Chinese internet censors are deleting online forums promoting the millennial phenomenon known as “lying flat,” in which young Chinese people quit their jobs to opt out of an overworked lifestyle the Chinese Communist Party has pushed in recent years, the Hindustan Times reported Tuesday.
“Censors have deleted a tangping (which means ‘lying flat’) group with more than 9,000 members on Douban, a popular internet forum,” the Indian newspaper reported on July 6.
“The authorities also barred posts on another tangping forum with more than 200,000 members,” the newspaper added, citing a July 3 report from the New York Times.
Many young Chinese people fear “they won’t end up any better than their parents” in terms of finances, the International Business Times (IBT) reported on July 6. This generational fear has contributed to the “lying flat” movement, which “has also been triggered by the realisation that employees [in China] are working harder like machines on a twelve-hour shift, but the prices are rising faster than incomes.”
The “lying flat” concept defies a long-held societal norm in China promoting hard work. “The protests are against the strict 996 culture in China, which means working from 9:00 a.m to 9:00 p.m and six days a week,” according to IBT.
“Lying flat” first went viral on China’s heavily censored internet in April after a Chinese millennial named Luo Huazhong published a blog post titled “Lying Flat Is Justice,” along with an accompanying photo of himself “lying on his bed in a dark room with the curtains drawn,” the New York Times recalled on July 3.- READ MORE
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