A huge crowd has gathered on Kunming's Renmin Road for an environmental protest, the second time this month that residents have gathered to voice their opposition to proposed production of a toxic chemical from a nearby factory. The first such "Anti-PX" protest in Kunming was on May 4, after China National Petroleum Corporation announced plans to build a chemical plant in nearby Anning to produce 500,000 to ...

At the start of this POV video taken at Wednesday's protest near Jingwen Shopping Mall in Beijing's Fengtai District, the people chant kangyi, "protest." As a collective they rock back and forth, like a wave. It surges in fits and starts, apparently toward uniformed officers. There is safety in numbers -- civilians outnumber cops -- so individuals feel little hesitancy to shout whatever they please. But the ...

Geng Yanbo, mayor of Datong in northern Shanxi province, was ordered to step down on Friday and accept his new position as vice mayor, for mysterious reasons. Residents haven't exactly embraced the decision, reports SCMP. "While it is not unusual to see villagers in China sometimes kneeling to petition for their rights or to seek justice from senior officials, Datong residents have gone down on their knees ...

This might become a trend. Following in the footsteps of the Gangnam Style protesters, five migrant workers took to creative means to attract attention to their protest on Thursday outside the China National Radio building in Beijing. Like the Gangnam dancers in Wuhan, these men were demanding unpaid wages, to the tune of 280,000 yuan, they say. ...

A group of 40 construction workers took to looting, rioting, vandalism, mayhem, and Gangnam Style on Monday in Wuhan, Hubei province to protest unpaid wages. Reports are that they're owed 233,000 yuan from their company. With no other recourse, a man surnamed Lu, the contractor, organized a group Gangnam dance in front of a concert hall. ...

It's good to see such a public account of the Chinese and Japanese standing in solidarity for once... against an angry horde of 1,000 migrant workers demanding equal regulations. Beginning early Friday morning, employees of Japanese electronic appliance maker Shanghai Shinmei Electric besieged a factory in Shanghai and held 18 Chinese and Japanese managers hostage, including company president Hideaki Tamura ...

With power, what does a man buy first? A mistress, of course, especially in this country, where it's been said that "a man without a mistress is useless." But in Shenzhen on Monday, someone held a little demonstration to push back against the practice of taking ernai (literally, "second wife"). Around Book City outside the Grand Theater Metro subway station at 4 pm, a "mistress" and "cowherd" were given a " ...

Hong Wrong puts it perfectly: Thousands of Hong Kong Christians were unified in intolerance yesterday during a protest against homosexuality at government headquarters… In a city that loves to protest -- everything from its chief executive to luxury brands -- this might be the worst: people demonstrating against a perceived brave new world in which they're no longer allowed to be openly bigoted homophobes. ...

We're in the second day of censorship protests outside the offices of Southern Weekly in Guangzhou. Today: leftists have come to bat for the government, young men give speeches, and Chinese media rally to Southern Weekly's cause in the only way they can. ...

For the first time in more than 20 years, according to SCMP, a major newspapers's editorial staff in China has gone on strike to protest government censorship. They were on the streets this afternoon in Guangzhou, outside Southern Weekly's offices, scattering chrysanthemums and other flowers, periodically chanting for democracy and human rights. It's been basically peaceful and without incident. ...

It began as a strongly worded letter. When journalists at the Guangdong daily paper Southern Weekly returned to work on Thursday to find a section had been altered by a propagandist -- headline changed, article replaced -- they published an open letter demanding "an investigation into the incident." They named names, in particular accusing Guangdong propaganda chief Tuo Zhen of editorial hijacking. The lett ...

Police estimate that about 2,600 protesters participated in a pro-government rally in Hong Kong on Sunday (or "as many as 40,000," if you believe organizers). It was the first half of a doubleheader of protests, with the nightcap coming yesterday -- the anti-government variety -- attended by 17,000, according to police. (In proportional hyperbole, organizers declared 130,000 people showed up.) ...

Remember, you can do anything in China as long as you don't subvert the state, anger the wrong people, or -- as one subway petitioner found out -- "disturb social order." Meng Zhaohong, whose son was electrocuted at Gulou Station in 2010 when he was a 22-year-old student, has been petitioning for safer subways around Beijing's Line 2 for the past three weeks. (BJC reader Kris Pickett first alerted us to her ...

That last video we just put up of a man streaking outside the Nobel Banquet Hall in Stockholm wasn't just some prankster after a laugh, or a drunk man who'd lost his wits. It was part of a coordinated protest featuring none other than Liao Yiwu, author of The Corpse Walker and the recipient of this year's German Peace Prize. He's the one wearing a black overcoat who ushers the streaker, Meng Huang, over the ...

In Stockholm on Monday, on the night of the Nobel banquet, a man dashed butt-naked through the cold and snow, his ebullient battle cry resonating across the dark Swedish night. Wherefore? According to SVT News (via Notes on the Mosquito, a website about the poetry of Xi Chuan), the streaker was protesting Mo Yan winning the Nobel Prize in Literature. (We don't know Swedish, but we see very clearly after put ...

About 300 people gathered on Sunday in Chaoyang District to protest a proposed high-speed rail that would connect Beijing and Shenyang. As noted earlier, they demonstated peacefully, holding mass-printed pieces of paper that read, "Support 18th Congress, oppose bureaucracy" (among other slogans). Oiwan Lam of Global Voices adds more information: ...

A not-in-my-backyard-type protest took place yesterday in our fair city, featuring about 300 demonstrators in Chaoyang District who didn't like that a proposed high-speed rail connecting Beijing and Shenyang would run so close to their homes. People's Daily reports that Shenyang officials have been eagerly anticipating the start of construction since the plan was publicized on November 19 -- the line would ...

According to AFP, more than 20 people in Hanoi have been arrested today for anti-China protests. About 200 protesters waved banners and chanted, "Down with China's aggression!" A similar demonstration was broken up in Ho Chi Minh City. AFP: Vietnam, which has begun exploring for oil in what it claims as its territorial waters, last week issued a rebuke to Beijing over claims that Chinese fishing boats had s ...

The students who protested on Tiananmen Square in June 1989 have gone on to lead lives as writers, teachers, businessmen, doctors, artists. Some have continued being activists. Some have spent most of their time in prison, before dying. Chen Weiming became a gun-toting member of the Mujahideen army in Syria. ...

Sources are saying that scattered protests involving "more than 1,000 villagers" (SCMP, via Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy) in Wenzhou, Zheijang province have resulted in either "hundreds" (SCMP), "200” (Want China Times) or "more than 10” injuries (Radio Free Asia). It began in Longgang township on Tuesday, where villagers were unhappy about a proposed electricity transfo ...