Sometimes I feel like a broken record: Yet again (or more accurately, still), the Chinese government is cracking down on Internet activity that they feel violates their “cultural standards.” As usual, that includes online gambling.

The Chinese State Council Information Office is cracking down on websites they don’t like and have shut down more than 60,000 so far, with another 1,700 websites still under investigation. People caught using or operating the illegal online casinos are being punished by sentences of up to five years, usually prison terms that mandate hard labor.

According to the Chinese government, taking control of unsavory websites is necessary to protect China’s helpless citizens from security issues, viruses and more. That seems likely, because I doubt a Chinese person is capable of learning which websites they want to visit and which they want to avoid. Things such as not sharing your personal information with sites you don’t trust, something everyone else takes for granted, are apparently too difficult for the Chinese to learn.

Wang Chen, the Minister for the Information Office, was kind enough to clear things up and let us know why such a crackdown on internet activity is so important. According to him, aside from the safety issues already mentioned, it’s necessary to “improve the cultural environment on the Internet.”

Some might argue that the government blocking citizens from searching for information on Liu Xiaobo doesn’t improve the cultural environment on the Internet, but they’re wrong. There’s something barbaric and unsavory about letting people read about a Nobel Prize-winning human rights advocate, so the Chinese government is right to protect people from that terrible information. Why, reading up on human rights is even more dangerous than gambling. After all, feeling strongly about blackjack won’t get you run over by a tank.

Clearly, human rights knowledge is very dangerous, so China is right to protect people from it. After all, if you’re ignorant, you won’t get too riled up and the government won’t have to kill or imprison you. They also need to shut down online casinos because if you play there you could lose money (of course, you could also win money). Worse yet, if caught playing at the casino, you would face imprisonment. So the government needs to shut down the website to protect you from that temptation! What a benevolent government! I don’t know why people say such bad things about these nice Communists.

By the way, this website is banned in China, so at least the citizens don’t have to worry about stumbling upon my blogs.

At least this crackdown didn’t involve running people over with tanks. China has vowed to crack down on gambling in the country and has been doing just that. A recent raid in the province of Yunnan has resulted in an arrest of 21 suspects accused of running an illegal online gambling operation. In addition, their bank accounts containing approximately ¥550,000 have been frozen.

Back in February, China’s Ministry of Public Security placed a new emphasis on putting an end to online gambling in the Middle Kingdom. Since that time, they have arrested over 3,600 suspects and frozen over ¥700 million in funds, according to the state-run Xinhua News Agency.

Gambling – both online and land-based – has been banned in mainland China since the communist government took power in 1949. I think it’s because they don’t like an individual having an influence over whether their amount of money gets larger or smaller. The government wants to be the one that decides that (after all, there are state-run lotteries).

With the World Cup taking place in South Africa, China is currently placing an emphasis on sports betting. All overseas online casinos and sports books are banned from accepting Chinese customers. China monitors those sites to look for activity from its citizens. If any get through, there can be swift “justice” exacted upon the Chinese citizen. Of course, if you’re a Chinese citizen, there’s a good chance that the Communist Party of China monitors everything you do anyway, as we have found from the controversy surrounding their hacking of Gmail.

China defends controlling how people spend their money, what information they get from the news, and what terms they can search on the internet on the grounds that they are protecting the nation by removing things that would harm the people. Letting people gamble is bad because it’s not good for them. Engaging in nuclear proliferation with North Korea – a nation that might be crazy enough to start a nuclear holocaust, denying freedom of religion, freedom of property and the right to vote for their national leaders is what’s best for the people, though.