Most upperclass folks in China (and even their kids) regularly used VPNs and were able to access forbidden sites, at least while I was living there in a provincial capital city, 2018-19

The way it was explained to me is that the government simply doesn’t want the majority of people to have access to threatening information. I suppose educated, wealthier people in cities are too few in comparison to bother with. 

 True that. But if people are searching with VPNs wouldn't the searches come from another country instead of China then? 

 That’s a good point 😅 we’ve reached the limits of my technical knowledge