Internet Anxiety, the Norm of the ‘Good’ Netizen and the Construction of the ‘Proper’ Wired Self

This chapter continues to explore young people’s experiences and meaning making in relation to the Internet, but from a different angle than in the last chapter. Here I focus on how the participants’ Internet-related subjectivities and self-understanding refl ect the Chinese discourse of modernity, with the Internet as a central symbol, and related to this, the ideal subjecthood embodied in the double subjectifi cation regime discussed in Chapter 1. I start by offering an account of the widespread anxiety about the Net in Chinese society.