After six years, I’ve left @SixthTone. Or conditions were created for me to leave after publishing a project that criticized “zero-COVID,” which landed multiple people in hot water. It’s been bittersweet leaving a place we’ve built over the years but it was time. (A long 🧵) pic.twitter.com/6IRPTwOzXg— Bibek Bhandari (@bibekbhandari) May 10, 2023
TLDR: The OP, senior editor/leader got shat on from a lot of people outside the mag for publishing a piece critical of zero-Covid in January. Management told him to take a 40% cut in pay or leave. He left.
There’s apparently a crackdown on Sixth Tone for its pieces covering lgbt, women and labor issues. The thread gives examples.
This sucks because ST is basically the one Chinese news source that covers those issues at all, in addition to positive coverage of China. It’s the one source I use when I tell people that “look, you can publish stuff that critiques things in China”.
Looks like that tendency got them in hot water, though.
TLDR: The OP, senior editor/leader got shat on from a lot of people outside the mag for publishing a piece critical of zero-Covid in January. Management told him to take a 40% cut in pay or leave. He left.
There’s apparently a crackdown on Sixth Tone for its pieces covering lgbt, women and labor issues. The thread gives examples.
This sucks because ST is basically the one Chinese news source that covers those issues at all, in addition to positive coverage of China. It’s the one source I use when I tell people that “look, you can publish stuff that critiques things in China”.
Looks like that tendency got them in hot water, though.
Bad start to the morning.