The following post on alleged police violence posted by Zhang Zhou (张洲), a Chinese film director, was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 5:39am Hong Kong time today, June 1, 2012. Zhang currently has more than 75,000 followers, according to numbers from Sina Weibo. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre].
Zhang Zhou’s post includes the following photograph apparently showing a Chinese police officer pinning a woman to the pavement by placing his knee on her neck.

Zhang writes:

A policeman locking his knee into a woman’s neck and looking coldly at her — this photo definitely has the potential to win the Pulitzer Prize for best news photo.

Lei Yi’s original Chinese post follows:

执法者将膝盖顶在一名妇女的脖子上，轻蔑而冷漠的看着她——这张照片绝对有获《普利策新闻摄影奖》的资质

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.

One of the key strategies of China’s Party leadership in enforcing media controls — under the information policy mandate of “public opinion guidance“, or yulun daoxiang (舆论导向) — has been to restrict the source of news production. This is why the Party prevents online news portals from reporting news independently, forcing them to rely instead on the aggregation of news reported by traditional media, including China’s new generation of market-driven newspapers.
Web portals operated by companies like Sina, Sohu and Tencent cannot maintain their own teams of news reporters. That’s why comedian Zhao Benshan (赵本山) committed a major comic faux pas back in 2010 when when he played out a routine for the annual Spring Festival on China Central Television in which ordinary peasants in the countryside were interviewed by a pair of men introducing themselves as “online journalists” working for a fictional Sohu.com program called “Seeking the Root of the Matter” (刨根问底).

[ABOVE: Comedian Zhao Benshan (second from left) is interviewed by fictional “online journalists” during a skit for the official 2010 Spring Festival Gala.]
As though to fire home the point that reporting restrictions for online media were no laughing matter, the General Administration of Press and Publications (GAPP) — the government agency that licenses journalists and publications — reiterated on February 22, 2010, that websites in China were not eligible for press cards, and therefore had no right to carry out interviews or gather news.
The word in Chinese is caifang (采访), which can mean “interview,” “report” or, more broadly, “gather information.” The GAPP official said websites, or anyone without proper press accreditation, had no “right to interview,” or caifangquan (采访权).
Restricting the “right to interview” to traditional media is politically safer because magazines and newspapers, whether Party run or market-driven, are all part of the official press genealogy. Even market-driven newspapers must have “sponsoring institutions,” which help to ensure political discipline. [For more background on this, please read our post: “How Chinese media relate to power“].
Commercial web portals, which are situated outside the extended Party press family, cannot be trusted with the precious “right to report.”
However, as we’ve emphasized again and again, confusion and complexity are the order of the day in China’s media environment. Just as traditional media — and particularly commercial publications — have exploited the gaps in order to push news coverage further, so have commercial websites tested the limits.
One of the best recent examples of this is Tencent’s Living (活着) series, which manages to offer quality investigative news in pictorial form.
On May 28, Living ran an investigative photo series about China’s national network of illegal kidney suppliers.
We encourage readers to visit the series themselves, but we offer a taste below of how it begins, slide by slide. Brother Sam (山姆哥), incidentally, is the alias for a well-known Chinese investigative reporter, about which we will say no more.

SLIDE 1
From May 14 to 28, 2012, Tencent news photographers went undercover to an illegal kidney sourcing facility in Hangzhou posing as individuals wanting to sell their kidneys, recording the entire process . . . The kidney sales network extends across the country, operating as an efficient assembly line. The price for a single kidney domestically is 35,000 yuan. By Brother Sam (山姆哥) and Cao Zongwen (曹宗文), Editor Wang Wei (王崴)

[ABOVE: The opening slide of QQ.com’s photo report on China’s national kidney sales network. The story’s lead is shown below the photograph..]
SLIDE 2
The kidney selling location in this undercover investigation is located at the intersection of Linding Road (临丁路) and Tiandu Road (天都路) in Hangzhou’s Jianggan District (江干区). From the outside things look perfectly normal, and no one would ever guess that here lives a group of young people who hope to sell their own kidneys. Every year in China the lives of close to one million people rely on dialysis; but in the past year, legal kidney transplant procedures numbered only 4,000. The massive demand has led to the emergence of underground kidney donation, and built up an illegal network of explosive profits.

[ABOVE: Young Chinese wait in a Hangzhou facility, where they hope to sell their kidneys for 35,000 yuan. .]

Continue reading the story from Tencent’s Living (活着) series HERE.

As we edge closer to the 18th Party Congress and its important leadership transition, one of the most crucial things to watch is how the debate over “political system reforms”, or zhengzhi tizhi gaige (政治体制改革), shapes up in China’s press. A key related issue, of course, will be the fight against corruption.
During his July 1, 2011, speech to commemorate the 90th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party, readers may remember [Qian Gang’s analysis here], President Hu Jintao (胡锦涛) said that the Party needed to fight corruption seriously and effectively, or risk losing the support of the people.
But Hu’s speech itself showed an abundance of caution. He offered no concrete answers, not even new political buzzwords — suggesting no one in the leadership had the upper hand and that the battle lines were silently being drawn. He made no mention whatsoever, for example, of the issue of officials reporting their assets (even internally), which has been tossed about for years. He made no mention of the role of press supervision, or “supervision by public opinion” (舆论监督), in holding officials to account.
Throwing up one more for the political reform debate file this year, the Global Times ran an editorial yesterday called, “Fighting Corruption is a Crucial Battle for Chinese Society”. The editorial essentially argued that while corruption is a key issue and should be fought aggressively, the Chinese public should manage their expectations, understanding that thoroughly eliminating corruption is impossible.

[ABOVE: The May 29, 2012, lead editorial in the Global Times addresses corruption and political reform.]
Re-posting the editorial yesterday, major web portals, including QQ.com, rewrote the headline of the Global Times as: “China Must Permit Some Corruption, the Public Should Understand“.
The altered headline itself prompted a great deal of debate on Chinese social media. “QQ.com has spoken the true import of the Global Times editorial,” one user responded.
Addressing the issue this morning, Global Times editor-in-chief Hu Xijin (胡锡进) wrote on his own Weibo account:

The headline for yesterday’s Global Times editorial was, “Fighting Corruption is a Crucial Battle for Chinese Society.” In reposting the editorial, QQ.com maliciously changed the headline to, “China Must Permit Some Corruption, the Public Should Understand”, misleading readers. The Global Times can be criticized, but if this sort of arm-twist editing is encouraged and imitated, this would be to the detriment of public opinion in China. I hope all web editors across the country to not err in opposing this way of doing things.

[ABOVE: The Global Times editorial appears on QQ.com with the altered headline.]
I encourage readers to make their own judgements about the Global Times editorial. A full translation follows:

“Fighting Corruption is a Crucial Battle for Chinese Society” (反腐败是中国社会发展的攻坚战)
Global Times
May 29, 2012
Yesterday it was announced that former railway ministry chief and ministry Party secretary Liu Zhijun (刘志军) has been formally expelled from the Chinese Communist Party. He is suspected of crimes and has been transferred to judicial authorities for handling according to the law. This news has once again rattled the public sensitive nerves on the issue of corruption. Nationally, news about the fall of corrupt officials has come out again and again, giving people the impression that there is wave upon wave of corrupt [officials]. The government arrests corrupt officials, but they keep on coming. So what is going on here?
China is clearly in the midst of a period of high corruption, and the conditions for entirely removing corruption are not in place. Some people say, all we need is to “democratize” and the issue of corruption can be resolved. This view, however, is naive. There are many “democratic countries” in Asia, such as Indonesia, the Philippines and India, where the problem of corruption is more severe than in China. But China is perhaps the country in Asia right now where “the pain of corruption” is felt most keenly.
This has to do with China’s political moral code of “serving the people”, which is lodged in the hearts of the whole society. But in fact, the market economy has upset the implementation [of this moral code], and officials that shrug it off or even betray it continue to emerge through various cracks in our system. China is a country where globalization runs deep, and the high standards of clean [governance] of developed nations have already been acknowledged by the Chinese public. Under the forced compression into the Chinese public opinion environment of this information stemming from different times and contexts, there is no way of release from the pain and entanglement.
There is no way in any country to “root out” corruption. Most critical is containing it to a level acceptable to the public. And to do this is, for China, especially difficult.
In Singapore and Hong Kong salaries are high, and in the United States most candidates [for public office] are wealthy. Generally, after someone comes to office they gather a reputation and resources that enable them to take various “revolving doors” after they have left office, cashing in on these resources. But in China all of these roads are closed off.
Public opinion in China would not support a general raising of official salaries. And the system does not permit the use of personal influence and connections to make major money after an official finishes serving. And allowing the rich to serve as officials would cause people to feel something is amiss. The legal wages of Chinese officials are quite low, and a number of local officials use “unspoken rules” (潜规则) to enrich themselves.
The entire society in China has to some extent today become “ruled by the unspoken” (潜规则化). Doctors, teachers and others involved in public welfare industries are also working by “unspoken rules.” Many have legal wages that are low, but earn “grey income” (灰色收入).
It is not clear where the boundaries of these “unspoken rules” are. This is one of the reasons why corruption cases are so numerous. There is a popular saying now that, “The law cannot be enforced when everyone is an offender” (法不责众). Once an official takes this idea to heart, and believes that “other people are doing the same thing,” then he becomes extremely dangerous.
We must severely crack down on those who are corrupt, never appeasing them. This will substantially raise the dangers and costs of corruption, and serve the necessary deterrent role. The government must make mitigating corruption it biggest governing objective.
The public must firmly increase supervision by public opinion [i.e., monitoring of power by voicing views, particularly through the media], raising the impetus in pushing forward with the fight against corruption. But the public must also understand, on this great road, the objective fact and reality that China has no way of entirely suppressing corruption without sending the whole country into pain and confusion.
In saying these things, we don’t at all mean to suggest that fighting corruption is not important, that it can to put off. Quite the opposite, we believe that the fight against corruption should become the chief problem to be addressed by political reform in China, and that it is a common pursuit of the whole country.
We also believe that fighting corruption is not entirely something that can be “fought”, nor is it something that can be entirely “reformed.” It’s resolution relies at the same time on “development”. It is a question of individual officials, and a question of the system — but that’s not the entire story. It is also a question of the “overall development level” (综合发展水平) of Chinese society.
Fighting corruption is a difficult task in China’s social development. But its victory relies at the same time on the elimination of other obstructions in other areas of battle. China can’t conceivably be in a situation where it is a country behind in all other areas, but where its officials are really clean. Even if that were possible, it would not be sustainable. Fighting corruption is a point of breakthrough for China. But this country ultimately can only “move forward in a comprehensive manner” (综合前进).

The following post by Lei Yi (雷颐), a well-known Chinese historian with just under 108,000 followers, was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 1:32am Hong Kong time today, May 30, 2012. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre].
Lei Yi’s post, which refers to the Chinese Communist Party simply as “it” (它), criticizes the suggestion that China is unsuited to “democratic politics” (民主政治) because the “character” (素质) of Chinese people is too low.

More than 60 years ago, it firmly avowed that the character of Chinese people was already suited to democratic politics. Several years later, it grabbed hold of political power. Now, it firmly avows that the character of the Chinese people is too low, that democratic politics cannot be carried out. The facts avow that its more than 60 years of rule has sent the character of the Chinese people into a downward slide, to the point that disqualified from exercising democratic politics.

Lei Yi’s original Chinese post follows:

六十好几年前，它坚决承认中国人民的素质已经可以实行民*主政治。几年后，它夺取了政权。现在，它坚持认为中国人的素质太低，还不能实行民*主,事实上承认，它执政的六十余年，使中国人民的素质下降了，至少下降到无资格实行民*主政治的水平。

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.

On May 28, 2012, new management regulations took effect for Sina Weibo, one of China’s most popular social media sites, as part of an intensifying government crackdown on social media in the country. According to the regulations, users logging more than 5 posts of “sensitive information” would be prevented from posting for 48 hours and have the relevant content deleted. Further, those users posting “sensitive content” with “malicious intent” would be prevented from posting for more than 48 hours and face the possibility of having their account terminated. As of May 29, Sina had recruited close to 6,000 “community committee members” who would be tasked with monitoring posts and determining punishments. The English-language Global Times quoted Beijing lawyer Wang Zhengyu as saying the committee lacked legitimacy: “Only the courts, not microblogging service providers, have the right to judge the authenticity of the content and decide what online behavior infringes on others’ rights or are in violation of Chinese laws.” In the above cartoon, posted by artist Kuang Biao (邝飚) to Sina Weibo, a distressed Chinese internet user prepares to feed a “post” by hand into his computer as a sharp blade hovers at the top of the screen, ready to fall.

The following post by Shenzhen Old Cui (深圳老崔), a Chinese media consultant with more than 60,000 followers, was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 1:18pm Hong Kong time today, May 29, 2012. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre].

I hear this person has recently become red hot again?

Shenzhen Old Cui’s post responds to rumors now spreading — and rapidly disappearing — on social media that Chinese starlet Zhang Ziyi has been prevented from leaving China due to her alleged relations/connections with fallen political star Bo Xilai. So far this “news”, which has been reported by the US-based Boxun, has not been confirmed. Zhang Ziyi’s name so far remains searchable on Sina Weibo.
The following picture of Zhang was included with Shenzhen Old Cui’s post.

Shenzhen Old Cui’s original Chinese post follows:

听说这位最近突然又红起来了？！

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.

On May 28, 2012, new management regulations took effect for Sina Weibo, one of China’s most popular social media sites. According to the regulations, users logging more than 5 posts of “sensitive information” would be prevented from posting for 48 hours and have the relevant content deleted. Further, those users posting “sensitive content” with “malicious intent” would be prevented from posting for more than 48 hours and face the possibility of having their account terminated. Ever since August 2011, China has targeted the so-called “online rumor” in a bid to cleanse its domestic internet of harmful information. The campaign intensified in March 2012, as rumors on domestic social media suggest there had been a coup attempt in Beijing. In this cartoon, posted by the state-run online television network CNTV (part of China Central Television), users cower before a computer screen as another user, the proverbial online malicious gossip, gabs away, his words becoming a pair of hand grenades labeled “online rumors”.

We’ve written a great deal in recent weeks and months about how Chinese of all stripes — from journalists and lawyers to academics and the curious hoi polloi — have used social media to share information and perspectives on human rights, international affairs, propaganda and public diplomacy. But while we emphasize the importance of microblogs as a popular and personal means of communication, we should not forget that they are also important tools for organizations and agencies — including those with a vested interest in controlling and spinning information.
On May 24, People’s Daily Online Public Opinion Monitoring Center released a list of China’s top influential microblogs operated by public security offices at the provincial and sub-provincial level in China, determined on the basis of confirmed followers (认证粉丝数), follower activity levels (粉丝活跃率), original posts, average shares and comments and other criteria.

[ABOVE: An image shared by the Guangzhou Public Security Bureau on its official Weibo account on May 29, 2012, showing Guangzhou police in action. A Sina Weibo button on the photo slideshow allows users to share photos on their own accounts with a click of the mouse.]
According to the center’s study, the top public security microblog in China is “@GuangzhouPublicSecurity” (@广州公安), the official police Weibo in the city of Guangzhou in China’s southern Guangdong province. Number two and three on the list are the official accounts of the Jinan and Harbin police, “@JinanPublicSecurity” (@济南公安) and “@PeacefulHarbin” (@平安哈尔滨).

[ABOVE: A list of China’s top ten official police microblogs, from top to bottom: “Guangzhou Public Security”; “Jinan Public Security”; “Peaceful Harbin”; “Changsha Police Matters”; “Xiamen Police Online”; “Xi’an Public Security”; “Peaceful Taiyuan”; “Fuzhou City PSB”; “Peaceful Nanjing”.]
What sort of information are these official microblogs sharing?
The report from the People’s Daily Online Public Opinion Monitoring Center cites one example from April this year in which Guangzhou police printed and distributed a deck of cards with 54 local most-wanteds, hoping members of the public would provide information. One of the suspects (The “King” card) surrendered to police in late May, after news of the deck was reported in local media. The story of the suspect’s surrender, shared through the official microblog of the Guangzhou police, drew participation from close to 100,000 internet users, according to the Online Public Opinion Monitoring Center.
Subsequent news shared via Weibo of the capture of the “Seven of Spades” in the Guangzhou deck attracted 333 shares and 108 comments.