Teen puts face to fight against smut
By Jiang Zhuqing (China Daily)
Updated: 2004-07-03 16:10

Pang Weiqiong, a junior middle school student, is excited about representing kids like herself at a nationwide televised conference.

She thinks the message she will send is important: Calling on the country's elementary and middle school students to "say no" to pornographic and illegal publications.

"We have found that not all reading and viewing experiences bring us the sentiment of truth, goodness and beauty," said Pang, who studies at the No 2 School of Foreign Languages in Taiyuan in North China's Shanxi Province.

During the past few months, Pang and her classmates have taken part in a series of activities to fight piracy and illegal publications - items they label "spiritual drugs that would poison the soul of youth."

Governments at all levels are urging a nationwide campaign against pornographic and pirated publications so as to create a sound cultural environment for the healthy growth of kids, said Liu Yunshan, head of the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee.

Liu spoke at the 17th national tele-conference on the anti-porn and piracy drive, saying that the the government should organize the publication of healthy and interesting books and game software to keep youth intrigued and occupied.

Governments should also invest in building public Internet pubs with good environments for the youth, said Liu, who is also a member of both the Political Bureau and Secretariat of the CPC Central Committee.

Senior officials from the departments of public security, customs and education attended the meeting and called for driving porn and pirated publications away from schools, residential areas and book markets.

The nation has clamped down or shut entirely 1,458 distributing centres or market that sell illegal publications, confiscated 103.82 million copies of illegal publications and arrested 3,606 suspects this year, said Gui Xiaofeng, deputy director of General Administration of Press and Publications.

Latest statistics from Gui's administration indicate the nation has dealt with 2,178 cases involving pornographic publications and confiscated 7.54 million publications, including 1.67 million porn discs, 40,000 pocket books and 2.44 million cartoon books.

Meanwhile, "the marketing situation of publications remains austere," said Gui, adding that illegal publications that threaten the national unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity are constantly found in western regions and the spread of harmful publications among juveniles is worrying in some places.

"Mountains of facts prove that lots of juvenile delinquency and crimes have direct relations with ill social surroundings or are caused by ill culture," said the official.

To this, Gui suggested that the customs and frontier defence departments should conduct strict examinations of luggage or mail from abroad and confiscate all illegal and porn publications.

Relevant departments in charge of fighting against porn and illegal publications are urged to repeatedly launch overhauls and examinations, especially in wholesale markets, shopping malls, booths or shops dealing with disc retailing or rentals around schools as well as peddlers in the street, he said.

It is necessary to root out the sources of porn and illegal publications by digging out illegal disc manufacture lines as well clearing and rectifying publication enterprises that violate the rules, said Bai Jingfu, vice-minister of public security.

Another job is to curb the spread of harmful information through the web, said Bai. Police bureaux at all levels should work together with departments of publications and press, culture, industrial and commercial administrations to combat porn and illegal publications.

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