China's largest social network has blocked all mentions of John Oliver after the talk show host attacked Xi Jinping

June 20, 2018 at 10:11 AM EDT

HBO; Fred Dufour/Reuters

John Oliver criticised Xi Jinping's presidency on his show, "Last Week Tonight," over the weekend.
Oliver blasted Xi's consolidation of power and China's human rights abuses.
The social network Weibo has blocked all mentions of "John Oliver" and scrubbed all recent posts about him and his show.
Chinese internet companies regularly censor content that they believe could jeopardise the country's political stability.

China's largest social network, Weibo, has blocked all mentions of John Oliver's name after the TV host criticised President Xi Jinping on his show, "Last Week Tonight."

On Sunday, Oliver blasted Xi's consolidation of power and attempts to establish what he described as a cult of personality by way of abolishing presidential term limits, amassing lists of "untrustworthy" people, and censoring content on the internet at an unprecedented pace.

As a result, Weibo has censored all posts mentioning Oliver's name and show in an attempt to stop users from reading about Oliver's attacks on Xi.

The ban was first noticed by Inkstone, a South China Morning Post-affiliated news outlet focused on China, on Wednesday when reporters found that they were unable to post news about Oliver on Weibo.

Tweet Embed:
//twitter.com/mims/statuses/1009376552969097216?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
China's Weibo has banned all new posts mentioning John Oliver (who mocked exactly this kind of internet censorship) https://t.co/aFGsQvjVom pic.twitter.com/EVi1Ylnu0i

The microblogging platform has also scrubbed all posts containing the words "John Oliver" and "Last Week Tonight" since June 12, Business Insider found.

While there is no indication that Weibo's censorship came at the behest of the Chinese government, the Communist Party is known to have a firm grip on internet content. In March, China temporarily banned a Quora-like platform from app stores after it was found not to have censored enough content.

While "Last Week Tonight" is not officially broadcast in the country, and YouTube is blocked in mainland China, Oliver's shows are regularly discussed and shared unofficially on video platforms, Inkstone noted.

Chinese internet companies regularly censor content that they believe could jeopardise the country's political stability.

Earlier this year, Weibo blocked the letter N from the internet after it was used to attack Xi. Douyin, the country's video-sharing app, also banned Peppa Pig videos because the government believed the cartoon was being used to spread "negative influence" among the country.

The country has also repeatedly censored content containing images of Winnie the Pooh, which Chinese critics use to mock Xi and to imply physical similarities between the president and the fictional bear.

US viewers can watch Oliver's 20-minute segment on China here.

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