China to use Marxism to clean-up Internet

AFP | April 23, 2007 

China's leaders are hoping that Karl Marx can shift the country's Internet users away from "decadent" content and help them clean up the Web, state media reported.
The Communist Party's Politburo this week asked media and cultural groups to promote and produce more "healthy online cultural products" including promotion of the ideology of Marxism, Xinhua news agency reported late Monday.

The government wants the Internet to "represent the social progress and the splendid traditional culture of China", the agency said, quoting a release from the meeting, which was led by President Hu Jintao.

The campaign's aim is to nurture a healthy online culture and prevent "decadent" material from spreading, Xinhua said.

China's Communist Party leaders, who enforce strict curbs on the press, have made no secret of the fact they regard the Internet as a threat and that it should be subjected to the same controls as traditional media.

In January, Hu called on the party to "purify" China's Internet community, which is rapidly growing as the country's economy expands.

The numbers going online jumped by almost 24 percent last year to reach 137 million, around one in ten Chinese, Xinhua quoted the China Internet Network Information Center as saying.

The country recently launched a crackdown on Internet pornography and last month capped the number of new cybercafes allowed to open this year, a measure state media said was aimed at stemming growing Internet addiction.