The Man Who Built the Wall of Light and Filmed the State

It was a night that shone as brightly in Chongqing as rarely before - not because of the neon facades of the megacity, but because of a single projector. At 10 p.m., a few days before the big military parade in Beijing, giant letters appeared on a house wall in the middle of the university district: "Only without the Communist Party can there be a new China." A few seconds later a second sentence flared up: "No more lies, we want the truth. No more slavery, we want freedom." A message like a clap of thunder - in a city of 30 million people, in a country where any deviation from the party line is persecuted. The authorities needed almost an hour to find the source of the light. Finally five police officers stormed a hotel room, tore open the curtains, turned off the projector - and looked straight into a camera that was aimed at them. On the table lay a handwritten letter: "Even if you are beneficiaries of the system today, one day you will inevitably become victims in this land. So please treat the people with kindness." A few hours later the video of the raid went online and spread like wildfire. For the first time the surveillance state itself had become the object of surveillance.

"Dear friends!
I do not know who you are, but I know that you also have mothers, fathers, spouses and friends. That is why I am writing you these lines. First I want to make clear that I have no criminal intent and do not want to harm anyone. I only chose this path because I can no longer remain silent. Please do not be cruel to the people living in this country. Please do not harm innocent citizens. You too will one day grow old, and if this country continues to be ruled in this way, neither you nor your children will be spared.

People have the right to speak the truth, they have the right to strive for freedom. If all voices are silenced, the country becomes a prison. I ask you to show a little leniency, to not make yourselves into perpetrators. Be vigilant and remember: today it may seem like duty to you, but tomorrow it may affect you yourselves.

Everyone who loves this country should treat it with kindness. I hope that one day you will look back and be proud that you chose to do the right thing."

(Signature, date August 16, 2025)

The man behind this staging is named Qi Hong. He had left China with his wife and daughters nine days earlier and from a safe distance in the United Kingdom activated the projector, recorded the police operation and edited it together. "My only wish was to express myself," he said later. "The party installs cameras to watch us. I thought I could use the same method to watch them." The video was more than a protest - it was a parable about a country that is watched by about 700 million surveillance cameras, by facial recognition software, big data profiles, drones and a social credit system that registers even the smallest deviations. Qi reversed the logic, and millions watched. Within four days the clips reached over 18 million views on Chinese-language platforms. "Qi Hong tricked the police, outsmarted the state machinery - and they could hardly do anything about it," said blogger Li Ying, who spread the videos. "It was a blow against the myth of total control."

Qi is not a professional activist but a man who long tried to remain inconspicuous. Born in 1982 in a mountain village near Chongqing, he left school at 16, became a migrant worker, was arrested several times without a residence permit and mistreated. Only when he became successful with online trade on Taobao, got married and bought an apartment in Beijing did his life seem to calm down. In 2013 he withdrew to the countryside, ran a parcel station, read Buddhist texts. But back in Chongqing he developed a keen political awareness.

The propaganda in his daughters' schoolbooks, the overheated nationalism, the suppression of free speech - all that would not let him go. He read Orwell's 1984 and Animal Farm, Huxley's Brave New World and began posting sharper words on WeChat. On the anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre he wrote: "The pursuit of light is something that every thinking person should long for. Light of wisdom, light of civilization, light of humanity, light of democracy." His New Year's wish for 2024 was simply: "May everyone have freedom from fear." When Xi Jinping's big military parade was announced he made a decision. On August 10 he rented a hotel room with a view of a high-rise, rehearsed projections for ten days with harmless wishes like "be healthy," "be happy." Then he left the country with his family. On August 29, already in London, he switched on the projector and filmed the reaction of the state power.

The revenge followed immediately: police interrogated his mother in front of her house, took his brother and a friend into custody. Qi knew that his step would not remain without consequences. But he does not see himself as a hero. "I am not brave," he says, "but I could no longer remain silent." His action is part of a series of creative individual protests that are cracking China's authoritarian facade. His model was Peng Lifa, the "Bridge Man," who in 2022 unfurled banners against Xi Jinping on the Sitong Bridge in Beijing and has since disappeared without a trace. Human rights organizations now report that Peng has been secretly sentenced to nine years in prison - for alleged "picking quarrels" and "arson." His family has no access to him, his place of detention is unknown. But it is precisely this martyr status that inspires imitators. In Chengdu the young activist Mei Shilin again hung banners over an overpass in April 2025: "No national renewal without political reform." He too was arrested, his whereabouts are unclear. Bloggers like Li Ying report that this year they have been sent more protest videos than ever before - an indication that despite omnipresent surveillance a new generation refuses to be intimidated. The CCP responds with repression but also with nervousness. For a regime that bases its power on the myth of perfect control such images are dangerous. They show that even in the densest net there are still gaps - and that a single man with a projector can throw the propaganda machine off balance. Qi Hong knows he cannot return. His future in the United Kingdom is uncertain, the family lives in exile. But his protest has created an echo that reaches far beyond Chongqing. He has turned the camera - and millions of people now no longer just look at the party's propaganda images but at the face of the state itself, staring into the lens in surprise. Perhaps that is the strongest message: that even in a country with 700 million cameras not every truth can be erased. Sometimes a single beam of light is enough to break the darkness.

To be continued .....