
After 'South Park' Censorship Episode, China Deleted the Show from the Web - dgelks
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/ywaq3g/after-a-south-park-censorship-episode-china-deleted-the-entire-show-from-the-web
======
unnouinceput
Good, good....the more the merrier. Maybe finally the world will stop cuddling
with China like they did in past 3 decades and start treating them for what
they really are. A tight grip censorship dictatorship that has thrown dust in
the world's eyes posing as softies while behind the scenes they amassed a lot
of wealth riding West blindness.

~~~
redleggedfrog
God help us when South Park is helping us find our moral compass...

~~~
mattmanser
South Park has been advocating an ideology, including many morals, from day
one of the shows. It may be a mixed message, it may be contradictory, but a
lot of SP comedy hinges on pointing out the absurdities in our societies.

Comedy has always been a place you'd look if you want to see someone speak
truth to power, for millennia too, and South Park has always done that.

~~~
rtpg
The message of South Park is to point at people with any conviction and say
“ha! Look at these idiots with an ideology. The only correct way is to be edgy
and make fun of everything”

It’s basically about nihilism.

~~~
SirensOfTitan
"It seems to be a hangover of the Medieval Catholic era that causes most
people, even the educated, to think that everybody must "believe" something or
other, that if one is not a theist one must be a dogmatic atheist, and if one
does not think capitalism is perfect, one must believe fervently in socialism,
and if one does not have blind faith in "X", one must alternatively have blind
faith in not X or reverse of X. My own opinion is that belief is the death of
intelligence. As soon as one believes a doctrine of any sort, or assume
certitude, one stops thinking about that aspect of existence. The more
certitude one assumes, the less there is left to think about, and a person
sure of everything would never have any need to think about anything and might
be considered typically dead under current medical standards where absence of
brain activity is taken to mean that life has ended." Robert Anton Wilson

~~~
AtomicOrbital
yes however it goes without saying taking a stand to not believe is also a
belief position

~~~
ForceOfPhil
I like rush

"if you decide not to choose you still have made a choice"

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wei_jok
If you cannot watch the episode in your country, here is a link to the "Band
in China" on facebook (subbed in traditional Chinese):
[https://www.facebook.com/fighterstudiohk/videos/396572967928...](https://www.facebook.com/fighterstudiohk/videos/396572967928125/?v=396572967928125)

~~~
bboygravity
Uhm? Facebook is the first thing that non-Western countries will block for
political reasons.

~~~
nopemagnet
magnet:?xt=urn:btih:645FEB655D770627403E61BD6DF817C8EE30492B&dn=South+Park+S23E02+HDTV+x264+SVA&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Ftracker.coppersurfer.tk%3A6969%2Fannounce&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Ftracker.leechers-
paradise.org%3A6969%2Fannounce&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Ftracker.opentrackr.org%3A1337%2Fannounce&tr=http%3A%2F%2Ftracker.trackerfix.com%3A80%2Fannounce

~~~
swebs
Why is this link downvoted? If it's due to your views on piracy, torrents
shouldn't be any worse that the pirate Facebook stream.

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s3r3nity
I love this in every way.

I'm curious to see if their relationship with Ubisoft gets strained, though,
given some recent news with gaming companies trying hard to maintain good
relations with China, and because I believe Ubisoft is partly owned by a
Chinese company.

(FYI - Ubisoft / Obsidian made the Stick of Truth games, and I believe a
mobile game or two with the South Park license.)

~~~
holy_city
Tencent has about a 5% stake iirc. They also have small interests in
Activision-Blizzard and a big chunk of Epic. I have no idea what 5% of a
company buys them.

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0xdead
I love how a single episode of a show can piss off the government of a
country. Just recently Saudi Arabia banned an episode of "Patriot Act" and now
this. Tyrants are really sensitive I guess.

~~~
ur-whale
> Tyrants are really sensitive I guess.

Here's a fun game to play: close your eyes and imagine yourself in their
shoes, hanging on to power day after day by a thread, relying on fear and
coercion to keep on going.

Now comes such an episode making fun of you in front of the people you scare
for a living.

What do you do?

~~~
randie63
You don't ban it, cuz it shows that you habe been hurt by it.

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carapace
I just explained this to my mother, who is 80 and has dementia, and this is
what _she_ said:

"That's silly."

"It's only going to make people around the world watch it."

"A country the size of China with the power that they have and they mess up on
a tiny insult."

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tibbydudeza
Awesome response ... love those two ... fortunately they have financial and
creative freedom to do what they want.

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onemoresoop
I don't think South Park angered the CCP only with Winnie the Pooh. Southpark
can be seen as subversive to authoritarian regimes, the catchy jokes may make
the people think outside the reestablished mold.

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liuliu
Interesting. To my knowledge, South Park was never imported into China. Maybe
I am outdated, when it is imported to China?

~~~
OkGoDoIt
This is not about it officially airing on Chinese TV, it’s about blocking it
entirely from the whole of the Chinese Internet. You can’t even search for
“South Park” and get any search results, not just on video sharing sites but
on web search and social media sites as well. There’s another discussion on
hacker news today that goes in the more details, it’s pretty scary the extent
to which the Chinese government can wipe an entire topic off their corner of
the internet. And with centralized chat systems like WeChat, your messages
won’t go through either if they catch censorship algorithms. This effectively
allows them to limit conversation about topics, which greatly hampers the
Streisand effect everyone else is alluding to.

~~~
liuliu
I just surprised it wasn't already years ago, given South Park's nothing-is-
safe free-pass in The States which we loved.

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sebringj
Southpark, NBA, keep going and China will implode with boredom.

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Lapsa
Have noticed Morey guy, Matt, Trey & whatnot. China remains faceless. China
this and China that.

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dmitriid
Is it irony that the episode on censorship isn't even available outside of the
States?

~~~
Strom
There is no US-only restriction. Some locations might be restritcted, but I
could watch the episode in Estonia.
[https://southpark.cc.com/](https://southpark.cc.com/)

~~~
dmitriid
The restrictions are weird. The link you posted isn't available from Sweden.

The irony of anti-censorship episode being only available in select
countries...

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odabaxok
It is not like it is censored in Sweden, it's just someone holds the
distribution rights in Sweden for South Park. So, they cannot show it to you
on their website.

So, there is no irony here, it's copyright issue, not censorship issue.

~~~
simonask
It is at least pretty interesting that the end result of repressive censorship
and "free" market capitalism seems to be the same: limitations on what you can
see or hear.

To the average human, it doesn't really matter if it is the state that
prevents you from seeing something or the forces of market capitalism. You
have to do something illegal to see it either way, and you will be punished if
discovered.

~~~
i_am_proteus
The difference is that in capitalism you can pay the owner to see it. Most of
the people who are blocked from one source by copyright probably have it
available on a paid streaming service.

~~~
thedaemon
As the current market shows, you cannot always get the content from the owner.
Some TV Shows are unavailable and the owners are unwilling to release them for
whatever reason.

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neighbour
Once again, Parker and Stone are breaking the mould. Power to them.

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tempodox
So China is censoring the fact that they are censoring.

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fenk85
[https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/oct/08/we-
good...](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/oct/08/we-good-now-
china-south-park-creators-issue-mock-apology-after-show-reportedly-censored)

"'We good now China?' South Park creators issue mock apology after show
reportedly censored"

Well all publicity is good publicity, fair play to them for standing up to
their principles

~~~
shantly
They got me to watch an episode for the first time in over a decade, so yeah,
well done all around.

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subversionist
Make no mistake, China knows South Park doesn't give a fuck about this.

This is about sending a very clear message to everybody else. You can be as
big and well known and South Park, yet be cancelled in one second.

~~~
latexr
> You can be as big and well known and South Park

I think you’re overestimating South Park’s popularity, especially when
compared to the NBA. They cancelled it because they don’t like being made fun
of.

~~~
age_of_stone
i'd say 99% Chinese people don't know or don't watch South Park. yes, its
popularity is very much overestimated.

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nutcracker46
Deleted only from the web controlled by the Peopple's Republic of China. You
can still access South Park from the Republic of China and elsewhere.

(Look what I did there: two countries, not one.)

~~~
thrower123
The One China policy is moronic. If they keep being assholes, it is about time
to give Taiwan their long overdue recognition.

Hell, give them back the Security Council seat that they had until the 70s...

~~~
mschuster91
> Hell, give them back the Security Council seat that they had until the
> 70s...

I'd rather prefer reforming the UN SC to get rid of the "veto" concept. It's
time that the US, China and Russia have to finally be held accountable for the
shit they did all over the world.

~~~
marcosdumay
Hum... Are you aware that the UN has no intrinsic power, but is just a forum
that hosts diplomatic negotiations?

What change do you expect getting rid of the veto would bring?

~~~
mschuster91
> Hum... Are you aware that the UN has no intrinsic power, but is just a forum
> that hosts diplomatic negotiations?

I was talking about the Security Council which can legalize military
interventions either by individual countries or by UN-labeled forces (e.g. as
in the Afghanistan War), and can conduct investigatikons into war crime and
other international law violations.

> What change do you expect getting rid of the veto would bring?

Right now, the veto powers block consequences for their allies - the US/Israel
don't want their numerous illegal acts (regime changes, Iraq/Afghanistan war
crimes, their part in the Palestine issue) investigated, the Russians block
investigations into the atrocities of Assad's Syrian regime and the Chinese
block everything that targets North Korea plus whatever the Russians need
support. The only thing that's somehow consistently investigated are crimes of
African warlords, creating an additional nasty white supremacism layer on top.

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zarro
I see lots of Anti-China sentiment. I would be very careful here into not
falling into the trap of making ourselves China's "Enemy".

China in its current form needs an "Enemy" to survive, without it, it has to
deal with difficult questions like "censorship", and in order to survive will
need to change - and that's what really scares them.

~~~
umvi
So how do you oppose a government that is the sworn enemy of values you regard
more precious than your own life?

It's hard _not_ to be the enemy of such a government seeking to increase its
power and influence on the world.

~~~
zarro
Totalitarian governments rely on distraction and misdirection of the populace
in order to survive. Without it to use as ammunition to unify the people
against a common "enemy", the very nature of its limiting rule forces the
populace to start questions to try and improve their own condition. Questions
like "freedom" and "censorship". Totalitarian governments are not equipped to
satisfy difficult questions like this and will either adapt or crumble.

Thus the best way "oppose a government that is the sworn enemy of values you
regard more precious than your own life" is to allow it to face its internal
problems without giving it the "enemy" it so desperately needs as ammunition
to use against you.

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sabujp
All the other stuff doesn't matter I guess (nba, hollywood, apple, blizzard,
etc)? But since techies love south park for some reason we suddenly care? HN
are full of hypocrites. In any case, I need to go rewatch the episode with
chinese translations. Watched it on hulu and CC didn't show for the chinese
speaking parts :( .

~~~
danso
The Blizzard story is the top HN story today with 1,700+ upvotes.

Yesterday, HN's top story was about Apple removing the Taiwan flag from the
emoji keyboard:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2019-10-07](https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2019-10-07)

