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South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

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Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#141

Post by bboygravity »

jquery wrote: post #132
bboygravity wrote: post #128

Interesting. I haven't watched South Park in ages. The only reason I'm going to watch this episode is because China banned it. I wonder if it works like that for people who live in China. Is it something Chinese people often do (specifically seek out banned stuff)?

No. There is simply too much personal risk for most people. Chinese censorship works because it’s backed by an enormous stick.

Do you say this as a person living in China or as a person observing China from the outside?

All of my Chinese friends when traveling to China use VPNs and other tricks in China and watch Youtube and all of that other Western stuff. It seems to be the norm among young (educated) people there.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#142

Post by sgt101 »

eanzenberg wrote: post #112
finnthehuman wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I appreciate that a lot of their commentary is about how people can get carried away, regardless of how good/bad the character's ideals or intention are. A fair bit of pop media really turns me off by how hard it tries to force-feed me fashionable political opinions that I already agree with . Most of my political disagreements with people come down more to ends vs means, implementation details, unintended consequenc…

The OG Man Bear Pig was related to Al Gore predicting Florida would sink and there would be more aggressive storms/hurricanes caused by then-global warming.

Turns out Al Gore was right!

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#143

Post by sgt101 »

jquery wrote: post #131
licebmi__at__ wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or this is how you get the creators apologizing through the characters -for almost half an episode- of being so stupid of equating climate change with a half man, half bear, half pig creature.

They were mocking Al Gore, who made some pretty wild doom predictions which didn’t come true. Even if you’re fully on board with climate change being a very serious issue, there’s plenty of space to mock people. For example, how about an episode which mocks Democrats for coming down hard against nuclear energy (except for Yang)? It’s incredibly disappointing to see the candidates cave to the anti-nuclear wing of thei…

Correction : Al Gore made doom predictions that haven't come true yet!

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#144

Post by sgt101 »

fooker wrote: post #95
viscanti wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're also a big proponent of bothsideism. For some topics that makes sense (because there are two legitimate or legitimately absurd sides). For other topics it just pollutes discourse by elevating an illegitimate side.

An illegitimate side according you, might not be illegitimate in general. I'm not saying there are no universally illegitimate sides, but even those have their supporters and some reasonable arguments. The focus should be on deconstructing these arguments instead of marking the side as illegitimate.

Oh there are you know. Some people want to murder other people that they have never met and don't know, also they want to murder those people's children. These people don't have some reasonable arguments, instead they have a shared assumption of hate and (im)moral purpose.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#145

Post by jnsaff2 »

turk73 wrote: post #93
toomanyrichies wrote: post #81

Comedy Central is owned by Viacom, which also owns Paramount Pictures. China is a huge market for Paramount's films. Paramount has previously explored a 49% sale to China's Wanda Group, and they currently have extensive financial backing from the Shanghai Film Group Corp.[2] If they wanted to, it's well within the purview of the CCP to apply pressure to Paramount's ability to finance its films or distribute those fil…

Self-censorship is still censorship. If these companies crater to the least common denominator, then free speech in the West is also doomed. We can't allow that to happen. Putting profits ahead of everything else is a sure way to go broke because it sacrifices quality and every other good for the sake of short-term profit. We saw Disney do this with Star Wars, trying to pander to Asian audiences and failing miserably…

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chilling_effect

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#146

Post by Teever »

dang wrote: post #129
BubRoss wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Relax, he was clearly talking about the Chinese government, not Chinese people in general.

Your bias predisposes you to read it that way. Were you responsible for a community with a wide spectrum of backgrounds and views, you'd quickly learn how unreliable that sense of "clearly" can be. HN users who are Chinese or of Chinese background have a right to come here and not see comments like that one, just the same as all HN users do. Edit: actually, once I read the context of the thread, I see your point. The…

I'm a little confused by this exchange here dang so I'd like some clarification if possible.

If the user above had said "the Chinese government", "The Communist Party of China" or simply "the party" then their comment would have been acceptable to you?

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#147

Post by thrwy_01 »

TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #126
BubRoss wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Relax, he was clearly talking about the Chinese government, not Chinese people in general.

I think we need to be really clear when we talk about these things. When we write “the Chinese” there is bound to be at least some subset of readers who see that and assume the write meant all Chinese . I don’t believe we can be certain of the writers intent until the writer makes it clear.

Even if the writers clearly make this distinction, Chinese people, driven by Chinese propaganda, will often conflate the two. Indeed, Chinese people, even in a non political context will sometimes treat a comment about a single Chinese individual as a statement about all Chinese people.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#148

Post by probably_wrong »

kevcampb wrote: post #7
sunkenvicar wrote: post #2

Worth a click through. The full episode is available to watch for free.

"Due to copyright and other legal issues, this South Park episode cannot be viewed in your Country" So yes, banned in China (Hong Kong)

Same in Germany, as it always has been.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#149

Post by unicornfinder »

bboygravity wrote: post #141
jquery wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. There is simply too much personal risk for most people. Chinese censorship works because it’s backed by an enormous stick.

Do you say this as a person living in China or as a person observing China from the outside? All of my Chinese friends when traveling to China use VPNs and other tricks in China and watch Youtube and all of that other Western stuff. It seems to be the norm among young (educated) people there.

VPNs are getting increasingly difficult to use there as the great firewall becomes more effective. It wouldn't surprise me if most people don't bother anymore.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#150

Post by rangibaby »

bboygravity wrote: post #128

Interesting. I haven't watched South Park in ages. The only reason I'm going to watch this episode is because China banned it. I wonder if it works like that for people who live in China. Is it something Chinese people often do (specifically seek out banned stuff)?

> The only reason I'm going to watch this episode is because China banned it.

Streisand effect!

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