China: Why the white paper became the protest symbol of the protesters

A humble piece of white paper is the protest symbol of hundreds of protesters opposing Beijing’s “zero tolerance” policy.

In Shanghai, dozens of protesters gathered on Sunday afternoon holding a blank sheet of paper. Similarly, in Beijing, where protesters held white pieces of paper in a demonstration at the prestigious Tsinghua University.

And in another shocking video a young woman can be seen walking the streets of Wuzhen – a city in the eastern province of Zhejiang – with chains around her wrists and duct tape over her mouth. She was holding a white paper in her hands.

The trend has its roots in the 2020 protests in Hong Kong, where locals held up white pieces of paper to protest the city’s draconian new national security laws.

Some have argued that the gesture is not only an attempt to silence those who disagree with the Chinese authorities but also a challenge as if to say: ‘are you going to arrest me for holding a sign that says nothing?'”

“Sure, the papers don’t say anything but we know what’s there,” one protester in Shanghai told the BBC.

Johnny, 26, who is protesting in Beijing, told Reuters news agency that the white paper came to “represent everything we want to say but can’t say”.

Kerry Allen, the BBC’s China media analyst, noted that Chinese censorship officials have overreached the country’s social media platforms.

Meanwhile, paper maker Shanghai M&G Stationary was forced to deny rumors that it had pulled all A4 paper from the shelves due to national security concerns. M&G officials said that its production and operation was normal and that they had alerted the police to a fake document circulating on the Internet, which is where the rumor about the company started.

People in Beijing marching on the third ring road… singing… and holding up empty white papers…

The empty white paper symbolizes their protest against censorship in China. 🔥🔥🔥

🔊 sound …🧐#China #ChinaProtests pic.twitter.com/Rwg24s9Nul

— Wall Street Silver (@WallStreetSilv) November 27, 2022

A video, believed to have been shot on Saturday at the Communication University of China in the eastern city of Nanjing, shows an unidentified man angrily grabbing a white piece of paper from a protester before walking away. In another video later that night, dozens more students appeared on campus holding pieces of white paper and standing in silence.

The wave of civil disobedience is unprecedented in mainland China in the past decade, as frustration grows over Xi Jinping’s “zero Covid cases” policy nearly three years into the pandemic. The protests, sparked by a deadly apartment fire in the western part of the country last week, spread on Sunday to cities including Shanghai, Beijing, Chengdu and Wuhan.

It is noted that on Monday, China reported a new daily record of new Covid-19 cases, with 40,347 infections, which makes it difficult for Beijing to back down.

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