The letter ‘N’ ‘my emperor among words banned by Great Firewall of China

A website that tracks Chinese censorship has said that for a brief while over the weekend, The Great Firewall of China had banned the use of the letter N on the social media. This was reported by the China Digital Times.

Following this, there was speculation on the social media that the word N may have been banned because its Chinese alphabet is used to denote dissent.

In a blog post, a Victor Mair, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania said, 'N' could indicate 'number of terms in office', and with the addition of another Sinograph - symbols used in written Mandarin - could mean 'successive terms in office', that's why it was banned.

Following criticism, China's censors removed the ban on the letter N. However they were quick to add other words to the ban list. The phrase Xi Zedong was banned after critics compared Xi Jinping to Mao Zedong.

According to Newsweek, anyone trying to post these banned words got the message, "Sorry, this content violates the laws and regulations of Weibo's terms of service."

The other words that found its way into the ban list were 'change the law', 'disagree', 'immortality', 'incapable ruler', 'I oppose', 'my emperor' and 'personality cult'.

A few other phrases which were banned included, 'to board a plane' and 'long live.'

OneIndia News