang Daily — would suffer palpitations of anxiety. Any time a news commentary came we would be summoned to discuss the matter. We would put our heads together and determine whether a self-criticism was necessary, or whether some other disciplinary measure had to be taken.
My own fate, my removal as a top editor at Southern Weekly, was sealed once I had collected a fair number of these “news commentaries.” One troublesome report became the final straw, and so it was my turn to go.
Southern Weekly has enjoyed the protection of Guangdong’s provincial Party leadership in the past. But during those years I was at the paper, the situation grew steadily worse. Even at that time, though, there were never any instances of prior censorship exercised from outside the newspaper.
While at Southern Weekly I oversaw the creation of three New Year’s special issues. All were the work of the editorial office.
Prior Censorship Released From Its Cage
As Cheng Yizhong has noted, toward the end of the Jiang Zemin era the orders and bans of the propaganda department went underground. They were no longer delivered in written form.
After 2005, controls tightened. Following the creation in the early 1990s of the News Commentary Group, the Central Propaganda Department then formed a “content review system” (审读制度), placing “reviewers,” or shenduyuan (审读员), directly inside media regarded as strategically important. These reviewers would exercise prior censorship on media content. At the same time, a group of trusted propaganda officials were appointed as editors in chief at newspapers in order to take strict precautions.
As tight as things got — with every branch and blade of grass mistaken for the enemy — the attitude of propaganda officials toward those media seen as more outspoken was one of trepidation. The Central Propaganda Department became much more hands-on, displaying its power before newspapers like Southern Weekly.
Zeng Li, the reviewer at Southern Weekly, has revealed that since May 2012, when Tuo Zhen (庹震) became the new minister of propaganda for Guangdong province, the control and oversight of newspapers in Guangdong reached an extent previously unseen. The theme of each issue of Southern Weekly had to be reported to the provincial propaganda office, and editorial could only proceed after this had been approved.
Important news reports and editorials all had to go through a review process at the propaganda office before they could be published. There was even one instance in which notification of a report’s deletion came only after the newspaper had gone to press, so that hundreds of thousands of copies had to be destroyed. (Another friend at Southern Weekly says that there were in fact four cases in 2012 of reports being killed after the issue had gone to press).
The Five Cuts (连挨五刀)
The editorial process surrounding the 2013 New Year’s special edition of Southern Weekly is in fact a living specimen of news censorship in contemporary China. In the midst of this storm, the Professional Ethics Committee of Southern Weekly (新闻职业伦理委员会) released a version of the internal process involved in the creation the New Year’s edition. This account paints a reliable portrait of the rough intrusion of news censorship.
Having been involved in the New Year’s edition, I understand just how important it is as a mark of the Southern Weekly brand. The issue is highly anticipated by readers, and the process of getting the issue out is painstaking. this is especially true when everything you do is so carefully scrutinized.
Preparations for this issue began in early December. The theme agreed upon initially was “crossing the river,” a reference of course to Deng Xiaoping’s famous statement about the reform process as “crossing the river by feeling the stones.” The theme proposal was passed on to the paper’s editor-in-chief, Huang Can (黄灿), by the editorial office. It was mid-month before a response came back from Huang. He advised instead that the issue center around the idea of the “China Dream” (中国梦), a decision made entirely to appease propaganda leaders.
On December 23, the editorial office provided a written plan for the issue to Huang Can. On the 24th, Huang submitted the plan to provincial propaganda authorities. Importantly, this was the first time in the paper’s history that the New Year’s special edition was subjected to prior censorship.
In fact, this prior censorship of the Southern Weekly involved what we can call “five cuts” (身挨五刀), as follows:
FIRST CUT: Many proposed topics for the issue were rejected. On December 26, the first opinion came back from the provincial propaganda office. It dealt mostly with “people.” Many planned profiles of certain people had to be removed.
SECOND CUT: The New Year’s Greeting (新年献词) in the issue was delivered twice for review and revision by propaganda authorities. The original title of the Southern Weekly greeting was “China’s Dream, the Dream of Constitutionalism” (“中国梦，宪政梦”). Huang Can was unhappy with the editorial and so he made revisions and then sent it to propaganda authorities. The paper was then ordered to work on another draft, which was again submitted. The draft submitted on December 31 was cut down to 1,000 words. The title was, “We Are Closer to Our Dream Than Ever Before” (我们比任何时候都更接近梦想).
THIRD CUT: Major cuts were made to the inside pages of the special issue. On the night of December 31, as production of the issue was in its final stages, Huang Can conveyed further opinions from the propaganda office to the paper’s editors. An entire page was cut that included an end-of-the-year round up of major news stories. An order later came for the deletion of two more articles. The editors had no choice but to spend another two hours laying out the issue.
FOURTH CUT: There was an attempt to entirely supplant the front page of the issue. As the editors were laying out the page, Huang Can took a photo of the front page with his mobile phone and sent it to the propaganda office.
In the early hours of January 1, 2013, Huang Can suddenly informed the editors of the latest “opinion” from propaganda authorities. First, authorities said the front-page image from Chinese history of Yu the Great Taming the Waters was too dark — it might be misinterpreted, they said. It had to be replaced by an image of an aircraft carrier. Second, the words “China’s Dream, a Dream [Glimpsed Through] Adversity” (中国梦, 梦之难) could not be used for the front-page of the issue.
After hearing these instructions, the mood of the editors essentially collapsed. The deadline for signing off on the proofs had long since passed. Major changes were basically impossible. After some back and forth, it was agreed that the image could stay. The headline was changed to “Homeland Dreams” (家国梦).
FIFTH CUT: This was the last and most serious cut, and it happened after the entire production process had finished. At around 3 a.m. on January 1, with work finally finished, the editors responsible for the special issue signed the pages. The deputy editor was the last to sign before the proofs went off to the printer. The editors then switched off their mobiles and went home.
At first light, the editor-in-chief and deputy editor-in-chief were called back to the provincial propaganda office and ordered to make further changes to the issue. The focus was on the front-page and the annual greeting. Provincial propaganda authorities said they wanted introductory remarks added to the front page. These words were attributed to Guangdong’s propaganda chief, Tuo Zhen (庹震), once the incident had boiled over onto China’s internet.
Based on what we know now, it is likely the introductory remarks were dictated orally by the deputy propaganda minister, Yang Jian (杨健), and transcribed by the deputy editor-in-chief before being sent back by mobile for a final approval. The final, final version of the introductory remarks was then sent back by propaganda authorities for publication.
It is not yet clear exactly who finalized the text, which included grade-school errors — referring, for example, to the historical episode of Yu the Great Taming the Waters as occurring 2,000 years ago. In fact, Yu the Great lived between 2,200 and 2,100 B.C.. You do the math.
Still unsatisfied, authorities also turned again to the New Year’s greeting (which, remember, had been censored three times already). Several lines were removed and around 100 words added. One casualty of this final draft was the last surviving instance of the word “constitutionalism,” the idea at the heart of the original. Additions to the greeting included language pulled directly from the political report to the recent 18th National Congress — “[We have] confidence in our theory, confidence in our path and confidence in our system.”
On the night of January 1, provincial propaganda authorities ordered that the title of the special issue be changed to “Seeking Dreams” (追梦). With the editorial staff now off duty, it was now up to the editor-in-chief and deputy editor-in-chief of Southern Weekly to head to the print room and carry out the final instructions.
I ask any of my fellow Chinese journalists to consider as they read this account: Have you ever seen such an editorial process as this? I am plenty familiar with the process of media control in China, but I find this case astounding! Is there anything these controls don’t fuss about? Content plans. Issues. Specific topics. Drafts. Photos . . . Everything, absolutely everything, must serve the goals of the propaganda office. And the journalists and editors of the newspaper are little more than servants to be ordered around. The staff at Southern Weekly labored through exhaustion day after day, not to put out the best issue of the newspaper possible but to deal with the tortuous whims of propaganda officials. These controls are like a nightmare that goes on day after day, month after month.
Southern Weekly is a commercial product — even though, naturally, it is a special kind of product. Southern Weekly is a commercially operating enterprise whose boss ultimately is the Chinese Communist Party. But China today already has a “modern enterprise system” (现代企业制度). Look at today’s state-run enterprises. Can Party leaders trifle as they please with the managers of these enterprises? Can they just head over and poke their fingers into the operation of these businesses? Of course not. But such chronic symptoms of the planned economy are still very much alive within today’s system of news and propaganda.
The First “No”
The Southern Weekly incident is important first and foremost because it exposes what has been happening behind the scenes. Over a period of several years, media controls have been transforming and becoming much stricter. Methods of prior censorship have been applied shamelessly in the darkness.
In recent years, devoted readers of Southern Weekly have bemoaned the fact that the newspaper has been less strong and less critical, that it has been missing altogether from many major stories. Increased doses of official jargon and empty talk in its pages has not gone unnoticed.
Former Southern Weekly reporter Li Haipeng (李海鹏) wrote on Chinese social media recently: “I arrived at Southern Weekly in 2002 and left in 2009. I saw for myself that there wasn’t a day that the paper didn’t struggle under strict control. It was like a tree that would lose a branch today and another tomorrow . . . ”
Readers of Southern Weekly had no way of knowing how much truth had been buried by the heavy hand of prior censorship — how many sparks had been snuffed out.
The staff at Southern Weekly had suffered long. But this time they hit their limit. Their demands were specific. They wanted a rollback of prior censorship. They wanted editors to have autonomy again.
Propaganda leaders may be more careful after this showdown over censorship. But the road to freedom of expression as guaranteed in Article 35 of China’s Constitution will be a long one. The orders and bans will continue. Punishments will still await those who step too far over the line.
But we can say that things have begun. For the first time, the word “NO” has resounded within China’s media system. The game of competing interests we saw played out this week was like none we have seen before.
My hope is that China’s leaders will have the wisdom to distinguish between those who desire and support a fresh approach to governance, and those whose disgusting actions only create anger and mistrust.
The time has come for greater tolerance of the media. The time has come to be more respectful of the people’s rights. On the issue of political reform, we can delay no longer.

As we reported earlier today, journalists at The Beijing News sent a strong message of support to their colleagues in south China yesterday when they chose (against an explicit directive) not to publish the hardline Global Times editorial on the Southern Weekly incident. The paper, apparently brought to heel, finally ran the editorial today.
But the spirit of principled resistance is still very much alive at The Beijing News, and it can be glimpsed in this piece posted online today in the paper’s lifestyle section — a classic example of the time-honored practice of conveying deeper meaning through sublime and ambiguous writing, or chunqiu bifa (春秋笔法).
The piece is a loving tribute, yes, to porridge. In particular, to the porridge of the south. But it is really a song of love and support from The Beijing News to similarly embattled colleagues at Southern Weekly.
In Chinese, the word for “porridge,” zhou (粥), is a homophone of the first character in “weekend,” zhoumo (周末), the second half of Southern Weekly‘s publication name. The shorthand for Southern Weekly is nanzhou (南周), which sounds very similar to “porridge of the south,” or nanfang de zhou (南方的粥).
“Zhou,” also known as congee, is a food eaten widely in Guangdong and Hong Kong.
A selected translation follows:

Hot porridge in an earthen pot, hailing from [China’s] southland. Just placed upon the table, the porridge writhes still with heat. Perhaps it has a heart of courage yet. In the deep of the cold night, you open your mouth and white steam billows. There are so many troubles in this world, and all you can count on for warmth is this bowl of porridge.
It is said that this year is the coldest winter for decades . . . from the south all the way to the north — like a person chilled from head to foot. In the lingering cold of the night, what can offer us a bit of warmth and comfort?
　　
Well, the first thing that comes to my mind is a steaming hot bowl of porridge. And there is nothing better than the earthen pot porridge of the south.
. . .
　　
Just a bowl of porridge, but in this bitter winter, we gather round this bowl of porridge and warm ourselves. This food bears the weight of hope. In olden times, running porridge shops was a tradition passed down for generations. Porridge can bring us prosperity. It can satisfy our hunger. Perhaps a bowl of porridge seems not worth talking about — and yet, how many destitute and homeless has it saved.
Hot porridge in an earthen pot, hailing from [China’s] southland. Just set upon the table, the porridge still writhes with heat. Perhaps it still has a heart of courage. In the deep of the cold night, you open your mouth and white steam billows. There are so many cares in the world, and all you can count on for warmth is this bowl of porridge. A bowl of hot porridge tells us of the power of love and consolation.

We were hearing late yesterday that negotiations were going ahead in Guangdong that might enable Southern Weekly to return to its former status quo, bringing to a close the one-week standoff between newspaper staff and overbearing local propaganda leaders. The big news today is that the Southern Weekly incident has claimed its first professional casualty, with the resignation of Dai Zigeng (戴自更) as publisher of The Beijing News in protest of a propaganda order forcing Chinese newspapers to run a hardline editorial from the Global Times.
[UPDATE 5pm: SCMP is now reporting that Dai’s resignation was “verbal” and it is uncertain whether this has been accepted by Beijing propaganda authorities. Note, the authorities have a strong interest in maintaining Dai’s presence as publisher until this boils over. What we need is word from Dai himself.]
Like Southern Weekly, The Beijing News is recognized as one of China’s top professional newspapers. It also has a familial relationship to Southern Weekly, having been originally launched by former Southern Metropolis Daily editor-in-chief Cheng Yizhong (程益中) as a joint venture between the Nanfang Media Group and Guangming Daily.
In one of the biggest China media stories of 2011, The Beijing News was transfered to direct control by Beijing’s municipal Party committee, essentially knocking it down an administrative rank and making it more difficult for the paper to report more sensitive local stories in the capital.
According to one version of yesterday’s events, The Beijing News received a visit from a Beijing city-level propaganda official after it refused to publish the Global Times editorial, which appeared in many papers across the country (and had been pasted across the internet the day before). The official reportedly threatened to dissolve the newspaper if it did not comply with the central-level order to run the Global Times piece.
After receiving this warning, The Beijing News held a staff vote to decide whether or not to comply with the propaganda order. The vote was in favor of “not reprinting” (拒绝转载). Soon after, Dai Zigeng submitted his resignation to local propaganda authorities and the mood inside the paper was reportedly dismal, with many staffers in tears.

[ABOVE: Dai Zigeng resigned as publisher of The Beijing News yesterday over a propaganda order instructing media to run a hardline editorial from the Global Times.]
The pressure from Beijing propaganda leaders continued, however, and the decision was eventually made late last night — by exactly whom is not yet clear — to run the Global Times editorial in today’s edition. The editorial appears on Page 20 under the headline, “Global Times Runs Editorial on the Southern Weekly Incident.”

We’ll keep our eye on this case and share anything we can at the earliest possible opportunity.

The Southern Weekly story continues to develop rapidly in China. With no response yet from the Party leadership, the stakes are rising. How will China’s leaders balance the impact this crisis could have on Xi Jinping’s (not-so-carefully crafted) image as a reformer against the Party’s essential priority of maintaining public opinion controls?
If it is true, as Berkeley’s China Digital Times (CDT) reports, that media have been issued a propaganda directive on the Southern Weekly incident that deflects blame from Guangdong propaganda officials toward foreign “hostile forces,” that is not an encouraging sign. The tone of the directive as reported by CDT is extremely hardline, reaffirming that “Party operation of the media is an unshakeable basic principle (党管媒体是不可动摇的基本原则).”
As the Southern Weekly crisis develops, we should bear in mind that this did not begin as a face-off between pro-reform voices and status-quo Party conservatives. While the incident has now prompted calls for freedom of speech in China, the root issue was that propaganda officials in Guangdong — the spiritual heart of China’s reform and opening — upset the status-quo by exercising censorship to such an intrusive extent that the situation became unacceptable to working journalists, most of whom had already made an uneasy peace with media controls.
The crisis at the Nanfang Media Group is not just about whether Xi Jinping is serious about the ostensible new openness and responsiveness attributed to him by sustained state propaganda. It is about whether China could be moving backward on the issue of media freedom, which would send worrying signals about the overall direction set by the new leadership.
Despite the concerted application of controls on Chinese social media — more from our excellent Data Journalism Lab — the Southern Weekly incident seems not to have abated online.

[ABOVE: In these images posted to Chinese social media, users hold up signs supporting Southern Weekly.]
In particular today, social media users have heaped scorn on the Global Times newspaper for its editorial yesterday, which played down vocal opposition to the actions against Southern Weekly by suggesting its defenders were an isolated few with little real knowledge of what had actually happened at the paper.
The Global Times editorial — which was run in scores of Chinese media under an order by propaganda authorities — alleges on the basis of a statement issued on January 6 through the official Sina Weibo account of Southern Weekly that Guangdong’s provincial propaganda office was not responsible for the changes made to the paper’s New Year’s edition after the page proofs had been finalized by editors. As we wrote yesterday, reliable internal sources at Nanfang Media said editors and other staff widely criticized that Weibo statement, which was in fact pushed by propaganda authorities exerting pressure on the paper’s top editors.
Here is one of the paragraphs in the Global Times piece, which also makes a snide reference to the case of Chen Guangcheng, apparently an attempt to brand Southern Weekly supporters as collaborators aligned with American interests, an assertion that fits with the “hostile forces” warning in CDT’s reported propaganda directive:

The Southern Weekly crisis has smoldered in recent days, but if we look carefully we see that many of the people most active online, aside from a few who are working at Southern Weekly, are those who left Southern Weekly long ago, people who have lately had not relationship to the newspaper group — and also a number of active Weibo users. In the real world, they are quite scattered, connecting only through the internet. Their most recent focus of support [before this incident] was Chen Guangcheng (陈光诚), who is now far away in America.

The Global Times piece also confuses the issues at stake in the Southern Weekly incident, suggesting the protests represent an impractical, idealistic push for free media:

Whether or not these people wish it to be so, there is a generally accepted view that under China’s current social and political situation it’s impossible to have “free media” of the sort these people desire in their hearts. The development of all media in China can only accord with China’s larger realities. Media reform must be part of China’s overall reforms, and media will assuredly not become “political special zones” in China.

No one, of course, is calling for “political special zones” in China. As I said earlier, journalists at Southern Weekly were objecting first and foremost to a serious encroachment on already limited freedoms. Arguably, there was ample opportunity late last week, after the incident broke, for the authorities to deal with it intelligently. It was only after the strong-arm response over the weekend — and the forced false statement through the newspapers official Sina Weibo account — that the situation escalated into broader calls for free speech.
In a clear indication of the ugly turn in the tone of the row over the Southern Weekly incident, social media users are widely likening propaganda and media censorship to the feeding and eating of feces.
This post by Yu Geng (余耕), for example, jokes bitterly that “in fact only a piece of shit separates Southern Weekly and the Global Times — of course, Southern Weekly shovels the shit and the Global Times eats it.” The post is accompanied by a smash-up image of both newspapers separated by, well, see for yourself.

The image of Global Times in the smash-up is taken from the newspaper’s February 10, 2012, edition, which features an article by a Fudan University scholar arguing that Chinese media must act as watchdogs, but of the country’s “national interests” rather than the public interest.
This Weibo post, with another visual mash-up, similarly likens the Global Times to a “good dog” that does the bidding of Party leaders.
In this cartoon, posted to Sina Weibo by artist Perverted Pepper (变态辣椒), a Santa Claus whose face is formed by the Chinese character for “propaganda” (宣) spoon feeds feces to waiting children from a bowl being used as a toilet (to put it gently) by another figure labeled “Global Times: “One spoon for each person!” he says.

When Global Times editor-in-chief Hu Xijin (胡锡进) defended his newspaper earlier today by saying it had “a responsibility first and foremost to its millions of readers,” he was met with a tide of scorn. One user re-posted Hu’s remarks and added: “What editor-in-chief Hu means to say is that when shit tastes this delicious, why aren’t the rest of you following our example?”

Information is developing rapidly in the wake of last week’s “New Year’s Greeting” incident at Guangdong’s Southern Weekly, one of China’s leading professional newspapers. For those who weren’t looking, CMP posted two updates over the weekend, available here and here.
In a moment, we’ll post our translation of an important open letter released over the weekend by a group of prominent Chinese scholars from the mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan. The letter bemoans the “loss of freedom of expression” in Guangdong, a “crucial touchstone” of reforms, and calls for the immediate removal of Tuo Zhen (庹震) as propaganda chief of the province.
Before we get to that letter, however, let’s review the latest information on this developing incident, which is without a doubt one of the most important we will witness in China this year.

[ABOVE: In the lobby of the Nanfang Media office building in Guangzhou, a wall mural touts the group’s strong legacy. Photo by David Bandurski.]
According to an internal account CMP obtained from a source at the Nanfang Daily Group, which publishes a constellation of top magazines and newspapers, including Southern Weekend and Southern Metropolis Daily, an expanded meeting (编委扩大会议) of the editorial committee at Southern Weekly was held at 7 p.m. on Saturday, January 5. The meeting was voluntarily attended by many members of the paper’s editorial staff.
At the meeting, editorial staff demanded that a special investigative team be appointed to look into the “New Year’s Greeting” incident and produce a report to be issued publicly. Wang Genghui (王更辉), the deputy editor of Nanfang Media, and Huang Can (黄灿), a member of the group’s editorial committee and acting editor-in-chief of Southern Weekly, described to those present how the New Year’s special edition of the newspaper had been “altered in violation of the rules” (违规删改), particularly in the addition of an introduction to the edition. They promised that there would be no settling of scores and that the censorship process would be “returned to normal.”
At the insistence of the editorial staff, Wang Genghui and Huang Can agreed to the immediate formation of an investigative team and said they would relay the staff’s demands to their superiors. The meeting concluded at around midnight.
At around 12:30 a.m. yesterday, January 6, editorial staff learned from reliable sources of an instant message (短信) reportedly ordered by Huang Can and passed on by the paper’s general manager, Mao Zhe (毛哲), ordering that a statement be issued via Southern Weekly‘s official Sina Weibo account. The core content of that message was as follows: “The January 3 New Year’s Message and its introduction in the New Year’s edition of this newspaper were written by editors at the paper to conform to the theme of ‘seeking dreams.'”
The deliberate distortion of the truth in the instant message was a shock to the paper’s editors, especially to those editors who had been responsible for the issue in question.
The staff subsequently learned that just as Southern Weekly was holding its expanded editorial committee meeting, Nanfang Media had held a “core group meeting” of its Party committee (党委核心小组会) under pressure from provincial propaganda authorities. The meeting had discussed the statement contained in the instant message.
Opinions at the meeting were divided, and no final decision had been reached, but at the direction of Nanfang Media’s Party secretary, Yang Jian (杨健), who is also a provincial propaganda official and was present at the meeting, Huang Can directly pressed the staff member in charge of the paper’s official Weibo, Wu Wei (吴蔚), with an order to make the post.
Southern Weekly editorial staff immediately sought out Huang Can and the media group’s Party Committee and voiced their opposition to the public statement. Huang Can’s response was that the words “and its introduction” could be removed from the statement, so that it would read instead: “”The January 3 New Year’s Message in the New Year’s edition of this newspaper were written by editors at the paper to conform to the theme of ‘seeking dreams.'”
Yesterday morning, January 6, members of the Southern Weekly editorial committee separately contacted responsible persons at Nanfang Media saying they hoped the statement and its flagrant twisting of the truth be withdrawn. At the same time, just as the release of the objectionable statement was imminent, news broke online of the report from Singapore’s Lianhe Zaobao (CMP referred to this story yesterday), which reported — without any attempt at confirmation from Southern Weekly editors — that “Tuo Zhen was not in Guangdong at the time the incident occurred, and the incident has no connection to him or to Guangdong’s propaganda office.”
In the view of Southern Weekly staffers, the statement being prepared for the paper’s official Weibo and the information reportedly leaked to Lianhe Zaobao by a source close to the propaganda office were entirely related. They believed this was a concerted effort to direct responsibility away from Tuo Zhen and provincial propaganda authorities.
At around 4 p.m. yesterday, January 6, members of the editorial committee at Southern Weekly received notice that a session was to be held on the 21st floor of the Nanfang Media office building.

With Wang Genghui and Huang Can presiding, the editorial committee meeting was attended by Cheng Mingyang (陈明洋), Wu Xiaofeng (伍小峰), Zhu Qiang (朱强), Qiao Hua (肖华) and Zhu Hongjun (朱红军). The paper’s general manager, Mao Zhe, was also present.
At the meeting, Wang and Huang expressed their determination to send out the false statement, but this met with uniform resistance from the other members of the editorial board. Mao Zhe also rejected the idea at the time.
The dissenting members of the editorial committee emphasized the need to respond to the demands of the editorial staff and offered a proposal for resolving the incident. Wang and Huang said they would make a record of the proposal and present it to the Group and to the propaganda authorities. Mao, the general manager, also gave his support. The editorial committee reminded Huang and Wang of the importance of taking a conciliatory attitude so that staff morale could rebound and work go forward on the paper’s next issue.
After the meeting ended, members of the editorial committee shared the content of the meeting with core staff members. There was a general sense of support. Everyone kept their cool.
At 7:51 p.m., Wu Wei, the staff member responsible for the newspaper’s official Weibo account, urgently notified members of the editorial committee that the editor-in-chief, Huang Can, had again pressured him, asking that he share the paper’s Weibo account username and password. Wu Wei repeatedly withheld the information.
At 9:18 p.m., Wu Wei was forced to comply with a request for the account information and everyone was notified that he would no longer be responsible for content on the Southern Weekly Weibo account.
At 9:20 p.m. a statement staffers described as “completely at odds with the truth” (不符事实真相) was issued on the official Weibo account of Southern Weekly (@南方周末) without confirmation or authorization from members of the newspaper’s editorial committee.
About 10 minutes after the statement was released, Huang Can and Mao Zhe arrived at the editorial office on the 23rd floor and told those present: “[Nanfang Media Party Secretary] Yang Jian (杨健) would like to have a word.” Editors refused.
At 10:09 p.m., Huang Can sent a message to one member of the Southern Weekly editorial committee saying that he was “very sad” (很难过) over the matter.
Thus began the “strike” by Southern Weekly staff. John Kennedy at SCMP has some images here.
That is the summary of most recent events as shared with CMP by a source at Nanfang Media.
Let’s turn quickly now to another important open letter on the “New Year’s Greeting” incident at Southern Weekly. This letter, issued yesterday and addressed to Guangdong’s new top leader, Hu Chunhua (胡春华), calls for the immediate removal of Guangdong’s propaganda minister, Tuo Zhen.
Signers of the open letter include Peking University law professor He Weifang (贺卫方), economist Mao Yushi (矛于轼), prominent lawyer Zhang Sizhi (张思之), author Zhang Yihe (章诒和) and veteran journalist and blogger Li Chengpeng (李承鹏).

To the Guangdong Provincial Party Committee and Secretary Hu Chunhua:
This time, the actions of your Honorable Committee’s propaganda Minister, Tuo Zhen, concerning the special New Year’s edition of Southern Weekly, have extended throughout society. In public opinion, the disgust and opposition toward Tuo Zhen is readily visible, and it is clear that society generally has taken a civilized and necessary position of resistance to Tuo Zhen and to the Honorable Committee’s Propaganda Office, which Tuo Zhen leads. When we learned of this situation, we reacted with alarm, and there are certain things which must be spoken, hence this formal recommendation (建议书).
Guangdong province is the bridgehead (建议书) of reform and opening, and it has been committed to taking the lead. In China today, the lingering sense of rise and regeneration relies to a great extent on Guangdong. For Xi [Jinping] as for Deng [Xiaoping] before him, southern tours (南巡) marked great events that began in Guangdong. The entire nation, and people both here at home and overseas, regards Guangdong as the most crucial touchstone (试金石) of reform and opening. The power of this one province ripples across our whole country, and the contributions of Southern Weekly are an undeniable part of that. Over the past 30 years, Southern Weekly has focused on everyday lives, on issues of justice and conscience with professionalism, good sense and a temperate [attitude], laying down the Guangdong tradition and Guangdong spirit of reform and opening.
For many years, through the efforts of the “people of Southern Weekly” (南周人), who have harbored strong feelings for their country along with a strong constructive spirit, Southern Weekly has been an important domestic media, propagating the reform tradition of Guangdong, and it has garnered widespread respect in and outside China. Internationally, Southern Weekly is already regarded as the face of China under reform and opening. Domestically, Southern Weekly has spoken with a clear sense of truth, and has spoken on the people’s behalf. It is one of the newspapers [in our country] that presses closest to the feelings of the public. . .
The editorial team at Southern Weekly remains one of the country’s top groups of media professionals, and they are, moreover, closely connected with the current of reform and the spirit of opening. They have been moderate, rational and forbearing, with a sense of order. The actions this time of Tuo Zhen, your Honorable Committee’s propaganda Minister, will stir public anger and urge them to common protest (群体抗议) such as we have not seen in Southern Weekly‘s 30-year history. If it had not been for Tuo Zhen’s overbearing actions, would things have come to this point?
The ice has thickened, and this is not one day’s Winter. It is said that ever since Tuo Zhen took up his post as propaganda minister of Guangdong, he has leapfroged the editorial flow of Southern Weekly, unscrupulously inserting himself in the editorial process, with sense of neither the proper measure of his post nor the nature of decent conduct. He has treated his official power as an instrument of personal gain . . . Wherever he goes ten thousand horses stand mute [i.e., no one dares say anything]. If Tuo Zhen did not harbor such hostility for reform and opening, would things have come to this point?
. . . .
We are concerned that permitting someone like Tuo Zhen to continue in his position, . . . will have an even greater negative impact on Guangdong’s provincial Party leadership in the future, and will possibly mean a loss of the Guangdong tradition so integral to opening and reform. [We are concerned] that the freedom of expression that newspapers and magazines [there] should have will be completely lost.
In light of this we openly advise that the only correct means [of dealing with this matter] is to immediately remove Tuo Zhen from his position as provincial minister of propaganda and to dispatch him to a more arduous placement for further tempering and training, which would put him on a right path.
The first group of signers are as follows:
Mao Yushi (矛于轼), economist
Zhang Sizhi (张思之), lawyer
Zhang Yihe (章诒和), author
Li Chengpeng (李承鹏), author
Ye Fu (野夫)
He Weifang (贺卫方), professor of law, Peking University
Zhang Qianfan (张千帆), professor of law, Peking University
Qin Hui (秦晖), professor of history, Tsinghua University
Guo Yuhua (郭于华), professor of sociology, Tsinghua University
Zhang Ming (张鸣), professor of international relations, People’s University of China
Xi Xin (徐昕), professor of law, Beijing Institute of Technology
. . . SEE CHINESE BELOW FOR FULL LIST OF SIGNERS.

The recent incident at Guangdong’s Southern Weekly appears to be galvanizing Chinese from diverse backgrounds. Earlier today, we reported how the second open letter voicing support for the newspaper has been signed not just by journalists but by lawyers, academics, artists, writers, students, migrant workers and others.
This afternoon another open letter surfaced on Chinese social media, this time attributed to students at Guangzhou’s Sun Yat-sen University. The letter, which includes the names of 18 signers identified as students of the university, bears the title: “Today, We Are Not Without Choices: An Independent Call from Sun Yat-sen University Students on the Southern Weekly Incident.”
The letter concludes with three demands:
1. That the Party leadership in Guangdong launches a thorough investigation of the causes of the incident, and that those responsible are handled according to the law.
2. That all internet posts and Weibo posts discussing this incident that have been blocked or deleted be reinstated, “respecting the expression of every differing opinion.”
3. That no action be taken to punish anyone who has voiced their opinion over the incident.
A partial translation of the letter follows:

As the bells rang in 2013, the sun did not shine on this new year. Nor on this New Year’s did the New Year’s Greeting at Southern Weekly meet the public as normal. What came instead was the news that government organs (权力部门) has crudely interfered with the editorial process, creating a news accident (新闻事故); what came instead was the denunciation of propaganda organs by the editors and readers of Southern Weekly.
Southern Weekend has earned peoples’ respect became it “stands in the muck of the public will,” because it “gives power to the powerless, and urges the pessimists on.” It [commands respect] because of the conviction that “a single statement of truth weighs more than the whole world.” It [commands respect] because it “has never given up.” These are also our reasons for choosing Southern Weekly, and for supporting Southern Weekly.
Today, the Southern Weekly that has given us confidence and strength seems utterly powerless.
It is because we have yielded that power has become unbridled and wanton; it is because we have been silent that the Constitution has become a rubber stamp. Our yielding and our silence has not brought a return of our freedom and our radiance. Quite the opposite, it has brought the untempered intrusion and infiltration of rights by power.
The journalist Tan Weishan (谭伟山) wrote on Weibo: “Why have we always remained silent? Because this is an era in which a single phone call can rescind your employment, because you need to sustain your family, to put a roof over their heads, because resistance on your part could harm both those above and below you, and possibly bring the closure of the entire newspaper.”
Today we can still choose to remain silent. We can still choose to do nothing about power that has run amok. But we know very well that if today we continue to yield and to choose silence, what awaits us is a bottomless abyss. . .
Mr. Hu Shi once said famously and rightly: “Fighting for your own rights is fighting for the rights of your country; fighting for your own freedom is fighting for the freedom of your country. Never was a free and democratic country built by slaves.”
If we always pointed the finger at outside factors, and if we never began with ourselves, this world of ours would never ever change. . .

There seem to be constant new developments what is now being referred to as the “New Year’s Greeting incident” at Guangdong’s Southern Weekly. Those new to the story can catch up here and here, and read the wrap-up at the Wall Street Journal.
Singapore’s Lianhe Zaobao yesterday cited an unnamed “official source” as saying that Guangdong’s propaganda chief, Tuo Zhen (庹震), singled out over the past three days as responsible for the interference at Southern Weekly, was not in Guangdong when the incident occurred. According to the newspaper, the source said the action “had nothing to do with Guangdong’s provincial propaganda department.”
If this is true it leaves behind a great bit question: Whose decision was it?
A January 4 open letter protesting interference at Southern Weekly, the second following a letter from a group of former Southern Weekly journalists, continues to gather signatures. A confirmed list of the first batch of signers, obtained by the China Media Project yesterday, included 98 signatures made before 10 p.m. on January 4. Signers included Ai Xiaoming (艾晓明), a popular professor at Guangzhou’s Sun Yat-sen University, and Southern Metropolis Daily founder and former editor-in-chief Cheng Yizhong (程益中).
The second confirmed list of signers, those signing before 10 a.m. on January 5, included 458 names. Among them were well-known Chinese blogger Bei Feng (北风) and Cui Weiping (崔卫平), a professor at Beijing Film Academy and a frequent contributor to Southern Weekly.
Signers of the letter represented a wide range of fields and backgrounds — journalists, academics, writers, students, lawyers, migrant workers, and even one name identified as “a citizen seeking freedom.”
Our deleted post archive shows that posts, like this one, about the Southern Weekly incident are being actively removed from social media in China.
Searches on Sina Weibo for Southern Weekly are now blocked, returning a message that reads: “According to relevant laws, regulations and policies the search results for ‘Southern Weekly’ cannot be shown.”

Apparently, searches in English for “Southern Weekend” and “Southern Weekly” are still fair game.
Below is the full Chinese-language version of the second open letter.
—————
就南方周末献词事件告天下书
末世未亡，现世再传劣迹。二零一三年初，《南方周末》刊发新年纪念特刊，全部付型版样已经审定，记者编辑休假。在编辑部不知情的情况下，广东省委宣传部部长庹震妄动私念，狠删既定版面，篡改新年献词，并指令私添错误百出之特刊按语，铸成南周献词事件。
南周苦审查久矣。然而特刊选题经庹震审核批准，成稿按指令或删减或抽掉，付印大样也历经内外查验。概言之，庹震篡改之前，南周特刊无一字不经审验，审查意志贯彻始终。究庹震所为，假借审查官之外衣做掩护，但僭越办报流程之实不能欺瞒。
南周新年献词本有传统，用词立意皆成新篇，每每为时人传诵与钦佩。而庹震侵犯审查与新闻边界，不惮涂抹献词，格式化中国梦想，染指南周珍宝而谄媚上意，令人憎恶。其大禹治水之按语，用典、历史皆错，更有错别字贻笑坊间，颟顸之态徒增笑料。
大陆办报，制度环境早已众所周知，而天网般之事前审查制，则为庹震独创。南周及至广东媒体，皆不能幸免。虽然新闻无法，唯望宣传官员与媒体恪守界限，互有敬畏，始成舆论机关之职责与气象。南周非为私产，庹震待之如私物玩偶，阴狠跋扈，媒体人郁积在此，痛恨尤甚，今日诉诸全国读者。
新闻审查，如鲠在喉，传媒以委屈之态百般腾挪。庹氏入粤不足一年，奉行文阀大棒政治，视管理如绞杀，广东新闻界万马齐喑与薄王治下之当年重庆新闻界毫无二致。庹震之所以屡屡得逞，乃玩弄部长权柄，自相私授独裁独断于粤省。其褫夺新闻编辑权，视新闻界如无物，岂非欺岭南及中国无人哉？
南周蒙尘，亦非南周一家之损失。南方报业与中国改革风潮亦步亦趋。南方进，则中国进，南方败，则中国败。庹震毁版销报，腐蚀改革魂魄，非仅为吞并文字也。此一风向标亦可用于南方政系，想必也为改革世代所认可。此吾辈竭力告读者诸君又一也。
爆发南周献词风波之后，庹震四处周旋，勒令删除记者及南周编辑部微博，更呵斥南方新闻界噤声。借助公权收拾其私欲营造之残局，庹氏未能吓倒新闻界。各界民众齐声驱庹，早已不限于南周读者圈。祈望读者南北、内外，同声呼应，亦可略告慰于天下。
庹震破坏之事，壅塞于途。此人之于新闻界，早已与强梁无异。其钳制舆论，野蛮无教养之作态，更无益于国家，亦以执政党名义献丑于世界，于情于势于理，再难当省宣高位。庹祸不除，新闻界无新闻，所谓刷新政治，徒托空言。望天下读者以真名实姓周知附议，勉力成就。