• kristina [she/her]
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    edit-2
    1 year ago

    https://baijiahao.baidu.com/s?id=1776810779288300462&wfr=spider&for=pc

    This guy wrote an opinion on it and mentioned some controversy around people wearing Japanese style clothing (military uniforms, kimonos, etc). I looked into it further and they were wearing these things to a Nanjing massacre memorial in Beijing. Its also been a thing where people post themselves in WW2 Japanese uniforms to show that they're fascists, basically, its a type of... very obvious dog whistle and the intent is to mock people that died fighting the Japanese, which is considered a serious offense in China.

    On September 8, 2023, young public security scholar Cui Xiangqian explained to a reporter from Zhenguan News that "In recent years, some people in society have taken photos in Japanese military uniforms from World War II and spread them online, promoting and beautifying the war of aggression, damaging national dignity and hurting national feelings, and causing a bad social impact. It is necessary to clarify the relevant legal responsibilities and crack down on them severely. Therefore, the intention of this provision in Article 34 is to better connect the Criminal Law and the Law on the Protection of Martyrs."

    So this is a limited bill, not something like 'banning bell bottoms' like the article mentioned. The purpose is to prevent the spread of fascist ideology and to punish people who mock the victims of the Japanese Empire. There were some concerns from lawmakers about how 'hurting the feelings and sensibilities of people in the Chinese nation' might be too vague, but their reasoning is that fascist dogwhistles can change rapidly and that the intent of the bill is to crack down on fascists and send them to jail for 10ish days and give them a 1000 yuan fine for each offense, plus community service time.

    As far as I can tell, this is something that is yet to be passed and it seems that most people want it to be more specific in its language. The bill has already heard 44k comments so far, I'm curious to see where it ends up.

    One of the pictures of people in Japanese uniforms in front of Sihang Warehouse referenced by the bill. article. People that do things like this are considered 'jingri' in China, which is an insult against people who consider themselves 'spiritually Japanese' and frequent fascist circles. After digging through some online commie sleuths that aid the police in finding fascists in China, they mentioned people associated with these groups would also cosplay Unit 731 and would show up to smaller socialist gatherings to assault people. They crossreferenced these reports to find these perpetrators.

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      • kristina [she/her]
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        edit-2
        1 year ago

        I also read that there is some religious sentiments based on this as well, some local religions feature ancestor veneration and some of those religions have a taboo about wearing clothing of a certain style in certain contexts (re: wearing period appropriate clothing of a warrior on a battleground might provoke the spirits). That informs this law to some degree as well, but I was unable to find specifics, it was only mentioned in passing by a single official that said they are trying to avoid public outrage in this context.

      • kristina [she/her]
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        edit-2
        1 year ago

        Pretty much, though it seems they take it more seriously than Germany and have task forces dedicated to it