曆史≠記憶
中國是一個曆史源遠流長的國家，但也是一個集體記憶缺失的國度。至少不太符合我們通常對記憶的定義：一種世代相傳的記錄和傳承方式，可以準確無誤地傳達曆史上發生的種種事件。
在當代中國，為了符合執政黨的宣傳口徑，可能會在曆史書中作相應的必要刪減或增補。主要是強調長期以來中國是如何被西方列強肆虐淩辱的，而共產黨是唯一能夠保護中國人民根本利益的政權。
在中國生活的三年半時間裏，我得以有機會了解人們是如何看待時政熱點的，例如新疆維吾爾族人民的遭遇，美國與華為的衝突，香港的抗議示威活動以及最近的新冠病毒疫情爆發。在每個熱點問題的背後，似乎都會發現政府在試圖改寫該事件的來龍去脈。在本文中，我將以新冠病毒為例，探討政府是如何出於維穩需要而改寫新冠病毒疫情宣傳口徑的。
中國集體記憶喪失的背景
中國人民往往為自己的悠久曆史感到自豪，這也是理所應當的。許多流傳至今的傳統節日都可以追溯到數千年前，例如端午節是為了紀念公元前278年投江自盡的政治家詩人屈原。但是，中國對曆史的熱愛也含有些許諷刺意味，因為即使最基本的事實也往往有可能出錯。例如每次在商務宴會上，跟你聊天的中國同伴總是會想辦法提到中國上下5000年的曆史！ （實際上，中國的曆史更接近4000年）。
人們常說，曆史是由勝者寫就的。中國經曆了無數朝代，可以說每個朝代都重寫了以前的曆史。在當下這個朝代的中國共產黨（CPC）作為執政黨也不例外。共產黨對1949年執政之前的100年曆史進行了不少刪改，其中數不清的曆史事實因而石沉大海。
例如，在1900年侵略中國的八國聯軍包括美國，日本，大英帝國，意大利，奧匈帝國，俄羅斯，法國和德國。在我認識的幾乎每個中國人的心中，這次侵略給整個國家帶來了巨大創傷，是中國屈辱世紀中尤其突出的一頁。但是中國課堂上沒有提到的是，八國聯軍是對當時極端民族主義組織義和團的回擊。從1899年開始，義和團對中國的基督教傳教士和基督教徒進行了大規模謀殺，試圖通過這種極端手段來清除中國國內的外國影響。中國的教科書裏還提到美國參與了八國聯軍，以證明美國一直在阻止中國的崛起。如果你請任何一位受過國內大學教育的中國人談談對八國聯軍的了解，他們多半會告訴你美國是當時八國聯軍的主導。但實際上，在八國聯軍的50,000人中僅有3,000名美國士兵。而且，美國後來把中國簽署《義和團協議》後支付的大部分戰爭賠款都退還了。
舉上述這個例子絕不是為這些國家在19世紀對中國進行的殖民行為辯解。在那期間，中國大片領土被西方列強割據和控製，是真實的曆史事實。同樣，這個例子也不是在為義和團戰敗後西方列強的掠奪行為辯解。相反，我是想分享自己與中國朋友們談論到這個話題時的經曆。他們的課堂上似乎沒有討論過義和團的暴力行為，以及義和團反外國和反基督教的性質。課堂上也沒有提及當時有約30,000名中國基督徒被義和團殺害的曆史事實。換句話說，圍繞曆史事件的這些細節並沒包含在中國的曆史課程裏。人們不是故意要忘記這些事情，他們隻是沒有機會去了解。
再以朝鮮戰爭為例，朝鮮戰爭始於1950年6月25日朝鮮人民軍入侵大韓民國（韓國）。但直到2010年，中國的官方口徑都還堅持說是美國侵略才造成了這場戰爭。實際上，是由蘇聯和中國支持的朝鮮率先對韓國進行了入侵，之後美國才作出的反應。
在中國現行版本的第二次世界大戰中，日本是由共產黨主導擊敗的。這段修正過的曆史幾乎忽略了美國支持的國民黨的作用。國民黨在與日本帝國主義戰鬥遭受重大傷亡之後，進而被中共戰敗趕出了中國大陸。同樣，中國現行版本也弱化了最終導致日本在二戰中宣布投降的那兩枚原子彈。在中國期間，我遇到的人裏隻有兩個聽說過飛虎隊。這群美國飛行員自願在1941年至1942年幫助中國與日本作戰，卻在中國的集體記憶裏幾乎銷聲匿跡。這些內容從中國的官方曆史中弱化或者刪除，多半是因為不符合政府的官方宣傳口徑：1）西方列強一直在找機會侵略中國； 2）中國共產黨是唯一能保護中國人民利益不受侵害的政權。
在中國教育體製下，大多數中國民眾認為1949年合並新疆（在這之前基本上新疆在獨立運轉）是幫助當地人擺脫貪婪的地主惡霸，獲得和平解放。很少有中國人知道這裏的解放涉及強迫維吾爾族同胞放棄伊斯蘭宗教信仰，甚至強迫他們養豬和吃豬肉。在中國期間，我隻遇到一個知道這些情況的人。令我驚訝的是，他把這些事件解釋為中國共產黨對維吾爾族人的慷慨大方：我們是在教導一群未開化的人如何飼養家畜並且用來賣掉賺錢。這有什麽問題嗎？
近代史上的記憶喪失
現今正在發生的事件也陸續在被重寫，用來進一步說明中國是西方不公正的受害者。
就拿美國對中國電信巨頭華為的製裁來說吧。一方麵華為宣稱自己是完全獨立於政府的，另一方麵又強勢表示中國政府將替它對美國采取報複行動。中國網友將這一切理解為美國在殘酷地試圖阻止中國崛起。但是在中國國內，網友看不到任何國外媒體對華為盜竊知識產權證據確鑿的新聞報道。當華為前首席財務官孟晚舟於2018年底被捕時，中國國內媒體並沒提到她和華為是如何規避美國對伊朗的製裁的。在中國網友心裏，她隻是美國對華為發動政治製裁的受害者。
對於正在新疆維吾爾族同胞身上發生的人權迫害行為，西方世界提出強烈抗議，中國政府卻說這是美國在利用人權作為抹黑中國形象的政治工具。中國還有不少愛國主義者認為，香港的動蕩是由於美國幹預造成的。實際上，香港的抗議示威活動是起源於2019年港府提出的逃犯引渡法案。
由於政府堅持不懈的輿論宣傳，大多數人似乎隻保留下了官方記憶，這些記憶就是：西方大國一直在想方設法阻止中國崛起。不論是曆史書籍和新聞報道，還是餐桌談話或課堂辯論，如果不符合這個官方記憶的口徑，多半會被改寫或刪除。因此，那些改寫和刪改的內容從未留在中國民眾的記憶中。
新冠病毒（Covid-19）疫情期間記憶喪失的時間軸
在中國期間親曆新冠病毒疫情的過程中，我觀察到了這種記憶的喪失。回溯到2019年12月30日，一位名叫李文亮的醫生提醒他的親友，SARS病毒似乎重新出現了，並開始在他所在的醫院傳播。隨後，他被當地警察帶走訊問，並被迫簽署訓誡書，承認他散布謠言的行為是錯誤的（畢竟後來事實證明，該病毒的名稱不叫SARS病毒）。接下來的數周內這個新型病毒繼續肆意傳播，直到各大醫院人滿為患，情況失去控製。2020年1月23日，武漢市政府宣布封城。
從1月下旬到2月中旬之間，中國國內的輿論共識是該病毒始於武漢，並從那裏向外擴散。但是隨著事態不斷惡化，政府逐漸意識到，該病毒對中國整體經濟造成重創，並奪走了至少3000條生命（可能實際數量會更多），任由事態繼續發展可能會對其執政穩定性造成重大打擊。
於是，曆史開始慢慢被改寫：
2月6日，公民記者陳秋實宣告失蹤。在此之前，他深入武漢疫區，並在YouTube上發布視頻，包括武漢疫情的嚴峻局勢和對政府控製不力的批評。從中國政府的立場來看，如果要控製公眾對疫情的了解，就不能允許像陳這樣的記者對武漢的真實情況進行未經審查的報道。 同樣在2月6號，李文亮醫生被他試圖提醒民眾的新冠病毒感染住院數周後最終宣告不治。他的死亡時間從2月6日下午10:00分左右更改為官宣的2月7日淩晨2:58分。有一些朋友推測這次更改有兩個原因。首先，政府可以凸顯自己的盡責，表示花了長達五個小時盡了一切努力來救治李醫生。其次，因為當時廣大民眾為他的離世感到出離憤怒。因此，政府選擇在大多數人睡著後的午夜時段宣布李醫生去世，這樣可以減少人們因憤怒而上街遊行示威的可能性。 2月8日，國內社交媒體上流傳著一張上海年輕女子在街頭舉著言論自由標語的照片。當時我已經在中國呆了三年之久，從來沒有看過或聽過哪個人敢於公開提出這種訴求。然而幾天內，這張圖片就從中國互聯網上消失了。
2月21日，日本《朝日新聞》（Asahi News）的一篇報道中指出，美國的14,000例流感死亡病例中有一部分可能是新冠病毒（Covid-19）感染。這篇報道被用來在中國國內廣泛傳播，以引發人們對美國作為新冠病毒潛在來源的懷疑。 2月22日，中國科學院西雙版納熱帶植物園在其官網刊文稱，新冠病毒並非起源於武漢的華南海鮮市場。該研究成果可能是真實的，不過該文章後來被用來廣泛傳播，作為病毒並非源於中國的證明。 2月27日，傳染病學專家鍾南山院士通過新聞發布會向全國民眾通報，新冠病毒可能並非起源於中國。鍾南山院士因在2003年SARS疫情期間擔任關鍵角色，受到中國民眾的廣泛信任和尊重。 2月28日，中國國內社交媒體上開始瘋傳一個CNN新聞報道的錯誤翻譯截屏。錯誤翻譯寫的是，美國疾病控製與預防中心（CDC）承認該病毒起源於美國。由於中國有好幾億人不太懂英語，這種錯誤翻譯達到的傳播效果往往驚人。
英文標題：美國疾病控製與預防中心（CDC）確認了美國的第一起來源不明的新冠病毒感染，表明美國正在發生新冠病毒的社區傳播。中文錯誤翻譯：美國疾病預防控製中心承認第一個新冠病毒起源於美國。
2月29日，張文宏醫生在一次采訪中說，新冠病毒很可能起源於武漢。之前經常接受新聞采訪的他在這之後就幾乎不再出現在電視節目中了。張文宏醫生在疫情爆發初期屬於一顆冉冉升起的新星，以其真實誠懇的態度廣受公眾尊重。當時他公開提倡共產黨員衝到第一線替換身心俱疲的醫護人員，贏得了民眾的稱讚。 3月1日，中國共產黨製定的新網絡安全法出台，賦予政府更多權力在社交媒體平台上管控關於新冠病毒的言論。根據新規，隻有政府授權的機構和個人才能在指定社交媒體平台上提到新冠病毒。 在那之後，雖然除官方口徑之外的任何關於病毒的言論都銷聲匿跡了，但很多關於病毒的陰謀論卻似乎受到扶持一般悄然興起。
上麵的這個例子隻展示了中國互聯網言論管控的冰山一角，不過至少能幫你對輿論操控的具體策略有個大致了解。例如在國內流行的視頻分享平台Bilibili上，這個有51個粉絲的用戶總共上傳過13個視頻，其中有12個平均觀看次數都不到200次。然而，他在3月1日發布的一個視頻卻超過24萬5千次觀看量。該視頻是一個簡短的中文解說片段，說有意大利專家確定新冠病毒來自美國。考慮到這個賬號粉絲極少，以及該賬號所有的其他視頻觀看次數都極少，可以毫不誇張地說，如果沒有宣傳部門的推手，這條視頻幾乎不可能有如此高的觀看次數。可能有點類似YouTube將美國政府希望人們看到的特定內容推送到首頁一樣。在我向Bilibili的審查部門投訴之後，該視頻被刪除了。
3月3日，我當時準備在Bilibili上發個視頻，內容是討論美國在新冠病毒爆發初期的應對措施。在Bilibili上發布的所有視頻都需要事先經過平台的人工審核。一開始我被告知該視頻的內容過於負麵，無法發布。隨後我把視頻修改的更正麵了一些，然而還是再次被審核部門拒絕。通過電話溝通，我被告知現在政府不再允許個人在網上討論關於冠狀病毒的任何信息。當然不是說所有關於冠狀病毒的討論都從Bilibili上消失了，而是隻有經有關部門批準的機構和個人才能發布內容。
3月11日，中國外交官們開始在推特上發起一種陰謀論，說是美軍將新冠病毒帶到了武漢（盡管有中國政府其他部門已經官宣否認了這種陰謀論）。由於Twitter在中國被禁，所以僅有隻言片語被傳播回了防火牆內。中國網民隻能根據少量虛假和不可靠的信息得出結論。民眾總體上還是傾向於支持政府的官方輿論版本。
3月16日，在白宮官方網站（Whitehouse.gov）上有人發起了一份請願，譴責中國病毒一詞，並提到尤其在新冠病毒（COVID-19）來源尚未得出科學定論時，將病毒歸咎於中國是不可接受的。我絕對認同不應該把新冠病毒造成的後果歸咎於中國和中國人民。但作為執政政府，中國共產黨讓病毒從2019年12月30日至2020年1月23日肆意傳播不加有效控製，應該負相應責任。如果當時中國政府及時作為，新冠病毒在全球範圍的傳播將得到大幅減少。
3月20日，中國最有影響力的官方媒體中央電視台（CCTV）采訪了一位中國專家，介紹了美國在抗擊病毒方麵的進展。該中國專家指出，美國開發疫苗的速度如此之快，明顯表明美國科學家早在武漢疫情爆發前就掌握了這種病毒的基因序列。換句話說，該病毒很可能是美國用來攻擊中國的生化武器。
3月21日，中國官方外宣媒體《環球時報》等雜誌開始指出2019年11月份在意大利存在新冠病毒案例的可能性。通過這種讓病毒來源模糊不清的宣傳策略，給中文新聞讀者造成的印象就是似乎根本不可能找到病毒的起源。
3月22日，中國駐美大使崔天凱否認了3月11日前後出現的陰謀論。但是，他堅持把新冠病毒起源描述為一個尚未證實的問題，並指出媒體和外交官對其起源的推測是非常有害的。事實是，目前除中國以外，沒有權威科學家認為新冠病毒起源於中國以外的其他地區（直到7月中旬本文發表之際，這種判斷仍然是主流看法）。
3月28日前後，中國中央電視台錯誤翻譯了歐美研究報告，並按照錯誤翻譯進行了廣泛報道，稱新冠病毒不是在武漢開始的。
圖1和圖2：《自然醫學》刊發的一篇文章裏，杜蘭大學醫學院的羅伯特加裏（Robert Garry）醫生指出，武漢的華南海鮮市場可能不是新冠病毒的來源。在中國國內，這被錯誤翻譯為：美國承認該病毒並非來自武漢。 圖3：來自中國的一個Twitter用戶在傳播這個錯誤翻譯。
上麵列出的中國國內的官方輿論宣傳策略不一而足，遠未詳盡。不過這些例子還是很有代表性，結合說明了中國政府的宣傳部門為了幫助民眾創造集體記憶，是如何有選擇性地刪改和創造信息的。
失憶後的世界
在意料之中的是，這場輿論宣傳閃電戰中，中國政府使用了一直以來非常有效的話術：中國屬於受害者，新冠病毒是由美國或意大利帶到中國的。通過差不多六個星期的密集輿論宣傳，4月初我與上海的友鄰聊天時就發現，大多數人都已經相信該病毒起源於美國。在關於新冠病毒起源的爭論過程中，我還失去了一個曾經的好朋友。
在社交媒體上，那些呼籲言論自由的內容在2月上旬就驟然停止了。李文亮醫生的相關文章被審查刪除。就好像人們已經完全忘記了疫情爆發初期的那些恐懼和憤怒。
圖1：有關李文亮醫生去世的兩篇紀念文章隨後遭到審查刪除（圖2）。圖3：微信朋友圈的一篇帖子，引用了約翰斯圖亞特米爾（John Stuart Mill）關於言論自由重要性的名言：所有禁言的國家必定犯錯。
當然，除了將特定宣傳內容推送給讀者之外，相關部門還可以刪除不利和敏感內容。這樣的操作同時也在現實世界中發生著。
我的一個上海鄰居在院子裏的樹上掛了一副李文亮的畫像。短短幾天之後肖像就被摘下了。
圖1：李文亮的肖像掛在鄰居的樹上（2020年3月2日）。圖2：肖像已被摘下（2020年3月5日）。
在中國，民眾何時用何種方式來祭奠李文亮醫生屬於一件政治事務，而不是個人事務。因此，你對悲傷的表達也在政府的控製之下。
我家附近一副類似的藝術作品也在短暫出現後消失了。
作品中的警察戴著口罩，象征著新冠病毒疫情爆發初期的控製。
與中國相似，美國的社交媒體在新聞宣傳中也起著重要作用。但是區別在於，美國的政府和官員無法控製民眾獲取的信息，也不能控製和刪改那些政府不想看到的內容。
在中國也有許多網友對《人民日報》和中國中央電視台（CCTV）等官方媒體失去了信任。他們轉而通過微博（類似推特）和微信公眾號（類似Medium或Substack）來閱讀新聞信息和時事分析。之前和我陷入爭論的那位朋友就是在微信上讀到過一篇文章。那篇文章暗示說，由於武漢病毒研究所是由美國國立衛生研究院（NIH）部分資助的，因此美國肯定知道新冠病毒，並從實驗室把該病毒泄漏了出去。
可能這麽說還缺乏客觀證明，不過我認為，當中國民眾感覺無法從官方新聞機構獲得真實信息時，他們會更傾向於相信通過非官方渠道發布的那些類似陰謀論的消息。如本文所述，這些非官方渠道也可能是由政府相關部門操縱的。無論中國讀者從哪個來源獲取新聞，是來自官方媒體還是社交自媒體，政府都對你所看到的內容擁有最終決定權。
未來的集體記憶缺失
從2019年12月下旬李文亮醫生向親友發出疫情警告的那一天到今天，真實的曆史隻有一個版本。但是綜上所述，人們對這段曆史的相關記憶已經被係統地修改或刪除。那麽從現在起的五年、十年或十五年後，小學生們又將如何了解到新冠病毒的起源呢？我預感到時候的課堂上不會提到野生動物買賣和衛生條件差導致疫情爆發的這種內容（類似於2003年SARS病毒的傳播原因）。
舉個韓國的例子作為對比，2014年的韓國世越號渡輪沉沒事件造成多達250名中學生無辜喪生。在事件發生五年後，首爾市政府在光化門廣場為死者建造了新的紀念設施。為什麽要紀念？是為了保留這份公眾記憶。確保不會忘記過去的錯誤，避免未來再有類似悲劇發生。
隨著中國政府在病毒起源上編織的謊言越來越多，真相就越來越不可能浮出水麵。否則最終得知真相的民眾在恍然大悟之際，不免會問 如果這是假的，那還有哪些是假的？ 這是執政黨不能也不敢讓中國人民提出的問題。
今天的中國人民對鴉片戰爭、八國聯軍以及南京大屠殺的記憶曆曆在目，仿佛自己親曆了這些曆史事件。但是與其相比，有許多人不記得或者不知道距離現在更近的天安門事件。大多數人也不太了解1987年的大興安嶺火災，由於當時滅火過程不透明，並存在嚴重的官僚作風，最終導致250萬英畝土地受到火災損害，將近5萬人無家可歸。也幾乎沒有人記得1994年在新疆克拉瑪依市發生的大火，造成近300名青少年葬身火海。如果現場的官員沒有讓孩子們坐好等領導先走，這些孩子可能還有逃生的機會。
隨著時間的流逝，忘記曆史長河中的事件是難以避免的。但是在開放的民主國家，人們會對那些過去有爭議的事件進行研究分析，以史為鑒。例如在美國，我們一直會討論為結束二戰而在日本投下原子彈的道德爭議，也會辯論美國當時是否應該涉足越南戰爭。記得2006年我在讀高中，當時阿富汗戰爭爆發已經五年了。我們的英語文學老師用整堂課來討論阿富汗戰爭的錯誤性。這些公開的討論和辯論為大家創造了記憶，記錄下那些過去和現在的道德和人文爭議。對過去進行追憶和反思，可以指導我們在將來做出更好的決斷。
中國政府似乎不太會這樣做，而且在可預見的未來似乎也不太可能。我擔心那些在未來即將發生的真實記憶，或許也會像這次新冠病毒疫情中的一些記憶一樣，在曇花一現後被迫修改或消失
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English Version
Note: I wrote the majority of this piece in mid-April and chose to hold off publishing until I returned to America.
History ≠ memory
China is a nation with a long history but it is also a nation with no memory. At least not in the way we tend to define memory, a device for recording and passing down across generations an accurate representation of how past events unfolded.
In modern day China, whole chapters may be deleted or inserted into the book of history in order to fit the Communist Party’s desired narrative, namely that China has long been victimized by cruel Western powers and the Party is the only entity capable of protecting China’s interests.
Living in China for three and a half years, I had the opportunity to understand how people view hot-button issues like the treatment of Uighurs in Xinjiang, America’s conflict with Huawei, the protests in Hong Kong, and most recently the coronavirus outbreak. Behind each issue, there is an active attempt to rewrite the history of how events unfolded.
In this piece, I explore how the narrative around the coronavirus was re-written in real time to strengthen the Party’s rule.
Background on collective memory loss in China
Chinese people are proud of their history, and rightly so. Many of today’s traditions hearken back to people or events from thousands of years ago — for example, the annual Dragon Boat Festival is thought to celebrate Qu Yuan, a statesman-poet who died in 278 BC. However, there exists a certain irony in China’s affinity for history in that even the most basic facts are often remembered incorrectly. In every business dinner, your conversation partner will almost invariably find an opportunity to interject with something about “5000 years of Chinese history!” (in reality it is closer to 4000 years).
History is, as they say, written by the victors. China has passed through myriad dynasties, each of which rewrites the history of times prior. The current dynasty, the Community Party of China (CPC), is no exception. The CPC has engaged in revisions of the 100 years prior to its ascent in 1949 with a seemingly unending supply of whiteout.
Take, for example, the 1900 occupation of China by the Eight-Nation Alliance, comprising the United States, Japan, the British Empire, Italy, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Russia, France, and Germany. The pain of this occupation, a particularly prominent trauma in China’s “Century of Humiliation,” is seared into the mind of almost every Chinese person I know. What is left out of classroom lectures is that the occupying armies invaded in response to the hyper-nationalistic Boxer Rebellion which began murdering Christian missionaries and Chinese Christians in 1899. It was a heavy-handed and violent effort to purge China of foreign influence. America’s participation in the incursion is used as evidence that the US has always been bent on stemming China’s rise. If you were to speak with a typical college-educated Chinese person about their understanding of the Eight-Nation Alliance, you would think America was the prime aggressor. In reality, the US only contributed 3,000 of the 50,000 troops and returned most of the war reparations that China was forced to pay after signing the Boxer Protocol.
Post-publication note: the purpose of the above example was not by any means to excuse the participating countries for their colonization of China during 1800’s, under which large swaths of China’s territory were carved up and controlled by Western powers. Nor is it to excuse the pillaging that followed the defeat of the Boxers. Rather, I wanted to relay my experience of talking to people about this topic, who had generally not discussed the violent, anti-foreign, and anti-Christian nature of the Boxer uprising in their classrooms. Nor did they discuss the fact that some 30,000 Chinese Christians were killed by the Boxers during the uprising. In other words, the nuance that typically surrounds historical events was not part of the standard curriculum. People didn’t willfully forget that these things happened — rather, they just didn’t learn about them in the first place, through no choice of their own.
Take, for another example, the Korean war, which started when the North Korean People’s Army invaded the Republic of Korea (South Korea) on June 25th, 1950. Until 2010, China’s official position asserted that American aggression caused the war. In reality, America acted in response to the invasion of South Korea by its Soviet- and Chinese-backed neighbor to the north.
In the Chinese version of World War II, Japan was defeated solely at the hands of the Communist Party. This revisionist history completely ignores the role of the US-backed KMT, which, after sustaining heavy casualties fighting the Imperial Japanese Army, was driven out of Mainland China by the CPC. It also ignores the two atomic bombs which led to Japan’s ultimate surrender. In my time in China, I only met two people who knew of the Flying Tigers, a group of American pilots who volunteered to help China fight Japan in 1941 to 1942. These events have been removed from the official history because they don’t further the narrative that 1) Western powers have always been out to get China and 2) the CPC is the sole guardian of the Chinese people.
As a result of their education, most people view the 1949 annexation of Xinjiang, which was previously operating essentially as an independent country, as an act of liberation from greedy landlords. Very few Han Chinese know that this “liberation” involved forcing Uighur Muslims to renounce their religion, raise pigs, and eat pork. In my time in China, I only met one person who knew this. To my surprise, he interpreted these events as evidence of the CPC’s generosity towards the Uighurs: “We were teaching an uncivilized group of people how to raise a valuable animal they could sell and earn money. What's wrong with that?”
Memory loss in recent history
Events from the present day are also rewritten to further the narrative that China is a victim of Western injustice.
America’s aggressive stance against Chinese telecoms giant Huawei, which on the one hand claims to be entirely independent from the Chinese government but on the other hand confidently says that Beijing will retaliate on its behalf in the face of continued American pressure, is taken by Chinese citizens as evidence that America is cruelly bent on stemming China’s rise. However, well-documented cases of Huawei’s IP theft go unreported in China. When Huawei’s former CFO, Meng Wanzhou, was arrested in late 2018, her complicity in helping Huawei skirt American sanctions on Iran were not discussed in Chinese media. She was simply a victim of America’s politically-driven war against Huawei.
The Western world’s outcry against atrocities committed in Xinjiang are seen as America using human rights as a “political tool to smear China’s image.” The more nationalistic voices in China claim that the unrest in Hong Kong, which in reality are a result of an ill-conceived extradition bill introduced in 2019, are due to US meddling.
As a result of the constant propaganda barrage, most people seem to retain only those memories which further a narrative that Western powers act, and always have acted, primarily to prevent China’s rise. Events that fail to drive this narrative are reinterpreted or expunged from both history books and present-day reporting, and thereby from dinner table conversation or classroom debate. Thus, the memories of these events never take shape in China’s national conscience.
A timeline of memory loss during the Covid-19 epidemic
I saw this “expunging of memory” happening as I watched the coronavirus disaster unfold. On December 30th, a doctor named Li Wenliang warned his colleagues that SARS had returned and was making its way through his hospital. He was subsequently brought in for questioning by local police and forced to sign a letter acknowledging that he was wrong to spread rumors (after all, the disease turned out to be something other than SARS). The virus spread unchecked for weeks until hospitals began filling up and the situation became untenable. On January 23rd, the Wuhan government announced it was shutting the city down.
For a short time between late January and mid February, the consensus within China seemed to be that the virus started in Wuhan and expanded from there. However, at some point the CPC realized that their association with a virus that had tanked the Chinese economy and taken at least 3,000 lives (though likely many more) would strike a critical blow to their legitimacy.
And so they began rewriting history:
On February 6th, citizen journalist Chen Qiushi disappeared after posting videos to YouTube that both criticized the CPC and showed how dire the situation was in Wuhan. The CPC could not allow people like Chen to give an unfiltered view of what was happening in Wuhan if they were to successfully control public perceptions of the outbreak.
On the same day, Li Wenliang succumbed to the virus he tried to warn people about. His time of death was altered from approximately 10:00 PM on February 6th to 2:58 AM on February 7th. My friends speculated this alteration was made for two reasons. First, it allowed the government to say that they spent five hours making every effort resuscitate him. Second, by waiting until most people were asleep to declare Li dead, they reduced the chance of people taking to the streets in anger. People were furious about his death.
On February 8th, a picture of a young woman in Shanghai holding a sign demanding freedom of speech circulated on social media. At this point, I had been in China for three years and had not once seen or heard a single person publicly make this demand. Within days, this image disappeared from the Chinese internet.
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A February 21st report from Japan’s Asahi News stating that some of America’s 14,000 flu deaths may have actually been Covid-19 was used within China to cast suspicion on America as a potential source of the virus.
On February 22nd, a Chinese Academy of Sciences research institute in Yunnan said that the virus didn’t originate at the Huanan Seafood Market in Wuhan. Although this conclusion may be true, it was used to push a narrative that the virus didn’t originate in China altogether.
On February 27th, infectious disease expert Dr. Zhong Nanshan went on TV to tell the country that the virus may not have originated in China. Dr. Zhong is well respected and trusted because of the role he played in the 2003 SARS outbreak.
On February 28th, a false translation of a CNN news clip was shared ad-nauseam on social media. The translation indicated that the American CDC admitted the virus originated in the US. Because there are hundreds of millions of people in China who do not speak English well, these types of false translations are surprisingly effective.
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English caption: CDC confirms first case of “unknown origin” in the US, indicating community transmission is occurring in the US. Chinese translation: The American CDC admits that the first case of the novel coronavirus originated in America.
On February 29th, Dr. Zhang Wenhong stated during an interview that the virus most likely originated in Wuhan. After this, he all but disappeared from his increasingly regular television appearances. Dr. Zhang was a rising star in the early days of the outbreak, respected for his no-nonsense attitude. He won people’s hearts by publicly demanding that members of the CPC deploy to the front lines to relieve overworked nurses and doctors.
On March 1st, the CPC enacted a new internet security law giving them broader authority to silence discussion about the virus on social media platforms. Under the new rules, only people that had the government’s blessing were allowed to discuss the virus on certain social media platforms.
Next, while any expression of doubt over the official narrative was muted, they allowed and encouraged conspiracy theories to flourish.
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This example barely scratches the surface of the ways in which the Chinese internet is manipulated, but at least gives you an idea of the tactics employed. On the popular video streaming platform Bilibili, a user with 51 followers had uploaded a total of 13 videos, 12 of which had an average of less than 200 views. One particular video, released on March 1st, had over 245,000 views. It was short clip of a Chinese-language narration explaining that Italian experts had determined the virus came from America. Given the small number of followers and low view count for the other videos, it is an understatement to say that such viewership is virtually impossible without a rankings boost from the country’s propaganda organs. It would be like YouTube promoting to its front page specific content that the US Government wanted people to see. This video was deleted after I complained to Bilibili’s censorship department.
On March 3rd, I tried to publish a video on Bilibili discussing America’s response to the virus. I was at first told that the content of the video was too negative and therefore could not be published. I revised the video, giving it a more positive spin. After the video was rejected a second time, I called the censorship department and was told that they are no longer allowing people to discuss the coronavirus outbreak. This is not to say that all coronavirus content disappeared from Bilibili; rather, only approved voices got to post such content.
On March 11th, Chinese officials and diplomats began pushing a conspiracy on Twitter that the US military brought the coronavirus to Wuhan (despite the fact that another branch of the Chinese government had already debunked this conspiracy theory). Because Twitter is banned in China, only bits and pieces trickle back behind the Great Firewall. Chinese netizens are forced to draw conclusions based on both false and spotty information. Generally speaking, they tend to side with their government’s version of the narrative.
On March 16th, a petition was started on Whitehouse.gov that condemns the term “Chinese virus” and says it is unacceptable to blame China “especially under the circumstances where the origin of COVID-19 is not scientifically definite yet.” While I agree that it is wrong to blame China and Chinese people for the virus, it is necessary to hold the CPC responsible for allowing it to spread unchecked from December 30th, 2019 until January 23rd, 2020. If the CPC had acted earlier, the global spread of Covid would have been dramatically reduced.
On March 20th, China Central TV (CCTV), the most influential broadcaster in the nation, interviewed an expert about America’s progress fighting the virus. The expert stated that America’s speed in developing a vaccine was an obvious indicator that American scientists had the genetic sequence of the virus in their hands well before the Wuhan outbreak. In other words, the virus is likely a US bioweapon that was used to attack China.
On March 21st, Global Times and others begin to point to the possibility of cases existing in Italy in November. This tactic of muddying the waters about the origin of the virus gives consumers of Chinese news the impression that it is simply impossible to know where it originated.
On March 22nd, the Chinese Ambassador to the US disowned the conspiracy theory propagated on March 11th. However, he continued to paint the question of where Covid-19 started as something unknowable, stating it is “very harmful” for journalists and diplomats to speculate about its origins. At this point in time, there were no serious scientists outside of China who thought the virus originated anywhere but China (and so it remains today, in mid-July, at the time of publishing).
Around March 28th, CCTV misquoted Western researchers and broadcasted false translations claiming that the virus did not start in Wuhan.
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Images 1 & 2: An article in Nature Medicine, in which Dr. Robert Garry of the Tulane University School of Medicine states that the Huanan Seafood Market in Wuhan was likely not the origin of the virus. Within China, this was portrayed as: “America admits that the virus did not come from Wuhan.” Image 3: A Twitter user in China parroting this talking point.
The propaganda initiatives detailed above do not represent an exhaustive list. Nonetheless, taken together they illustrate what the CPC’s propaganda department does to manufacture desirable memories and delete undesirable ones.
The post-amnesia world
Unsurprisingly, throughout this propaganda blitz, the government made use of the age-old narrative: China is a victim, the virus was brought here by the US or by Italy. By early April, after six weeks of aggressive propaganda, my impression from talking with friends and neighbors in Shanghai was that most people believed the virus originated in America. I lost a friend after getting in an argument about where Covid-19 started.
The social media posts calling for freedom of speech that characterized the early part of February had all but stopped. Articles written about Li Wenliang were censored. It was as if people had completely forgotten about the fear and anger they felt in the early days of the outbreak.
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Image 1: Two articles about the tragic death of Li Wenliang which were subsequently censored (Image 2). Image 3: A post from a WeChat friend with a quote attributed to John Stuart Mill on the importance of freedom of speech: “All countries that censor speech will end up making mistakes.”
Of course, in addition to placing selected content in front of you in order to reinforce a narrative, the censors remove undesirable content as well. This happens in the physical world, too.
A neighbor of mine in Shanghai had a Li Wenliang portrait hanging on the tree in his yard. Within days, the portrait had been removed.
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Image 1: A portrait of Li Wenliang hanging on a neighbor’s tree (March 2nd, 2020). Image 2: The portrait has been removed (March 5th, 2020).
In China, how and when you grieve about Li Wenliang’s death is a political matter, not a personal one, and thus your expression of grief is subject to government control.
Another piece of protest art similarly disappeared from my neighborhood.
The police are depicted wearing face masks, evoking the early days of virus control.
Similar to America, social media in China plays an important role in shaping narratives. The difference is that in the US, government officials cannot control what you see or what is off limits.
Many people have become distrustful of state media outlets like People’s Daily and CCTV. They often turn to Weibo (think Twitter) and WeChat Public Accounts (think Medium or Substack) for news and analysis of current events. The friend I mentioned getting in an argument with above had read posts on WeChat suggesting that because the Wuhan Institute of Virology was partially funded by the NIH, America must have known about the virus and played a role in leaking it from the lab.
I know this is anecdotal and does not prove anything. Nonetheless, my intuition is that when people are starved for credible information from their country’s journalistic institutions, they will have a lower threshold for believing conspiracy-esque news delivered through other channels. As discussed above, these channels can also be manipulated by government officials. No matter which sources you get your news from, state media, independent media, or social media, the state is the ultimate arbiter of what content you see.
Memory loss of things yet to happen
There is only one true history of what happened between late December 2019, when Li Wenliang warned his colleagues about the virus, and today. But, as discussed above, the things which evoke memories of this history have been systematically altered or dismantled. In five, ten, or fifteen years from now, what will school kids learn about the origin of the virus? I would posit that they will not learn a story about how wild animal trade and poor sanitation caused the outbreak (similar to what happened in with SARS in 2003).
To give a contrasting example, in Korea, where 250 students needlessly died when the Sewol ferry sank in 2014, five years after the incident the Seoul city government opened a new memorial to the deceased. The aim? To preserve memories. To ensure that past failures are not forgotten and thus not repeated.
When you are as far down the rabbit hole with a lie as the CPC is on Covid-19’s origin, there is no hope of backtracking towards truth. Doing so would cause too much doubt and scrutiny by the people they set out to deceive. “If that was all fake, what else is?” This is a question the Party cannot afford to have Chinese people asking.
Chinese people alive today remember the Opium Wars and the occupation by the Eight Nation Army and the Rape of Nanjing as if these events happened to them personally. But many people in China do not remember Tiananmen. Most people do not remember that the Daxing’anling fire of 1987, which burned over 2,500,000 acres and left 50,000 people homeless, could have been mitigated were it not for a governance structure that prioritized meetings and bureaucracy over action and transparency. Virtually no one remembers the 1994 fire in the Xinjiang city of Karamay that killed nearly 300 schoolchildren, whose deaths could have been avoided if the officials at the scene had not ordered the children to stay in their seats while they themselves fled.
Losing memories to history is as inevitable as the passage of time. But in open democracies we study the controversial events of our past. We debate whether or not it was moral to drop the atomic bomb on Japan. We debate whether or not America should have participated in the Vietnam war. In 2006 when I was a senior in high school, five years into the war in Afghanistan, my English Literature teacher spent a full class period discussing what a failure the war had been. These discussions and debates create memories for us — memories of moral failures, past and present. These memories of the past can guide us towards better decisions in the future.
As a country, China does not have this, and it does not seem to be on the horizon. I fear that the memories of things yet to happen will, like the experience of the Covid-19 outbreak, be lost soon after they’re formed.
