Since 2013, contention-oriented Internet events have been increasingly transformed into consensus-oriented new media events in the Chinese cyberspace. The direct cause of this transformation is the obstruction of online emotional mobilization. The main emotions expressed in online mobilization, such as sympathy, anger, and playfulness, have been increasingly labeled and attacked as negative, irrational, and uncivil. The key condition surrounding the demobilization of online emotions is a set of new policies that are centered on the concepts of civility and civilization as well as the new social environment in which these policies are implemented. The practice of regulating the Internet in the name of civility constitutes a civilizing process. This process has undermined emotional mobilization online, leading to the weakening of contentious online activism in China in the past few years.