In China, bragging about your wealth can get you censored

BEIJING • He started by exploring the sauna, built into the palatial bathroom of the hotel's presidential suite.

Then the video blogger went to the dining room, where a chef waited with a glistening steak.

The next morning, he awoke to a lobster breakfast, which he ate cross-legged in bed.

"Today's bill: 108,876" yuan, or more than S$23,100, he said after checking out from the hotel in Chengdu, China, waving his receipt at the camera.

"I slept away the equivalent of multiple iPhones," he giggled.

The video was tacky, sure. Ostentatious, definitely. Now, it is also a violation of Chinese Internet rules.

The Chinese authorities have declared war on content deemed to be flaunting wealth, amid sweeping calls by Chinese President Xi Jinping to combat inequality. As Mr Xi positions himself for a third term, he has cast himself as a man of the people, leading a campaign against entrenched interests.

Financial regulators have cracked down on the country's technology giants, extracting pledges of loyalty and hefty donations.

Tycoons have been detained on corruption accusations.

And online, the authorities have ordered social media platforms to scrub the hugely popular videos that make clear the gap between the haves and the have-nots.

The hotel blogger amassed over 28 million followers on Douyin - the Chinese version of TikTok - by posting videos in which he toured expensive hotels and sampled delicacies. But after being singled out by the state media, he deleted those videos.

His recent posts show him trying convenience store snacks.

Mr Zhang Yongjun, a senior official at China's cyberspace administration, said at a news conference earlier this year: "We will strengthen our management and increase the power of our crackdown, to make Internet platforms feel there is a sword above their heads."

There is no clear definition of what constitutes flaunting of wealth. Although officials have laid out a few examples, such as showcasing receipts or over-ordering food, they have largely outlined a sort of "I know it when I see it" rule.

"Can the spread of this content inspire people to be healthy, ambitious and work harder for a beautiful life? Or does it cater to people's vulgar desires?" Mr Zhang said.

Douyin, the video platform, said it closed about 4,000 accounts in two months this year, including ones that posted videos of people "scattering renminbi".

Xiaohongshu, an Instagram-like lifestyle application, announced last month that it flagged nearly 9,000 wealth-flaunting posts from May to October.

Inequality in China is vast. One per cent of Chinese own 31 per cent of the country's wealth, according to Credit Suisse Research Institute. The pandemic has further exposed disparities, as the rich returned to luxury spending while other Chinese continued to struggle.

If unaddressed, the imbalance could pose a threat to the authorities' near-total control, which rests on a promise of economic comfort.

Exorbitant urban housing prices and accelerating competition for white-collar jobs have left many young people feeling that the "China Dream" is out of reach.

But the campaign against wealth flaunting - with its focus on tamping down the trappings of wealth, not the wealth itself - underscores a broader question about how far Mr Xi's rhetoric will go.

Assistant Professor Zhang Jun of the City University of Hong Kong, who studies Chinese class politics, said of the crackdown: "It's more trying to appease public dissatisfaction from certain actors, without - at least at this moment - really seriously touching anyone's cake."

NYTIMES