Meticulous revolt

The Washington Post has published an article by Maureen Fan about the recent protest ‘strolls’ in Shanghai, in which prosperous urban residents are demonstrating against the construction of a high speed train route through their neighborhood.

The article is titled Shanghai’s Middle Class Launches Quiet, Meticulous Revolt. It’s a good review of the affair, but here is a small, nit-picking correction:

After each stroll, residents upload photos and videos to Chinese Web sites, which are often blocked by the government, and to YouTube, a site that isn’t. The project has turned neighbors who did not know each other into close friends and allies who now compare notes and strategize.

The government does not block Chinese websites; it forces Chinese websites to self-censor. If they do not comply, they can be taken off the Internet using technological means, or their web masters can be arrested. Blocking is a pleasure reserved for websites hosted on servers outside Mainland China, such as Youtube.