All news must be good news, says Chinese government (crackdown on negative reporting)

The Guardian (U.K.) ^ | August 18, 2007 | Jonathan Watts

[Stoat]

All news must be good news, says Chinese government

Jonathan Watts
Saturday August 18, 2007


 

China has ordered its media to report only positive news and has imprisoned a pro-democracy dissident amid a clampdown on dissent ahead of the most important meeting of the communist party in five years.

Media controls have been tightened, Aids activists detained and NGOs shut down as president Hu Jintao prepares for the 17th party congress, when the next generation of national leaders will be unveiled in a politburo reshuffle.

Chen Shuqing, who is a founder member of the banned China Democracy party, suffered the toughest punishment meted out so far when he was found guilty on Thursday of "inciting people to overthrow the government". The intermediate people's court in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, sentenced him to four years in prison. Chen was an outspoken critic of the Communist party, although because of the tightly controlled traditional media his campaigning in recent years was largely restricted to the internet.

The free-speech group Reporters Without Borders said it was appalled by the verdict. "Courts taking their orders from the Communist party continue to crack down on cyber-dissidents," the Paris-based organisation said. "We reiterate our appeal for the release of Chen and the 50 other cyber-dissidents and internet users held in China."

With the congress nearing - the exact date is a secret, but it is expected in October - the domestic media have been banned from conducting independent investigations of food and product safety stories. In Beijing the municipal propaganda department has issued detailed instructions to editors on how they should cover the test of traffic-easing measures

[Stoat]

My apologies for the extreme, heavy, forced editing of this article, which was done to comply with FR posting rules.  Please click on the original article link to read the full story.

Giving credit where it's due...I found this news item because it's linked at Orbusmax

Orbusmax ™ Northwest News - 'Around The World In 80K'

It's rather surprising (to me) that a hard-Left media organ like The Guardian would be so very critical of policies in China.....this suggests to me that what's going on in China is REALLY bad, most likely far worse than what's being reported.

[SolidWood]

Not much different from the Western medias rule: all news have to negative (at least concerning anything remotely American or conservative).

[Cringing Negativism Network]

PRC Fairness Doctrine ...

[samtheman]

We have our own version of that:

All leftists, traitors, anti-Americans and most other Democrats are GOOD.

All patriots, conservatives and most of the Republican Party is BAD.

Pretty simple. Even a journalism major from a US university can keep those two rules straight.