While South Korea is busy going wild for stray cats eating food, China has its own ideas about dining while in view of a webcam.
According to Asian Correspondent, erotic banana-eating videos are now all the rage among Chinese netizens. In fact, the practice has become so popular that the Chinese government recently banned the “inappropriate” act by way of some new livestreaming regulations, which forbid overtly sexual banana consumption as well as – inexplicably – “wearing stockings and suspenders while streaming”.
Video via YouTube user GlobaL.
In order to clamp down on these practices, China is now requiring livestreaming companies to monitor their content around the clock in hopes of preventing these acts from appearing online, however with a fast-growing livestreaming industry – one of the country's largest streaming sites boasts 120 million active users alone – this type of surveillance may be infeasible.
Chinese citizens, too, are wondering how the ban will be enforced. “Netizens took to social media to ask how the government planned to enforce the online ‘banana eating ban’,” writes Asian Correspondent. “Many said it was futile as there were other types of phallic-shaped fruits and vegetables.” Outside of China, a lone protester in London also took to the street outside the Chinese embassy to exercise his right to eat bananas in a sexual manner; the protest certainly made a statement, even if it was a slightly uncomfortable one.
Video via The Guardian.
Indeed, bananas are just the beginning. As China's livestreaming industry grows so, too, do the country's number of camgirls. These young Chinese women, who are akin to vloggers, garner online fame not only by eating bananas but also by encouraging netizens to shop for things like bags, flowers and gifts online. The women later share their profits with the livestreaming companies which host them.
According to Shanghaiist, a successful camgirl can earn up to 100,000 yuan per month. Roughly 75% of their viewers are male and 68% are between the ages of 19 and 35. Though most have become famous for talking about their daily lives and doing random things like trying on clothes, some have posed nude or had sex on their livestream channels to gain popularity, both of which the Chinese government is hoping to stop.
[Top photo via Asian Correspondent]
