China has banned hip-hop culture and actors with tattoos from appearing on television.
The country’s top media regulator — the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television of the People’s Republic of China (SAPPRFT) — now “specifically requires that programs should not feature actors with tattoos [or depict] hip hop culture, sub-culture (non-mainstream culture) and dispirited culture (decadent culture),” Sina, a Chinese news outlet, reports.
Gao Changli, director of the administration’s publicity department, outlined four “Don’t” rules on Friday:
Absolutely do not use actors whose heart and morality are not aligned with the party and whose morality is not noble.
Absolutely do not use actors who are tasteless, vulgar and obscene.
Absolutely do not use actors whose ideological level is low and have no class.
Absolutely do not use actors with stains, scandals and problematic moral integrity.
The ban follows the removal of the prominent rapper GAI from Hunan TV’s Singer, a hit competition show. Clips of GAI, whose real name is Zhou Yan, were also removed from China Hunan TV’s official Youtube Channel, but no official explanation has been given. Another popular rapper PG One had his music taken off streaming platforms after the government criticised his song “Christmas Eve,” accusing the song’s lyrics — which include the word “bitch” and references to “white powder” — of being misogynistic and promoting drug use.
Citizens reacted with anger to the ban, flooding Chinese social media with negative comments.
“How can a government with high culture have such childish logic?” one user wrote on Weibo — China’s equivalent of Twitter.
