Something Is Spreading Like WILDFIRE Across China — And It’s About to Get Worse

On April 4th, 2026, a 26-year-old

product manager in Beijing, China

uploaded a file to GitHub. Within 48

hours, it had been downloaded by

millions of Chinese tech workers. Her

video about this file pulled over 5

million likes in China alone. This file

and the video along with it has caused

billions of dollars in damages to the

Chinese economy. And the worst part is

is that Chinese workers are happy about

this. The CCP has still not banned this

too. And they haven't even named the

person who posted it. That's because Xi

Jinping knows that he literally cannot

do that. Because banning something like

this would mean to admit something that

they desperately don't want the world to

know. This is a story about how a

generation of Chinese 20-year-olds are

winning [music] a war against Xi

Jinping. And they're winning so

convincingly that Xi Jinping himself had

to come out and beg them to stop. Take a

listen.

To understand why this is happening, we

have to go back to 2021. In April of

that year, a guy in China who called

himself the kind-hearted traveler posted

a 200-word essay to a Chinese forum.

The title of this post was lying flat is

justice. His argument in this post was

pretty simple. He was tired of life. So,

he wasn't going to buy a house, he

wasn't going to get married, and he

wasn't going to have any kids. In short,

he didn't want to work towards a better

future for himself. He was just

basically going to lie flat, and the CCP

could do nothing about it. Now, people

complaining on social media is nothing

new. I'm sure you guys have seen it

millions of times already. This post

should have died a quiet death like

millions of posts that complain about

life on social media. Instead though, it

got reposted millions of times. That's

because it described exactly how every

young Chinese person was feeling. You

see, for the previous 30 years, the deal

in China had been very simple. You work

996. 9 in the morning to 9 at night, 6

days a week. You eat the bitterness as

Xi Jinping likes to say, and in return,

you'd be richer than your parents. For

many Chinese citizens, this was a great

deal and it worked for 30 years.

Unfortunately though, it does not work

anymore. In 2023, the youth unemployment

rate in China hit more than 21%. It was

such a high number that CCP announced

that they will not be publishing this

number anymore. Then, they came back a

year later with a new formula. A formula

that conveniently did not count any

students that had graduated school. And

guess what? The formula worked. The

Chinese unemployment number magically

dropped. This reminds me of a joke that

my parents once told me. A town just

kept on flooding every year. So, the

mayor installs one of those measuring

poles by the river. You know, with a red

line at the top that says danger

flooding.

Now, next time the storm hit, water

rises right up to that red line and

citizens start to panic. They march to

the city hall and demand that the mayor

do something. So, he does. He goes down

to the river and moves the red line up

saying, "Look, it's not flooding

anymore." That's basically what the CCP

did. Instead of solving the problem,

they just redefined the number that

points out that there is a problem. Now,

China's youth unemployment number are

not that much of an outlier. Take a look

at this chart that basically compares

youth unemployment in many different

countries.

Here you can see the 21% Chinese youth

unemployment that CCP had announced

itself before they stopped publishing

the number. And then, when they came

back with the new formula, the Chinese

youth unemployment dropped to roughly

16%. And guess what? Countries like the

UK, Italy, Chile, Finland, all pretty

much have the same youth unemployment

number. So, maybe you're wondering this

is not such a big deal. Well, this is

where China's size actually becomes a

massive problem in more ways than one.

First, it already has millions of people

who are unemployed. But, on top of that,

it has 12 million more graduates who are

walking into the worst job market in 30

years.

Then, guess what? Next year, it has an

even bigger cohort of graduates who are

expected to come into this market. Now,

of course, majority of these graduates

will hopefully find a job, but around

1/5 of them are expected to be

unemployed. And that's bad. On top of

that, the situation gets worse if you

look at the jobs some of these people

are actually taking on. More than 20% of

delivery drivers in China, aka people

who deliver DoorDash and Uber Eats in

China, hold a college degree. And then,

at least 70,000 drivers have a master's

degree. Now, I'll give you guys that.

70,000 is not a huge number in a country

like China. But still, these graduates,

especially the ones who have master's

degree, probably did not imagine

themselves delivering food for other

people. Now, much like in the rest of

the world, in China an entire generation

was told that studying hard at the

Gaokao led to a stable urban career.

That social contract is breaking. This

is where I want to remind you guys of

the golden rule of YouTube, especially

when you're making China-related videos.

You just have to talk about the one

child policy. You just have to. You see,

each unemployed or underemployed

graduate is the only child of two

parents and maybe even up to four

grandparents. They have invested

everything in their kids' education. And

for these families, the situation is not

looking bright. Their kids are having a

harder and harder time finding a job.

And at the same time, Xi Jinping is

killing off some of the biggest

industries in the country. This is where

things get a bit complicated because

just recently Xi Jinping killed off the

Chinese tutoring industry. This industry

was worth around $120 billion per year.

This was clearly a big business inside

of China. Now, Xi Jinping believed that

education, especially low-level

education, should be free. Parents

should not have to fork out a bunch of

money just for their kids to go through

grade school and elementary school. Not

a bad idea, but unfortunately, killing

an industry this big does mean that

people, a lot of people, are going to be

out of jobs. And on top of that, there

are no new jobs being created. In fact,

this crash was so bad that Xi Jinping is

now actually going back on his word and

loosening restrictions on the tutoring

industry. So, he created all this mess

for no reason. And the people who

suffered the most were, of course, the

tutoring business people and the young

people who, you know, depend on the jobs

that this industry provides after they

graduate. So, hopefully now it's

starting to make a little sense as to

why Chinese students are starting to lie

flat. Then, in 2022, things got worse.

Lying flat evolved into something

darker. It was bailan, or in English,

let it rot. Where lying flat was saying

that, "Hey, I will not play your game."

Bailan basically means that, "I will not

play your game and I kind of hope that

you lose, too." Now, 2022 was the year

of the great Chinese lockdown, the COVID

lockdown, where Xi Jinping wanted to

achieve his impossible goal of zero

COVID. That's why he locked down 25

million people in Shanghai inside of

their apartments for 2 months. There

were drones flying above the buildings

telling residents to control their souls

desire for freedom. People were

literally starving in high-rises while

CCP officials were giving press

conferences talking about how food

supplies were abundant. And then

something snapped. In November of 2022,

a fire in a building in Urumqi killed 10

people who were literally locked inside

their apartment. Meaning they could not

leave even if they wanted to. The doors

were chained shut from the outside so

people inside could not break

containment. And this created a massive

backlash that Xi Jinping did not expect.

Thousands, maybe even tens of thousands

of Chinese citizens poured into the

streets in Shanghai, in Beijing, in

Chengdu, in Wuhan, anywhere you can

think of. These people were so sick of

the lockdown that they were literally

chanting publicly down with Xi Jinping,

down with the CCP. Something like this

has not happened in China since 1989,

the Tiananmen Square massacre.

The CCP was in full panic mode. In some

cities people were not allowed to make

any signs that they could take to the

protest. So people started holding up

just a blank sheet of white paper. And

then people got arrested for holding up

a blank sheet because government

believed this was them speaking out

against their policies. But guess what?

Despite all the crackdown, this actually

worked. Within weeks Xi Jinping did

something he had never done before. He

abandoned his entire zero COVID policy.

In one press conference, the whole of

China changed overnight. The protesters

had learned something that the CCP

didn't want them learning. The regime

could flinch if the backlash was strong

enough. This man that lying flat and by

lying just kept on going and they became

worse. By 2023, by lying had taken a new

shape. Adults with master degrees from

major universities like Tsinghua or

Peking University, [music] basically

China's Harvard and MIT, started moving

back in with their parents. They call

themselves full-time children. They

treated this like a job, but to me it

sounds like retirement. All they would

do is eat dinner with their parents,

drive them to doctor's appointment, take

care of grandparents, and anything else

that they have to do to support the

parents. But in return, they expect a

salary, around 4,000 to 8,000 yuan a

month. That's around $500 to $1,100 per

month. It's important to clarify here

that these are 27-year-olds with elite

degrees in China who did the math as to

how they want to live their life. They

looked at the Chinese job market and

they looked at their parents' retirement

saving and they decided that they were

better off living as full-time children.

Now, this is not some isolated incident.

By 2023, an estimated 16 million young

Chinese people were calling themselves

full-time children. This was a major

social phenomenon. And then, by 2025, it

got worse. By lying had taken its final

form, rat people. The hashtag rat people

on Chinese social media crossed more

than 10 million views. Related hashtags

like crowd rat person or bed all days

started trending regularly on Chinese

social media before CCP sensors deleted

them. Then, these hashtags would just

instantly get reposted under a new

variation of the same name. Let me give

you a day in the life of someone who

calls themselves a rat people. These are

mostly Gen Z teenagers who don't have a

job. So, their daily routine consists of

staying in bed for 3 hours after waking

up, washing up a bit after that, then

sleeping for another 5 hours, not eating

anything until their parents wake them

up in the evening, and then this whole

cycle continues. They eat dinner, go

back to sleep, then wake up the next

morning, stay in bed for even longer,

and then just stay in bed until they

have to wake up again for dinner.

Basically, like rats, avoid light,

rhythm, and societal expectations. All

this is having a real impact on the

economy. And I'm not just talking about

rat people, I'm talking about the whole

thing. Let it rot, buy land, and then

rat people. This is hurting the economy,

which in turn is making situation worse

for new students who want to come into

the workforce, which means some of these

students are joining this cohort of

people who have basically given up

trying. In fact, in late 2024, a Chinese

economist named Gao Shenwen said the

quiet part out loud. During a speech at

an investor conference in Shengzheng, he

dropped three major bombshells. First

one being that the Chinese GDP growth

has been overestimated by roughly three

percentage points each year. This has

major consequences. He was basically

saying that China's economic miracle for

the last 3 years was largely a

statistical fiction. It was a lie, and

roughly 40-50 million people who should

have had jobs don't have jobs. CCP is

lying about employment in the country.

The second bombshell he dropped was

talking about the generational divide.

He said that post-pandemic China has

been made up of vibrant old people and

lifeless young people who are desperate

to get to a better situation. This was

the most important part of his speech

because this quote that he talked about

resonated with the younger population of

China, and it quickly went viral all

over Chinese social media. The

catchphrase that hit the hardest was him

saying that the Chinese young Chinese

people were turning off the lights and

eating noodles. This is a Chinese

investment slang, which is basically

used to describe someone who's down on

their luck after losing a lot of money

in stock market. He was saying an entire

generation is basically like someone who

just had bad luck in the stock market.

This was a major moment in China because

this guy wasn't some dissident. He

wasn't someone who hated the CCP. He

wasn't someone who was you know, living

overseas and just on China. He

was the chief economist at one of

China's major state-owned brokerages.

So, when someone with his kind of access

and his kind of loyalty to the

government says something, you know,

he's not just doing this to on the

government or on the party. He's

speaking the truth, but unfortunately,

CCP did not see it that way because

within 48 hours of this speech going

viral, he was basically erased from

Chinese internet. His speech, the full

speech was deleted. His personal WeChat

account and other social media accounts

were deleted. And the CCP key basically

sent a message to every other economist

saying that, "Hey, this is one topic you

cannot talk about." He was just stating

what he believed to be the truth. But

unfortunately, that was a bit too much

for the CCP.

This all brings us back to April 4th,

2026. The GitHub upload that we talked

about at the start of the video. That

tool was put out by this girl, Koki Xue.

She is 26 years old. She is an AI

product manager living in Beijing. And

to understand what she put out, you need

to understand what has been happening to

Chinese tech workers for the last few

months. You see, Chinese tech companies

had started doing something genuinely

dystopian, even by CCP standards. They

were forcing their engineers, their

workers to log every aspect of their

workflow. How they think, how they

decide, whatever they're doing, they

want some AI tool to log everything so

the company could distill this

information into an AI agent. Then they

could fire all their employees or at the

very least reduce the head count at the

company, aka less job for Chinese

workers. For the workers, this was a

scary situation. Imagine you're at your

job and your boss wants you to work. Of

course, you want to do a good job, but

in the back of your mind you know

there's an AI tracking everything you

do, so one day it can replace you. This

is exactly why the GitHub tool went

viral. It was a tool that was meant to

fight against the AI that was looking to

replace the workers. Let me explain how

this tool works. It has three modes:

light, medium, and heavy sabotage.

Depending on how closely your boss is

watching you, the AI that's tracking

your every move gets fed material and

data that is so deliberately corrupted,

so basically wrong, that the resulting

AI agent that is made using this data is

useless. And if you play your cards

right, your boss will not be able to

tell anything that you did wrong because

the logs that this agent or this tool is

creating, they look very real. In fact,

Koki Xue told MIT Technology Review, and

I quote, "I originally wanted to write

an op-ed opinion piece, but decided it

would be more useful to make something

that pushes back against this problem.

And that's the energy that an entire

generation of Chinese people are

feeling." Now, remember what I told you

at the beginning, the CCP has not banned

this tool yet because banning something

like this would mean publicly

acknowledging that Chinese tech workers

are being asked to train their own

replacements. And that is something

Beijing absolutely does not want to do.

Now, this AI tool is just one pillar of

the revolt that Chinese workers are

carrying out. The second pillar is

something called run philosophy. Now,

the word run here is a pun in Chinese.

In Mandarin, the character run sounds

basically identical profitable. So, when

young Chinese people say they are

running, they are saying it's profitable

to leave the country. That's the whole

pun. What run philosophy actually looks

like in practice is a giant crowdsourced

manual for how to get out of China

before things get worse. Go to any

Chinese social media platform and you'll

find threads where young Chinese prayed

incredibly detailed guides as to how to

leave the country. They talk about

Canadian Express entry or maybe Japanese

high-skilled professional visa program.

Even Singapore's Tech Pass. They

basically talk about which country they

can go to and how easy is it to get in

there. What paperworks you would need,

what you have to say to the immigration

officer at the airport, what you have to

say during your visa interview. They

also share tips on how to actually move

money out of the country. You see, in

China, it has become drastically harder

to move your money out since the new

SAFE rules have kicked in. Those rules

require Chinese banks to flag any

cross-border transfers of over 5,000

yuan. That's around $1,000. And banks

are also required to keep transaction

records on file for 10 years. With all

these rules, CCP is basically,

financially speaking, shutting down its

borders. Not to keep people out, but to

keep people in. And that's exactly why

the young Chinese people are running

faster than ever. Canada, Japan, and

Singapore are still the top destination

for Chinese talent. But lately, Mexico

and Hungary have started showing up in

threads, too. And you guys want to hear

what Beijing's response is to all this?

Well, it's pretty similar to what Cuba

did under Fidel Castro. Beijing has

labeled run philosophy unpatriotic,

which is the exact same word every

collapsing regime in history has used to

describe its immigrants.