China is Banning All Media Stories About ‘Western Lifestyles’ and Flaunting Money

In an effort to curb Western influence on China’s citizens, the Chinese executive branch has issued an order to all local media platforms preventing them to report content that it deemed non-compliant to the Communist Party’s ideologies.

The country’s State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television issued an official notice on Monday prohibiting any news that encourage “Western lifestyles” and makes fun of traditional Chinese values and culture.

The initiative, which covers radio, television, film, print and the internet, also forbids publication of stories about celebrities’ private lives. This also covers features with people’s exaggerated overnight success stories, over-the-top flaunting of wealth and other similar subjects and themes.

Xinhua reported that the news organization’s workflow is instructed to be actively monitored to ensure “inappropriate” articles are avoided. News agencies are also expected to abide by the standard news-gathering processes that the authorities have determined to be permissible.

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The notice directly stated that reports “that focus on Western lifestyles, the lives of celebrities, and give details of personal private matters, including love affairs and family disputes, must be firmly prevented,” according to the South China Morning Post.

Employees must also monitored for their “ideological orientation” through a form of performance review to ensure that everyone complies accordingly. Failure to do so may incur penalties that range from public criticism, suspension of the erring programs, to revoking of the organisation’s licence to operate.