A Short History of Chinese Propaganda and Porn (YNOT)

Read the full article by LynseyG at YNOT.com

Porn has always been an effective way to spread subversive ideas about sexuality, society, and even politics. But rarely does the political sphere seek out porn as a cover for its political agendas. Oddly, however, that’s exactly what Chinese propagandists have been doing for months now.

Since pro-democracy protests broke out in Hong Kong in June, the Chinese government has been waging a war of information against the protesters. “Chinese state-owned media outlets have depicted the protesters as violent separatists advocating independence,” wrote Jane Li at at qz.com. Independence isn’t what the protesters are after, of course—they want protection from extradition, greater democracy, and a curb on police brutality. But Chinese disinformation aimed at poisoning worldwide opinion against the protesters isn’t about to be deterred by things like facts… or standard channels for spreading ideas.

By early September, China’s anti-protester sentiments were spreading to social media. And not just vanilla social media, either. On September third, Echo Huang at Yahoo.com wrote, “Some Twitter accounts at the center of Beijing’s recent online campaign had been tweeting a range a content including pornography.” And, given porn’s popularity on Twitter—one of few remaining social media platforms that allows adult content, “At least two of the four accounts with the most retweets were related to pornography.” 

Lynsey G. is an adult industry hanger-on who's been writing about her obsession with porn for over a decade.