2022 Chinese COVID-19 Protests

The 2022 Chinese COVID-19 protests were a series of protests that occurred in late 2022 in the People's Republic of China in response to COVID-19 guidelines. The protests were sparked by a fire in an apartment building in the Jixiangyuan community, Urumqi, XUAR, on November 24, 2022, which killed ten people and injured an additional nine; many Chinese citizens blamed government COVID-19 regulations, which were assumed to have delayed the evacuation, although this was denied by local government officials, who instead alleged that the delay was partially caused by traffic blocking the building entrance.

On November 28th, 2022, citizens in Urumqi took to the streets to demand discounts on common utilities due to difficulty acquiring them in lockdown, for organized building fire inspections to ensure that this disaster would not reoccur, and for the local government to specify the end date of lockdown procedures. On November 29th, the Urumqi Municipal People's Government held a press conference to address the concerns of struggling residents in Urumqi during the COVID-19 epidemic. The local government agreed to give low-income residents monetary assistance with a guarantee of 300 yuan per person, exempted families renting housing in Urumqi from rent for five months (with the possibility of reduction of five months instead on lease renewal), and to set up programs for public welfare jobs and employment assistance to ease the difficulties of pandemic employment. However, protests continued; Western media jumped on the opportunity to suggest that Chinese citizens were calling for the overthrow of the central government, widely publicizing examples of citizens chanting slogans condemning the CPC (ex. a few citizens yell 'we want freedom', to which a crowd responds 'f*ck your freedom'; another case is of a protest with a group shouting 'down with Xi Jinping', which strangely occurred only a third of a mile from U.S. Consulate Services, sparking accusations of color revolution).

Eventually, the demonstrations acquired the name 'white paper protests' in the Western press due to images of protestors holding up blank pieces of paper to signify their disapproval—these images were met with ridicule on Chinese social media, with netizens using the papers as blank canvases to type slogans and jokes. Real grievances and the reasonable demands of disgruntled citizens were used to create a false narrative of complete upheaval, with proof of programs to pay 'white paper' protestors to stage a skewed image of public opinion being discovered less than ten days after the fire. Due to public pressure, the central government ultimately reeled back many of its lockdown measures by early 2023, leading to an increase in COVID-19 related deaths and an end to the 'white paper protests.'