title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Based on these differences, there are many academics who argue that the two versions of the treaty are distinctly different documents they refer to as "Te Tiriti o Waitangi" and "The Treaty of Waitangi", and that the Māori text should take precedence, because it was the one that was signed at Waitangi and by the most signatories. The Waitangi Tribunal, tasked with deciding issues raised by the differences between the two texts, also gives additional weight to the Māori text in its interpretations of the treaty.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: The entire issue is further complicated by the fact that, at the time, writing was a novel introduction to Māori society. As members of a predominately oral society, Māori present at the signing of the treaty would have placed more value and reliance on what Hobson and the missionaries said, rather than the written words of the treaty document. Although there is still a great deal of scholarly debate surrounding the extent to which literacy had permeated Māori society at the time of the signing, what can be stated with clarity is that of the 600 plus chiefs who signed the written document only 12 signed their names in the Latin alphabet. Many others conveyed their identity by drawing parts of their "moko" (personal facial tattoo), while still others marked the document with an X.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Māori beliefs and attitudes towards ownership and use of land were different from those prevailing in Britain and Europe. The chiefs would traditionally grant permission for the land to be used for a time for a particular purpose. A northern chief, Nōpera Panakareao, also early on summarised his understanding of the treaty as ""Ko te atarau o te whenua i riro i a te kuini, ko te tinana o te whenua i waiho ki ngā Māori"" (The shadow of the land will go to the Queen [of England], but the substance of the land will remain with us). Nopera later reversed his earlier statement – feeling that the substance of the land had indeed gone to the Queen; only the shadow remained for the Māori.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: In November 1840 a royal charter was signed by Queen Victoria, establishing New Zealand as a Crown colony separate from New South Wales from 3 May 1841. In 1846 the Parliament of the United Kingdom passed the New Zealand Constitution Act 1846 which granted self-government to the colony, requiring Māori to pass an English-language test to be able to participate in the new colonial government. In the same year, Lord Stanley, the British Colonial Secretary, who was a devout Anglican, three times British Prime Minister and oversaw the passage of the Slavery Abolition Act 1833, was asked by Governor George Grey how far he was expected to abide by the treaty. The direct response in the Queen's name was:


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: At Governor Grey's request, this Act was suspended in 1848, as Grey argued it would place the majority Māori under the control of the minority British settlers. Instead, Grey drafted what would later become the New Zealand Constitution Act 1852, which determined the right to vote based on land-ownership franchise. Since most Māori land was communally owned, very few Māori had the right to vote for the institutions of the colonial government. The 1852 Constitution Act also included provision for "Māori districts", where Māori law and custom were to be preserved, but this section was never implemented by the Crown.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Following the election of the first parliament in 1853, responsible government was instituted in 1856. The direction of "native affairs" was kept at the sole discretion of the Governor, meaning control of Māori affairs and land remained outside of the elected ministry. This quickly became a point of contention between the Governor and the colonial parliament, who retained their own "Native Secretary" to advise them on "native affairs". In 1861, Governor Grey agreed to consult the ministers in relation to native affairs, but this position only lasted until his recall from office in 1867. Grey's successor as Governor, George Bowen, took direct control of native affairs until his term ended in 1870. From then on, the elected ministry, led by the Premier, controlled the colonial government's policy on Māori land.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: The short-term effect of the treaty was to prevent the sale of Māori land to anyone other than the Crown. This was intended to protect Māori from the kinds of shady land purchases which had alienated indigenous peoples in other parts of the world from their land with minimal compensation. Before the treaty had been finalised the New Zealand Company had made several hasty land deals and shipped settlers from Great Britain to New Zealand, hoping the British would be forced to accept its land claims as a fait accompli, in which it was largely successful.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: In part, the treaty was an attempt to establish a system of property rights for land with the Crown controlling and overseeing land sale to prevent abuse. Initially, this worked well with the Governor and his representatives having the sole right to buy and sell land from the Māori. Māori were eager to sell land, and settlers eager to buy.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: The Crown was supposed to mediate the process to ensure that the true owners were properly identified (difficult for tribally owned land) and fairly compensated, by the standards of the time. In particular, the Governor had the responsibility to protect Māori interests. Still, Hobson, as Governor of New Zealand, and his successor Robert FitzRoy both took seriously their duty as protectors of Māori from unscrupulous settlers, working actively to prevent shady land deals. Hobson created a group of "Protectors of the Aborigines"; officials specifically appointed to verify owners, land boundaries, and sales. Lack of funds often prevented land deals at this time, which created discontent among those who were willing but unable to sell. Combined with a growing awareness of the profit margins that the government was receiving by reselling the land at a profit, there was growing discontent among Māori with the pre-emption clause. At this time Māori and others argued that the government's abuse of the pre-emption clause was incompatible with article three of the treaty which guaranteed Māori equal rights to those of British subjects. FitzRoy was sympathetic to their pleas and decided to waive the pre-emption clause in 1844, allowing land sales directly to individuals.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: The growing disagreement over British sovereignty of the country led to several armed conflicts and disputes beginning in the 1840s, including the Flagstaff War, a dispute over the flying of the British Union Flag at the then colonial capital, Kororareka in the Bay of Islands. The Māori King Movement ("Kīngitanga") began in the 1850s partly as a means of focusing Māori power in a manner which would allow them to negotiate with the Governor and Queen on equal footing. The chiefs justified the King's role by the treaty's guarantee of "rangatiratanga" (chieftainship).


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Conflict continued to escalate in the early 1860s, when the government used the Māori King Movement as an excuse to invade lands in the eastern parts of the North Island, culminating in the Crown's confiscation of large parts of the Waikato and Taranaki from Māori. The treaty was used to justify the idea that the chiefs of Waikato and Taranaki were rebels against the Crown.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: FitzRoy's successor George Grey was appointed Governor in 1845. He viewed the Protectors as an impediment to land acquisition and replaced them with new officials whose goals were not to protect Māori interests, but rather to purchase as much land as possible. Grey restored the Crown's right to pre-emption bypassing the Native Land Purchase Act in 1846, which contemporary writers viewed as a "first step towards a negation of the Treaty of Waitangi". This ordinance also tightened government control of Māori lands, prohibiting Māori from leasing their land and restricting the felling of timber and harvesting of flax. A high court case in 1847 ("R v Symonds") upheld the Crown's right to pre-emption and allowed Grey to renegotiate deals made under Fitzroy's waiving of the pre-emption clause. Governor Grey set out to buy large tracts of Māori land in advance of settlement at low prices, later selling it to settlers at higher prices and using the difference to develop land access (roads and bridges). Donald McLean acted as Grey's intermediary and negotiator, and as early as 1840 was aware that Māori had no concept of the sale of land in British sense. Soon Māori became disillusioned and less willing to sell, while the Crown came under increasing pressure from settlers wishing to buy. Consequently, government land agents were involved in a number of dubious land purchases, agreements were sometimes negotiated with only one owner of tribally owned land and in some cases land was purchased from the wrong people altogether. The whole of the South Island was purchased by 1860 in several large deals, and while many of the sales included provisions of 10 per cent of the land set aside for native inhabitants, these land area amounts were not honoured or were later transmuted to much smaller numbers. In some cases Grey or his associates bullied the owners into selling by threatening to drive them out with troops or employ rival chiefs to do so.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: In July 1860, during the conflicts, Governor Thomas Gore Browne convened a group of some 200 Māori (including over 100 pro-Crown chiefs handpicked by officials) to discuss the treaty and land for a month at Mission Bay, Kohimarama, Auckland. This became known as the Kohimarama Conference, and was an attempt to prevent the spread of fighting to other regions of New Zealand. But many of the chiefs present were critical of the Crown's handling of the Taranaki conflict. Those at the conference reaffirmed the treaty and the Queen's sovereignty and suggested that a native council be established, but this did not occur.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: The Native Land Court (later renamed the Māori Land Court) was established under the Native Land Court Act of 1862, which also finally abolished the Crown right to pre-emption. It was through this court that much Māori land was alienated, and the way in which it functioned is much criticised today. A single member of a tribal group could claim ownership of communal tribal land, which would trigger a court battle in which other tribal members were forced to participate in, or else lose out. The accumulation of court fees, lawyers fees, survey costs, and the cost of travelling to attend court proceedings resulted in mounting debts that could only be paid by the eventual sale of the land. In effect, Māori were safe from the court only until a single tribal member broke ranks and triggered a case, which would invariably result in the sale of the land. By the end of the century, nearly all of the highest quality Māori land had been sold, with only two million hectares remaining in Māori possession.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Although the treaty had never been directly incorporated into New Zealand law, its provisions were first incorporated into specific legislation as early as the Land Claims Ordinance 1841 and the Native Rights Act 1865. However, in the 1877 "Wi Parata v Bishop of Wellington" judgement, Judge Prendergast argued that the treaty was a "simple nullity" in terms of transferring sovereignty from Māori to the British Crown. This remained the legal orthodoxy until at least the 1970s. Māori have since argued that Prendergast's decision, as well as laws later based on it were a politically convenient and deliberate ploy to legitimise the seizure of Māori land and other resources.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Despite this, Māori frequently used the treaty to argue for a range of demands, including greater independence and return of confiscated and unfairly purchased land. This was especially the case from the mid-19th century, when they lost numerical superiority and generally lost control of most of the country and had little representation in government or the councils where decisions that impacted their affairs were made. Simultaneously, Māori rights over fisheries (guaranteed in article 2 of the treaty) were similarly degraded by laws passed in the late 19th century.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Over the longer term, the land purchase aspect of the treaty declined in importance, while the clauses of the treaty which deal with sovereignty and Māori rights took on greater importance. In 1938, the judgement of the case "Te Heuheu Tukino v Aotea District Maori Land Board" considered the treaty as valid in terms of the transfer of sovereignty, but the judge ruled that as it was not part of New Zealand law it was not binding on the Crown.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: The treaty returned to the public eye after the Treaty House and grounds were purchased by the Governor-General, Viscount Bledisloe, in the early 1930s and donated to the nation. The dedication of the site as a national reserve in 1934 was probably the first major event held there since the 1840s. The profile of the treaty was further raised by the New Zealand centenary of 1940. For most of the twentieth century, textbooks, government publicity and many historians touted the treaty as the moral foundation of colonisation and argued that it set race relations in New Zealand above those of colonies in North America, Africa and Australia. Popular histories of New Zealand and the treaty often claimed that the treaty was an example of British benevolence and therefore an honourable contract. Even though Māori continued to challenge this narrative, the treaty's lack of legal standing in 1840 and subsequent breaches tended to be overlooked until the 1970s when these issues were raised by the Māori protest movement.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: The Waitangi Day Act of 1960 was a token gesture towards acknowledging the Treaty of Waitangi and somewhat preceded the Māori protest movement as a whole. It established Waitangi Day, although it did not make it a public holiday, and the English text of the treaty appeared as a schedule of the Waitangi Day Act but this did not make it a part of statute law. Subsequent amendments to the Act, as well as other legislation, eventually acquiesced to campaigns to make Waitangi Day a national holiday in 1976.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: During the late 1960s and 1970s, the Treaty of Waitangi became the focus of a strong Māori protest movement which rallied around calls for the government to "honour the treaty" and to "redress treaty grievances". Māori boycotted Waitangi Day in 1968 over the Māori Affairs Amendment Act (which was perceived as a further land grab) and Māori expressed their frustration about continuing violations of the treaty and subsequent legislation by government officials, as well as inequitable legislation and unsympathetic decisions by the Māori Land Court continuing alienation of Māori land from its owners. The protest movement can be seen as part of the worldwide civil rights movements, which emerged in the 1960s.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: As a response to the protest movement, the treaty finally received limited recognition in 1975 with the passage of the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975, which established the Waitangi Tribunal, but this initially had very limited powers to make findings of facts and recommendations only. The Act was amended in 1985 to enable it to investigate Treaty breaches back to 1840, and also to increase the Tribunal membership. The membership was further increased in another amendment in 1988.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: The treaty was incorporated in a limited way into New Zealand law by the State Owned Enterprises Act 1986. Section 9 of the act said "Nothing in this Act shall permit the Crown to act in a manner that is inconsistent with the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi". The government had proposed a transfer of assets from former Government departments to state-owned enterprises, but because the state-owned enterprises were essentially private firms owned by the government, there was an argument that they would prevent assets which had been given by Māori for use by the state from being returned to Māori by the Waitangi Tribunal and through Treaty settlements. The Act was challenged in court in 1987, and the judgement of "New Zealand Maori Council v Attorney-General" defined the "Principles of the Treaty" and the proposed sale of government assets was found to be in breach of this proviso. This allowed the courts to consider the Crown's actions in terms of compliance with the treaty and established the principle that if the treaty is mentioned in strong terms in a piece of legislation, it takes precedence over other parts of that legislation should they come into conflict. The "Principles of the Treaty" became a common topic in contemporary New Zealand politics, and in 1989, the Fourth Labour Government responded by adopting the ""Principles for Crown Action on the Treaty of Waitangi"" a similar list of principles to that established in the 1987 court case.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Legislation after the State Owned Enterprises case has followed suit in giving the treaty an increased legal importance. In "New Zealand Maori Council v Attorney General" (1990) the case concerned FM radio frequencies and found that the treaty could be relevant even concerning legislation which did not mention it and that even if references to the treaty were removed from legislation, the treaty may still be legally relevant. Examples include the ownership of the radio spectrum and the protection of the Māori language.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Some have argued that the treaty should be further incorporated as a part of the New Zealand constitution, to help improve relations between the Crown, Māori and other New Zealanders. The Fourth Labour Government's "Bill of Rights White Paper" proposed that the treaty be entrenched in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. This proposal was never carried through to the legislation, with the attitude of many Māori towards it "suspicious, uneasy, doubtful or undecided". Many Māori were concerned that the proposal would relegate the treaty to a lesser position, and enable the electorate (who under the original Bill of Rights would be able to repeal certain sections by referendum) to remove the treaty from the Bill of Rights altogether. Geoffrey Palmer commented in 2013 that:


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: During the 1990s there was broad agreement between major political parties that the settlement of historical claims was appropriate. Some disagreed however, and claims of a "Treaty of Waitangi Grievance Industry", which profits from making frivolous claims of violations of the Treaty of Waitangi, were made by a number of political figures in the late 1990s and early 2000s, including former National Party leader Don Brash in his 2004 "Orewa Speech". The "Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi Deletion Bill" was introduced in the New Zealand Parliament in 2005 as a private member's bill by New Zealand First MP Doug Woolerton. Winston Peters, the 13th Deputy Prime Minister of New Zealand, and others supported the bill, which was designed to remove references to the treaty from New Zealand law. The bill failed to pass its second reading in November 2007.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: In terms of public opinion, a study in 2008 found that among the 2,700 voting age New Zealanders surveyed, 37.4% wanted the treaty removed from New Zealand law, 19.7% were neutral, and 36.8% wanted the treaty kept in law; additionally, 39.7% agreed Māori deserved compensation, 15.7% were neutral, and 41.2% disagreed. In 2017, the same study found that among the 3,336 voting age New Zealanders surveyed, 32.99% wanted the treaty removed from New Zealand law, 14.45% were neutral and 42.58% disagreed, and 9.98% didn't know.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Today, the treaty is still not specifically part of New Zealand domestic law, but has been adopted into various acts of parliament ad hoc. It is nevertheless regarded as the founding document of New Zealand.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: During the early 1990s, the government began to negotiate settlements of historical (pre-1992) claims. , there were 23 such settlements of various sizes, totalling approximately $950 million. Settlements generally include financial redress, a formal Crown apology for breaches of the treaty, and recognition of the group's cultural associations with various sites. The tribunal has, in some cases, established that the claimants had not given up sovereignty, and there are ongoing discussions with regards to the applicability of land seized in conflicts and obtained through Crown pre-emption. However, the Tribunal's findings do not establish that the Crown does not have sovereignty today, since the Crown has "de facto" sovereignty in New Zealand regardless and the Tribunal has no authority to rule otherwise. Treaty Settlements minister Chris Finlayson emphasised that: "The Tribunal doesn't reach any conclusion regarding the sovereignty the Crown exercises in New Zealand. Nor does it address the other events considered part of the Crown's acquisition of sovereignty or how the Treaty relationship should operate today". Recommendations of the Tribunal are not binding on the Crown, but have often been followed.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: The anniversary of the signing of the treaty – 6 February – is the New Zealand national day, Waitangi Day. The day was first commemorated in 1934, when the site of the original signing, Treaty House, was made a public reserve (along with its grounds). However, it was not until 1974 that the date was made a public holiday. Waitangi Day has been the focus of protest by Māori (as was particularly the case from the 1970s through to the 1990s), but today the day is often used as an opportunity to discuss the history and lasting effects of the treaty. The anniversary is officially commemorated at the Treaty House at Waitangi, where it was first signed.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: New Zealand Post issued a miniature sheet of two stamps in 1990 to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the signing of the treaty.


title: Treaty of Waitangi

text: Another miniature sheet was issued in 2015 to mark the 175th anniversary. The $2.50 sheet showed the figures of Tamati Waka Nene and William Hobson shaking hands.


title: Daniel Naroditsky

text: Daniel Naroditsky (born November 9, 1995), also known as Danya, is an American chess grandmaster, author, and commentator. He published his first chess book at age 14.


title: Daniel Naroditsky

text: Born in San Mateo, California, Naroditsky learned chess at age six from his father, Vladimir. He was soon taking serious chess lessons. In May 2007, he won the Northern California K–12 Chess Championship, the youngest player ever to do so. Later that year, Naroditsky won the Under-12 division of the World Youth Chess Championship with 9½/11. In May 2008, he won the Northern California 9–12 Chess Championship.


title: Daniel Naroditsky

text: At the 2010 U.S. Open Chess Championship, Naroditsky scored 7½/9 to share second through fifth places, behind grandmaster Alejandro Ramírez and tied with grandmasters Alexander Shabalov and Varuzhan Akobian. Naroditsky played in the 2011 U.S. Chess Championship, but finished with more losses than wins. In July 2011, he earned his first grandmaster norm. Naroditsky earned his second grandmaster norm at the 2013 Philadelphia Open by tying for first place with GM Fidel Jimenez. In 2014, Naroditsky tied for 1st–5th with Timur Gareev, Dávid Bérczes, Sergei Azarov, and Sam Shankland in the Millionaire Chess Open in Las Vegas, Nevada.


title: Daniel Naroditsky

text: He is active on YouTube and Twitch, where he has over 258,000 subscribers and 227,000 followers, respectively. He plays on Chess.com under the handle DanielNaroditsky, and on Lichess.org under the handle RebeccaHarris. He frequently ranks close to, or at, the top on both websites' global leaderboards in Rapid and Blitz time controls.


title: Daniel Naroditsky

text: Naroditsky's parents are Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union. His father Vladimir immigrated from Ukraine, while his mother Lena came from Azerbaijan. Naroditsky graduated from Stanford University in 2019 with a degree in history. He lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, where he is the resident Grandmaster of the Charlotte Chess Center.


title: Ken Park

text: Ken Park is a 2002 erotic drama which revolves around the abusive and dysfunctional lives of several teenagers, set in the city of Visalia, California. It was written by Harmony Korine, who based it on Larry Clark's journals and stories. The film was directed and shot by Clark and Edward Lachman. The film is an international co-production of the United States, the Netherlands, and France.


title: Ken Park

text: The title character Ken Park (nicknamed "Krap Nek": his name spelled and pronounced backward), is a teenager skateboarding across Visalia, California. He arrives at a skate park, where he casually sets up a camcorder, smiles, and shoots himself in the temple with a handgun. His death is used to bookend the film, which follows the lives of four other teenagers who knew him.


title: Ken Park

text: Shawn is the most stable of the four main characters. Throughout the story, he has an ongoing sexual relationship with his girlfriend's mother Rhonda, whom he tells that he fantasizes that he is with her when having sex with her daughter Hannah. He casually socializes with their family, the rest of whom are completely unaware of the affair.


title: Ken Park

text: Claude fends off physical and emotional abuse from his alcoholic father while he tries to take care of his neglectful pregnant mother, who never does anything to defend him. Claude's father detests him for not being masculine enough. However, after coming home drunk one night, he attempts to perform oral sex on Claude, which prompts the boy to run away from home.


title: Ken Park

text: Peaches is a girl who lives alone with her obsessive and highly-religious father, who fixates on her as the innocent embodiment of her deceased mother. When he catches her having sex with her boyfriend Curtis – whom she has playfully tied to her bed – he beats the boy and savagely disciplines her, then forces her to participate in a quasi-incestuous wedding ritual with him.


title: Ken Park

text: Tate is an unstable and sadistic adolescent living with his grandparents, whom he resents and abuses verbally. He engages in autoerotic asphyxiation while masturbating to a video of a woman playing tennis. He eventually kills his grandparents, in retaliation for petty grievances, and finds that it arouses him sexually. He records himself on his tape recorder so that the police will know how and why he did it, puts his grandfather's dentures in his mouth, lies naked in his bed, and falls asleep. He is later arrested.


title: Ken Park

text: The film cuts frequently between these subplots, with no overlap of characters or events until the end, when Shawn, Claude, and Peaches meet and have a threesome. In a game of "who am I?" afterward, they refer to an unnamed person they know who is now dead. The film cuts to a title screen, followed by a flashback to before the opening scene. Ken has impregnated his girlfriend and taken a menial job. At the skate park, they discuss whether to abort the pregnancy, and she asks Ken rhetorically if he's glad his mother didn't abort him; he does not answer.


title: Ken Park

text: Clark attempted to write the first script for "Ken Park", basing it on personal experiences and people with whom he had grown up. Dissatisfied with his own draft, he hired Harmony Korine to pen the screenplay. Clark ultimately used most of Korine's script, but rewrote the ending. The film was given a $1.3 million budget. The arrangement was to film using digital video, but Clark and Lachman used 35mm film instead.


title: Ken Park

text: Although it was sold for distribution to some 30 countries, the film was not shown in the United Kingdom after director Larry Clark assaulted Hamish McAlpine, the head of the UK distributor for the film, Metro Tartan. Clark is alleged to have been angry over McAlpine's remarks about 9/11. Clark was arrested and spent several hours in custody, and McAlpine was left with a broken nose. The film has not been released in the United States since its initial showing at the Telluride Film Festival in 2002. Clark says that this is because of the producer's failure to get copyright releases for the music used. The film was banned in Australia due to its graphic sexual content and portrayals of underage sexual activity after it was refused a classification by the Australian Classification Board in 2003. A protest screening held in Sydney, hosted by film critic Margaret Pomeranz, was shut down by the police.


title: Ken Park

text: Review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reports a 46% approval rating based on 13 reviews. Ed Gonzales of "Slant Magazine" noted some redeeming elements in an "otherwise familiar "Kids" procedural" in which "the parents are all monsters of some kind and there’s an excuse for every teenager’s bad behavior". Rob Gonsalves of "eFilmCritic", wrote that the film "is about people lost in a haze of contempt and despair, trying to wrest some love or relief out of the situation." Michael Rechtshaffen of "The Hollywood Reporter" described it as "a ragingly controversial feature that makes it very tricky to distinguish between insightful and incite-ful." Todd McCarthy of "Variety" described it as "Beautifully crafted but emotionally dispiriting and alienating in its insistence on spotlighting only the negative aspects of life". Lee Marshall of "Screen Daily" wrote that "Clark, being Clark, pushes things a little too far; so a not entirely constructive tension is set up between the need to show and the desire to shock."


title: Eid Mubarak

text: Eid Mubarak is an Arabic term that means “Blessed feast/festival'”. The term is used by Muslims all over the world. Internationally Muslims use it as a greeting on the feast. In the social sense, people usually celebrate Eid al-Fitr after Ramadan and Eid al-Adha in the month of Dhul Hijjah (the 12th and final Islamic month). Some state that this exchange of greetings is a cultural tradition and not part of any religious obligation.


title: Eid Mubarak

text: Throughout the Muslim world there are numerous other greetings for Eid ul-Adha and Eid ul-Fitr. The companions of Muhammad used to say to each other in Arabic when they met on Eid ul-Fitr: "Taqabbalallâhu minnâ wa minkum" (which means "[May] God accept from us and you [our fasts and deeds]"). Throughout the Muslim world, variations in Eid greetings exist.


title: Eid Mubarak

text: Arab Muslims use the term Eid Mubarak, and have a number of other ways to say happy holiday. Some Arabs also add "kul 'am wantum bikhair" (كل عام و أنتم بخير), which means "May you be well with every passing year". There is another common term in GCC states which is "Minal Aidin wal Faizin" (من العايدين والفايزين), an Arab sentence meaning "May we be sacred [one more time] and may we be succeed [in our fasting]", and the reply will be “Minal Maqbulin wal Ghanmin” (من المقبولين والغانمين), which means “May [our good deeds] be accepted [by God] and may we win [the paradise]”.


title: Eid Mubarak

text: Persian speakers (Iranians, Afghans and Tajiks) use the phrase “eid-e shoma mobarak” (عید شما مبارک) or “eid mobarak” (عید مبارک) for short.


title: Eid Mubarak

text: Bosnian Muslims also commonly say "Bajram Šerif mubarek olsun"; the response is "Allah razi olsun". Another common Eid greeting by Bosnian Muslims is "Bajram barećula".


title: Eid Mubarak

text: In Serbia, Muslims usually celebrate by saying "Bajram Šerif Mubarek Olsun" to which the other replies with "Allah Razi Olsun"


title: Eid Mubarak

text: In Turkey and Azerbaijan, Turks wish each other happy Eid with Turkish phrases including: "Bayramınız kutlu olsun" ("May your Eid be blessed"), "İyi Bayramlar" ("Good Eid days"), and "Bayramımız mübarek olsun" ("May our Eid be blessed"). The phrase “ Eid Mubarak” is not used.


title: Eid Mubarak

text: In India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, people say Eid Mubarak wishes by shaking hands and hugging them three times followed by hand shake one more time after the Salat al Eid.


title: Eid Mubarak

text: Urdu speakers, traditionally, only start saying the greeting after the Eid prayer. However, newer generations typically resort to saying the greeting at midnight of the Eid day, similar to other special days such as New Year's Day or birthdays. They use the greeting "Eid Mubarak" () which is traditionally replied with "Khair Mubarak" (). "Āp ko bhi Eid Mubarak" () is a rising alternative response among the newer urban generations.


title: Eid Mubarak

text: Pashto speakers (mainly Pashtun people from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and eastern Afghanistan) also use the Eid greeting ""May your festival be blessed"" ( ; "akhtar de mubarak sha").


title: Eid Mubarak

text: Balochi speakers (mainly Baloch people from Balochistan province and Iran's Sistan and Baluchestan Province) also use the Eid greeting ""May your Eid be blessed"" ( ; "aied tara mubarak ba").


title: Eid Mubarak

text: Many Bangladeshis may also use the phrase "Eid Mubarak" or "Eid greeting, ""Eid's Greetings"" (ঈদের শুভেচ্ছা; "Eider Shubhechchha").


title: Eid Mubarak

text: Muslims in countries such as Indonesia and the Malay language-speaking populations of Malaysia, Brunei, and Singapore use the expression "Selamat Hari Raya" or "Selamat Idul Fitri" (Indonesian) or "Salam Aidilfitri" (Malay). This expression is usually accompanied by the popular expression "Minal Aidin wal Faizin", an Arab sentence meaning "May we be sacred one more time and succeed in our fasting". It is a quotation from a poem written by Shafiyuddin Al-Huli during the time Muslims ruled in Al-Andalus.


title: Eid Mubarak

text: In the Philippines, it is recognized as a legal holiday, though the Arabic greeting of Eid Mubarak has gained traction only recently. The traditional greeting of Muslims in the Philippines resembles that of the neighboring Malay-speaking world. This is namely "Salamat Hariraya Puwasa" ("Selamat Hari Raya Puasa") for Eid al-Fitr, and "Salamat Hariraya Hadji" ("Selamat Hari Raya Hajji") for Eid al-Adha.


title: Eid Mubarak

text: The Hausa language, originally from Northern Nigeria and Niger, is widely spoken among Muslims throughout West Africa. Their equivalent Eid greetings in Hausa is "Barka da Sallah", which translates to "blessed Eid prayers".


title: Eid Mubarak

text: In Mali, the greeting in Bambara on Eid al-Adha is "Sambe-Sambe". This greeting is similarly used by countries that have majority Mande speaking peoples, another Lingua Franca spoken by Muslims in West Africa, or were once part of the historic Mali Empire.


title: Eid Mubarak

text: "Ni ti yuun' palli" is the Eid greeting among Dagbanli and Kusaase speakers in Ghana. It means "Happy new Eid season". The Hausa greeting "Barka da Sallah" is also commonly used during the period.


title: House of Anubis

text: House of Anubis is a mystery television series developed for Nickelodeon based on the Dutch–Belgian television series "Het Huis Anubis". The series was created by Hans Bourlon and Gert Verhulst and premiered on Nickelodeon on 1 January 2011 in the United States and on 25 February 2011 in the United Kingdom. The series is the first series from the network to be filmed outside the United States and the first telenovela-format series for the network. The show aired from 1 January 2011 to 17 June 2013.


title: House of Anubis

text: Anubis House is a residence at an English boarding school, built in the 1890s as part of an estate by Egyptologist Robert Frobisher-Smythe. The house is now the boarding house for nine secondary school children under the watch of the boarding school's strict caretaker, Victor Rodenmaar Jr (Francis Magee) and house-mother Trudy (Mina Anwar). A popular girl called Joy Mercer (Klariza Clayton), is withdrawn from the school without warning, along with all evidence of her existence. Joy's best friend, Patricia Williamson (Jade Ramsey), is saddened by Joy's disappearance. On the same day, a new girl from America named Nina Martin (Nathalia Ramos) joins the school under a scholarship and replaces Joy as Patricia’s new roommate. Patricia is sure it is no coincidence and accuses Nina of being part of Joy’s disappearance.


title: House of Anubis

text: Nina meets an elderly woman after moving in, who gifts her with a locket shaped like the Eye of Horus. The woman identifies herself as Sarah Frobisher-Smythe, the daughter of Robert. However, when Nina walks Sarah back to the retirement home she lives in the Head Carer calls her Emily. Afterwards, Nina's locket proves to function as a key to open a secret panel in the attic, in which she finds a collection of antique phonograph cylinders and a portrait of Sarah as a girl. The cylinders are diary recordings made by Sarah during and after her parents' trip to Egypt to uncover Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922. Alongside Egyptian hieroglyphs on the back of the portrait, the recordings offer clues to the location of a number of Egyptian relics. Nina becomes friends with nerdy Fabian Rutter (Brad Kavanagh) and tells him about everything. After popular Amber Millington (Ana Mulvoy Ten) falls out with her best friend Mara Jaffray (Tasie Lawrence) over Amber’s boyfriend Mick Campbell (Bobby Lockwood) Amber swaps dorms with Patricia so Amber can be roommates with Nina. Nina, Fabian and Amber form a secret group, 'Sibuna' (Anubis backwards), and later initiate Alfie Lewis (Alex Sawyer) and Patricia, who is eager to learn how the relics are connected to Joy's disappearance.


title: House of Anubis

text: After finding seven relics, the Sibunas intuit that they must be put together to make the Cup of Ankh, a mythic cup capable of producing an elixir of life. However, the cup can only be assembled by one born on seven o'clock of the seventh day of the seventh month. As Joy's birthday is the seventh of July, it is revealed that Victor and his secret society, consisting of staff from the school, a police officer, a nurse, and Joy's father, conspired to force Joy to assemble the Cup of Ankh. They removed Joy from school, and destroyed evidence of her existence, to protect her from a former society member Rufus Zeno (Roger Barclay), who will stop at nothing to get the cup. However, on the 'chosen hour' of the cup's assembly, Joy realises that, as she was born at seven "PM", she is not able to assemble the cup; Nina, however, shares Joy's birthday and was born at seven o'clock in the morning. Nina assembles the cup and, with the rest of Sibuna, fool Rufus into believing himself immortal.


title: House of Anubis

text: While hiding the Cup of Ankh, Nina unknowingly sets free an Egyptian spirit, Senkhara. Senkhara curses Nina with the Mark of Anubis, bending her to her will, and instructs her to find the Mask of Anubis, an artifact able to "weep tears of gold" in addition to an elixir of life. The Sibunas discover a chamber of tunnels underneath the house that contain a series of puzzles and tasks in order to progress, including swinging scythe-like pendulums over a chasm and a game of Senet using players as pieces. Senkhara is displeased with Nina's slow pace and gives the Mark of Anubis to the rest of Sibuna, and to Nina's grandmother, as a threat. Alongside the group, Victor is also searching for the mask as he believes that it holds the missing ingredient for the elixir of life – tears of gold. To obtain the Book of Isis that contains the recipe for the elixir, Victor instructs Mr Sweet to gain an Egyptian Exhibition. Jerome locates his father in prison, who tells him that in order to reverse his bad luck, Jerome must find the Frobisher Gem and put it into the Frobisher shield after he stole it as a child. New American pupil Eddie (Burkely Duffield) becomes rivals with Patricia, even though they are just hiding the fact that they are attracted to each other. Victor teams up with Anubis House's new housemother, Vera, who 'helps' him with locating the mask. Unbeknown to Victor, Vera is in fact working with Rufus Zeno. It is a race against each other as Sibuna and Victor try to outwit one another on the quest for the Mask of Anubis that will lead to eternal life. In the end, Nina leaves for good to live with her grandmother.


title: House of Anubis

text: A new teacher, Miss Denby (Susy Kane), arrives at the school. New American student K.T. Rush (Alexandra Shipp) comes to the school. Eddie has a vision of K.T.'s dying grandfather giving her a key and telling her to go to Anubis House. Eddie and K.T. do some snooping around the house while Fabian tries to decipher a series of codes mistakenly given to Amber. Eddie and K.T. become new members of Sibuna. When Amber leaves for fashion school, Sibuna is revived with Eddie as a leader and Fabian, K.T., Patricia and Alfie as members. They find out that the adults are trying to reawaken a sleeping Robert Frobisher-Smythe, with Denby being the "Keeper" [she keeps Frobisher in the tank room in the gatehouse (her home on the school property)], Victor being the "Enabler", and Mr. Sweet being the "Seeker". The Sibunas discover that Miss Harriet Denby's name is actually Caroline. Her sister is actually Harriet – and the original Keeper. However, she is locked in a mental hospital because of her sister. It turns out that K.T. is the great-granddaughter of Frobisher. Jerome, Joy, Alfie, and Patricia are the descendants of Frobisher's friends and are needed for the ceremony, but because of Caroline Denby lying about her identity, Frobisher is reawakened evil.


title: House of Anubis

text: Everybody thinks that the ceremony didn't work out since Sibuna intervened just in time, but when Caroline goes to the gatehouse to pack her bags, she meets Frobisher, who is reawakened and evil. Caroline does not tell Eric Sweet or Victor about this. Robert explains to Caroline that he needs to capture five sinning people for Ammut at midnight or noon, so that they could become evil. The sinners captured are Victor, Patricia, Mr. Sweet, Fabian and Alfie. Ammut rises, but needs more souls. She gives Frobisher a book that easily captures people's souls. A fake assembly is organized as an attempt to capture more souls. Willow (Louisa Connolly-Burnham) is the only person who didn't become a sinner. Willow, Eddie and K.T. are chased by Frobisher and the soul-less students but Harriet comes to the rescue with a stolen ambulance. She explains that Willow didn't become a sinner because she had K.T.'s moon key, and that Ammut can be sent back with Caroline's sun key and K.T.'s moon key. Willow becomes a sinner when she and K.T. try to steal the sun key because Harriet slipped the moon key into K.T.'s pocket. In the end, Ammut is sent back, devouring Caroline. Frobisher is not evil again and old. All the sinners are back to normal and don't remember what happened during the time they were sinners. Willow doesn't even remember the short time that she was good, so she forgot about the whole mystery. The Sibunas, of course, are told by Eddie and K.T. about what happened. Frobisher and Harriet set off for Egypt, and Jerome and Joy finally get together after a lot of drama, involving Jerome cheating on Mara and Willow. Mara and Fabian flirt. The group enjoys a fireworks display.


title: House of Anubis

text: In the finale special "Touchstone of Ra", the Anubis House residents are preparing for their graduation; however, their joyous celebration plans are cut short with the arrival of four [freshmen] fourth years who move in early – Cassie, Erin, Dexter and Sophia. Patricia instantly antagonizes Sophia because she spotted her flirting with Eddie. On their trip to an Egyptian museum, Eddie, Dexter and Sophia discover a special artifact known as the Touchstone of Ra. Back at the house, Victor announces that an artifact from the museum was stolen, and the Touchstone suddenly appears to be in Eddie's possession. Victor confiscates the Touchstone but has no intentions of returning it. Later, the Sibunas (along with Sophia and Mara) overhear Victor speaking to Mr. Sweet about what happens when the Pyramid of Ra is built. They plan to prevent him from building the Pyramid, retrieving the Touchstone for good measure. Eventually, Eddie discovers that Sophia has betrayed them when she plans to complete the Pyramid of Ra herself. At the graduation ceremony, Mara is manipulated by an unknown force when she wears the valedictorian medal (which is actually an artifact discovered by Alfie). At the house, the Sibunas team up with Victor to find the remaining pillars of the Pyramid to stop Sophia from accomplishing her goal. In the final showdown, the Pyramid is incomplete and the students are saved. Since Sophia fails, she is transformed into stone as a punishment from Ra. Eddie loses his Osirian powers in the process. Since Victor's "destiny" was to prevent the pyramid from ever being built, he decides to leave the house for good that evening as the students celebrate their graduation party.


title: House of Anubis

text: Production on the pilot episode began in August 2009, though with a different cast and a different title than the eventual series. In March 2010, Studio 100 announced that the series was sold to Nickelodeon in the United States, and Nickelodeon confirmed that "House of Anubis" was in development for a planned fall 2010 debut. The series was filmed in the summer of 2010 in Liverpool, and was first broadcast in the United States on 1 January 2011. Nickelodeon included "House of Anubis" in its 10 March 2011 press release for its annual Upfront presentation to advertisers and media.


title: House of Anubis

text: The series is the first original series produced for the flagship U.S. Nickelodeon channel to be produced outside of North America. The series is structured in a different manner from other live-action television series in that each episode consists of two eleven-minute segments, a format commonly used in half-hour animated series (although the events of each subsequent segment pick up from the events of the previous segment); and the series' episodes are formatted to be broadcast in the five-day-a-week format that is typically common with soap operas or telenovelas.


title: House of Anubis

text: On 29 June 2011, "Entertainment Weekly" confirmed that Nickelodeon had ordered a second season of House of Anubis and that production would begin on 21 July 2011 in Liverpool. A total of forty-five half-hour episodes (ninety 15-minute episodes) were aired, premiering on 9 January 2012.


title: House of Anubis

text: On 16 April 2012, a third season was confirmed by Nickelodeon and Lime Pictures. Nathalia Ramos, who played lead character Nina Martin, did not return for the series' third season so that she could focus on finishing college. Eugene Simon confirmed that filming of the third season would begin in the summer of 2012. On 16 July 2012, Nickelodeon (UK & Ireland) announced on their Twitter page and the website's blog that filming of season 3 would begin that month. Bobby Lockwood announced on his Twitter page that he would not be returning for the series' third season, but instead that he had a new show called "Wolfblood" coming out on CBBC later in 2012. It was announced on the House of Anubis Facebook page that there would be new characters named KT Rush, played by Alexandra Shipp, and Willow, played by Louisa Connolly-Burnham.


title: House of Anubis

text: The series was filmed in Liverpool with Ye Priory Court standing in for Anubis House, the gardens are filmed in Croxteth Park and Peckforton Castle Lodge, located in Chester, standing in for the gatehouse.


title: House of Anubis

text: "Anubis Unlocked" is a behind the scenes show which aired in and produced by Nickelodeon UK. Ten episodes were commissioned for the first series of "House of Anubis", which featured cast interviews, behind the scenes clips, tours of the set, and exclusive previews. These ten episodes were presented by Anna Williamson and Jamie Rickers. "Anubis Unlocked" was not commissioned for the second series of "House of Anubis", though a short behind-the-scenes segment aired at the end of series two. "Anubis Unlocked" was re-commissioned for the third series of "House of Anubis".


title: House of Anubis

text: Youth Television News praised the series, commending Nickelodeon's attempt at a drama series, saying "a good story always outdoes a repetitive sitcom."


title: House of Anubis

text: The hour-long series premiere on 1 January 2011 was watched by an average of 2.9 million viewers for the first two episodes. The series scored a 4.0 share (846,000 viewers) among teens 11–17, a 4.4 share (952,000 viewers) among kids 11–15 and a 3.5 share (1.2 million) among kids 11–18, ranking #1 amongst all broadcast and basic cable programs in its timeslot in all pre-teen and teen demographics.


title: Keerthi Reddy

text: Keerthi Reddy is an Indian former actress who appeared primarily in Telugu, Tamil, and Hindi language films. Her notable work includes "Tholi Prema" (1998), "Pyaar Ishq Aur Mohabbat" (2001) and "Arjun" (2004). She has received a Filmfare Award for her performance in the film "Arjun" (2004).


title: Keerthi Reddy

text: Keerthi Reddy was born to an interior designer and dress designer mother. Her grandfather is Keshpally Ganga Reddy, Ex-Member of Parliament from Nizamabad in Telangana. She was raised in Bengaluru. She did her schooling in Jiddu Krishnamurthy's The Valley School near Kanakapura, Bengaluru. She was trained in Bharatanatyam for eight years. She briefly studied at St. Joseph's Public School in Hyderabad. She attended Ryerson University for higher education.


title: Keerthi Reddy

text: In 1996, Keerthi Reddy made her film début in a comedy thriller "Gunshot", opposite Ali directed by S. V. Krishna Reddy. In 1998 Keerthi was cast as female lead in "Tholi Prema" opposite Pawan Kalyan which was a blockbuster. In 2000 Keerthi Reddy made her Bollywood début in "Tera Jadoo Chal Gayaa" opposite Abhishek Bachchan. Her next film "Pyaar Ishq Aur Mohabbat" featured her as Isha Nair opposite the debutant Arjun Rampal. Her role was a girl who was loved by three men Gaurav Saxena, Yash Sabarwal (Suniel Shetty) and Taj Bharadwaj (Aftab Shivdasani). In 2002 Keerthi had a supporting role in "Badhaai Ho Badhaai" opposite Anil Kapoor. After these films, she stopped acting in Hindi films.


title: Keerthi Reddy

text: In 2002 Keerthi Reddy acted in "Super Star", her only Kannada film. In 2004 Keerthi Reddy acted in the Telugu film "Arjun" starring Mahesh Babu for which she received her only award, a Filmfare Best Supporting Actress Award in Telugu.


title: Keerthi Reddy

text: Keerthi married actor Sumanth, Nagarjuna Akkineni's nephew and the grandson of ANR in 2004. They divorced in 2006. She later remarried and settled in USA. The couple has two children.


title: Censorship in China

text: Censorship in the People's Republic of China (PRC) is implemented or mandated by the PRC's ruling party, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It is one of strictest censorship regimes in the world. The government censors content for mainly political reasons, such as curtailing political opposition, and censoring events unfavorable to the CCP, such as the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, pro-democracy movements in China, the Uyghur genocide, human rights in Tibet, the Taiwan independence movement, Falun Gong, and pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong. Since Xi Jinping became the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party ("de facto" paramount leader) in 2012, censorship has been "significantly stepped up".


title: Censorship in China

text: The government has censorship over all media capable of reaching a wide audience. This includes television, print media, radio, film, theater, text messaging, instant messaging, video games, literature, and the Internet. The Chinese government asserts that it has the legal right to control the Internet's content within their territory and that their censorship rules do not infringe on their citizens' right to free speech. Government officials have access to uncensored information via an internal document system.


title: Censorship in China

text: As of 2022, Reporters Without Borders ranks China as one of the ten countries globally with the least press freedom. In August 2012, the OpenNet Initiative classified Internet censorship in China as "pervasive" in the political and conflict/security areas and "substantial" in the social and Internet tools areas, the two most extensive classifications of the five they use. Freedom House ranks the Chinese press as "not free", the worst possible ranking, saying that "state control over the news media in China is achieved through a complex combination of party monitoring of news content, legal restrictions on journalists, and financial incentives for self-censorship," and an increasing practice of "cyber-disappearance" of material written by or about activist bloggers.


title: Censorship in China

text: Other views suggest that Chinese businesses such as Baidu, Tencent and Alibaba, some of the world's largest internet enterprises, have benefited from the way China blocked international rivals from the domestic market.


title: Censorship in China

text: In the Republican China period, the earliest known instance of Chinese censorship was in 1941 when the second volume of the book "Inside Asia", by John Gunther, was banned by the Nationalist government.


title: Censorship in China

text: The People's Republic of China adopted the "Economic Reform" policy in 1978, which transformed China's economic structure from a planned economy to a market economy. To stimulate the economy, the Chinese government relaxed its control on media, which promoted media commercialization, profits, and growth. The 1989 Tiananmen Square protests were a turning point for Chinese censorship, especially after they were forcibly suppressed on 4 June 1989 following a declaration of martial law and People's Liberation Army troops being deployed, and the Chinese government was condemned internationally. Following the protests and subsequent massacre, news censorship was strengthened because government officials considered that free media had promoted the "turmoil" and represented a potential threat to the regime. After 1995, the Chinese government expanded internet access because it thought that a developed internet would have a positive effect on economic growth; it simultaneously adopted strategic censorship to control information.


title: Censorship in China

text: The CCP Propaganda Department (中共中央宣传部; CCPPD) is the main official institution responsible for censorship work. Other departments, for example the State Council Information Office and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism (formerly known as the Ministry of Culture until 2018), assist with censorship work. In 2013, CCP general secretary Xi Jinping upgraded the Internet censorship department and established the Cyberspace Administration of China (中央网络安全和信息化委员会办公室; CAC), an independent network regulation agency.


title: Censorship in China

text: The Chinese government censors the domestic internet community and foreign websites differently. For the domestic internet community, the propaganda department governs what type of content should be banned or deleted on the internet, and the system of social media or website conduct self-censorship which automatically filters all sensitive content. Censors review the posts on social media, and the users must register by their real name. For foreign websites, the "Great Firewall" prevents Chinese citizens from accessing particular websites with sensitive content by blocking the IP address of these websites. Meanwhile, some foreign websites are not blocked, but the government extends the loading time for these websites. By 2020, an estimated 12 million to 20 million Chinese internet users were using Virtual Private Networks (VPN) to bypass the internet blockade. In accordance with "Implementation Rules for Provisional Regulations of the Administration of International Networking of Computer Information in the People's Republic of China" (), the Chinese government does not support Internet users who use VPN to bypass Internet censorship and visit blocked websites within the Chinese mainland. In principle, it is forbidden for Internet users to use a VPN, but if they only do so without selling VPNs or making profits, the government will not investigate.


title: Censorship in China

text: Most broadly, the purpose of the censorship apparatus is to maintain the stability of the status quo system of governance under the CCP. This includes political censorship as well as censorship of content deemed obscene and harmful to public morality, although the latter justification can be used as a means to censor political topics as well. The more specific reasoning and logic of censorship is not publicized by the state, however; scholars outside of China generally tend to take two overarching views of its purpose: first, censorship primarily targets unauthorized criticisms of the party-state; and/or second, censorship primarily targets expression of sentiment that is conducive to organization of collective action (whether or not it is critical of the party-state).


title: Censorship in China

text: In 2013, Gary King, Jennifer Pan, and Margaret E. Roberts published research based on large-scale sampling of posts on a variety of Chinese social media, arguing that the primary motive for censorship is to quash potential for collective action, and not prevent criticism of the government "per se". Through regular, automated sampling of extant posts, the authors were able to analyze which were deleted over time. While drawing only from Internet-based sources, King et al. argued their data demonstrated that "despite widespread censorship of social media, we find that when the Chinese people write scathing criticisms of their government and its leaders, the probability that their post will be censored does not increase. Instead, we find that the purpose of the censorship program is to reduce the probability of collective action by clipping social ties whenever any collective movements are in evidence or expected."


title: Censorship in China

text: Further experiments conducted by King et al. (2014) demonstrated and recreated mechanisms of censorship of social media. The authors created social media accounts to publish text online, tracking what was and was not deleted, and additionally obtained social media censorship software used by private corporations to comply with government regulations. King et el. again argued their work offered "rigorous support for the recent hypothesis that criticisms of the state, its leaders, and their policies are published, whereas posts about real-world events with collective action potential are censored."


title: Censorship in China

text: In 2019, however, Dimitar Gueorguiev and Edmund Malesky published an analysis of the data gathered in King, Pan & Roberts (2013), arguing that the sample included critical posts garnered through state-led consultation campaigns, wherein the Chinese government specifically solicited public comment on certain proposals, laws and regulations. Gueorguiev and Malesky subsequently concluded that controlling for such condoned criticism, the "strong" thesis of King, Pan & Roberts (2013)—that collective action potential is the primary trigger of censorship, and not a criticism of the government—failed to stand. Rather, while collective action may be a strong, or the strongest, condition for censorship, general criticism is also a major target as well.


title: Censorship in China

text: In 2017, Bei Qin, David Strömberg, and Yanhui Wu published an article titled "Why Does China Allow Freer Social Media? Protests versus Surveillance and Propaganda." This article, based on King, Pan, and Roberts' argument, explores the Chinese government's censorship goals by analyzing data from Chinese social media site Sina Weibo. Qin et al. also point out that the Chinese government can monitor and predict upcoming collective action events, and can ask local governments to intervene and prevent violence conflicts. Qin et al. state that "Governments can use these methods to track and analyze online activities, to gauge public opinion, and to contain threats before they spread." Qin et al. also note that the central government limits its censorship to encourage people to express their opinions about the government's performance and public policies. Therefore, the government can receive feedback from the internet, which helps officials to get to know local issues and improve their work. Also, this article discusses some posts on Weibo that have accused local officials of corruption, which means some corruption cases can be predicted on social media, and the central government can supervise the local officials on the internet.


title: Censorship in China

text: Chinese scholars Liu Liming and Sheng Qiwen state that censorship helps to protect national information security as well as prevent in the disclosure and infringement of any important national or personal information. Song Minlei points out that censorship is conducive to the maintenance of China's "ideological security." Internet censorship, Song writes, can protect the mainstream ideology, such as the core socialist value system, prevent the spread of harmful information abroad, and maintain national political stability. Nevertheless, Western scholars and Chinese scholars still have a common point of view when discussing the goal of China's censorship. The core purpose of censorship is to maintain the stability of the CCP's political power.


title: Censorship in China

text: Multiple organs of both the CCP and the Chinese state exercise various degrees of responsibility for censorship.


title: Censorship in China

text: The Publicity Department of the CCP plays a major role in censorship. It issues editorial guidelines for media nationwide, delineating topics that cannot be covered or must be covered in a certain way. In 2013, "The Beijing News", a CCP-run newspaper, noted that the Publicity Department employed over 2 million 'public sentiment analysts' () across the country, who monitor comments on particular topics on the Chinese Internet and compile reports for relevant government or Party bodies if discussion crosses certain thresholds, which in turn decide if and how to respond. Additionally, the Cyberspace Administration of China, another Party body, monitors and censors Internet-based media and speech, and issues guidelines to online platforms outlining priorities for controlling discourse.


title: Censorship in China

text: In 2018, a number of agencies underwent a reorganization designed to strengthen Party control of media. Most of the duties of the General Administration of Press and Publication (previously the State Administration for Press Publishing Radio Film & Television), which licensed and censored all content publishers within China, including in print, audio, and Internet formats, were taken over by the new National Radio and Television Administration under the authority of the State Council. Film and press work was transferred directly to the Publicity Department in the form of the State Film Administration and State Administration of Press and Publication.


title: Censorship in China

text: Media outlets usually employ their own monitors to ensure political content does not cross Party lines. For example, WeChat, a popular messaging and social media platform run by Tencent, uses semi-automated methods to monitor content sent between accounts, including images, checking for politically sensitive material, and will block said material from reaching the intended recipient, even if the sending account is non-Chinese.


title: Censorship in China

text: Sina Weibo, the dominant microblogging platform in China, has an internal censorship department that issues its own directives in line with government authority requirements and employs its own censors to monitor content. The Committee to Protect Journalists has published documents it said are from the Weibo censorship department between 2011 and 2014 that detailed the methodology: "... Sina's computer system scans each post using an algorithm designed to identify politically unacceptable content... [p]osts are flagged by the algorithm and forwarded to the department's employees, who decide their fate based on the instructions listed in the censorship logs." This method is consistent with those documented by King, Pan & Roberts (2014) for other websites. Weibo has been reprimanded and forced to limit certain website functions by Chinese authorities as a consequence for failure to adequately censor content.


title: Censorship in China

text: Censorship in the PRC encompasses a wide range of subject matter. The motivations behind such censorship are varied; while some are stated outright by the Chinese government itself, others are surmised by observers both inside and outside of the country.


title: Censorship in China

text: The Chinese government regulates the creation and distribution of materials regarding Chinese history. Particular emphasis is placed on combatting "historical nihilism". The CCP's historical research body, the Central Committee Party History Research Office, has defined historical nihilism as that which "seek[s] to distort the history of modern China's revolution, the CCP and the armed forces under the guise of reevaluating existing narratives", and thus countering such nihilism is "a form of political combat, crucial to the CCP leadership and the security of socialism". In practice, the term is often applied to any narratives that challenge official views of historical events. Under Xi Jinping, the government began to censor digitized archival documents that contradict official depictions of history.


title: Censorship in China

text: One example of this is the censorship of historical writings about the Cultural Revolution. Although the Chinese government now officially denounces the Cultural Revolution, it does not allow Chinese citizens to present detailed histories of the suffering and brutality that ordinary people sustained.


title: Censorship in China

text: Questioning folk-historical stories, such as those of the Five Heroes of Mount Langya, can be a criminal offense.


title: Censorship in China

text: In 2021, the Cyberspace Administration of China launched a hotline for the reporting of "historical nihilists" and "illegal" comments about Chinese history. Netizens face jail time and other punishments if they are found to have posted content critical of China's leadership, policies and history.


title: Censorship in China

text: The Council on Foreign Relations says that unwelcome views may be censored by authorities who exploit the vagueness in laws concerning publication of state secrets. Major media outlets receive guidance from the Chinese Department of Propaganda on what content is politically acceptable. The PRC bans certain content regarding independence movements in Tibet and Taiwan, the religious movement Falun Gong, democracy, the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, Maoism, corruption, police brutality, anarchism, gossip, disparity of wealth, and food safety scandals.


title: Censorship in China

text: In the lead-up to the Beijing Olympics, the government allegedly issued guidelines to the local media for reporting during the Games: political issues not directly related to the games were to be downplayed and topics such as the Pro-Tibetan independence and East Turkestan independence movement as well as food safety issues such as "cancer-causing mineral water" were not to be reported on. However, the government claims that such a list does not exist. As the 2008 Chinese milk scandal broke out in September, the Chinese government also denied speculation from media outlets that their desire for perfect games contributed towards the allegedly delayed recall of contaminated infant formula. This caused deaths and kidney damage in infants. On 13 February 2009, Li Dongdong, a deputy chief of the General Administration of Press and Publication, announced the introduction of a series of rules and regulations to strengthen oversight and administration of news professionals and reporting activities. The regulations would include a "full database of people who engage in unhealthy professional conduct" who would be excluded from engaging in news reporting and editing work. Although the controls were ostensibly to "resolutely halt fake news", it was criticized by Li Datong, editor at the "China Youth Daily" who was dismissed for criticizing state censorship. Li Datong said "There really is a problem with fake reporting and reporters, but there are already plenty of ways to deal with that." Reuters said that although CCP's Propaganda Department micro-manages what newspapers and other media do and do not report, the government remains concerned about unrest amid the economic slowdown and the 20th anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre.


title: Censorship in China

text: In January 2011, Boxun revealed that the Politburo member responsible for the Propaganda Department, Li Changchun, issued instructions for the Chinese media to downplay social tensions on issues such as land prices, political reform and major disasters or incidents, and to ensure reporting does not show the CCP negatively. The CCP warned that the media must "ensure that the party and government do not become the targets or focus of criticism", and any mention of political reforms must reflect the government in a favourable light.


title: Censorship in China

text: The Chinese government censors content it considers contrary to Chinese moral and cultural norms, or anything that the state finds to be contrary to the official state beliefs. Content censored on moral grounds has included pornography in China, particularly extreme pornography; violence in films; "low-culture" and morally "problematic" performances, such as hip-hop or those featuring visibly tattooed artists and LGBTQ content on television.


title: Censorship in China

text: Pornography has been illegal since the founding of the People's Republic in 1949 and is a major target of censorship, but it is still commonly accessible within the country. Chinese media have reported on censors specifically hired by provincial authorities to screen movies confiscated from unlicensed dealers for pornographic content. The government has launched campaigns to crack down pornography to "protect minors and maintain public morality", but pornography consumption within the country has grown steadily since 2000.


title: Censorship in China

text: Censorship bodies generally treat LGBT content as immoral, and regularly censor non-pornographic depictions of such content in mass media. Positive depictions of same-sex relationships in movies and television have been taken off the air by censors, and according to Human Rights Watch, negative depictions of LGBTQ people are "common and pervasive" as of 2015. Global controversy erupted in 2018 when Mango TV edited out Ireland's Eurovision song because it depicted two men holding hands and dancing together. An LGBT flag waved during an earlier performance by Switzerland that year was also blurred out. The European Broadcasting Union subsequently terminated its relationship with Mango TV's parent company, Hunan Broadcasting System, preventing any further airing of the Eurovision Song Contest in China. Censors had also cut Albania's 2018 performance because of the lead singer's tattoos.


title: Censorship in China

text: In 2021 the National Radio and TV Administration added a ban on "sissy men and other abnormal esthetics" to its rules using the offensive term niang pao.


title: Censorship in China

text: China has historically sought to use censorship to protect the country's culture. During the Cultural Revolution of the 1970s, foreign literature and art forms, religious works and symbols, and even artifacts of ancient Chinese culture were deemed "reactionary" and became targets for destruction by Red Guards.


title: Censorship in China

text: Although much greater cultural freedom exists in China today, continuing crackdowns on banning foreign cartoons from Chinese prime time TV, and limits on screening for foreign films could be seen as a continuation of cultural-minded censorship. The foreign TV shows and films on internet also become the target of censorship. In July 2017, Bilibili, one of the most popular video sites in China, removed most of American & British TV shows, and all foreign categories like "American drama" to comply with regulations.


title: Censorship in China

text: In order to limit outside influence on Chinese society, authorities began to restrict the publishing of children's books written by foreign authors in China from early 2017, reducing the number of these kind of books from thousands to hundreds a year.


title: Censorship in China

text: Male actor's earrings and ponytails have been blurred due to the perception that they are rebellious and countercultural.


title: Censorship in China

text: The Constitution of China guarantees freedom of religion for citizens, as it does the freedom of speech. In practice, however, there are strict regulations on religious practice and speech. Five state religions are officially recognized: Buddhism, Catholicism, Daoism, Islam, and Protestantism; faiths outside of these are illegal, although some are tolerated to varying degrees. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, for instance, is permitted to maintain a small number of places of worship for expatriates, but is forbidden from preaching or proselytizing to Chinese citizens, as are all foreigners. Foreigners caught proselytizing have been arrested and expelled from the country.


title: Censorship in China

text: A number of religious texts, publications, and materials are banned or have their distributions artificially limited in the PRC, and information concerning the treatment of some religious groups is also tightly controlled. Under Chinese law, a minor is forbidden to receive a religious education of any kind.


title: Censorship in China

text: The Falun Gong is subject to suppression in China, and virtually all religious texts, publications, and websites relating to the group have been banned, along with information on the imprisonment or torture of followers.


title: Censorship in China

text: Christian Bibles are allowed to be printed in China but only in limited numbers and through a single press. Their sale is also restricted to officially sanctioned churches, with online sales restricted since at least April 2018. The Chinese government has fined churches for possession of unauthorized editions of the Bible. Other Christian literature is also restricted; in January 2016, five people were arrested for simply "buying and selling officially forbidden Christian devotionals". They were sentenced to 3–7 years in jail.


title: Censorship in China

text: In 1989, China banned a book titled《性风俗》"Xing Fengsu" ("Sexual Customs") which insulted Islam and placed its authors under arrest after protests in Lanzhou and Beijing by Chinese Hui Muslims, during which the Chinese police provided protection to the Hui Muslim protesters, and the Chinese government organized public burnings of the book. The Chinese government assisted them and gave into their demands because Hui do not have a separatist movement, unlike the Uyghurs. A collection of brain teasers published in Sichuan in 1993 caused similar effects, and the three editors of the book were sentenced to 2–5 years. Hui Muslim protesters who violently rioted by vandalizing property during the protests against the book were let off by the Chinese government and went unpunished while Uyghur protesters were imprisoned.


title: Censorship in China

text: In 2007, anticipating the coming "Year of the Pig" in the Chinese calendar, depictions of pigs were banned from CCTV "to avoid conflicts with ethnic minorities". This is believed to refer to China's population of 20 million Muslims (to whom pigs are considered "unclean").


title: Censorship in China

text: In response to the 2015 Charlie Hebdo shooting, Chinese state-run media attacked Charlie Hebdo for publishing cartoons insulting Muhammad, with the state-run Xinhua News Agency advocating limiting freedom of speech, while CCP-owned tabloid "Global Times" said the attack was "payback" for what it characterized as Western colonialism, accusing Charlie Hebdo of trying to incite a clash of civilizations.


title: Censorship in China

text: In recent years, censorship in China has been accused of being used not only for political protectionism but also for economic protectionism. Tsinghua University professor Patrick Chovanec has speculated that the Chinese ban on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube may have been done in part to grant a business advantage to the websites' Chinese competitors. Similarly, China has been accused of using a double standard in attacking Google for "obscene" content that is also present on Chinese competitor Baidu. The 2D version of the blockbuster film "Avatar" was also pulled from screens in the country; reportedly for taking in too much money and seizing market share from domestic films. Furthermore, the official ban on most foreign films hardly affect Chinese citizens; such films can easily be acquired in copyright-infringing formats, allowing Chinese to view such films to be financially accessible while keeping their money within the domestic economy.


title: Censorship in China

text: In February 2007, the website of the French organization Observatoire International des Crises was banned in the PRC after it posted an article on the risks of trading with China. "How do you assess an investment opportunity if no reliable information about social tension, corruption or local trade unions is available? This case of censorship, affecting a very specialised site with solely French-language content, shows the [Chinese] government attaches as much importance to the censorship of economic data as political content," the organization was quoted as saying. In 2016, after a series of policy mishaps in the backdrop of severe economic downturn in the country, regulators, censors and government officials have increased censorship. Officials, regulators and censors acting to stem the flow of money abroad by creating an environment of "zhengnengliang" (positive energy), have warned to commentators whose remarks or projections on the economy contradict optimistic official statements.


title: Censorship in China

text: Private surveying and publication of geographic data (such as a map) without a permit is illegal in China, and geographic coordinates are obfuscated by a government-mandated coordinate system.


title: Censorship in China

text: At the end of December 2019, Hong Kong media began to report several cases of unidentified pneumonia in Wuhan, China. At the same time, Chinese mainland media had no reports related to new unidentified pneumonia.


title: Censorship in China

text: In late December, social media networks were under official pressure to censor contents that related to the early warning of the virus. At the end of December, the Chinese livestreaming platform YY (YY 直播) started to censor content that contained specific keywords, for example, "Unknown Wuhan Pneumonia (不明武汉肺炎)" and "SARS outbreak in Wuhan (爆发SARS疫情)."


title: Censorship in China

text: On 30 December, Li Wenliang released a message in a WeChat group, saying that "seven cases of SARS were diagnosed in the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market and isolated in the emergency department of our hospital." An hour later, Li Wenliang announced in the WeChat group that "the latest news is that coronavirus infection has been confirmed and virus typing is in progress." On 3 January 2020, he was warned and admonished by Zhongnan Road Street police station of Wuchang District. Li Wenliang died of COVID-19 on 7 February, which caused a sensation in Chinese society. China's government began to restrict information about the epidemic beginning in early January, before the existence of a novel coronavirus had been confirmed. On WeChat, the mention of Li Wenliang was blocked starting on 9 February. At the same time, topics related to criticism of the government's policies on dealing with the pandemic were being censored.


title: Censorship in China

text: Scholars Lotus Ruan, Jeffrey Knockel, and Masashi Crete-Nishihata point out that since the outbreak, government officials have restricted the dissemination of information about the virus in order to reduce public fear. They also state that "on the other hand, censoring keywords critical of central leadership and government actors may be an effort to avoid embarrassment and maintain a positive image of the government." Historian Jeremy Brown said, "the initial cover-up of the virus in December and January in Wuhan allowed it to spread and fueled a global pandemic instead of containing it locally."


title: Censorship in China

text: Language is a sensitive matter in the PRC. But in the same way, false or unreal praise and devotion must be subjected to careful scrutiny in China. Since the 1960s, there are several articles in newspapers that have been criticized and censored consequently.


title: Censorship in China

text: On the twentieth anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, Chinese media came under tremendous pressure from authorities. "Ming Pao" reported on the CCP Publicity Department's "hitherto unimaginable extent" of pressure to screen out any related content. The journal reported two incidents in 2008 which caused official concern, but which could not be proven to be deliberate challenges: "Beijing News" published an image of an injured person being taken to the hospital on 4 June and "Southern Metropolis Daily" reported on unusual weather in Guangdong province with the headline of "4 storms in June," which both journals insisted were due to carelessness. Some newspapers have therefore instructed their editors to refrain from using the numbers '6' and '4' in their reports during this sensitive period. Furthermore, the numbers cannot be used in the headlines lest the Publicity Department disapprove.


title: Censorship in China

text: 30 journalists and 74 netizens were reportedly imprisoned in China as of September 2014; China had "44 journalists in prison, more than any other country."


title: Censorship in China

text: The CCP also often employs teams of writers () to write articles under pseudonyms for the "People's Daily", the official newspaper of the CCP, as well as other journals. These writing teams are most often employed by the Central Propaganda Department, the Central Organization Department, and the Political and Legislative Affairs Committee. The main purpose of these writing groups is to spread the opinions and political thoughts of the CCP without these ideas being perceived as propaganda. Writing teams consistently use the same pseudonyms to write about specific topics that they specialize in. For example, Ke Jiaoping is the pseudonym for a writing group that publishes articles about technological education and He Zhenhua is the pseudonym for a writing group that publishes articles opposing separatism.


title: Censorship in China

text: The CCP punished foreign journalists by failing to renew their credentials when foreign journalists criticized its policies. On 19 February 2020, China announced the revoking of the press credentials of three "Wall Street Journal" reporters based in Beijing. The government of China accused "The" "Wall Street Journal" of failing to apologize for publishing articles criticizing China's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, and failing to "investigate and deal with those responsible".


title: Censorship in China

text: Foreign and Hong Kong news broadcasts in mainland China from TVB, CNN International, BBC World Service, and Bloomberg Television are occasionally censored by being "blacked out" during controversial segments. It is reported that CNN has made an arrangement that allowed their signal to pass through a Chinese-controlled satellite. Chinese authorities have been able to censor CNN segments at any time in this way. CNN's broadcasts are not widely available throughout China, but rather only in certain diplomatic compounds, hotels, and apartment blocks.


title: Censorship in China

text: Numerous content which have been blacked out has included references to the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, the Dalai Lama, the death of Zhao Ziyang, the 2008 Tibetan unrest, the 2008 Chinese milk scandal and negative developments about the Beijing Olympics. Due to the anti-censorship stance taken in the South Park episode "Band in China," as well as the appearance of the Dalai Lama and Winnie-the-Pooh, South Park was entirely banned in the PRC following the episode's broadcast.


title: Censorship in China

text: During the Summer Olympics in Beijing all Chinese TV stations were ordered to delay live broadcasts by 10 seconds, a policy that was designed to give censors time to react in case free-Tibet demonstrators or others staged political protests.


title: Censorship in China

text: In January 2009, during a television report of the inauguration of U.S. President Barack Obama, the state-run China Central Television abruptly cut away from its coverage of Obama's address when he spoke of how "earlier generations faced down fascism and communism." Foreign animation is also banned from prime-time viewing hours (5pm to 8 pm) to protect domestic animation production.


title: Censorship in China

text: In September 2020, China's Ministry of Culture and Tourism announced it was "strengthening the content review and onsite supervision" of television media, such as talk shows and period dramas, that explore cultural, historical, and political themes. In 2019, it had already begun censoring popular historical Chinese dramas for not promoting socialist values, such as Story of Yanxi Palace.


title: Censorship in China

text: China has a large diversity of different foreign films broadcast through the media and sold in markets. China has no motion picture rating system, and films must therefore be deemed suitable by Chinese censors for all audiences to be allowed to screen.


title: Censorship in China

text: For foreign-made films, this sometimes means controversial footage must be cut before such films can play in Chinese cinemas. Examples include the removal of a reference to the Cold War in "Casino Royale", and the omission of footage containing Chow Yun-fat that "vilifies and humiliates the Chinese" in "". Prior to the 2008 Summer Olympics, the PRC administration announced that "wronged spirits and violent ghosts, monsters, demons, and other inhuman portrayals" were banned from audio visual content.


title: Censorship in China

text: Access to the 12,000 movie screens in China is a powerful incentive for film makers, especially those producing material such as "Kung Fu Panda 3" to consult and cooperate with Chinese censors. Taking a Chinese partner, as was done in the case of "Kung Fu Panda 3", can bypass the quota. Despite this, almost all internationally released foreign films are freely available in Chinese- and English-language versions through the counterfeit trade in DVDs.


title: Censorship in China

text: All audio visual works dealing with "serious topics" such as the Cultural Revolution must be registered before distribution on the mainland. For example, "The Departed" was not given permission to screen because it suggested that the government intends to use nuclear weapons on Taiwan. Films with sexually explicit themes have also been banned, including "Farewell My Concubine", "Brokeback Mountain" and "Memoirs of a Geisha". Warner Brothers never submitted "The Dark Knight" for censors, citing "cultural sensitivities in some elements of the film" due to the appearance by a Hong Kong singer whose sexually explicit photographs leaked onto the internet. Films by PRC nationals cannot be submitted to foreign film festivals without government approval.


title: Censorship in China

text: On 16 December 2012, the film "V for Vendetta" was aired unedited on CCTV-6, which raised hopes that China is loosening censorship. However, in August 2014 government officials caused the shutdown of the Beijing Independent Film Festival, an annual event for independent Chinese filmmakers to showcases their latest works. It was understood by the organizers the government was concerned the festival would be used as a forum to criticize the government.


title: Censorship in China

text: Hollywood producers generally seek to comply with the Chinese government's censorship requirements in a bid to access the country's restricted and lucrative cinema market, with the second-largest box office in the world as of 2016. This includes prioritizing sympathetic portrayals of Chinese characters in movies, such as changing the villains in "Red Dawn" from Chinese to North Koreans.


title: Censorship in China

text: China's state-run General Administration of Press and Publication (新闻出版总署) screens all Chinese literature that is intended to be sold on the open market. The GAPP has the legal authority to screen, censor, and ban any print, electronic, or Internet publication in China. Because all publishers in China are required to be licensed by the GAPP, that agency also has the power to deny people the right to publish, and completely shut down any publisher who fails to follow its dictates. Resultingly, the ratio of official-to-unlicensed books is said to be 40:60. According to a report in ZonaEuropa, there are more than 4,000 underground publishing factories around China. In 2008 there was one instance of burning of religious and politically incorrect books by local library officials. The banning of unapproved literature or books that have since fallen out of favor with the CCP continues, though critics claim this spotlight on individual titles only helps fuel booksales.


title: Censorship in China

text: Publishing in Hong Kong was uncensored prior to the passage of the Hong Kong national security law. Publishers such as New Century Press had freely published books about Chinese officials and forbidden episodes of Chinese history. Banned material including imported material such as that published by Mirror Books of New York City were sold in bookshops such as "People's Commune bookstore" patronized by shoppers from the mainland.


title: Censorship in China

text: The album "Chinese Democracy" by American rock band Guns N' Roses is banned in China, reportedly due to supposed criticism in its title track of the government and a reference to the currently persecuted Falun Gong spiritual movement. The government said through a state controlled newspaper that it "turns its spear point on China". Also banned is the track "Communist China" by British rock group Japan.


title: Censorship in China

text: The album "X" by Australian pop singer Kylie Minogue was released as a 10-track edition of the album by EMI Records. The album got three tracks banned due to strict censorship in the People's Republic of China. The tracks that were omitted were "Nu-di-ty", "Speakerphone" and "Like a Drug".


title: Censorship in China

text: China has historically issued bans to music acts who proclaim support of Tibetan independence or otherwise interact with the Dalai Lama, such as Oasis—which had concerts cancelled after lead singer Noel Gallagher had performed in a concert to benefit the movement, Maroon 5—which had concerts cancelled after a band member made a Twitter post celebrating his 80th birthday, and Lady Gaga—who became the subject of a ban issued by the CCP Propaganda Department after having posted an online video of her meeting with him.


title: Censorship in China

text: China's internet censorship is regarded by many as the most pervasive and sophisticated in the world. The system for blocking sites and articles is referred to as "The Great Firewall of China". According to a Harvard study conducted in 2002, at least 18,000 websites were blocked from within the country, and the number is believed to have been growing constantly. Banned sites include YouTube (from March 2009), Facebook (from July 2009), Google services (including Search, Google+, Maps, Docs, Drive, Sites, and Picasa), Twitter, Dropbox, Foursquare, and Flickr. Google was planning to launch a censored version of its search engine in China, blocking information about human rights, democracy, religion, and peaceful protest, but it was terminated. Certain search engine terms are blocked as well.


title: Censorship in China

text: Reporters have also suggested that China's internet censorship of foreign websites may also be a means of forcing mainland Chinese users to rely on China's own e-commerce industry, thus self-insulating their economy. In 2011, although China-based users of many Google services such as Google+ did not always find the services entirely blocked, they were nonetheless throttled so that users could be expected to become frustrated with the frequent timeouts and switch to the faster, more reliable services of Chinese competitors. According to BBC, local Chinese businesses such as Baidu, Tencent, and Alibaba, some of the world's largest internet enterprises, benefited from the way China has blocked international rivals from the market, assisting domestic companies.


title: Censorship in China

text: More recently, under current CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping, there has been a big push to improve information technology and use the improved technology as a means to further promote propaganda and the CCP agenda. This initiative has been successful, and by the end of 2015, almost 700 million Chinese citizens had internet access. However, with this improvement in technological access, there is now much more efficient communication regarding current events and government issues through social media, resulting in broader discussions amongst Chinese netizens on government policies and affairs; the government has implemented rules and preventative measures to counter the spread of negative public opinion regarding the CCP and governmental affairs. For example, Article 246. Section 1 in Criminal Law states that unlawful posts that are shared over 500 times or seen over 5000 times will result in the poster being charged with up to 3 years in prison.


title: Censorship in China

text: The regulation of public opinion was tightened after the National Propaganda and Ideology Work Conference in August 2013. At the conference, General Secretary Xi Jinping underscored the importance of "ideological work" in strengthening and uniting China; more specifically, he strongly emphasized the need to suppress controversies, "mistaken viewpoints", and rumors on every public platform. Shortly after this conference, a nationwide Internet Cleaning-up Campaign (净网行动) was implemented, during which there was a widespread deletion of blogs containing views deviating from those of the Party. That same month in 2013, the government also made a concerted attack against "Big V's" (verified social media celebrities with large public influence) who had a history of online activism and rumor-mongering.


title: Censorship in China

text: Yang Qiuyu, Zhou Lubao, and Qin Huo Huo are three "Big V's" that were arrested between 21 and 23 August 2013 on charges of rumormongering and slander. In that same month, Chinese-American investor Charles Xue (Xue Manzi), one of the most popular liberal social commentators on Chinese social media, was also arrested. Three weeks after his arrest, he appeared on CCTV-1 (a Chinese TV channel), confessing that he "irresponsibly posted rumors about political and social issues online," and commending the new internet regulations passed under General Secretary Xi Jinping's administration. These arrests served as an example to the rest of the "Big V's" as well as other Chinese internet users to be careful of what they expressed online; in fact, even five months after these arrests in August, there was a noticeable decrease in the number of posts and discussions from prominent online figures. On popular microblogging site Weibo, opinion leaders decreased their posts by around 40% from the previous year. By 2015, instances of censored posts from popular Weibo accounts included messages that were only mildly critical of the government – for example, the blocking of sarcastic comments in the wake of a widely viewed documentary about urban air pollution in China entitled, "Under the Dome" ().


title: Censorship in China

text: From 2017 onwards, Chinese censors began removing all images of the character Winnie the Pooh in response to the spread of memes comparing General Secretary Xi Jinping to the plump bear, as well as other characters from the works of A.A. Milne, later leading to the film "Christopher Robin" being denied release in China.


title: Censorship in China

text: The Chinese government also employs people as "black PRs" to remove information from the Internet and criticize those who speak negatively about the government. Network operators are obligated by the Cyberspace Administration to assist the government in monitoring and removing "illegal information" online. Moreover, the Cybersecurity Law that went into effect on 1 June 2017 forces internet providers to identify internet users, facilitating control and monitoring of public expression online.


title: Censorship in China

text: The State Council has the right to cut off network access or shut down internet access in response to incidents it deems a risk to national security. For example, in response to the 2009 riots in Xinjiang, the Chinese government restricted internet access in the region and shut down the social media platforms Twitter and Fanfou. In May 2022, outspoken market strategist Hong Hao's social media accounts in China (Weibo & WeChat) were suspended due to series of negative commentaries regarding the country's two-year slump on COVID-19 lockdowns and political tensions.


title: Censorship in China

text: According to Reporters without Borders, China has over 2,800 surveillance centers devoted to text messaging. As of early 2010, cell phone users in Shanghai and Beijing risk having their text messaging service cut off if they are found to have sent "illegal or unhealthy" content.