Since arriving in Beijing a mere 8 months ago now, we have had 3 Youtube blocks – the 3rd has been permanent, and now you can only access YouTube in China via a proxy. Not to mention most blogs on blogspot and blogger.com. Twitter is now also blocked again (the last one was during the Tiananmen Massacre Anniversary) and surprisingly, 2 weeks ago, most of Google’s apps from gmail (I know – WHAT!) and Google Talk were also severed from us internet addicts.
Now, the last remaining landmark of social media – that everyone said NO, NO, China cannot and will not block, has finally been cannon-balled: Facebook.
Yes, since yesterday evening, this lifeline, this rope I used to keep myself connected to the cliffs of other countries, has unravelled and lies at the bottom of the ravine. And I’m thinking, I could wait and perhaps a new rope will come, or will it be *god forbid* a Youtube Part Deux- and never come back.
More than any other social media shutdown, this one has everyone up in arms. China being so massive, one feels like a pindrop in the population and immensely cut off from the rest of Asia and the Western world. Everything runs at its own pace and style here, and often just that FB message alert in my email box is enough to feel I am grounded in what goes on outside the invisible walls surrounding the country.
What’s the cause this time? The riots in Xinjiang province. In an attempt to supposedly stop the violent news spreading. anything referencing the violence is being blocked, as are ofcourse Twitter and Facebook so no one can comment and spread news on it.
One often wonders whether some brainwashing, or that Men in Black device that shoots a light out and makes you forget whatever has just happened, should also be a nationwide “must,” along with the blocking. I’m sure I’m not alone when I say that all the blocking does is satisfy the rebel in me. I look harder and am more curious to know what is so dark and deceptive underneath the surface to be found, that the powers up there, don’t want me to find…
“Should we finally picket and demonstrate? ” said one text I received. I admit, I was quite ready on this one.
That and I plan to keep googling Xinjiang, violence and brainwash, till they shut me off, then move onto the next comp, till I have exhausted all computer like and internet surfing devices within my crazy reach.
Might as well give my censors something to work for.
Neener, neener, neener.