China Bans Horror Movies

KublaiKhan writes "According to an article on Reuters, the Chinese censors have decided that horror movies are verboten. 'Offending content included "wronged spirits and violent ghosts, monsters, demons, and other inhuman portrayals, strange and supernatural storytelling for the sole purpose of seeking terror and horror," the administration said. This is apparently a sort of Chinese version of the Jack Thompson effect, as the "mental health of adolescents" is cited as one of the reasons for the ban. Presumably, this ban — much like the spitting ban — is intended to improve China's image in the rest of the world before the Olympics open; but given the Streisand effect, would this ban perhaps unintentionally spur a surge of horror movie popularity in China?" Blizzard has had trouble with skeletons in World of Warcraft , and I imagine this decision stems from similar objections.

Comments

So much for Documentaries...

[houstonbofh]

I guess "An Inconvenient Truth" can't be aired in Chine now... This is only half a joke.

Improve their image?

[geekgirlandrea]

And just how exactly is it supposed to improve their image with the rest of the world to look like a bunch of censorious tyrants?

What a worthless government

[rastoboy29]

How long will the Chinese people tolerate this stuff?  They have to meet with their Western colleagues, and explain that they may not be allowed to visit a certain internet sight, see a certain movie, etc. because their government doesn't think they can handle it.

It's embarrassing.

Re:What a worthless government

[oddfox]

Nobody in America with half a brain and true concern for the flagrant abuses of basic universal human and civil rights is advocating doing anything with China other than cutting off the (economic) lifeblood that's keeping this despicable government in power in the first place. We are entirely within our rights to advocate this sort of policy because many of us cannot stand the idea of supporting that government financially through trade. A violent overthrow in the style of Iraq and Afghanistan isn't going to happen and shouldn't happen, I can't see America attacking China unless we slip pretty far (Nevermind how far we've slipped already in the past eight years).

It's not that we're responsible for democracy and human rights in China, but rather that every responsible conscientious human being is responsible for ensuring the spread of the basic values that the Chinese government refuses to allow its citizenry. It doesn't matter how proud the Chinese people are or how powerful they think they could possibly be against the government that made Tienanmen Square happen. There's a point where you have to realistically view just how weak and powerless you are to prevent your government from doing whatever it damn well pleases.

Basically it's "fsck off, we'll fix the problems ourselves".

No, basically, it's "fsck off, we'll fix the problems if you don't because tomorrow it might be us becoming subjects." If the Chinese people won't or can't step up to the plate to prevent the spread of a very dangerous totalitarian government, well, sorry guys but someone will do something about it.

To reiterate, nobody's with good intentions and a solid head on their shoulders is advocating a violent overthrow, we want peaceful change, we want to take the steam out of this current regime so that the Chinese government would be that much more willing to sink or swim. Sadly, this will have the side-effect of being at least partially harmful to the population, but it's definitely the path of least bloodshed. Chinese citizens are proud of their history and culture, as they very well should be, but to refuse the assistance of those with genuine concern is just stupid and foolhardy. We aren't trying to dictate the future of your country so much as we're assuring the continuance of civilized society that doesn't suppress its citizens mercilessly. And you can bet your bottom dollar the Chinese government would love nothing more than expansion, which we're not going to allow.

This will be interesting

[WindBourne]

Is china able to get ALL of china to clear their households of this, but not able to stop illegal copying, stealing of secrets, theft of business, etc? Hmmmmmm.

Geography 101

[interactive_civilian]

I just thought you might like to know that, while they are all in Asia and are very close to each other, Japan, Korea, and China are actually different countries with different kinds of culture, laws, and government.

Based on this, I can't help but wonder what a Korean horror movie (The Host) and a Japanese horror movie (Godzilla) have to do with the Chinese government banning horror movies...

What makes this a coincidence?

It just seems like saying, "Oh? You are from the United States? Coincidentally, there's a special about Costa Rican rain forests on TV right now."

Re:Geography 101

[insertwackynamehere]

Your ignorance is showing btw. America as in the US = The United States Of America. The New World was known as America and when America broke free of British rule (one of the first to break European imperialism btw, and as long as we're pointing out blood on each others hands, you guys have a much darker past of foreign occupation). Anyway, the states became United into a country and they were "of America" because that is the name of the New World. There weren't any other major western countries that weren't controlled by Europe at the time and when the country was named, it was actually more of a confederacy than it became later on. The states wanted to be looked at as individual places joined together with each other for support but still separate entities. So "United States" makes a lot of sense and "of America" is good because that is where the states were located. Meanwhile, in Europe, countries were named after groups of natives for the most part. France means "Land of the Franks" for example. That's real original. Think I'm being childish? Well it sounds less childish than your petty attempt to insult America for its name. At least I'm stating a fact about France's etymology while you just throw insulting opinions. Finally, America, from a Western Perspective existed as a continent before it contained countries (I know about the Native Americans before someone tries to throw that out). Europe on the other hand was invaded by Romans who romanized existing groups of people but kept divisions similar to those that already existed tribally (to some extent at least). As Europe became the Europe we know and love today, it's countries already existed. If things had been the other way around maybe some countries would have incorporated Europe into their name. But now their doing it retroactively with the EU anyway.

Re:What is the problem here?

[unlametheweak]

We are two entirely different cultures and what are you doing passing judgment on the Chinese? I am not passing judgment on the Chinese. I am passing judgment on human beings. More specifically I am passing judgment on human beings who are dictators.

You can dilute and diverge the argument over more trivial cultural differences (nice try), but the topic is about censorship and more generally human rights, and not more specifically (as you imply) about a cultures spitting habits.

On So Many Levels

[Anonymous Coward]

This is obviously a terrible thing, but of course this is China after all; not exactly a shining beacon of freedom and democracy. Not something we would want to model ourselves after. Banning an entire genre of movies is an incredible and bold act by a government, but in my opinion the thunder is stolen by the more egregious human rights violations in that country that are also government policy.

As a a movie watcher, fan of the genre (My all time favorite movie is Alien), and fellow human being who enjoys being able to watch, read, and listen to whatever I damn well please, this is quite offensive. But banning movies? With that they're just piling it on now--and it was a big pile already. China sucked before this, it just sucks a little bit more after. This is a symptom of a larger disease, so I hope I don't see any groups spring up to fight for the rights of Chinese horror movie fans. How about you try and stop them from executing political dissidents first, and work from there. Not being able to legally buy scary movies seems a tad frivolous by comparison when there are people getting a bullet in the head for speaking out against the party. This is the same country that has a "Great Firewall" (that doesn't work) so does it surprise us that they'd have the audacity and arrogance to think this is a good idea and one that can actually be effective?

Re:On So Many Levels

[evanbd]

It's the frivolous stuff that actually hits a lot of people that gets a lot of people angry enough to do something. The big things that only hit a few people are easier to sell to the masses, since it's always someone else being affected. But when everyone is affected...

If horror movies is the only thing hit, I predict nothing will come of it. But if this is the start of a trend, then something very interesting might be about to happen.

Revolutions have been started over taxes on tea...

Re:Does the ban cover Dragons then?

[Zekasu]

I guess that's what 'inhuman portrayals' would mean. I find this really funny considering, well, you know, China's whole giant book of mythology.

Oh, and of course, the Chinese dragon.

Re:It's not that bad!

[glwtta]

Whereas, for example, cows are kinda lame - they just stand around and chew all day - so it's OK to eat them.

I love how people rationalize their random choices of which animals are edible and which are just too damn fuzzy-wuzzy lovable to eat.

For the record, I'll eat anything (as long as it's made out of meat).

Re:What is the problem here?

[Haeleth]

It would be interesting to hear your non recursive definition of a 'dictator', as I wonder how many other leaders may fall into this category.

My non-recursive definition of a "dictator" is a leader who uses oppressive means to hold onto power, where "oppressive means" are things like stifling free political speech, rigging (or simply not holding) elections, and intimidating or imprisoning peaceful political opponents.

The leaders of China stifle free speech, do not hold elections, and imprison political opponents: therefore they are dictators. The same goes for the leaders of countries like Iraq, Cuba, North Korea, arguably Pakistan, etc.

On the other hand, the leaders of countries like the USA, Canada, Britain, France, etc. encourage free political speech, hold elections that the majority even of their opponents believe are free and fair, and do not intimidate or imprison peaceful dissidents; therefore they are not dictators, by my definition.

Seems fairly clear and consistent to me, but I'm sure you'll find something to nitpick.

whats scary is:

[Allison Geode]

from the article:

China, where graphic ... is keen to step up its control of the cultural arena ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August, which are widely seen as a coming-out party for the rising political and economic power.

what's scary to me is, the last time that I can think of when the olympics were used as a "coming out party for a rising political power," was this.

Re:whats scary is:

[dbIII]

However the situation in China over the last two decades has been decreasing amounts of centralised control and more situations where ordinary citizens have been able to get corrupt government officials removed. It's no democracy but it is vastly different to a totalitarian state like North Korea and vastly different to the China of thirty years ago.

Re:Ban Horror, Monsters or Shlock Stock?

[Cheezymadman]

Getting 500 WoW gamers together is like getting 10 Halo players together. Not that hard if you find the right issue.

Doesn't change much

[rbarreira]

People in China don't go to the Cinema a lot, and they don't buy many legal DVDs either. So this won't change anything, since pirated movies of all genres will still be available.

Re:What is the problem here?

[unlametheweak]

Investigated the effects of emotional desensitization to films of violence against women and the effects of sexually degrading explicit and nonexplicit films on beliefs about rape and the sexual objectification of women. Males viewed either 2 or 5 R-rated violent "slasher," X-rated nonviolent "pornographic," or R-rated nonviolent teenage-oriented ("teen sex") films. The objectivity of this research is in question. The abstract uses language that presupposes conclusions (i.e. "violence against women", "sexually degrading", "explicit" are value-judgment terms which are undefined [in the abstract at least] but have generally negative conotations). These researchers are not objective, so therefore no objective evidence can (accurately) be determined. This is not science. There is no evidence to back up your statements.

However you not only fail to prove your point, you give evidence to completely invalidate your point:

There were no differences in response between the R-rated teen sex film and the X-rated, sexually explicit, nonviolent film, and the no-exposure control conditions on the objectification or the rape trial variables. And in no way does this abstract conclude that there is a cause and effect relationship as you so blatantly state:

watching porn will make people more likely to allow another person to be hurt. However, I'm sure any advocacy group could do their own research and come up with their own unscientific and unverifiable conclusions. Nor is this research on-topic. "Horror" movies != "whore" movies.

- QED (I will not comment on this matter further)

Meta commentary by the /. site

[sukotto]

"The more crap you put up with, the more crap you are going to get."

Is the current fortune at the bottom of the page.

Can I moderate the fortune +1 ?

Re:Godwin 101

[Nuskrad]

You forgot one

Streisand effect doesn't apply

[pikine]

Streisand effect applies when some private information is leaked about a public figure, and the person tries to protect his/her own privacy while inadvertently making that information more popular. It has to do with people's curiosity to peer into someone else's private life, but anti-censorship is most often used as an excuse.

In the case of horror movie ban, there is no person's private life involved, so Streisand effect doesn't apply. It is perhaps more similar to public ban of pornography in some countries, where people still try to stealthily distribute pornography by various means. However, pornography is fueled by people's curiosity about sex. I don't think horror movies incite people's curiosity about anything.

My own feeling is that there will still be a small percentage of people who are fatally attracted to spirituality, psychic, voodoo, and witchcraft. They will continue to smuggle these horror movies and perform cult worship. However, most people will live happily without being bothered with annoying horror movie advertisements.

Speaking of which, I was eating at a food court that has some television, and it showed a trailer of a horror movie with green slime, deteriorated tissue, fermented blood, and all this crap. Though I didn't react outrageously about it, it really disturbed my appetite. Such a dining experience!

Re:They also send the coppers after you...

[sydneyfong]

Hi comrade!

Nitpick first: Hong Kong isn't a "democratic" bastion, otherwise why all the fuss about when we'll actually have universal suffrage? It is, however, supposedly a bastion for "related democratic goodies" such as free speech, right to fair trial, etc.

Well obviously I do agree that the recent events raised doubts about whether we're still that bastion, but in these few days we've seen the "recovery" process kick into place. While the HK police seems to be still thick faced and not admitting to any wrongdoings, it seems that negative press has pressured the government (at least the Department of Justice) to at least free the guy who was deemed most "innocent". I think this is actually a good sign, and it shows that the whole system works (well, sorta :-/). If you do read Chinese then this (the last paragraph) is what I mean.

As a small disclaimer I do live in HK and I was recently actively involved in some recent "anti-police" activities. So, um, I might be biased.

Re:and what of our image abroad?

[smellotron]

Have you ever wondered what non Western societies make of flicks like "Saw" and "Hostel?"

I imagine they're just as disgusted by them as I am. I don't understand how those movies succeed.

English Major

[Deliveranc3]

While yelling, "Oh noes teh chinese teh sencors!" is excellent mod material on /., a more thought provoking discussion might involve the themes that horror movies embody.

It probably isn't nightmares that the Chinese government is against but some element of society that horror critiques.

Mary Shelly's Frankenstein critiques the notion of the outsider, conformity, beauty and justice for example. Distopian film has been a powerful tool in contextualizing societies problems since Metropolis (1927).

Can anyone with a study of horror themes beyond the obvious ( catharsis towards human frailty and the proximity of sexuality to violence) give us an indication of the social consciousness being repressed here?