As China’s “MeToo” movement gathers steam, individuals and media platforms are pushing at the boundaries of what is allowed on the country’s tightly controlled internet by finding ways around censorship to allow activists to mobilise support.
Over the past two weeks, dozens of people have taken to China’s Twitter-like platform, Weibo, to publish stories of sexual harassment by Beijing’s top literati and leaders of non-government organisations. Although no prominent officials have yet been publicly accused, regulators have taken a cautious approach, as with all public incidents that can spark mass expressions of discontent.
Two monks published a 95-page document on July 1 accusing the president of China’s Buddhist Association, Shi Xuecheng, who is also the abbot of the famous Longquan monastery near Beijing, of sexual abuse. Within days the case had gained so much attention that “sexual abuse” became an auto-correct phrase suggested by the dominant search engine Baidu for searches on “Longquan monastery” — even though searches on the topic were blocked.