History Forum / General / British History / January 2007

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Hilarious!

Gans Goes Hysterical & Rants Frantically...

Gans should move to China and see what REAL CENSORSHIP & INTIMIDATION is all
about.

How Sweet It Is!...

Watching Pogue Gans Make An Abject Fool Of Himself.

Deeeeeeeelightful!

DSH

Lux et Veritas et Libertas

Deus Vult
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ON THE NET

'I Know Who My Comrades Are'
China plays cat-and-mouse with the Internet.

BY EMILY PARKER
Saturday, January 27, 2007
The Wall Street Journal

Out of China this week came two telling news items. One is that Internet
users hit 137 million, putting them on track to surpass their U.S.
counterparts in a couple of years. The other is President Hu Jintao's plea
that officials further regulate the Web and "actively and creatively nurture
a healthy online culture."

There you have it: The Chinese cat-and-mouse game. This all raises an old,
unsettling question of whether the spread of the Internet will actually help
lead to China's democratization. Sure, the Web has pried open doors to free
speech and information on the mainland. But if Beijing is always just a few
paces behind, dispatching the censors to slam those doors shut--then
ultimately, does the Internet really matter?

Of course it does, optimists might argue. Just imagine what China would look
like if its pragmatic, development-minded leaders had kept the Internet out.

Mainlanders would not have been able to sign online petitions, read as many
outside news reports, write blogs, and post their comments on "sensitive"
topics. Foreign companies like Google, Yahoo and Microsoft may not have
descended on the scene. More generally, think in terms of that Milton
Friedman-esque link between economic and political liberty. With forces like
the Internet ushering in development and commercial opportunities, can
political freedom really be that far behind?

Some of those optimists may have underestimated Beijing; or at least its
willingness to unleash tens of thousands of Internet police--on top of
firewalls and the like--to keep the Web in check. And while the entrance of
foreign companies may ultimately play a positive role in increasing access
to information (more news is good news, right?), in the short term they are
paying a price. Google and Microsoft have been widely criticized for
censoring themselves in China; Yahoo for providing authorities with
information that helped land a Chinese journalist in jail.

My own optimism has been shaken at times. From 2004-2005, I wrote a series
of Journal columns about the Chinese Internet, enthusiastically observing
how mainlanders thwarted the censors to spread information and commentary
about "forbidden" topics. I also saw how quickly words, and entire Web
sites, could vanish from sight.

Given these constraints, will the Internet really be an effective force in
bringing freedom of speech and access to information to China? The truth is
maybe not, at least for now. The other truth is that these aren't
necessarily the freedoms in question. The Internet is setting into motion
what could have a far more transformative effect on Chinese society: freedom
of (virtual) assembly.

Here in America, freedom of assembly is easy to take for granted. In China,
where large groups may be met with suspicion--or worse--it is not. In 1999,
thousands belonging to the religious sect Falun Gong unexpectedly gathered
in Beijing for a quiet protest. They were neither rowdy nor violent. In
fact, all they really did was assemble. Yet this inexplicable gathering of
Chinese from various parts of the country deeply unnerved Beijing, and was a
catalyst for the harsh crackdown on the group.

This kind of--Surprise!--gathering, especially from a group that Beijing
distrusts, would still set off alarms today. So it is no small event that in
cyberspace, scores of like-minded Chinese assemble by the day. The Internet,
both in China and elsewhere, is a place for individuals to congregate with
others that hold similar interests and convictions. They exchange ideas,
information and links to other sites. In some cases, they even spring for
action: A Chinese online petition in 2004 may have helped create the
pressure needed to get doctor Jiang Yanyong released from jail. And of
course, these gatherings yield more dubious outcomes as well. Just this
month, a Chinese blog reportedly accused a Starbucks in the Forbidden City
of trampling on Chinese culture, spurring an Internet campaign with
thousands of supporters and threatening the store with closure.

More important, though, is that for those Chinese who long harbored
suspicions that their views were out of sync with the Communist Party line,
the Internet created a space to learn that they were not alone. Or as I
remember one intrepid, Beijing-based Internet essayist explaining to
me--Now, I know who my comrades are. In his online world, there were vibrant
discussions, "opinion leaders," and various intellectual camps. Peering into
this universe would even lead one to imagine the root formation of political
parties.

Some of these "netizens" have skillfully outwitted the censors by purposely
miswriting terms or using proxy servers. Their words dance above the
Communist Party line--alluding to, but failing to directly
address--hot-button topics. They have created a web in the true sense of the
word: Even if an individual site is taken down, another will just spring up
in its place. Yet the fact remains: Any truly controversial piece of news or
opinion would likely be too coded--or too quickly deleted--to reach the
majority of Chinese.

This all brings us back to the original question. If words are written, but
nobody gets to read them, will they make a difference? Beijing's censorship
of language is a serious obstacle to democratization, but it would be a
mistake to overemphasize this point. In China, the Internet has already set
into motion a core component of democratic consciousness. I know who my
comrades are--those words can easily be deleted. The realization behind them
can not.

Ms. Parker is an assistant editorial features editor at The Wall Street
Journal.