this post was submitted on 19 Jan 2025
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Summary

Many Americans joining China’s social media platform RedNote are encountering strict censorship uncommon in Western platforms.

One non-binary user had a post asking if the platform welcomed gay people removed within hours.

Posts on LGBTQ+ topics, fitness photos, and sensitive cultural content have been censored, frustrating users unfamiliar with China's moderation rules.

RedNote is hiring English-language moderators to handle the influx. While some users enjoy cultural exchange, others criticize restrictions.

Analysts see RedNote’s growth among US users as a soft power win for China.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 3 hours ago (2 children)

Anyone who has been using Xitter over the last couple of years has already experienced Chinese style censorship.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

Chinese style censorship is more consistent, though. No one is making up rules on the fly.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 hour ago

This is consistent. Anything that makes the racists, fascists, incels, tech bros, and billionaires uncomfortable is blocked.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

China censors all literature, film, music, and internet discourse employing advanced technologies and multiple tens of thousands of people while also running the world's largest prison for journalist. VPNs are blocked. Apps like Signal are blocked. Online gaming for minors is limited to 3 hours per day on weekends and holidays only. People get harassed by police for what they post online. Many go to jail for criticizing the government, spreading pornography or health related sexual content (including anything LGBT), supporting Taiwanese independence, or casting doubt on Chinese folk legends. Then, in addition to that (which I have not even begun to do justice to), all media companies run their own internal censorship regimes so as not to get in trouble with the authorities. And this rolls downhill: you the individual self-censor to not get in trouble with your boss or worse.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 hour ago

You don't think that's exactly where the US is heading?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 hours ago

There's a lot of gay people on the app this is strait up lies. Holy shit my eyes are open to this bullshit

[–] [email protected] 39 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

"Uncommon in western platform"

Shut the fuck up, I got banned from facebook in 2022 for speaking against israel. I merely said that having 40-to-1 casualty ratio wasn't indicating a war, but a massacre.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

Thn first amendment protects you against censhorship by the government only, so yeah facebook can censor yoyr speech

So if you wanted to talk shit about Israel you could spin up your own lemmy instance and there's nothing the government or anyone else can do about.

Can the same be said about Mainland Taiwan?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 35 minutes ago

Many Americans joining China’s social media platform RedNote are encountering strict censorship uncommon in Western platforms.

This has nothing to do with the first amendment in the first place.

Being banned from FB however as everything to do with common censorship on western platforms.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago) (1 children)

Mainland Taiwan per usual I see.

I wonder what happens if you post winnie the poo shit.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

They have a lot of pooh posts mainly from the ride at Disney there.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 hour ago

Dude yea I went to the app. I see the posts I was curious about it as well. There are a lot of Winnie the pooh posts you can see. Like go there yourself.

You're literally parroting bullshit

[–] [email protected] 16 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

this is disgusting. personally I prefer lgbtq related posts be censored by companies like Facebook and Twitter instead.

cisgender is hate speech, y'all

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 hours ago

"From the river to the sea"

[–] [email protected] 9 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

You can just go on the app and you'll see it for yourself, they don't bite.

  • There's lots of posts of people asking opinions about LGBT stuff and the platform has a large lesbian community.

  • The app is originally more popular with women and the norm is to assume anonymous users are female, "sis" is considered complementary and a sign of acceptance.

  • My Hero Academia is considered cancelled because the manga included a reference to Unit 731, which did some real Nazi shit in WWII.

  • Chinese politics and history post-revolution is a sensitive topic and generally avoided. If you're planning to go there so you can tell them about Tienanmen Square and how their government is evil, don't bother lol.

  • There are a few Western fascists trying to get on there, probably in hopes that the moderators won't recognize their dogwhistles (things like 1488, groyper, etc). They banned Nick Fuentes before he could post anything because they recognized the name, and I've seen posts circulating warning about their keywords. Hopefully the moderators they're hiring will help nip it in the bud.

  • Generally, like, remember that you're a guest and your experience will probably be fine. I've been surprised at both sides being respectful, and people are generally happy to have us. I'm sure there's parts of the Chinese internet that are much less pleasant but RedBook seems like a pretty amiable cultural crossing point. It's a unique opportunity to see another perspective without just going out on your own and there's no telling how long it'll last.

I am taking lots of notes from all the Chinese spies so that I can become a better Chinese spy for everyone here on Lemmy 🤗

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 hours ago

From my experience, it's a place for lighthearted fun.

I hated using Instagram and Facebook because of the toxic right-wingers always starting shit.

So imagine my surprise when these right-wing instigators actually get banned when I report them on RedNote.

Get wrecked idiots, finally a social app with an actual code of conduct.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 hours ago

The entire worldwide LGBT TikTok population should flood RedNote and post pro-LGBT stuff in their native language. Let Rednote scramble finding moderators that can speak in a language that’s only spoken by a few million people. Then those users should leave after a few weeks and leave RedNote with the bill. And then rinse and repeat after a few months.

[–] [email protected] 91 points 13 hours ago (3 children)

The fuck did they expect going to a Chinese platform

[–] [email protected] 24 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

“I’m an American and have a right to free speech, no matter what country the service is hosted in!”

[–] [email protected] 8 points 7 hours ago

But what if there is no country that “allows” the speech you want to say? I want to call for the beheading of billionaires. I assume you don’t think I should be able to do that?

[–] [email protected] 21 points 10 hours ago (2 children)

My question is how much of these articles are manufactured outrage. Like, I can't imagine anybody expected anything different - especially since some of this stuff is censored already on American social media (especially LGBT related stuff), and the media has spent 50 years telling Americans how much censorship there is in China and the Great Firewall.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 hours ago

Probably 90% from my personal experience, I see loads of LGBTQ posts on RedNote. I wonder if they're being sensored or just waiting to go through the moderation queue.

I could see English posts maybe accumulating negative sentiment scores or even just a lack of known words causing a post to end up in a moderation queue.

For reference sentiment scores are basically a numeric way of scoring a post. Words like "hate" get -10 points neutral words get 1 point, and positive words like love and friendship get +10 points. At least when I was in college, this was a popular way for social media to determine if they should push your content or not.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 7 hours ago

This is all just leading up to the TikTok savior Trump winning over the youth crowd. If you force them to a platform that is much worse, they will forget how controlling the previous platform was and just be happy to have it.

[–] [email protected] 53 points 13 hours ago (3 children)

Well the tankies seem to think that China is actually a Utopia that the western governments are hiding from us, so naturally there shouldn't be any censorship issues lol

[–] mindbleach 1 points 59 minutes ago

And they'll ban you for suggesting otherwise. That's what xenophobia is! Apparently!

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[–] [email protected] 28 points 12 hours ago (4 children)

Some devs in China must be working overtime to create separate infrastructure for the US so that censors aren't overwhelmed and miss things Chinese people aren't supposed to see. 😂

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 hours ago

Already done I’m sure.

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 hours ago

Damn, who could've seen that circus coming while honking its way over here? Not me.

[–] [email protected] 50 points 14 hours ago (17 children)

Yep, hopefully they see that just because the US is shitty that China can't be worse.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 13 hours ago (7 children)

I suppose the real question is whether most users will balk at this and move to a new platform, or just accept it.

My bet is that they'll just accept it.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 13 hours ago
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