“Why is no one talking? “
“Is there anyone? “
After waiting for ten minutes, there was still no movement. Feng knew that no one in the WeChat group could see his speech again – the group chat, again, was blocked.
Feng informed the group owner of the situation by private message. Not long after, the invitation link to the new group was sent, and old friends joined one after another, and you discussed one sentence after another, as if nothing had happened.
He couldn’t remember how many times he had done this – it was as if he had become a ghost, saying things that no one could see, and not seeing what others were saying, a situation he used to call “group bombing He used to call this situation “blowing up the group” – some sensitive content in the group chat, triggering the WeChat censorship, resulting in WeChat permanently cut off the group’s communication rights. “Now a little bombing group PTSD, no one speaks for a few hours will worry, is not another bomb. “
As a current affairs and politics exchange group owner, Chen Liang also has a deep experience of this. The first Time he was overwhelmed when the group blew up, the same situation experienced more, he found that the new group chat is a breeze, just follow the set label to check the old group of friends list, you can easily reorganize everyone. After a dozen “experiences”, he became more and more comfortable with it – in about ten minutes, he was able to turn the new group chat back into a group of 200-300 people. The group chat back to the state of two or three hundred people, “fried used to, a full set of operations at your fingertips”.
This “self-institutionalization, self-repatriation” process, in countless small and large WeChat discussion groups continue to play. From trivial matters around the world to the world pattern, from rules and regulations to the national constitution, the WeChat group that Feng is in has been “reincarnated” 20 times in just two years, and he has also changed from The first fear, anger became calm, and even learn to humor bittersweet: “blowing up the group proves that our grievances are noticed by WeChat, our discussion is still valuable. “
Feng never wants to spend time thinking about the reasons for blowing up the group, which he sees as self-censorship of speech, “Discussion is not a crime. I have done nothing wrong, so why should I be self-doubting? “
And Chen Liang then tries to figure out the mysterious and unpredictable WeChat censorship mechanism – in the logs he keeps for the group chats, the possible reasons for blowing up the group are accompanied by a specific point in time, which is recorded in detail: “Previously, there had been discussions about European Epidemic, suspicion of repeated use of the word ‘city closure’,” “Someone shared a link to news on Youtube”, “Possibly about Communist statements” …… In retrospect, it seems that every statement made by a group member could have been a trigger.
The timing of the bombing of the group is equally elusive, “usually around June 4 and National Day,” Chen Liang said. But it’s pointless to think about these, there are too many sensitive events, the year before last there was an anti-revisionist incident, last year was the new crown pneumonia, this year the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party, there is no day which January is not sensitive? “He later simply gave up recording, one by one the bombing of the old group is like a graveyard, but no one is even willing to reveal the epitaph.
The sense of self-censorship is inevitable for everyone who experiences a bombed group, but Chen Liang feels that it is this impermanent censorship mechanism that leads to panic. “By not telling you where the red line is, the authorities actually want everyone to be self-censored and subsequently become peaceful. “
It’s not as if no one has ever thought of escaping.
Having witnessed the inconvenience of censorship in group chats, Ozawa tried to convince members of his group to migrate to safe chatting software, and even built his own server to provide free technical support for the group to climb over the wall. The plan went well, and many people managed to “escape” through him, but not long after, everyone gradually returned to WeChat, and he temporarily shelved the transfer plan. As the national software, WeChat’s user stickiness is too big, almost all of our daily Life happens in WeChat, and its monopoly is undeniable. ” Ozawa said.
Group owner Chen Liang also tried to set up group chats in Telegram, but with little success. Hundreds of discussions every day, almost all of them still happen in WeChat. He is not discouraged, and believes that people would rather go back to WeChat to continue to “survive” consciously, not without benefits – for many people this has been the case. -For many people, it’s a reminder that “to be aware that you’re living with the system at all times is the only way to better understand WeChat, how it does evil, and thus the weight of the system, capital and power. This is also the value of WeChat’s existence – we have to use the tool itself to find the cracks and then try to resist. “
Live broadcasters’ phones confiscated
Being in Hong Kong, every time Chen Liang sets out to participate in political activities, he will live-stream with his groupmates in the WeChat group and share his insights. This day he took to the streets of Causeway Bay to participate in the anti-state security law march, sharing live videos and pictures with his groupmates, not forgetting to add descriptions – “It is estimated that there are 5,000 to 6,000 people at the scene “, “There was no sign of the police at all, but people hadn’t gone to the road yet”, and “Tear gas was released” ……
“What are the police officers in blue at the scene doing? ” “What was written on the political party propaganda flags on the roadside? “He would patiently answer each group member’s question and also help translate the Cantonese on the scene. In this group chat, the group members came from all over the world, and their positions were very different, and their reactions to his live action were also different: there were more than 300 people in the group, some worried about his safety, some mocking, and more just silently watching Chen Liang’s every move in the “news scene”. The group of more than 300 people were worried about his safety, some mocked him, and more just silently watched Chen Liang’s every move on the “news scene.
Chen Liang wandered between the police and the protesters, recording everything that was happening in front of him like a citizen journalist. In two hours, he shared 16 short videos and 26 pictures of the scene in the group – “I could feel the anger of the scene through the screen. “, said Xiao Yang, a friend of the group. Xiao Yang is passionate about political issues. During the anti-revision movement in Hong Kong, there was no reliable source of information in the mainland, so the news shared in the group became an important way for him to understand the movement. Although he was only on the screen, the interaction with Chen Liang and the discussions with other group members gave him a real sense of participation.
The last video Chen Liang shared in the group was a scene of the police driving the crowd into the blockade. He was filming while following the direction the police were pointing, intending to leave. But it wasn’t long before someone in the group passed along a report from the Hong Kong media breaking news – “I saw the group leader on the news! “The image shows Chen Liang, who is currently being stopped and checked, standing in a line side-by-side with many others, waiting to be searched by the police.
The number of group members was immediately reduced by two.
On the bus to the police station, Chen Liang did not forget to share his sightings and also filmed the interior of the bus to share with the group, but then disappeared. “How is Chen Liang doing? “”Is he okay? “”Will he be framed by the police? “The group of friends you sentence I sentence, the group like an exploding pot.
“I’m dying”, Xiao Yang said, she was in a mood that night, but there was nothing she could do. The group chat accompanied her to “experience” a lot of major events: Taiwan‘s election, the PolyU conflict, millions of people anti-revision march, there are always people who are interested in constantly transmitting instant messages or live streaming For example, during the Legislative Council primary election in Hong Kong, some of the group members live-streamed their own voting process. Although you can only watch from afar, but still very excited, after all, they have not experienced it. “
Chen Liang in Hong Kong for the group of people live on the day, a total of 193 people were arrested, Chen Liang was charged with illegal assembly. A group of people in Hong Kong began to help Chen Liang contact lawyers, the group also turned to discuss the general knowledge of the law in Hong Kong. At this point, a video shared with the group saved his life, and the lawyer said the 40-second clip proved that Chen Liang had not made any illegal moves.
Having escaped, Chen Liang went through his social accounts afterwards, and worries and greetings from the group were crowding the screen. Able to let the group of friends closer to the real, Chen Liang said: “often live this thing for me, kinda proud of. “
His phone was confiscated by the police, although all records have been deleted, communication applications logged out, due to fears that the group chat content is being monitored, they need to “move Home once” –The next day, the owner of the group will pull everyone into a new group.
This is familiar to the group members, who say goodbye and then meet again in a new group chat.
…… (one section omitted here)
The Democratic Testing Ground
“Jury arbitration will now take place, please sign up. “
After a heated argument, the word “jury” first appeared in this WeChat group. Chen Liang, the group leader, opened the “arbitration mechanism” due to members’ complaints and called The “jury” intervened in the conflict. His initial intention was to relinquish some of his management rights to prevent himself from making biased decisions, and to ensure that the group chat would develop into an autonomous organization under the guarantee of a democratic system.
In this case, the “jury” voted with five people agreeing and one abstaining, and reached a consensus -The group decided to remove the speaker from the group chat for 24 hours and, in accordance with the ruling, to remove “malicious references” from the group chat. In accordance with this ruling, “malicious reference to the other person’s Family” was added to the group rules “malicious provocation”. The jury posted the results in the group chat, and the group came to life – most of the Most of them were new to this mechanism. The group also had a lot of input on how to change the rules and how to establish other rules.
“The communication with other people that comes from doing these things, even the sense of honor, and the responsibility that builds from that, these things are the most important elements of civil society, or at least the things that are most needed when you first start. “Chen Liang believes that small-scale democracy is a necessary path to civil society, not only to solve immediate problems, but also to promote a good social climate. He believes in the words of Aristotle more than 2,000 years ago, “The purpose of the city-state is to cultivate the virtues of its citizens, which are closely related to the political system and the way of life. “
The “jury” met six times in two months and made many decisions on matters large and small for the group, but not as efficiently as the group leader had hoped. Sometimes it is said that at seven o’clock in the evening to raise their hands together to vote, until nine o’clock someone still did not appear, when asked, it turned out to go to dinner. Not everyone in the loose and casual chat room agreed with the “jury” system. “The company’s main business is to provide a wide range of products and services to the public.
Chen Liang finally felt a little tired, “many times the system instead of strengthening the adversarial, at this stage, the group has no way to maintain the interest and sense of participation of so many people, and then I think it is better to forget. “The good times did not last long, he abolished the arbitration, warning and legislative council structure he had managed to establish, officially declared the group chat into a state of emergency, and the dictatorial period officially began.
On the other hand, inspired by a controversy, Chen Liang also began to recruit arbitration groups in his group chat to intervene in time to maintain community order and justice in the event of irreconcilable conflicts. He claims that this is a good prototype of justice, based on the U.S. Federal Supreme Court – a pool of 15 candidates, from which seven people are randomly selected to form the arbitration panel, and both the prosecution and defense have to accept the arbitration results unconditionally. After some rules discussion, candidate registration kicked in, and 15 participants were barely recruited in two days, after which nothing more was done.
“The opinion on the arbitration panel has not been expressed, it has been swamped by a variety of information from the latter. “Chen Liang said somewhat helplessly that many people affirm the reasonableness of the existence of the arbitration group, but few people are really willing to give their time to participate. He thinks this may be somewhat related to the environment in which the group members grew up, “We grew up in a Culture where there is less sense of civic engagement. Most people think democracy is a good thing, but are not willing to take on so-called civic responsibilities. “Chen Liang believes that democracy as a technology requires considerable commitment, patience to deal with trivial matters, and that it is too early to imagine anything until a consensus on a democratic system is established.
The group he is in has previously carried out a number of democratic practices: negotiating the way the group leader is generated, discussing the voting rules, electing “deputies” to draft group rules and public review, and setting up a mediation committee. The group chat on …… has allowed many people to get a glimpse of what civil society looks like and how people get along with each other: rationally, tolerantly, caring for the well-being of others, and on an equal footing.
“Like Model UN,” said one group member when looking back on these attempts, these romantic imaginings were slightly superfluous – -maybe a loose-knit atomic society doesn’t need such elaborate mechanisms, “but the fact that people have tried to practice together has been very rewarding. “
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