Chinese want their government to control the Internet

You might very well assume that most Chinese people are angry about the Great Firewall of China. But if this new poll highlighted by Pew researcher Deborah Fallows is accurate, you are dead wrong:

[I]n a new survey, most Chinese say they approve of internet control and management, especially when it comes from their government.

According to findings from the fourth and most recent of a series of surveys about internet use in China from 2000 to 2007, over 80% of respondents say they think the internet should be managed or controlled, and in 2007, almost 85% say they think the government should be responsible for doing it.

One major reason for this overall finding, I'd have to think, is that 93 percent of respondents say that "much of internet content to be unsuitable for children."

When asked which online content they thought should be controlled, more internet users targeted the most offensive or annoying content: 87% of internet users would control or manage pornography; 86% violent content; 83% spam or junk mail; 66% advertisements; 64% slander against individuals.

But what about political content? Actually, a growing number of people think that is a problem, too:

Since 2005, the percentage of users who say that online content about "politics" should be controlled or managed jumped from 8% to 41%, by far the biggest increase of any items tested.

[Guo Liang, deputy director of the Research Center for Social Development, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences] said that the explanation for this increase probably lies in the spate of widely publicized incidents of fraud, blackmail, sensationalism, and other abuse of Chinese citizens via the internet. The Chinese word used for "politics" in this survey, zhengzhi, is not confined simply to political rights or competition for political control but may be understood to include larger questions of public morality and social values.

There are plenty of other fascinating findings in Pew's report, so read the whole thing.