The Big [Censored] Theory

The following stuff is censored in China:

  TV series or movies should be edited if they have the following content: (1) distorting Chinese and other countries’ culture and society; (2) defaming Chinese military forces, policemen, and judiciary; (3) showcasing obscenity content, either visual or verbal; (4) showcasing “excessive” images of murder, violence, horror, interrogation, drug-taking, and even gambling; (5) advertise negative and decadent values or deliberately exaggerate the negative part of society; (6) advocate religious extremism; (7) advocate environmental destruction and animal torture; (8) excessively showcase alcohol addiction, smoking, or other bad habits; (9) demonstrate other illegal content.

I have to ask: How would simply not putting this kind of negative stuff in our media not benefit us?

Why does a TV show have to show a lot of gore?

Why can we only laugh about sexual explicit jokes?

My only issue is with (9) because what is legal today can be illegal tomorrow. Simply no longer being allowed to mention something that was/is/going to be illegal is a bit far fetching I guess..

> (1) distorting Chinese and other countries’ culture and society;

Then no sarcasm is allowed which is an important measure to critize a state and its behaviour.

> (2) defaming Chinese military forces, policemen, and judiciary;

Same as for (1), making these groups "untouchable" and "uncritizeable" (if that's a word)

> (3) showcasing obscenity content, either visual or verbal;

Who defines "obscene"? The Ministry of Truth? The president? The government? Your mother?

> (4) showcasing “excessive” images of murder, violence, horror, interrogation, drug-taking, and even gambling;

Is there any movie where such display is not used as a negative example in the end or to explore the boundaries of human downfall? Tony Montana is not really the hero in the end, same goes for Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill or Fight Club.

> (5) advertise negative and decadent values or deliberately exaggerate the negative part of society;

Yeah, please don't put your finger where it hurts, we don't like that so much, someone could have a bad opinion of a broken state.

> (6) advocate religious extremism;

"Being Christian" is enough to be considered extremist in China, I think. Or let's ask the Uigurs how well these rules work for them.

> (7) advocate environmental destruction and animal torture;

Especially China is very good at the practical side of this, really no need to make movies about that. Besides that: Are there any movies where animals are tortured?

> (8) excessively showcase alcohol addiction, smoking, or other bad habits;

Same as with (4).

> (9) demonstrate other illegal content.

Bingo. Wildcard.

> How would simply not putting this kind of negative stuff in our media not benefit us?

You can't simply close your eyes and hope everything will get better by itself.