, Columnist
China’s Internet Is a Map of Xi’s Insecurities
A window into China’s cultural currents.
Photographer: Greg Baker/AFP/Getty Images
If you want to know what keeps President Xi Jinping up at night, watch what Beijing orders its internet censors to erase.
When state-backed media can’t be trusted, I’ve long looked to social platforms behind the Great Firewall for a live barometer of public mood. More than any whitepaper, the memes and viral moments — from lying flat and frowny horses to “Are You Dead?” — can feel like the clearest window into cultural currents. At least, until they vanish.