Pewdiepie – Felix Kjellberg – confirmed yesterday in a video that he’s banned in China.
In the video, he explained:
“Well boys, we did it. I’m banned from China, That’s right (laughs), after I spoke about the Hong Kong protests, and showed their leader being mocked for looking like Winnie the Pooh, I got banned from China.
That’s right. Now if you search anything PewDiePie related on any Reddit related forum in China or a YouTube related video, it will just be completely blank.”
Pewdiepie Laughs It Off
He would go on to say:
“I’m laughing, but yeah I’m sorry if you’re in China and try to watch my videos. That kinda sucks, it’s just kinda funny, like I knew it was going to happen.
The music artist Zedd got banned in China just because he liked a South Park tweet, so obviously me talking about the Hong Kong memes was going to get me banned.”
Memes don’t sit too well with the Communist Chinese government, especially Winnie the Pooh related ones. Winnie the Pooh has become a symbol of resistance in China. Protesters and bloggers are using the fictional bear to challenge President Xi and the Communist Party.
And, government authorities have been feverishly working to remove memes on social media that compare the president and Pooh. In fact, Chinese president Xi is apparently very self-conscious about the comparisons, and gets angry when the images are shown.
Memes pointing out the likeness between the two started back in 2013, during one of Xi’s U.S. visits. Moreover, China even refused to release Disney’s Christopher Robin movie back in 2018.
HBO was also recently banned in China, due to comedian John Oliver poking fun at Xi’s disdain of Winnie the Pooh.
This puts Pewdiepie in strangely unique company.
Xi is now the answer to the strange trivia question: What do Pewdiepie, HBO, and Christopher Robin have in common?
Will Pewdiepie lose any traction from this ban?
Comment below.