The blank paper has quickly become a symbol of the protests in China against harsh COVID-19 restrictions. Protesters have held aloft the most innocuous of objects, which is a blank sheet of paper. Blank signs were previously displayed during the Hong Kong protests in 2020 and the demonstrations in Russia earlier this year against the invasion of Ukraine. As one protester in Beijing told the reporters, “The white paper represents everything we want to say but cannot say.”
Blank paper a symbol of rare demonstrations in China
