Recently in mainland China, there has been a buzz surrounding an in-depth analysis of the old film “Youth”. Three analysis videos on social media platforms sparked heated discussions, with a total view count quickly surpassing 37 million. However, these trending videos were taken down on November 5th. Why did the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) take this action? What is the CCP afraid of?
The film “Youth”, directed by renowned mainland Chinese director Feng Xiaogang, premiered in December 2017, with versions for domestic and overseas audiences. Based on the bestselling novel of the same name by female author Yan Ge Ling, the film tells the story of a group of young people in a military art troupe during the 1970s and 1980s, exploring historical backgrounds such as the Cultural Revolution, the 1979 Sino-Vietnamese War, and the era of reform and opening up.
Eight years later, on the mainland film website “Bilibili” (B站), a blogger named “Chatting About Films” uploaded a series of three videos on November 2nd, 11th, and 29th analyzing “Youth” in depth, with each episode lasting about half an hour. These three videos quickly went viral and sparked discussions on social media platforms.
After the total view count exceeded 37 million, these three analysis videos were taken down from Bilibili on December 5th without any explanation.
When “Youth” premiered eight years ago, it set a box office record of 1.422 billion RMB. Viewers, mostly born in the 1950s and 1960s, resonated with the characters in the film as they reminisced about their youth.
However, the users on Bilibili are mostly young people aged 17 to 35, born after 1990, who have never experienced the historical periods depicted in the film. In reality, these young people are facing dilemmas of unemployment and bleak prospects.
Sheng Xue, Vice Chairman of the Democratic Alliance and spokesperson for the Independent Chinese PEN Center, told Dajiyuan, “The younger generation realizes that today’s social environment, the current predicaments, and the kind of personal destiny people are facing today are actually highly similar to the era of the Cultural Revolution. People may see history in the film, but in the analysis videos, what they see is reality, they see their own lives, which is why it resonates so deeply with them (young people).”
During the Cultural Revolution, the military art troupe had many “children of high-ranking officials” (now referred to as “second-generation reds” or “official second-generation”), who had limited talents and entered based on connections; there were also “ordinary people’s children” (now referred to as “grassroots people”), many of whom were exceptionally talented. The film portrays the discrimination and bullying of the children of high-ranking officials towards the children of ordinary people, and how the latter tried to change their fate through effort but were never accepted into the upper circles (a phenomenon known as “social stratification” today), unable to escape the tragic fate of being exploited and sacrificed (a situation referred to as being “harvested as leeks”).
Jiang Pinchao, editor of the “June 4th Poetry Collection” and writer at the Library of Congress, USA, stated that the social contradictions in today’s China are “reminiscent” of the China depicted in the film from that era, as people say, “history is contemporary history.”
He pointed out that the CCP brainwashes the common people through preaching, aiming to make them kind and diligent, but in reality, the CCP oppresses, enslaves, exploits, and destroys these people.
The male protagonist in the film, Liu Feng, is a character known as “Live Lei Feng”, always doing good deeds for others yet living a humble life. He was first abandoned by the art troupe and then sent to the front lines of the Sino-Vietnamese War. After Liu Feng, as a disabled veteran, tried to earn a living through small businesses, he was still bullied by local officials and urban management.
“Seeing how Liu Feng, a good person in ‘Youth,’ is treated unfairly, transforming from a good person into someone destroyed, unable to survive in society, young people see their own destinies in this, which is why ‘Youth’ has garnered such attention in mainland China,” Jiang Pinchao said.
Regarding the takedown of the analysis videos of “Youth”, some comments online view the blogger using “metaphors” to “blacken” the CCP, and the fascination shown by the swarming young people with the era of the Cultural Revolution as “waving the red flag against the red flag,” all touching the CCP’s sensitive nerves regarding its interpretation of the Cultural Revolution.
However, Sheng Xue believes that what the CCP fears is not people discussing the Cultural Revolution but people suddenly realizing that the “Cultural Revolution was never a thing of the past but an ongoing event,” because the CCP’s political system, institutions, structures, and entire ideology have “not changed at all.”
“People may now realize again that this system is constantly cycling and that the emotional resonance across eras in the film is today leading to more and more people having a collective cognition of this institutional harm,” Sheng Xue said.
“It itself is an authoritarian dictatorship, a terrorist regime. So, by making people realize this fact through such a perspective, that is certainly what the CCP fears,” Sheng Xue said.
Jiang Pinchao also stated that what the CCP fears is that the video analysis actually hits the nerves of ordinary Chinese people, leading them to reflect on history. “As we reflect on history, we are actually dealing with the same issues in reality. So, the fact that this incident has caused such a huge response and eventually required the implementation of ‘speech stability’ by the CCP to block these discussions is because it hits the nerves of these ordinary people in reality.”
“During the Cultural Revolution in China, the economy was on the brink of collapse, and the same is happening in China now,” Jiang Pinchao said. “If you reflect now and keep the discussion on ‘Youth’ going, that system will no longer be sustainable. People discussing constantly will eventually lead to reflection on this system, it is inevitable, because the reason why this phenomenon exists—people can’t survive, people suffer from severe ideological constraints—is due to your system.”
Jiang Pinchao further pointed out that the dissemination of the analysis videos for “Youth” not only poses a challenge to the CCP’s ideological system but could even lead to “social upheaval from online to offline.”
Sheng Xue stated that during the era of the Cultural Revolution, “many people passively accepted this destiny,” but this generation, when they realize this reality, would evidently not be willing to do so.
“This generation has broader horizons, more insights, more knowledge, and a better understanding of the external world than people of that era. Clearly, they will take action to change their destinies, and this action may involve changing the system and overturning this national terrorism and authoritarian regime,” Sheng Xue said.
Jiang Pinchao believed that the Chinese people are not lazy or not diligent; rather, it is the CCP’s dictatorship that makes the people “see no hope, not knowing what to do tomorrow, without a future direction,” “because a group monopolizes power, making policies absurd, leading to irreversible national decline.”
He mentioned that, to his knowledge, many Chinese people in China and overseas are reflecting and “whispering against” the CCP, “everyone has opinions against the CCP in their hearts, everyone knows that this system has problems.”
Sheng Xue also stated, “In recent years, more and more people have begun to think about why personal destinies in a country claiming to be the world’s second-largest economy are so miserable, just like leeks? More and more people have realized that organs of young people, children, and even infants are being harvested alive to support the powerful and privileged.”
“Now, when even their organs are no longer theirs, and ordinary people become ‘walking organs,’ more and more people are waking up, leading to a new rebellion, a collective action against this system,” Sheng Xue added.
Jiang Pinchao stated that change will not happen in China overnight, “but the pace of change is getting closer,” “when everyone is dissatisfied, that day will come sooner or later.”