> They are mostly very aware that they cannot speak freely.

That's correct, and as I said that's one of the reasons Chinese people bypass GFW.

The last paragraph in my previous comment may not have been clear enough. What I meant was that *after bypassing GFW*, you generally have minimal concern, not *before bypassing GFW*

You seem to believe that every potential interlocutor is bypassing the firewall. I know that many are not, because they are afraid of being caught.

No. For example, the U.S. has many problems and I would never say it is ideal, but I can openly disagree with the President or the majority party. My understanding is that this is not as easy for citizens of China inside China. Can you openly discuss the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests?

I have been on Douyin a lot, there is a lot chat rooms for people to debate politics, so it is a 50/50 divide for opinions (for and against). Many of them will say 'China sucks, and US rules'. People learn a way to speak avoiding keywords, if you are not careful, you get kicked out of the chat. Many of them you can tell are against the government, but these are not ordinary people, they probably don't work, and spending most of their time online talking about politics.