Xi Jinping is looking to solidify his control over China by being elected to a third term as the leader of the Chinese Communist Party, which means that he needs control of China’s history.

What his aim is, more broadly, is to crush any dissenting viewpoints of China’s “glorious” communist history, in which party leaders are never wrong, never criticized, and only the “official” versions of history will be allowed. A new law prohibiting the “slander of China’s martyrs and heroes” went into effect in March, and is now catching the eyes of the West because people are being sentenced to years in jail if they DARE mock someone the state has deemed unmockable.

Since it went into effect in March, the statute has been enforced with a revolutionary zeal, part of an intensified campaign under China’s leader, Xi Jinping, to sanctify the Communist Party’s version of history — and his vision for the country’s future.”

The Cyberspace Administration of China, which polices the country’s internet, has created telephone and online hotlines to encourage citizens to report violations. It has even published a list of 10 “rumors” that are forbidden to discuss.”

Was Mao Zedong’s Long March really not so long? Did the Red Army skirt heavy fighting against the Japanese during World War II to save its strength for the civil war against the Nationalist forces of Chiang Kai-shek? Was Mao’s son, Mao Anying, killed by an American airstrike during the Korean War because he lit a stove to make fried rice?”

Asking those very questions risks arrest and, now, prosecution. “It is a sign of the establishment of an absolute political totalitarianism,” said Wu Qiang, an outspoken political analyst in Beijing.”

China’s Communist Party has long policed dissent, severely restricting public discussion of topics it deems to be politically incorrect, from Tibet to the Tiananmen Square protests. The new law goes further. It has criminalized as slander topics that were once subjects of historical debate and research, including Mao’s rule itself up to a point. Since March, the law has been used at least 15 times to punish people who slight party history.”

And it doesn’t take much to catch eyes and be punished under the new law and snitch system.

Last month, the authorities arrested a man in Nanchang after he posted an irreverent comment about the legend surrounding the death of Mao’s son in 1950. “That fried rice was the best thing to come out of the whole Korean War,” he wrote.”

Officials have defended the law as a necessary tool to fight what one director with the Cyberspace Administration of China, Wen Youhua, called “historical nihilism,” which officials often use to describe deviant views.”

“These people may be trying to gain clicks or eyeballs, but these behaviors obviously touch moral and legal bottom lines,” Li Liang, a law professor in Beijing told The People’s Daily in April.”

This law is not only an attempt to rewrite history and make it “unquestionable.” It is also seen as Xi Jinping trying to control any mockery of himself. We already know that Winnie the Pooh imagery has been banned in China because of Xi and his super sensitive ego. It would be a shame if the entire internet knew about that.

Oh wait, they already do.

China Makes It a Crime to Mock Xi Jinping https://t.co/WqHGtPGdxa My response: pic.twitter.com/LtnnltPANs

— Josh Rogin (@joshrogin) November 2, 2021

This new slander law is not only important because of the Chinese people now being imprisoned for daring to question the official Chinese Communist Party line. It’s important because Xi Jinping has been getting called out – quite publicly – on Twitter on a regular basis by Enes Kanter of the NBA. Kanter (who is no mealy-mouthed wimp like Lebron James when it comes to human rights) is routinely sending out Tweets challenging both China’s human rights record on Tibet and the Uyghur Muslims, but also direct challenges to Xi himself.

XI JINPING and the Chinese Communist Party

Someone has to teach you a lesson,
I will NEVER apologize for speaking the truth.
You can NOT buy me.
You can NOT scare me.
You can NOT silence me.

Bring it on!! #FreedomShoes#XinnieThePooh pic.twitter.com/JFGEgIaXlN

— Enes Kanter (@EnesKanter) October 24, 2021

Under this law, Enes Kanter could be sentenced to prison, and don’t tell me that Xi Jinping doesn’t sit up at night and write fan fiction dreaming about it.

Kanter, for his part, is not backing down. Turkish dictator Erdogan has tried for years to get Kanter arrested, and it hasn’t worked, even though Erdogan had Kanter’s father imprisoned. Enes Kanter has a big platform, and he is going to keep using it to hold Xi and the Chinese Communist Party up to public scrutiny.

Ruthless Dictator XI JINPING and the Cultish Chinese Communist Party,
hear me loud and clear:

Hong Kong will be FREE!

To all Hongkongers watching,
please know that I stand with you.

You are not Chinese, you are not British,
you are Hongkongers!#FreeHongKong pic.twitter.com/BatB1KkjFo

— Enes Kanter (@EnesKanter) November 2, 2021

Oh, Xi, you silly old bear communist dictator. He knows that if he can be mocked by a cartoon bear, his image as a communist strongman is undermined. So the slander law will eventually (if it doesn’t already) apply to anyone who dares even post an image of Winnie the Pooh, or owns a plush Pooh Bear, because it will be seen as “slander” upon the leader of Communist China, and that will NOT be allowed.

It would be SUCH a shame if the entire internet kept reminding Xi Jinping about his “hunny pot” sized Achilles’ heel. After all, communist dictators shouldn’t be such delicate little snowflakes, should they?

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