Chinese govt. censors World Cup feed so citizens won’t see maskless crowd as protests in China rage

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Soccer fans in China have been watching a skewed version of the game — and of reality — as the Chinese government scrambles to keep them from seeing the massive, maskless crowds at the World Cup tournament in Qatar while its citizens are in the streets protesting the nation’s tyrannical “zero-Covid” policies.

While FIFA has ensured that every other nation is receiving the same live feed of the games, China’s state broadcaster, CCTV, has been using a 30-second delay to cut out close-up shots of the maskless many in favor of images less likely to inflame their already furious population.

“During a live broadcast of Sunday’s group game between Japan and Costa Rica, state broadcaster CCTV Sports replaced close-up shots of maskless fans waving flags with images of players, officials or the football stadium,” the South China Morning Post reports. “Broadcasters had already taken action to cut out crowd shots, doing exactly the same for the game between Australia and Tunisia, a move that was quickly picked up by social media.”