River crab () and harmonious/harmonize/harmonization () are

Internet slang Internet slang (also called Internet shorthand, cyber-slang, netspeak, digispeak or chatspeak) is a non-standard or unofficial form of language used by people on the Internet to communicate to one another. An example of Internet slang is "LOL" m ...

terms created by

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...

netizen The term netizen is a portmanteau of the English words ''internet'' and ''citizen'', as in a "citizen of the net" or "net citizen". It describes a person actively involved in online communities or the Internet in general.

s in reference to the

Internet censorship Internet censorship is the legal control or suppression of what can be accessed, published, or viewed on the Internet. Censorship is most often applied to specific internet domains (such as Wikipedia.org) but exceptionally may extend to all Int ...

, or other kinds of

censorship Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or "inconvenient". Censorship can be conducted by governments ...

in Mainland China. In

Mandarin Chinese Mandarin (; ) is a group of Chinese (Sinitic) dialects that are natively spoken across most of northern and southwestern China. The group includes the Beijing dialect, the basis of the phonology of Standard Chinese, the official language of ...

, the word "river crab" (河蟹), which originally means

Chinese mitten crab The Chinese mitten crab ('; , "big sluice crab"), also known as the Shanghai hairy crab (, pinyin, p ''Shànghǎi máoxiè''), is a medium-sized burrowing crab that is named for its furry claws, which resemble mittens. It is native t ...

, sounds similar to "harmonious/harmonize/harmonization" () in the word "

harmonious society The Harmonious Society (; also known as Socialist Harmonious Society) is a socioeconomic concept in China that is recognized as a response to the increasing alleged social injustice and inequality emerging in mainland Chinese society as a result ...

" (和谐社会), ex-Chinese leader

Hu Jintao Hu Jintao (born 21 December 1942) is a Chinese politician who served as the 16–17th general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from 2002 to 2012, the 6th president of the People's Republic of China (PRC) from 2003 to 2013, an ...

's signature ideology.

Terms

The 2004

Chinese Communist Party The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victoriou ...

announcement of the goal of constructing a "harmonious society" has been cited by the

government of China The Government of the People's Republic of China () is an authoritarian political system in the People's Republic of China under the exclusive political leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It consists of legislative, executive, m ...

as the reason for Internet censorship. As a result, Chinese netizens began to use the word "harmonious/harmonize/harmonization" (和谐) as a

euphemism A euphemism () is an innocuous word or expression used in place of one that is deemed offensive or suggests something unpleasant. Some euphemisms are intended to amuse, while others use bland, inoffensive terms for concepts that the user wishes ...

for censorship when the word for censorship itself was censored, particularly on BBSs. Following this, the word "harmonious" itself was censored, at which point Chinese netizens began to use the word for "river crab", a near homophone for "harmonious". In a further complication of meaning, sometimes aquatic product () is used in place of "river crab". These euphemisms are also used as verbs. For example, instead of saying something has been censored, one might say "it has been harmonized" () or "it has been river-crabbed" (). The widespread use of "river crab" by Chinese netizens represents a sarcastic defiance against official discourse and censorship. Some observers, however, have warned that the practice may also reproduce domination, since it does not aim for the abolition of censorship. The sensitive words will remain silent as such, and as a result the everyday reappropriation of official language creates the conditions for the latter's perpetuation. A well-known picture usually named ''River crab society, three wearing watches'' (河蟹社会，三个戴表) illustrates the slang "river crab". In the picture, the three wristwatches refer to the

Three Represents The Three Represents or the important thought of Three Represents is a guiding socio-political theory within China credited to then-general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Jiang Zemin, which was ratified at the Sixteenth Party ...

, where the Mandarin expressions used for "represent" () and "Wearing watch(es)" () are

homophone A homophone () is a word that is pronounced the same (to varying extent) as another word but differs in meaning. A ''homophone'' may also differ in spelling. The two words may be spelled the same, for example ''rose'' (flower) and ''rose'' (p ...

s. The satirized homophone of the three watches might be created by Chinese writer Wang Xiaofeng ( 王小峰), whose online nickname is "Wearing three watches" (戴三个表). An offensive term "foolish bitch" () is also used by anti-Communist Chinese people.

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{{DEFAULTSORT:River Crab (Internet Slang) Chinese Internet slang Internet censorship in China Internet memes Political Internet memes Crabs in culture Euphemisms

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