Guo Baofeng Called Home to Dinner
This particular instance of digital activism started with the Baidu World of Warcraft forums and ended with a Twitter-organized protest over the imprisonment of blogger Guo Baofeng.
An internet meme was created in mid-July when somebody posted the phrase “Jia Junpeng, your mother is calling you home for dinner!” (”贾君鹏, 你妈妈喊你回家吃饭!”) to the WoW forum on Baidu. A couple days after posting, it had been viewed over 8 million times. It eventually reached the forum’s maximum number of comments; commenters shared their versions of the fictitious Jia Junpeng’s story, among other whimsies.
It’s hard, for me anyway, to say why this little phrase prompted such a response from the forum. There’s no real pun here, no subversion to parse out. It’s quite literally what a friend would say to alert a kid named Jia Junpeng that his mom is calling him. The phrase bears a simple sentiment, perhaps more poignant to diehard WoW players spending a lot of time at the computer and neglecting simpler human interaction. An article in People’s Daily Online attempts an explanation via a Nanjing University professor at the College of Journalism and Communications, who says internet addicts’ feelings of guilt about their families prompted the huge response.
So ok, the meme is born. Cut to Fujian Province, where a young woman named Yan Xiaoling was allegedly gang-raped and murdered, allegedly by a man with some connection to local officials. A few well-known bloggers, including one Guo Baofeng, or Peter Guo (Twitter: amoiist), smelled corruption and wrote about it online. Officials dismissed the allegations, saying complications from an ectopic pregnancy caused Ms. Yan’s death. Seven of the bloggers were arrested and put in jail.
Following his arrest, Tweeters were all over it, making this call to action: send a postcard to the prison, with the words, “Guo Baofeng, your mother is calling you home to dinner!” and post a picture of the card before mailing it.
Guo Baofeng, your mother is calling you home to dinner!
The stamp commemorates the Chinese constitution
You can see a multitude of postcards culled together by China Digital Times here.
I’m wondering what other examples of activism have used the internet meme as a rallying point. The “green meme” (turning your Twitter icon green to support Iranian protestors in the presidential election that gave incumbent Ahmadinejad another term in office) is a striking visual show of solidarity, albeit doubtful as a true act of protest. Does turning a tweet into a postcard and mailing it to the prison legitimize the Guo Baofeng campaign as an act of protest?
“Sending a postcard to prisoners of conscience is an assymetrical way to protest. It will become popular because it is hard to trace back to participants, has a low cost to participate, and has an excellent online exhibition effect. It is hard for the authorities to ban, and it gives prison authorities clear pressure.” So says one netizen, in a quote taken from a Radio France International article (translation by CDT).
I rather like that some folks in China brought this internet meme back into the mix to generate awareness of the Chinese government’s undeniably harsh tactics for dealing with its critics. We can probably expect more innovations in digital activism like this one to follow.
Some sites on digital activism: Digiactive, Internet & Democracy Blog