Niubi! The Real Chinese You Were Never Taught in School

CHAPTER EIGHT. Internet Slang

In a country without a free press, it is impossible to overstate the profound impact that the Internet has had on society. The simple ability to see and read the internal thoughts of one’s fellow compatriots, as well as the viewpoints of people from around the world, is prodding an estimated 250 million Chinese to express themselves more freely, to consider a multiplicity of opinions in matters of public debate, and, most simply, to feel just a little bit less alone in this world. And sure, the Internet is censored in China, but the efforts of government watchdogs can be best likened, as one well-known Chinese blogger put it, to a dam that “is leaking all over the place.”

Online bulletin board systems (BBS) hosted by Chinese universities have long been hotbeds of intellectual debate, and today seemingly every company, media outlet, Web portal, and random organization in the country has a BBS garnering an estimated ten million new posts each day, with single posts frequently provoking hundreds, if not thousands, of replies. A mostly dead medium in the West, BBSs are invaluable to Chinese users because of the anonymity they afford. Blogs, too, are a noteworthy phenomenon, arguably far more widespread and vibrant than in the West. Everyone in China and their mother, it seems, has a blog: pop stars, CEOs of top companies, small-town mayors, powerful government officials, poor migrant workers, and journalists disillusioned with the censorship they face in their day jobs with state-owned media outlets. Many consider BBSs and blogs to be the truest reflection of what ordinary people on the ground really think about an issue-to the extent that the traditional media regularly quote from blog gers, and newspapers publish entire blog entries as op-ed columns.

There is, of course, a negative for every positive, and thus in the worst cases the Internet has served to ignite a terrifying mob mentality that hearkens back to the horrors of the Cultural Revolution. The “human-flesh search engine,” as these “netizens” call themselves, is infamous for harnessing the power of the Internet to hunt down people who, deservedly or not, have been slandered online and deemed worthy of punishment by the online lynch mobs. Some people have been physically attacked; others have had to change addresses, jobs, and phone numbers. In one fairly typical example, a Chinese student attending Duke University, who was perceived to be in support of Free Tibet protestors, was targeted by angry Chinese who posted her picture, contact information, and parents’ home address online. She received an avalanche of death threats, her parents got harassing phone calls at work, and one person claimed to have left human feces on her parents’ doorstep.

Overall, however, the Internet’s influence has been overwhelmingly positive. In many instances, it has filled in for the lack of a reliable judicial system and overcome endemic government corruption to bring justice for the masses. The Internet enables news of wrongdoing and injustice to spread at the speed of light and has spurred many real-life protests, petition drives, and heartfelt movements to get corrupt officials fired and persuade the central government to investigate allegations ignored by local governments. It has helped draw attention to corporate abuse and to raise money for ordinary people suffering under the weight of crippling medical costs and other hardships.

Not to imply, of course, that nascent revolution lurks in every bored instant message sent from one underpaid office worker to another, or every inane blog post about what some person ate for breakfast. Like Internet users the world over, Chinese netizens are chain-smoking in twenty-four-hour Internet cafés or lazing about at home, mainly idling away the days of their lives watching online video clips of stupid pet tricks, shopping for handbags on the Chinese equivalent to eBay, bitching about China’s notoriously terrible national soccer team, and playing hour after interminable hour of Counter-Strike. And, hell, they may all know how to get around the government’s censoring mechanisms, but, let’s face it, the vast majority of them are doing so in order to download pirated movies and, of course, to watch porn.

So here, for your reference, is all the latest in chat slang, Internet crazes, and weirdo sociological phenomena that make up the vibrant, silly, important, ridiculous, and revolutionary world of the Chinese Internet.

Society, censorship, and Internet memes

GFW

Stands for “Great Firewall of China,” a play on the Great Wall of China, and referring to China ’s Net Nanny, or Internet censoring mechanism.

GFW

河蟹 héxiè (huh shih)

Literally “river crab.” A euphemism for Internet censorship. One of the main guiding philosophies of the Communist party is that of a “harmonious society,” a catchphrase frequently played upon, parodied, and ironically referenced on the Internet. Using the word “censorship” will often get your site flagged by Web hosts, so when a post, or an entire Web site, gets blocked or deleted, Chinese Internet users sarcastically say that it’s been “harmonized.” “Harmony” in Chinese, 和谐 héxié (huh shih) is similar in pronunciation to “river crab.” And since these euphemistic mentions of harmonization have become so ubiquitous that they themselves have become target keywords for getting censored, the Chinese have turned to “river crab” to stand in for harmonization.

功夫网 gōngfu wăng (gohng foo wahng)

A euphemism for censorship. Literally “kung fu Web,” but as with “river crab,” mentions of kung fu in blog posts often refer to censorship. You’ll notice that the pinyin gōngfu wăng starts with g, f, and w. GFW is the abbreviation for the Great Firewall.

草泥马 cǎonímǎ (tsow nee mah – cǎo rhymes with “cow”)

Grass mud horse. A made-up creature that has become an Internet sensation spawning everything from dolls to You-Tube videos to scholarly essays because its otherwise benign name sounds like the obscenity 操你妈 cào nǐ mā (tsow nee ma), meaning “Fuck you,” and because it has become a symbol of the fight against Internet censorship. The most popular online video about the creature, a parody of kiddie songs sung by a chipper chorus of children’s voices, explains that the grass mud horse lives in the 马勒戈壁 mălè gēbì (mah luh guh bee), which innocently looks like “The Ma Le Desert” but sounds just like 妈了个屄 mālegebī (mah luh guh bee), or “your mother’s a cunt.” Moreover, the grass mud horse is often threatened by river crabs (a euphemism for Internet censorship, see the héxiè entry on page 157). While a phenomenon that involves children’s voices singing “fuck you” and stick-figure online cartoons and dolls may seem juvenile, it neatly encapsulates the biggest issues surrounding the Chinese Internet. The authorities go on “anti-smut” campaigns to wipe out “inappropriate” material from the Internet; netizens come up with clever ways to evade the censors, like saying “grass mud horse” instead of “fuck you,” and maybe the censors start censoring the euphemism itself; but then netizens simply find yet another way to talk about the banned term or banned ideas, much the way “harmony” was used as a euphemism for “censorship” and then got censored, which spawned “river crab” in place of “harmony.” And in the end, it becomes clear that any attempt to censor this unwieldy beast is a losing battle.

五毛党 wǔ máo dǎng (ooh maow dahng)

Literally “half-yuan party.” People paid to influence Internet discussion by writing blog and BBS posts extolling the government’s position on various issues and also to write comments in response to other posts, arguing the government’s side of things. The payment structure for these people varies, but at the time this term was coined, the Hunan Province government was said to be paying a lump sum of six hundred yuan (around eighty or ninety dollars) plus an extra wǔ máo (half a yuan, about seven cents) per post.

ZF

Short for 政府 zhèngfǔ (jung foo), which means “government.” ZF is often used in place of the Chinese characters so as not to attract the attention of the government censoring mechanism, which can be triggered by sensitive keywords.

JC

Stands for 警察 jǐngchá (jeeng cha), which means “police” or “police officer.”

FB

Stands for 腐败 fǔbaì (foo buy). Means “corruption” in Chinese, and since corrupt officials are often wined and dined, people now ironically say fǔbaì to refer to going out to a fancy restaurant, going on vacation, or otherwise treating oneself to something nice.

FZL or 非主流 fēizhǔliú (fay joo lew-liú rhymes with “pew”)

An “alternative” or “counterculture” person, usually rebellious and young with some sort of extreme style-elaborate hairstyle, piercings, unusual and edgy clothes, etc.-probably involving a great deal of influence from Japanese pop culture.

FQ or 愤青 fènqīng (fen cheeng)

Angry youth, patriotic youth. Coined in Hong Kong during the 1970s to refer to young people agitating for reform in Chinese society, but now used on the Internet to refer to extremely patriotic (or depending on your view of them, nationalistic) Chinese with aggressive stances on a number of political issues. Very broadly speaking, fènqīng tend to be virulently anti-Japanese and militantly opposed to Taiwanese and Tibetan independence. The issues at stake are complicated, and fènqīng attitudes can seem contradictory to anyone not familiar with their nuances. They often seem to unconditionally defend anything the Chinese government does but are simultaneously highly critical of that government for what they feel is too soft a stance on the core issues mentioned above. And they may exhibit intense xenophobia and call westernized Chinese “race traitors” while also believing that China should eventually democratize. Critics of fènqīng derogatorily call them 粪青 fènqīng (fen cheeng), a play on words that is pronounced the same as fènqīng but means “shit youth,” or just 粪 fènfèn (fen fen): “shit.”

人肉搜索 rén ròu sōusuǒ (ren roe so swuh)

Literally “human flesh search engine.” Refers to the phenomenon of Internet users hunting down people in real life.

草根网民 cǎogēn wǎngmín (tsow gehn wahng meeng)

Self-described ordinary citizens (in mainland China) who generally don’t have much of a voice, but who are slowly discovering the power of the Internet in helping to bring about social change (mainly in less sensitive areas like environmental protection, animal rights, labor rights, property rights, and rights for the disabled. Certain areas, however, cannot be touched without suffering consequences, such as attempting to organize politically). Literally “grassroots netizens” (a translation from the English).

晒黑族 shaìhēi zú (shy hay dzoo)

Literally “those who expose injustice.” It refers to people on the Chinese mainland who use the Internet to help expose or publicize injustice: for example by mass blogging about an incident on many different Web servers in order to overcome possible online censorship. Every Web host seems to have different censoring criteria, and thus something that gets blocked or deleted on one host server may not get censored on another.

别太 CNN bié tài CNN (byih tie CNN)

Literally “don’t be too CNN,” meaning don’t lie or distort the truth. When antigovernment rioting broke out in Lhasa in 2008, a perceived pro-Tibet, anti-China bias in Western media coverage provoked a rising tide of nationalism and anger among many Chinese. Someone started a Web site called Anti-CNN.com, with the slogan “Don’t be too CNN!” and dedicated to showing examples of truth distortion in the Western media’s China reporting. For example, one of the most hotly disputed photos, taken from the CNN Web site, portrayed two Tibetan men running away from Chinese military trucks rumbling ominously into town, but Anti-CNN posted the uncropped version of the photo that showed a group of Tibetan rioters throwing stones at the vehicles. Anger about media bias centers on CNN in particular because not long after the riots the CNN commentator Jack Cafferty outraged the public by referring to the Chinese as “a bunch of goons and thugs” during an on-air discussion about Chinese imports to the United States. Several (extremely dirty, profanity-filled) Chinese rap songs about the evils of “being too CNN” are also circulating on the Internet.

树洞贴 shù dòng tiē (shoo dohng tyih)

Literally “tree-hole post.” The Wong Kar Wai movie In the Mood for Love closes with the protagonist traveling to the remains of an ancient temple in Cambodia, finding a small hole among the ruins, and whispering into it. The scene is based on a (perhaps made-up) saying that in the past, people would find a small hole in a tree, hide a secret in it, and then seal the hole with mud, to be kept hidden forever. In online parlance, shù dòng tiē refers to a popular trend of posting secrets anonymously on the Internet-anything ranging from one’s salary to marital problems and beyond. People who do this are called 晒密族 shaìmì zú (shy me dzoo), literally “secret revealers,” or 晒客族 shaìkè zú, literally “information exhibitionists.”

我出来打酱油的 wǒ chūlaí dǎ jiàngyóu de (wuh choo lie dah jyung yo duh)

Literally, “I’m just out buying soy sauce.” This phrase, along with “soy sauce guy,” swept the Chinese Internet by storm thanks to a widely viewed Guangzhou TV news clip of a reporter asking an average man on the street his opinion of the latest celebrity scandal. The man famously replied “关我屌事, 我出来打酱油的” “Guān wǒ diǎo shì, wǒ chūlai dǎ jiàngyóu de” (gwun wuh dyow shih, wuh choo lie dah jyung yo duh)-“I don’t give a shit, I’m just out buying soy sauce.” Internet users have taken up the phrase “buying soy sauce” as a cynical euphemism for “It’s none of my business” or “Who gives a fuck?” On the Chinese version of Facebook and other popular sites, one now commonly finds, among the possible answers to online polls, “I’m just buying soy sauce.”

酱油男 jiàngyóu nán (jahng yo nahn)

Soy sauce guy. Indicating someone who ignores stupid shit.

很黄,很暴力 hěn huáng, hěn bàolì (hun hwahng, hun baow lee)

Literally “very yellow [pornographic], very violent.” This phrase became all the rage because of a news broadcast on CCTV (China Central Television, which is state owned and thus considered a government tool) about government regulation of the Internet. A thirteen-year-old girl being interviewed about her impression of the Internet used the phrase to describe what she had ostensibly seen online. Chinese Internet users have mockingly taken up the phrase and now use it in all sorts of different contexts, or simply use the same sentence structure and substitute different adjectives besides “yellow” and “violent” to fit whatever they are talking about.

别太 CCTV bié tài CCTV (byih tie CCTV)

Don’t be too CCTV. Meaning don’t bullshit or be a tool or espouse propaganda. Came about after the 很黄,很暴力 hěn huáng, hěn bàolì incident (previous entry) on China ’s state-owned TV station.

很傻,很天真 hěn shǎ, hěn tiānzhēn (hun shah, hun tyinn jen)

Literally “very foolish, very naive.” This phrase became popular after Hong Kong pop star Gillian Chung said it during a news conference. She was apologizing after pictures of her having sex with another celebrity, Edison Chen, were exposed on the Internet. Chinese Internet users were amused because it of its similarity to 很黄,很暴力 hěn huáng, hěn bàolì (page 163).

做俯卧撑 zuò fǔwòchēng (dzwuh foo wuh chung)

Literally “do push-ups” and a euphemism for a lame excuse or feelings of apathy. Stems from a June 2008 incident when the drowned body of a fifteen-year-old girl was found in Guizhou Province. The “push-up” reference comes from the provincial government’s official statement about what happened, which in addition to not being believed by most netizens, included the bizarrely specific detail that one of the last people to see the girl alive, a friend of her boyfriend, started doing push-ups near her on a bridge and that “on the third one” she cried out and then jumped. Netizens latched on to the detail, and sarcastic allusions to doing push-ups have flooded the Internet ever since. It generally means “it’s none of my business,” with a cynical edge that points to the futility of caring about anything when you are powerless to change things, but is sometimes used more lightheartedly to suggest a feeble excuse. “What were you doing in a sex chat room anyway?” “Uh… I was just doing push-ups.”

节约点, 喝茅台 jiéyuē diǎn, hē Máotái (jyih yreh dyinn, huh maow tie)

This catchphrase, which means “economize: drink Moutai,” comes from a report about a government official in Sichuan Province who beat up a shopkeeper for charging him too much for a bottle of Moutai (a high-end brand of Chinese liquor). It was explained that “Director Cao wanted to economize, because money is tight at the personnel bureau and he still owes money for house repairs.” The irony of this statement was not lost on Chinese netizens, and this quickly became the newest Internet meme, as Moutai is strongly associated with government corruption (no shady deal is sealed without a booze-soaked dinner involving copious amounts of this expensive liquor).

恶搞 ègǎo (uh gow)

An umbrella term for China ’s Internet parody culture (including online videos and Photoshop images spoofing current events). Literally “evil doings” or “restless work.” It comes from the Japanese word kuso, which spread first to Taiwan and then throughout greater China. Kuso means “shit” and also “poor quality” and described a Japanese fad for appreciating shitty computer games (similar to when we call a movie “so bad it’s good”). Since these terrible computer games were often unintentionally funny, in Taiwan the meaning eventually shifted to include anything ridiculous or funny.

网友 wǎngyǒu (wahng yo)

Internet friend(s). Making friends via the Internet is much, much more common in China than in the West. Westerners chatting online in China are often startled by the large number of messages they receive from Chinese strangers who are just searching for new friends to chat with. Some of these Internet friends are simply people to chat with while idling away the hours at work, some meet up in person, and some start relationships. Some Chinese even meet people by tex ting random phone numbers in the hopes of happening upon someone friendly.

网瘾 wǎngyǐn (wahng een)

Internet addiction. In 2008 China became the first country in the world to officially recognize this as a clinical disorder, similar to alcoholism and compulsive gambling, after several well-publicized cases in which young people died after spending days or weeks glued to the computer screen in Internet cafés. The country has several officially licensed Internet addiction clinics and has also seen a spate of unlicensed, hidden Internet cafés where kids banned from the Internet by their parents secretly go to play games.