Crooked Brain｜Exclusive interview with "Propaganda China" (Part 1): Become a tick and live quickly

Recently, a movement of posting posters and slogans overseas in support of the Sitongqiao protests has become a craze, and its sponsoring group "Citizen Daily" (also known as "Propaganda China" on Telegram) has also attracted much attention. As a pan-liberal among overseas diaspora groups, I began to pay attention to this community in the early stages of the epidemic. At the beginning of this year, I wrote two in-depth reports on Propaganda China for Wai Nao to help more people understand and connect with it. them. But what I am ashamed of is that after writing these two manuscripts, I was deeply troubled by depression and put them behind me.

"Wen Xuan China" was also in a period of inactivity at the time of the interview, but I was happy to see that they persisted in operating and finally took over the Sitong Bridge protest and expanded it into a large-scale overseas support event. Therefore, looking back at the two articles I wrote at that time, even though there are many regrets and flaws, I still want more people to see their efforts.

——Mimiana

Wainao's original text: ""Propaganda of China": Become a Tick and Live Quickly"

"Wen Xuan China" is a graphic and text creation volunteer group composed of Chinese netizens who care about civil society. It was first established as a channel on the social platform Telegram. It was established in early 2020 and currently has more than 9,000 followers on the platform. In its channel introduction, the organization describes itself as a "publicity group on Telegram" that "learns from Hong Kong people and uses moderate and rational propaganda to impress and awaken the Chinese people."

Members of this group produce pictures with clear viewpoints on different issues related to the civil society process in the Chinese-speaking world and disseminate them on social media. In addition to the focus events that China's traditional liberal communities pay attention to, such as the June 4th movement, the Hong Kong movement, Xinjiang re-education camps, the Wuhan lockdown and the tracing of the origin of the new coronavirus, they also pay attention to women's rights, LGBTQ2+, labor, race and international affairs. Democratic movements and other issues that have the characteristics of international progressive liberalism.

In the online community of Chinese liberals, the political graphic creation voluntary group "Wen Xuan China" is considered to have a distinctive style. This community, which self-identifies as "the most ordinary Chinese people", tries to emphasize its own principles: try to accommodate as many political spectrums as possible while maintaining the same bottom line.

No angry friends

The logo of China Propaganda is a cube composed of three colors. From each corner of the cube, it looks like an oracle bone inscription "wen". "This is a cube that grows and expands infinitely in the vast universe. On the one hand, it represents freedom and imagination, and on the other hand, it is like every Chinese youth who pursues freedom and democracy. It may be lonely, and some work has no results. But it is always full of vitality." A member of Wenxuan China explained.

"Wen Xuan China is first of all like a friend you are willing to have a cup of tea and chat with. He is not perfect, but he is kind, reasonable, has common sense, and has a bit of humor." When explaining how the group is different from other Chinese communities that focus on civil society , a member of Wenxuan China replied.

"This friend is not angry." They emphasized.

There are some provisions in the "Guidelines for Cultural Propaganda China" that explain the positioning of Cultural Propaganda China. "Do not insult any individual or group", "Do not make propaganda that conflicts with democratic values ​​(such as 'acceleration')", "Do not make false propaganda", "Speak with facts".

These principles were gradually customized by members who realized the importance of various procedural rules during the long process of managing discussion groups. They even experimented with democracy in group management. But later it still took the form of formulating principles and handling them by administrators, and sometimes citing cases. "Similar to common law," group members say.

"If we use commonly used concepts to describe our political philosophy, then we should be Greater China Jiao and Left Jiao/Left." When talking about the "political stance" of the members, the backbone of Wenxuan China said.

They said they try to accommodate as much of the political spectrum as possible while keeping the bottom line consistent. "Due to different concepts, internal divisions among campaigners may destroy a movement. The reason is that there is no reasonable mechanism to reach consensus, and the process of finding consensus is already practicing democracy. So how to find consensus? We think the most important thing It is to maintain a common bottom line. Just like Hong Kong's 'Five Demands', the common bottom line of China's propaganda is to 'end one-party dictatorship and build a democratic China'."

The backbone of the group said that they do not agree with the reformists, and on this basis, they support different voices.

Born from the epidemic, inspired by the Hong Kong movement

Wenxuan China was founded in the early days of the coronavirus outbreak in China. On the evening of February 6, 2020, doctor Li Wenliang, who was considered by public opinion to be the "whistleblower" of the COVID-19 epidemic, died of COVID-19 infection, triggering a tsunami of public opinion. At that time, many angry netizens defended Li Wenliang and demanded an apology from the Wuhan government. Later, some people called for the right to freedom of speech, liberalization of information censorship and control, and opposition to convictions for speech. The Weibo topic "We want freedom of speech" once became a hot search topic. However, the relevant topics were quickly deleted, and with the censorship and propaganda machines operating at full force, the public narrative about the epidemic was once again rewritten.

"On the day after Dr. Li Wenliang passed away, Propaganda China was officially established. The purpose is to spread it on different social platforms through pictures, music, videos, etc., to fight against the huge official censorship and propaganda machine, and to make more people aware of There is an urgent need for change, and they are willing to be part of the change." During the commemoration of Li Wenliang, they collected and disseminated a large number of online pictures of mourning Li Wenliang. It also became a channel for gathering news, and aimed to help the public understand multiple overseas lines in a timely manner. Let’s hold commemorative activities and encourage each other.

Wen Xuan China has also been deeply influenced by the 2019 anti-extradition movement in Hong Kong, and the Hong Kong movement is also a major creative theme of Wen Xuan China. Members of the group said that they had followed the anti-extradition movement in various channels on Telegram and learned a lot about creative propaganda and ways to collect, process and disseminate information.

The principle of "no differentiation, no separation of seats, no ashes" emphasized in the Hong Kong movement has also been listed as one of the "creative principles" for promoting China. The purpose of "no stage" in the movement has also been written into the "Guidelines for "Literary Propaganda of China":

We are not a big platform, we need to be tolerant and welcome people and propaganda who have different ideas and are at different positions on the political spectrum. We don’t give orders and welcome other organizers to call for action. However, in the absence of action organizers, we also need to launch activities to mobilize everyone's enthusiasm.

Team members said that because they drew on the idea of ​​​​"no platform", they are extremely mobile and strive to not vary from person to person.

In this fluidity, a "propaganda" work is formed, and everyone has a different division of labor. "Members of the group will choose to participate in three different types of work: topic collection, creation of literature and propaganda, and distribution of literature and propaganda according to their own circumstances. The topics will try to cover aspects such as news and current affairs, common sense and logic. After the creation, sometimes the group members will make suggestions and modifications for each other. program. It’s very much like a creative writing boot camp in a virtual space, except everyone is anonymous.”

In the more active stage, there are groups of friends who collect topics of interest or attention and then share them with others. Creators claim the topics of interest and create freely. For important historical events or social movements, such as June 4th, 1989, Wuhan lockdown, women's rights, etc., some people will take the initiative to submit articles as the date approaches.

However, as the epidemic gradually improved and the time invested by group members decreased, this system almost no longer worked.

No strong sense of friend or foe

The provisions mentioned above are relatively rare in Chinese civil society communities at home and abroad, but they are also implemented in the creation of groups. Publicity China does not have too many restrictions on the creativity of the works, but it has a clear spirit: it must not criticize, despise or insult any individual or group, so there will be no "breast bag"; it does not discriminate against gender, race, religion; data collection and information sources must be treated seriously Be serious and conduct FC (fact checking); it does not violate the basic value of "respecting individual life", so we do not promote "acceleration" in literature.

In this regard, Wenxuan China explained that they hope that members will imagine themselves as "a citizen who can convey a true and rational voice to the people around them." Therefore, they require themselves to "not make false propaganda or insult any individual or group. Do not discriminate against any religion, gender, or race, and do not make propaganda that conflicts with democratic values." They said that the propaganda of China pursues truth and beauty, respects logic and common sense, and does not want to attack the current mainland government in a narrow sense, but hopes to have A broader, deeper care.

"The means we use to obtain democracy are consistent with the goals of democracy." They wrote in the "Guidelines for "Literary Propaganda of China".

Clarity and humor

Clarity and humor are the definitions given by group members for a "good propaganda work". Different from the style of online political discussions, they have produced many interesting works. Members believe that this can "disintegrate the logic of the official website's discourse", and secondly, "it is also because no one likes serious content these days. Especially on a light social platform like Instagram, who would want to share on a platform for sharing daily life" Some ‘cynical’ remarks?”

The deeper logic is that they believe that humor is "the best counterattack against a totalitarian government."

This kind of propaganda is like a tick, and the totalitarian government is like a huge but clumsy animal. Although the tick is small, it is quiet and flexible. It makes this large animal impossible to catch and exterminate, and it can only become more and more angry. Increasingly frightened, it slowly loses blood. It wants to survive until next spring, but the ticks are multiplying at a faster rate. It will collapse one day, and all the tick has to do is survive quickly.

Wenxuan China was founded on a Telegram channel, and later expanded to Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms, and opened YouTube to upload some song works and interview activity records. Currently they have nearly 15,000 followers across all platforms.

Since everyone in this community is anonymous, they have no way of knowing each other's true status. However, based on daily observation, members of Wenxuan China said:

This group consists of the most ordinary Chinese people: some are heterosexual and some are homosexual. Some people like to read, play games, and go shopping. Many people’s anger and injustice stem from the suppression of the most basic demands of ordinary young people; many people feel disillusioned after watching the “anti-extradition” protests; many people are completely disappointed with what the government did during the epidemic; many people are dissatisfied with the government’s actions in Xinjiang Ethnic cleansing was being carried out with anger, disbelief, and horror. Therefore, the participants in Propaganda China are just ordinary Chinese young people who have common sense, rationality, and love for freedom.

Promote various online activities in China. Commemorating June 4th is the most important thing. To this end, they have released a large number of historical photos, materials and commemorative literature, launched an online memorial service, and organized several dialogues. In addition, they pay attention to major public events at home and abroad; they have promoted "Escape from WeChat 2.0: Digital Immigration to Telegram" together with multiple channels. The event advocates that all netizens leave WeChat and switch to Telegram as a tool for daily communication and information acquisition, and calls for Media and content creators have opened channels on Telegram to create a free, equal, and interesting Chinese ecosystem outside of censorship; they have also translated many foreign language articles.

In addition to highly politicized topics, the discussion groups attached to Propaganda China are usually a place for everyone to chat. Netizens will organize roundtable discussions, reading groups, lectures, movie nights, and even make friends and blind dates.

TAs organize conversations and discussions among "fellow travelers" who have differences on many issues, such as the safety comparison between domestic and foreign countries, their views on patriotic movies such as "Changjin Lake", their views on the feminist movement, and their views on local epidemic prevention policies. , from "Heart of Glass" to how to identify Little Pink, from the Taiwan issue to how to view your own identity, etc. When organizing discussions, they also follow the principles of the group.

“Both Simplified Chinese and Chinese users like to get together, and it is difficult to listen to and understand each other. Effective communication is rarely seen. As a result, many insightful users do not like to express their opinions in public groups, and there is a lack of community atmosphere.” Group members say they use rules to try to preserve in-depth discussions. For example, set the process, limit the speaking time, or only allow a few people to speak, etc.

Punch the air?

For security reasons, Wenxuan China’s activities are anonymous, and neither organizers nor members reveal their identities or private information to each other. The need for security and anonymity has also greatly limited the scope of activities and further organization and mobilization capabilities of Wenxuan China. Their works have no special release channels within the wall, and they cannot conduct large-scale publicity. They can only rely on sporadic transportation by group friends. and forward. Initiatives such as "Escape from WeChat" targeting the audience behind the wall, although they were once actively introduced to the platform behind the wall, were censored without exception, making it difficult to reach more WeChat users.

Propaganda China’s backbone also realizes that they cannot truly escape censorship. The technical "wall" can be easily overcome, but all users of Simplified Chinese are still subject to a system that monopolizes all resources in terms of culture, life and social relations; this makes it difficult for free thoughts to be transformed into "changing the rules of the game" "The action of "Escape" is more of a motivation for individuals to "escape", but those who successfully "escape" will soon find that resistance after leaving the "scene" is like punching the air.

"It is embarrassing and frustrating that an initiative that calls for "going outside the wall" cannot speak "inside the wall". The place where the message should reach the most is the most difficult to reach, which is also outside the wall for those inside the wall. Writing and promoting circumvention have always been a dead end." Duan Media commented in its report "Escape from WeChat" .

In late 2021, with the improvement of the epidemic, the backbone of Wenhua China said that everyone did not have as much free time as before, and the activity in the channel dropped significantly. From the frequency of posting several times a day in 2020 to one or more posts a day in 2021, Posts are posted every now and then. Now, the last few posts on Wenxuan China’s Telegram channel have been separated by more than a week. This once lively community is gradually becoming deserted.

What experiences and insights do the members of Wenxuan China have about participating in such a special community? What are the possible futures for them individually and as a group? Wainao interviewed members of Wenxuan China and two discussion group members. The article will be published tomorrow.