By stifling the expression of opinions, censorship has the gift of making certain speeches invisible. Conversely, the algorithms of digital platforms can highlight others by manipulating attention flows. The human species has, as we see, invented all kinds of centralized control and intervention mechanisms to give the world the appearance desired by those in power.
However, it happens that neither the harshest censorship nor the most powerful algorithms succeed in blocking the outpouring of certain moods of the population, which have appeared gradually, are difficult to dissipate and are very significant. This is the case of the impression that the Chinese have today of having entered into “a rubbish period of history” – an expression that has gone viral in China in recent months.
Indeed, for some time now, it has been taken up by many Internet users on social networks, whether in posts or videos which describe it in these terms:
“The story doesn’t always move in a linear fashion… Time and time again it has had moments like this.
“While the functioning and development of our society go against the most basic economic laws, the individuals who make it up find themselves unable to change such a state of affairs. They can only helplessly watch as our society progresses on a path that leads it to failure.”
Like wildfire
This is what we call a “dustbin era of history”. Among those who take up such a theory and who enjoy spreading it, we find a certain number of opinion leaders from all walks of life.
But the phrase first appeared in an opinion piece published in February by the Chinese newspaper Jingji Guancha Bao [“l’observateur de l’économie”]. By July, it had already spread like wildfire in China.
The subject has generated a lot of ink, the main question being how to cope with such a period, which can last several years, even several decades, when we are unlucky enough to find ourselves there. The answers are varied, but most suggest consuming less, waiting quietly without doing anything, or taking the opportunity to cultivate your body and mind…
Ironically, no one specifies when this period occurs. Of course, no one said it was now. And against all expectations, it was an official Chinese media outlet that first dared to put the dots on the i.
An embarrassing feeling
The
Related News :