China Hates Fiction

I heard today that China is outlawing any and all time travel stories because they're "disrespectful towards history" and "many stories are totally made up and are made to strain for an effect of novelty."

Wow.

Alright, let's put aside the fact that they apparently have just realized what the word "fiction" means and instead talk about what kind of impact this may or may not have on the way Chinese people think from now on. The author of this article states that time travel dramas are growing in popularity in China, so obviously they are successful and widely watched. How is a viewing public of hundreds of thousands (perhaps millions) going to react to their government outlawing their favorite form of entertainment? Presumably, they'll just take it and not start an outcry, otherwise the Chinese government probably would not have done this in the first place.

The way the article is written gives way too much credit to the Chinese government. The author talks about how they have "a good reason to go against the genre" just because it takes liberties with history and historical fact. Of course it does! It's. Not. Real. It's a drama created to entertain people and make money. Additionally, "many people complain there’re too many mistakes on history facts, making it unbearable to watch"? Welcome to the world of television and movies! If it was completely faithful to the source material, it wouldn't be as interesting to watch. If you don't like it, why don't you just refrain from watching it? I refuse to watch television shows and movies that I know will piss me off due to inaccuracies for that very reason.

But, this is missing the point entirely of why China's governement is doing this. They don't want it to exist because they want to control the type of information that their people consume. It's not such a huge step from this to outlawing fiction entirely, or at least fiction that is only approved by the General Bureau of Radio, Film and Television. When that happens, what will become of an entire country's ability to think independently and creatively? What will happen to the people's ability to lose themselves in a form of entertainment they enjoy? If America outlawed science fiction for some bizarre reason, I would be devastated. Not only am I barred from enjoying this genre when I want to relax, I can't even write in this genre without fear of being brought up on some sort of felony charge.

As a creative person, I can hardly wrap my mind around the reality that the Chinese people live in. If this is an indication of the direction that Chinese censorship is moving towards, how far is it actually going to go? I don't believe that it's possible to wipe out story telling completely, but they don't need to do that; all they need to do is to control the stories that do exist. Will that result in a country of people who can't use their minds, who have no sense of imagination or independent and creative thought? What kind of country will that look like?

Perhaps I'm making more of this than there actually is, but as much as I hate reality television, it would never occur to me to outlaw it if I possessed that power. People should be allowed to make their own choices in the products they create and consume, yet China moves in the opposite direction every day. Anecdotally speaking, I was once warned against typing the word "Tibet" in a chat screen to my friend in China because she thought that perhaps there was a chance that even that line of communication could be monitored, and she didn't want her Internet shut down in that unlikely event. Whether her fears were well-founded or not is beside the point--that fear exists for people.

I don't really know what I expect of the world in general, or what I want to happen instead, but hearing that silly time travel stories are being outlawed concerns me. This isn't something that threatens society or social mores; it's not vulgar or dangerous to delicate sensibilities. If they're intent on getting rid of dumb TV like this, how much further is it going to go?