Today is June 4th, which marks the 36th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre. But you might not know why Tiananmen is still an enduring symbol of Internet repression.
Tiananmen was part of the reason I got into Bitcoin in the first place. I used to be part of commemorations of the event - I remembered that many of those who attended wore masks - afraid of agents of the Chinese state that would harass them and their family back home. I wondered about the dystopia of never having ease even 5000 miles away.
Tiananmen is still censored in the Chinese Internet, with even mentions of the date getting wiped off. This has led to a cat and mouse game where June 4th becomes May 35th and other variants to trick censors.
One of the first things the Chinese authorities did when they effectively took over Hong Kong was to ban public, non-violent rallies in Victoria Park in commemoration of the victims of Tiananmen.
One author has described his books as “June 4th” (China in Ten Words, non-fiction, banned in China) and “May 35th” (Brothers, fiction, not banned in China). Even today, to get literature or books published in China, you must strip away mentions of Tiananmen.
Tiananmen marked the crossroads between a faction of the Chinese Communist Party that wanted to grant more liberty and those who wanted to let markets run more broadly - at the cost of strict state control. That latter faction eventually led China to build the strongest version of Internet control possible - the Great Firewall that cleaves the Internet in two, and the same surveillance playbook of company, platform and government that now reigns as the default Bitcoiners and Nostriches fight against.
I’m happy to say that Nostr is one of a few pockets where open discussions like this can happen and that can actually cross borders throughout the world, backed by relays that can fortify this content how they choose - and that Bitcoin is playing its role to erode the systems of control that came partly because tanks met innocents that bloody day.
