China’s plan to judge each of its 1.3 billion people based on their social behavior is moving a step closer to reality, with Beijing set to adopt a lifelong points program by 2021 that assigns personalized ratings for each resident.
The capital city will pool data from several departments to reward and punish some 22 million citizens based on their actions and reputations by the end of 2020, according to a plan posted on the Beijing municipal government’s website on Monday. Those with better so-called social credit will get “green channel” benefits while those who violate laws will find life more difficult.
Social credit will be defined as bowing to the government's demands for loyalty in all matters, of course. Whatever you do that the government doesn't like, no matter how small, will cost you.
American Twitter mobs sigh with envy.
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According to the ruling Communist Party's official newspaper, as of the end of September, 1.1 million local government workers have been deployed to ethnic minorities' living rooms, dining areas and Muslim prayer spaces, not to mention at weddings, funerals and other occasions once considered intimate and private.
All this is taking place in China's far west region of Xinjiang, home to the predominantly Muslim, Turkic-speaking Uighurs, who have long reported discrimination at the hands of the country's majority Han Chinese.
While government notices about the "Pair Up and Become Family" program portray it as an affectionate cultural exchange, Uighurs living in exile in Turkey said their loved ones saw the campaign as a chilling intrusion into the only place that they once felt safe.
Just when you thought it couldn't get creepier.
