Weibo to the Rescue!

A few weeks ago, Chinese in Shanghai rescued over 600 cats from being skinned through crowd-sourcing techniques using the micro-blogging website Weibo. Animal rescue groups and volunteers were called to intercept the truck after a message was spread through Weibo. The cats were ultimately saved and the police became involved after the truck that was carrying the cats was stopped by the concerned citizens.

I wanted to share this story because it bares some resemblance to the netizens vs. animal rights violations instances of Human Flesh Searches from the past.

Boston Marathon Bombing HFS

It's been quite a while since my last update and I apologize for this blog becoming so sparsely updated. I haven't had as much time as I'd like to peruse trends on the Chinese Internet and so a lot of stories have been slipping under my radar.

However, I would like to share this one story that hits very close to home.

A few weeks ago, a 22-year-old girl named Alicia Ann Lynch from Michigan tweeted and shared a photo of herself dressed up as a Boston Marathon bombing victim for Halloween. All judgement and poor-taste aside, what interests me about the story is the backlash she received and the exact similarities it holds against HFS cases in China.

As with HFS searches in China, American netizens used her social networking accounts to gather information about the young girl. Having discovered a photo of her driver's license, netizens were able to discern her address. Within days netizens found nude photos of her and shared all of that around the internet.

Netizens then took to the comments section of an article about the girl's poor decision to share her address and the names of her employer. The girl closed all of her social media accounts in an effort to evade netizens, but that was in vain. She reopened her account briefly to tell that she had lost her job.

As with cases of HFS in China, while most netizens spoke out against Lynch, there were many who also advocated against the wave of cyber-bullying and shaming that shook the story.

What this shows is that while the internet in America is significantly smaller than that of China, human flesh searches, or crowd-sourcing movements as they're more commonly referred to in the US, can be just as dangerous and common.

Human Flesh at it Again

I want to share on a story which broke two months ago, that of a young Chinese boy who vandalized a rare Egyptian artifact at the Temple of Luxor. My love of history and deep regret at defaced pieces of ancient culture aside, this story interest me because once again the sights of the Human Flesh Search Engine set themselves upon an adolescent.

After the photo was circulated, netizens quickly re-posted the story throughout Chinese social media and without much ado, they tracked down the young man's identify (which wasn't too difficult seeing as he wrote "Ding Jinhao was here"). Shortly after, the boy's parents apologized to a local newspaper in Nanjing for their son's lack of proper education and respect.

What this story shows once more is that the Human Flesh Search and Chinese netizens do not discriminate based on age.

Official Outfits

One of the main stories of "netizens vs. corruption" that my own research drew upon was the story of Zhou Jiugeng, a Chinese state official who was thrown into the internet spotlight after netizens dissected photographs oh himself wearing an expensive watch and equally expensive foreign cigarettes. It was later discovered that he also drove a Cadillac to work. Netizens questioned how a man in his position could afford such luxuries and determined that he must be involved in corruption since his salary did not match his amenities. As a result, he was fired from his post.

I discovered today two similar causes of netizens dissecting the outfits of officials and both questioning their spending abilities and morals.

The first story is from March 2012 during the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. Delegate Li Xiaolin came under fire from netizens for wearing an expensive Emilio Pucci pantsuit. While debates among netizens ranged from anger over lavish spending against a backdrop of Chinese rural poor, to the delegate's freedom to spend her money as she chooses and wear what she wants. Concurrent with attacks on Li, other images began to pop up showcasing various delegates sporting suits and attire from famous western designers such as Hermes, Dior, and Chanel.

More recently, a story followed a tragic event in Shaanxi province where an overnight bus rammed into the back of a gas tanker and caught fire, killing 36 people. Shortly after the accident, a photo circulated on Weibo depicting a middle-aged overweight man smiling near the wreckage. Netizens did a human flesh search for the man's identity and determined him to be Yang Dacai, chief of Shaanxi’s Safety Supervision Bureau. The photograph quickly sparked ire among netizens condemning his actions.

Regardless of his reasons for smiling, be it nerves or another situation that will remain unknown to netizens, those on China's internet soon began to analyze various photos of Yang wearing expensive watches costing anywhere from $30,000-60,000, more than an official in his post should be able to afford, proving that officials need to keep in mind that their expenses are not without scrutiny on the Chinese internet.

Search Engine hosted by Jesse Brown

This morning I discovered and listened to TVO's Search Engine hosted by Jesse Brown's podcast for "The Human Flesh Search Engine," the podcast's seventh episode. Examined are the implications of the Human Flesh Search Engine in mainland China.

The podcast discusses how many of these cases are small social victories that aim at local governments rather than the larger central government, and how the central government accepts and evens welcome this type of behavior. Interviewed is the producer of Invisible Killer (read below), who does not feel the internet represents the majority. However, the host, Jennifer Pak, continues to argue that in a governmental system were people feel injustices are covered up, the HFSE acts as the "imperfect solution in an imperfect system."

One story which was mentioned was Beijing's movement to install spyware and blocking technology in all new computers sold in China, and the angered response of netizens. The spyware aimed to block all pornographic content and websites with sensitive issues against the government. China's state media ran a news expose about how easy it is to search using Google and have porn pop up. They interviewed one college student who claimed his friend lapsed into a porn fixation due to images he came across while doing an internet search. Netizens felt the interview was a little too perfect and investigated, finding that the boy was actually an intern at the news station that interviewed him. His name and contact information were all posted online, including the information of his girlfriend. This was an instance that I had not heard of!

The podcast did refer me to a recent film that was produced in China called Invisible Killer. Invisible Killer (无形杀 - 2009) is a film about two people who meet and fall in love through the online game World of Warcraft. The woman has an affair and her partner, knowing only this other man's World of Warcraft username, attacks the other man online with the help of netizens. I'm now on the (online) hunt to find this film (with subtitles)!