Our Views: In numbers, China’s sign

Perhaps an act of God, or of clerks, also powerful in their sphere? Whatever the means, the Shanghai stock market fell 64.89 points on Monday, something that would not be noticed much of anywhere else but in Communist China.

That is because the massacres of democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square occurred on June 4, 1989 — 6/4. It is a symbol banned from the Internet by the Communist government.

“In the numerology of censorship, nothing is more sensitive,” reported The Los Angeles Times. “There is a ritualized cat-and-mouse game every year on this date between the censors and those who want to commemorate the death of hundreds, perhaps thousands” killed by the military in 1989.

“On the 20th anniversary, an advertisement managed to slip into a newspaper showing two groups of people — six on one side and four on the other — gazing philosophically toward the sky,” the Times noted.

The Shanghai market also became one of the targets of the Internet censors on Monday. They added “Shanghai stock market” and “index” to the long list of terms that are scrubbed, as best the government can achieve, from the Internet across China.

We hope that, whether an incident of God or man, this is another reminder to the people of China and the world of the evils done in the name of the Chinese Communist Party.