There are two sides, as always to the on-going debate over censorship in China and the right to access the worldwideweb. Blogging in China has also taken on huge proportions - literally hundreds of millions of people out there commenting. Microsoft, Google and Yahoo have all had to bow to pressure from the Chinese government, when agreeing to ban threads or posts upon request or containing offensive material. It seems draconian in todays more liberal China, and perhaps unnecessary. However, consider the alternatives; in a one party state, mass communication can be incited and lead to riots not in the interest of the Chinese nation long term. Are indeed, the Chinese ready for such freedoms of expression ?

I can speak first hand on my experience. Regrettably in China, one occasionally has to deal with legal issues that crop up from time to time. With a business to protect, staff welfare to consider, and clients to look after, I have responsibilities to look after my business. Yet what has occured when I have had to issue legal proceedings against copyright infringements to protect my “China Briefing” brand against a local Shanghai company trying it on ? Yes, comments such as “If you fight us we will declare war and have this case all over the Chinese media in a bad way”. Which is exactly what has happened. No due process, no recognition of the law - just a shot gun approach that what is mine is mine and what is yours is mine too, and a complete disregard for the legal procedures designed to solve disputes. I’ll slander you if you try and take your property back.

It’s not just been resigned to the odd trademark or copyright dispute either. One small, foreign owned consulting firm has apparently taken it upon themselves to blame all their legal troubles on me - sued by their employees for non payment of salary, apparently all their woes stem from the fact they view my practice as a competing firm. The result ?

Blogs and forum postings on various China blogs and social commentary websites that libel both myself and my businesses, and online attempts to drag both myself and my business into their on-going internal and legal problems. I’m related to them by “association” if you mention my name and business in the context of their problems on enough occasions. Throw enough mud - maybe some of it will stick on Chris. Somewhat basic for a marketing strategy perhaps, certainly compared to the standards I set with China Briefing, this blog, my various legal and tax publications and so on. Perhaps I’m there to be shot at for being successful and working hard and all this is fair game when you’re a struggling business beset with legal problems and unhappy staff ? Yup, if it’s all going badly, lets blame it all on our competitors.
There are even somewhat disingenous attempts to justify such comments. Posted after libellous statements appeared on a Chinese blog run by a Mr. Wang Jian Shuo, justification not to remove such comments appeared as follows:

” I always use the rule set by Martin-Lurther King: people should be judged by their characters instead of anything else. I don’t delete any post because it is posted by foreigners, Chinese, black, yellow. The only guideline is, it is the right or wrong comment. I won’t delete any comments just because he/she is foreigner, or leave a comment there just because he/she is a foreigner.”
Apparently it’s OK to libel ‘foreigners’ and not remove offensive posts about them because, well, this is China, it’s a Chinese blog, and they are ‘foreigners’. So thats all right then. One rule for China, another for everyone else in the blogosphere. Or so Martin Luther King is supposed to endorse. It’s corrupt, and not a little sly.
While most of the sites that run such comments have complied and removed any offensive remarks, I must admit I am concerned about some of the world wide web and Chinese participation issues. For sure, blogging seems to be an accepted route whereby if you don’t like someone or something, well, you can just libel them. Or if you have a dispute with someones business, well, hell, just go ahead and post lies and try and inflict damage online. People hide behind identities and post what they want. Or, in my case, the story that I am apparently such an ego-maniac that, in the Long Bar, a group of people, when my “China Briefing” magazine appears, bet drinks on how many times my photo appears - ridiculing both myself and my business. That comment actually I find pretty funny (my photo has appeared once in each issue in the introductory section the last 11 months, although the May China Briefing sees an addtional six of me with various Chinese Ministers - so get those bets in quickly). Thats OK, and I find it mildly amusing. What is not OK is to then go on and tell lies about my business and personal life in the same piece. It’s libel, it’s immature, and it says a lot about why the Chinese government are so concerned about blogging. Maybe they know the Chinese people well, and that in 2007 they are not actually ready yet for full online exposure to the world wide web.

From my experiences, when blogging in China is used to defame other competing businesses, people you don’t like, and to threaten “an online war” if involved in seeking copyright protection from brands that are being infringed by Chinese companies and individuals, maybe, just maybe, the Chinese government is right. The Chinese people, by and large, are too immature to even practice self moderation online.
For people such as “AllKnowingEye”, “Mary Lou Chen”, “Henry Chinaski”, and others - the damage you do in libelling people online is holding China back years in online freedoms. You can libel me, and to be frank I doubt it would make much difference to my business - but in acting the way you do you cause damage to your own governments abilities to give up more freedoms, inhibits your own lives and those of other, more responsible Chinese citizens, and makes you look petty and spiteful.
I find that rather sad.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 24th, 2007 at 11:31 am and is filed under Culture. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.