On Chinese Censorship and the Continuing Popularity of Mao

Here is an interesting post from someone visiting China: Shadow of Mao: There's no memory of democracy's brief bloom in China. And then here is another one, on a similar subject.

Granted, the average person on the street in the US isn't particularly knowledgeable of politics and world events -- Jay Leno's "Jaywalking" routines have demonstrated that time and again.

But you would think that people in China -- people standing in Tiananmen Square, mind you -- would know of the student protests and use of tanks by the government there in 1989. But apparently not. Just how powerful is the censorship machine in China? Surely it doesn't rival that of the completely closed off North Korea. But this article is enlightening, not only for the street interviews but also for the report on Google successes and failures: searches for democracy, free Tibet, and so on bring back zero results, while "Mao is great" bring back plenty.

And on the subject of Mao, how long will it be before the Chinese decide that he wasn't so great, that instead he was responsible for the murder of tens of millions of Chinese people? When will they stop gleefully getting their photos taken with Mao posters, stop selling Mao-merchanidize, and start understanding the true history of their country during the 20th century? Apparently it will take a while, given the many levels of censorship in place.