On March 7, 2013, clusters of dead pigs were found floating down the Huangpu River, or “Mother River of Shanghai,” which divides Shanghai into the East (Pudong) and West (Puxi) Banks. By March 20, more than ten thousand pigs had been fished out of the Huangpu and several thousand others retrieved from tributaries (Zhou 2013). Their appearance led to panic in the city, which is home to some of China’s wealthiest residents. The people of Shanghai rely on the Huangpu for drinking water, the country relies on it for shipping goods further inland, and it serves as an important revenue-generator for the tourism industry as a seemingly continuous stream of tourists board cruise vessels that offer a scenic view of Shanghai’s impressive and varied architecture from the river. The appearance of bloated pig carcasses caused networks of Shanghai’s 23.5 million residents to voice their concerns over the Chinese social media platform, Weibo. The public outcry prompted the government to respond. They released daily water-quality reports as well as food-quality reports that checked for the appearance of meat salvaged from the carcasses in nearby restaurants. Each day, these government institutions deemed the water quality “normal” and declared that no tainted pork was found in the restaurants. These checks did not, however, satisfy many local residents who were wary of official reports, especially given the years of recent food scandals combined with the thinly veiled excuses local government officials provided for the appearance of the dead pigs. For example, one official from Zheji-