China Censors Winnie the Pooh Over Xi Jinping Comparisons

China has censored Winnie the Pooh on social media there because of users' unflattering comparisons between the cartoon character and the country's president Xi Jinping.

The Communist Party's move to end term limits for presidents, possibly making Xi president for life in China, drew protest from Chinese internet users on Weibo, The Daily Beast reported. That, in turn, led Chinese censors to step in to block various words and phrases used in the protest – along with the Winnie the Pooh cartoon.

Many on social media have compared the new rule change for Xi as to the rule of Mao Zedong, who led China for 27 years until his death in 1976, according to Fortune magazine.

Fortune wrote that Chinese censors first whacked the lovable portly animated bear off its social media networks in 2013 when a meme circulated mocking Xi in a photo with President Barack Obama, comparing to a cartoon image of Pooh and Tigger the Tiger.

Winnie the Pooh was also blocked at various times on Chinese social media sites when those using the network mocked Xi as well, BBC News said.

But the ending of term limits for Xi as president brought a new round of criticism, and social media censorship in China. The country even barred the letter "N" on the Internet, according to The Guardian.

Victor Mair, a University of Pennsylvania China expert, told The Guardian the banning of "N" may have been "out of fear on the part of the government that 'N' = 'n terms in office,' where possibly n > 2."

The Guardian reported that other terms blocked by Chinese censors on Weibo included:

• "Ten thousand years" (Chinese way of saying "Viva!" or "Long Live!")
• "Disagree"
• "Xi Zedong" a mocking hybrid of the president’s name and Chairman Mao Zedong’s
• "Shameless"
• "Lifelong"
• "Personality cult"
• "Emigrate"
• "Immortality"

The Daily Beast wrote that censors also banned titles of George Orwell’s books “Animal Farm” and “1984” and the name Yuan Shikai, a Qing dynasty leader who tried to restore the monarchy to China, but was unsuccessful.

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