More days of mourning



One other way the country is observing a time of mourning is limiting the entertainment programming on TV. Those channels with "limited landing rights" would be mostly those that only foreigners can view, like AXN, HBO, ESPN, and Hallmark, though it also includes other channels that aren't foreigner-restricted. Additionally, the Hong Kong channels that are permitted for general consumption here in Shenzhen that provide programming mostly in English or Cantonese are suspended except for their newscasts. Phoenix, a Hong Kong-based Mandarin channel, I noticed, was still on the air, showing only news programming from Sichuan. CNN, BBC, CNBC, and Bloomberg, being primarily news channels, are still permitted to be seen.

CCTV and provincial channels, of course, are unaffected, but they are also mostly only showing news from Sichuan.

Comments

I'm trying to think how TV responded after 9/11. One cannot, of course, imagine a government imposed "entertainment ban" on TV in the US. But, if I recall correctly, there was a lot of 'self-censorship.'

In India, back in the days of one single state controlled TV channel, the three official days of mourning for the death of a statesman or leader (or longer, a whole week, when Indira Gandhi was assassinated) were normal. Programming was suspended, mournful dirges and various religious leaders chanting or praying replaced them. As kids, we hated it. I can't imagine this happening in the India of today either, with its myriad satellite channels beamed from all over Asia...
Jen Ambrose said…
One thing that is important to note about the mourning period here in the People's Republic of China is that this is the first time it has been observed for the deaths of common people, not Government Officials.