
Repository of censored and sensitive Chinese keywords - desdiv
https://citizenlab.org/2014/12/repository-censored-sensitive-chinese-keywords-13-lists-9054-terms/
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r0h1n
The list of words is so mind-boggling. On the Chinese Internet you cannot talk
about former leaders (Deng Xiaoping, Zhao Ziyang); current leaders (Xi
Jinping, Hu Jintao, Wen Jiabao); communist party/army/Ministry of
Truth/Police; porn/fuck/penis/vagina/sperm; protest/persecution/gang rape;
Muslim/Tibet; freedom/democracy/revolution....

I wish there was a way to visualize at a high-level how language on the
Chinese Internet is drifting over time and try and correlate it to the
emotions/thoughts the Communist Party wants people to have. This is the
Thought Police and Mind Control from 1984, only way, way more advanced and
insidious and real.

Brrrr. Getting the chills just imagining being subjected to this!

Edit: adding a direct link to the Google Docs spreadsheet containing the 9054
words -
[https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19eS47Dg086vR1jh9oo51...](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19eS47Dg086vR1jh9oo51pXstYVT2wft13JGCrnAeU7A/edit#gid=728354615)

~~~
Fuxy
You cannot control peoples thoughts this just makes the language evolve in
order to bypass the firewall and people will find different words to mean the
same thing in order to avoid the firewall.

And if that word gets banned they will just start using another one.

It makes communication a lot more cryptic if you're not part of the 'in' crowd
but it doesn't stop people from talking about it.

~~~
justquest
The firewall isn't about being impenetrable.

It's about modifying the aggregate opinion of a population - not a specific
individual. Politics is about statistics in the sense that you only need x
percent of something to accomplish y goal. In other words, only x percentage
of people need to think in a certain way to accomplish y goal. This is why,
for example, VPNs aren't strictly enforced. Those who need them, get them. But
it's such a pain in the ass for a regular person to subscribe to and deploy,
that it doesn't matter on the aggregate level for 5% of people to break
through.

~~~
vinceguidry
Right. Also, banning all VPNs would make commerce very difficult. And the
Party loves commerce.

I'm sure they'd love to stifle all non-party-endorsed political discussion,
but they're in a difficult position which is getting more and more difficult
with every year. It will be interesting to see how the situation evolves.

------
waterhouse
My reflex, seeing the headline, is to think, "I wonder if there's information
to be gained from this: the knowledge of exactly what the Chinese government
deems worth censoring might provide information in itself."

Then I wonder if the people in charge of the censorship have thought of this,
and are deliberately adding "noise", by censoring some random additional words
or censoring everything in the same category as the words they actually want
to censor.

r0h1n's post suggests that the range of things they censor is surprisingly
extensive, and might be evidence in favor of this hypothesis.

------
javajosh
I fear that one user of this repository will be US software startups wanting
to operate in China to show they want to enthusiastically play nice with the
government.

To those companies I say: you're selling out a billion people's human rights
for a buck! Shame on you!

------
4rt
did they really censor the numbers 89 and 6.4?

how do they teach counting?

~~~
thaumasiotes
6.4 isn't a number, it's a date. It's common in China to have the separator
for date elements be a period, so for example Christmas will happen on 12.25

And I dare say you learned to count with no mention of 6.4 ;)

~~~
nodata
(Pretty sure the Chinese don't use MM.DD for dates)

~~~
thaumasiotes
Do you have anything to back that up? For example, I speak to (and text with)
Chinese people frequently, and can say from personal experience that M.D (zero
padding is unusual) is quite common. Less than a week ago a Chinese student
asked me to look over her application to a Canadian university and I
recommended that dates written like 10.6 be reformatted to, using the example,
"Oct 6". Where are you getting your ideas from?

edit:

Here's an image of a flyer that I was given today, advertising an event of the
campus Russian club. You'll note that the event is scheduled for "2014.12.19
19:00"

[https://www.dropbox.com/s/e5fclcou9z39dl5/mmexport1418392916...](https://www.dropbox.com/s/e5fclcou9z39dl5/mmexport1418392916428%5B1%5D.jpg?dl=0)

I think the question now is, where do you get off randomly spreading
misinformation about topics you're obviously not familiar with?

------
r3m6
These lists would be great discussion material for a medium to advanced level
Chinese class at the many Confucius institutes around the world. But it is
very unlikely that it will show up there anytime soon.

------
jmnicolas
I think if US foreign policy didn't use censorship, gay rights and color
revolutions to destabilize other countries China would censor less, gays would
be safer in Russia and people would not die in Ukraine.

But of course it's so easy to blame those fascist foreigners that don't like
freedom.

