How does China exert media controls?

The watchdog group Reporters Without Borders ranked China 163 out of 168 countries in its 2007 index of press freedom. China’s constitution affords its citizens freedom of speech and press, but the document contains broad language that says Chinese citizens must defend “the security, honor, and interests of the motherland.” Chinese law includes media regulations with vague language that authorities use to claim stories endanger the country by sharing state secrets. Journalists face harassment and prison terms for violating these rules and revealing classified matter. The government’s monitoring structure promotes an atmosphere of self-censorship; if published materials are deemed dangerous to state security after they appear in the media, the information can then be considered classified and journalists can be prosecuted.

The most powerful monitoring body is the Communist Party’s Central Propaganda Department (CPD), which coordinates with GAPP and SARFT to make sure content promotes and remains consistent with party doctrine…Publicizing the CPD guidelines invites punishment,.. as in the case of Shi Tao, a journalist detained in 2004 and serving a ten-year sentence for posting an online summary describing the CPD’s instructions for how to report about the fifteen-year anniversary of events at Tiananmen Square.

This article can provide a very basic level of understanding, but it does not go into all the horrible details.  It has here described how the CCP uses broad language in order to deprive people of their constitutional rights at any given moment, but this is the point that is so crucial.  If the peolpe MUST defend “the security, honor, and interests of the motherland.” If the CCP manages to tie it’s own longevity and reputation to the so called interests of the motherland (which they have), then bam, there you have it, they can now use this disguise to protect themselves, and that’s why no one can criticize the party and anyone who dares speak the truth or call for justice is hit with this club and has no rights under this system of combining brainwashing and tricky language.  That is also why a lot pf Chinese people and the Chinese regime can look you in the face and say, we abide by the Chinese constitution and Chinese people have human rights, it’s because each crime they commit against Chinese people, they have a slippery way of getting around justice to suit the image they want people to perceive.