Ridiculous Chinese censorship used AI to change the gay couple in Together (2025) to a heterosexual couple (hexbear.net)

submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by xiaohongshu@hexbear.net to c/chapotraphouse@hexbear.net

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Usually, they only censor the explicit content. But this is the first time that AI tools were used to directly alter the content of the original film.

By the way, the film has been withdrawn from a wide release in China after receiving too many complaints.

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[-] Awoo@hexbear.net 87 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

ridiculous chinese censorship

bear-peekin *looks inside*

*Private company (the producers of the movie in fact) makes decision to do extremely stupid and unnecessary thing for Chinese localisation*

*Media blames Chinese Government for thing the Chinese Government didn't ask for*

EDIT: Is this even real? I am suspicious - https://hexbear.net/comment/6521304

EDIT2: Yeah it's real but the blame still isn't China itself.

[-] Damarcusart@hexbear.net 45 points 1 week ago

I'm starting to get a little suspicious of Xiaohongshu at this point, they seem to be so determined to prove that China isn't some utopia that they even go all in on western style anti-China propaganda efforts. If their goal is to get people to actually understand China properly, they're doing a terrible job with posts titled like this.

[-] heartheartbreak@hexbear.net 21 points 1 week ago

They have trot politics its lowkey annoying. I was talking to a trot recently who started talking about how china is oppressing the global south by exporting commodities and everything started to click lmao

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 22 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

How do I have trot politics? Trots would hate Mao and Deng. I am fully supportive of Mao and Deng policies as you can freely read through my comment history.

I am seriously curious how, after posting for years on this website, people still misrepresent my politics!

[-] thelastaxolotl@hexbear.net 25 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Western leftist who has only seen Trotskism, seeing a second leftist ideology: "Getting a lot of 'Trotskist chad-trotsky ' vibes from this..."

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[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 21 points 1 week ago

How is this anti-China propaganda? This is openly discussed on Chinese social media. The only reason I post is because Hexbear has a large queer community who care about this stuff.

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[-] Frogmanfromlake@hexbear.net 40 points 1 week ago

Looks like even OP is doing this

[-] Awoo@hexbear.net 42 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

This isn't the first time. There's been a long running myth in the videogame industry that you're not allowed to have skeletons in videogames in China. This isn't true of course, but it hasn't stopped western companies changing their games for the Chinese region by removing the skeletons and replacing them with something else.

This is caused by some dumbass liberal media producers in australia believing the propaganda that China is anti-lgbt and disallows this and making this adjustment based on that belief. It's caused by western ignorance and "better be safe than sorry" rather than anything the government actually wants.

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 20 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

This is false. The film in question is a buyout/acquisition film, meaning that the importing distributor pays a lump sum for the licensing rights and the original producer does not participate in the revenue earning from Chinese cinematic release, so the purchaser of film rights has more liberty to alter the content.

The other type of film is called revenue-sharing film - and because the producers retain the film rights, this would require the Chinese censorship to list out their demands for the producers to remove specific parts of the film.

[-] Awoo@hexbear.net 22 points 1 week ago

Ok but that's still a private company.

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 23 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Depends on your perspective. All import films are exclusively distributed by China Film Group (中影) and Huaxia Film Distribution Co (华影). Both are SOEs (China Film is state-owned, Huaxia is state-owned joint-stock enterprise) but are fairly autonomous. This film, Together, was licensed by China Film Group.’

Again I encourage you to read the link above (with machine translation) to understand the topic in more detail because a lot of what you’re writing is misinformation.

[-] Awoo@hexbear.net 23 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Again I encourage you to read the link above (with machine translation) to understand the topic in more detail

I did. The link is just a bunch of quotes of random things Chinese people are saying on social media (with no actual links to where they said them so I can't source anything or even trust that they're real). What exactly are you suggesting I take from a bunch of random people online complaining that the change happened? Why does a bunch of random Chinese social media posts prove what I have said is misinformation?

What exactly have I even said that is misinformation anyway? You know SOEs act independently of the state, or at least you should.

Your info isn't even correct anyway so why are you accusing me of misinformation? You're claiming that this film was actually released in this state. It was not released. It was due to be released on the 19th of September and they cancelled it on the 18th of September before the national release.

This is version of the film has in actual fact not been released.

I don't know where the original article you're linking to is getting its information from. Either it's some private screening, a leak, or it's totally and completely bullshit. The quality of the evidence makes me suspicious, some weird low quality photograph of a screen, maybe a theatre, is being compared to the western version with a photograph of it on a literal CRT? Who the fuck is using a CRT to watch a 2025 movie? The more I look at it the more questions I have about it. The fact nobody is citing any real sources in absolutely anything is pissing me off.

I'm getting more and more suspicious about whether this is even real. China Digital Times is based in Berkeley, CA. Who owns this shit?

Edit: From the wiki for this site's owner:

The website was started by Xiao Qiang of University of California, Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism in fall 2003. Xiao has asserted that Chinese internet users are using digital tools to create new autonomous forms of political expression and dissent, "changing the rules of the game between state and society".[4]

According to Freedom House, researchers at China Digital Times have reportedly identified over 800 filtered terms, including "Cultural Revolution" and "propaganda department".[5] The types of words, phrases and web addresses censored by the government include names of Chinese high-level leadership; protest and dissident movements; politically sensitive events, places and people; and foreign websites and organizations blocked at network level, along with pornography and other content.[6]

fidel-wut This site is owned by a Chinese dissident working in a US university to make anti China shit.

EDITEDIT: AND IT'S BEEN FUNDED BY NED LMAOOOOOOOOO

MULTIEDIT: I'm satisfied that the ai edit is real now.

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 16 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Again, it’s all over the social media, especially on xiaohongshu (social media platform) and zhihu (Chinese quora) that are extremely lib coded. They are the ones who care most about the LGBT stuff.

The page I posted is exactly catered for crowds like this. However, if you don’t like the source, feel free to take it from Sohu which posts articles from users. This is as mainstream as you can get.

Also, the film has been released in selected cinemas in 20 cities. This is how people have already watched it and reported on social media. No offense but you seriously are misrepresenting a lot of stuff here. As I said in the original post, it is being withdrawn from a wide release due to complaints.

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[-] Le_Wokisme@hexbear.net 20 points 1 week ago

there have been different rules at different times. Magic: The Gathering used to do some variant art for the chinese market but sometime in the mid 2000s Rosewater said they didn't have to anymore.

I've heard other media people say the rule for videogames was you could show bones but not bones sticking out of flesh, so skeletons were ok and zombies were ok but not a zombie with a bunch of bones sticking out.

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 17 points 1 week ago

Video game industry is not the same as distributing imported films.

As I wrote in another comment to you, there are only two film companies that have the exclusive rights to distribute imported films, 中影 and 华影, and these are the two companies that have dealt with the censorship bureau for years. You are making a lot of assumptions about a topic you barely understand.

In short, very few people thought the film would even have a cinema release in the first place due to the explicit content - especially gay marriage and some of the body horror contents. People were in fact surprised to see it getting a wide release.

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[-] kristina@hexbear.net 57 points 1 week ago

They made it a trans love story

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 35 points 1 week ago

lmao

[-] bobs_guns@lemmygrad.ml 38 points 1 week ago

Looks like this site was funded in the past by the NED before DOGE got em. Hate to cite Wikipedia but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_Digital_Times#Staff_and_operations

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 19 points 1 week ago

They’re libs lol. So are many users of xiaohongshu (the platform) and zhihu (Chinese Quora) that reported stuff like this. They are the ones who care the most about LGBT topics.

[-] Awoo@hexbear.net 29 points 1 week ago

NED is literally the CIA

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[-] SkingradGuard@hexbear.net 30 points 1 week ago

smuglord Those silly tankies on hexbear aren't so pro-china now!

[-] FunkyStuff@hexbear.net 21 points 1 week ago

Wait for the heel turn, last time this happened it ended with pants being pissed in solidarity.

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[-] FunkyStuff@hexbear.net 23 points 1 week ago

Were the complaints about the censorship?

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 29 points 1 week ago

Yes, people were like “what’s the point of licensing the film rights and showing it on screen when you’re going to alter the original content?”

A lot of people are also not comfortable with the government using AI to change the content to one that suits them, but I guess that’s the future now.

[-] Awoo@hexbear.net 37 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

You are better than this Xiaohongshu. You know this isn't "the government using ai to change the content" that did this. The change is carried out by the company that made the film. The blame lies with them for being incredibly overzealous with their changes, or with whoever gave them the advice to make these changes.

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 21 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

And why do you think they are overzealous with their changes?

Many Chinese shows have their scripts constantly altered and sometimes even have their entire storylines changed by the censors. It is one legitimate grievance many people have with the censorship.

In fact, it’s so common that people are already used to it. What’s different this time is the blatant use of AI to change the content to pass censorship.

Do you seriously think the censors are stupid and don’t know what’s being done to the film?

[-] Awoo@hexbear.net 19 points 1 week ago

And why do you think they are overzealous with their changes?

Because the west is absolutely swamped with media claiming all kinds of completely false things about China, the people believe them, and then they act on them if they're in a position of decision making power.

Do you seriously think the censors are stupid and don’t know what’s being done to the film?

The censors don't give a shit what the producers are doing to the film. Their job is to judge the film they're given, not to send it back and say "actually you've gone too far with your changes here and here and here".

Maybe you have a case that they should be given the power to send it back and say "no don't change this". But that's not what their job is currently.

[-] RagingGingivitis@hexbear.net 14 points 1 week ago

yeah this is a very blatant example of corpos being sinophobic & sloppy

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 16 points 1 week ago

The user you’re responding makes a lot of assumptions and doesn’t understand how import films are distributed in China. There is a distinct difference between buyout/acquisition films and revenue-sharing films. The film in question belongs to the former.

[-] FunkyStuff@hexbear.net 15 points 1 week ago

I've heard it described before (maybe it was by you actually, if so then just ignore me) that there's this general sort of dynamic where the companies learn to pre-emptively censor the media before the censors even get to it, because they've learned that it's best to do this to avoid the hassle. The problem is that they tend to be overly conservative and censor more than necessary. Do you think that's accurate?

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[-] Carcharodonna@hexbear.net 20 points 1 week ago

I know from previous discussions about this that the LGBTQ media censorship in China is sadly a real thing. Here’s the 2017 guidelines I looked at before: https://web.archive.org/web/20170630135640/http://www.cnsa.cn/2017/06/30/ARTI0Qg4cp7jtd1Z5o0RnfzM170630.shtml

Auto-translated portion in question:

(6) Rendering obscene pornography and vulgar low-level interest:

Specifically show the plots of prostitution, whoring, prostitution,removed, masturbation, etc.;

Show and display abnormal sexual relations and sexual behavior, such as incest, homosexuality, sexual perversion, sexual assault, sexual abuse and sexual violence;

Show and promote unhealthy views and states of marriage and love, such as extramarital love, one-night stand, sexual freedom, wife swap, etc.;

On this topic it’s often very difficult to determine what’s real and what isn’t, given that you have western media or CIA cutouts distorting the narrative for their own purposes. I try to look into the published regulations directly, but for these 2017 guidelines it doesn’t seem to explicitly discuss gay marriage. Were there new guidelines published, or is this some kind of a new push? Or is this just a company that misinterpreted the guidelines and did the AI stuff out of misinformation or paranoia?

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[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 20 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

For those who are wondering about the caption, it says:

The power of technology, it’s so scary #Together. But the movie is quite decent, it’s more atmospheric to watch horror films in cinema

[-] P1d40n3@hexbear.net 19 points 1 week ago

Big China L, ya hate to see it.

[-] tricerotops@hexbear.net 19 points 1 week ago

yet every anime they produce is BL. cant explain that.

[-] AF_R@hexbear.net 15 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I am way too inebriated for this struggle session so I’m just going to leave at at this:

I’m going to keep financially investing in China and laughing my way to the bank as the West collapses over the next 50 years

[-] xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 13 points 1 week ago

A leftist forum that doesn’t have people with strong convictions bitterly arguing over the most trivial perceived differences? Either a non-existent place or a fed corner.

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