The story of a restaurant employee who had to pay the price for sharing a video of a mother beating her child has triggered anger on Chinese social media.

The incident happened on September 14, when Mr. Jiang (江), an employee at the ‘Peng Shu’ Western-style restaurant in Changsha, stopped a mother from beating her young daughter at the shopping mall where the restaurant is located.

As reported by the Guizhou media channel People’s Focus (@百姓关注), a mother and daughter at the restaurant drew the staff’s attention when the mother began physically assaulting her daughter.

The mother, clearly overwhelmed by her emotions, resorted to kicking, hitting, yelling, and even attempting to strike her child with a chair, allegedly in response to the child accidentally spilling ice cream on her clothing.

During this distressing incident, which was captured on video, Mr. Jiang and another colleague intervened to protect the child and immediately alerted the police to the situation.

But the one who was punished in the end was not the mother.

Changsha restaurant staff intervened when seeing a mother beating her child. The topic went trending as a case of injustice after an employee was forced to pay a 10k rmb fine for spreading a video of the incident, while the mother faced no punishment. Read https://t.co/tHGSJx3EGN pic.twitter.com/of5j8KBlCe

— What's on Weibo (@WhatsOnWeibo) September 21, 2023

The video of this incident was shared online, leading the woman to repeatedly visit the restaurant in frustration over her unblurred face in the video. The police had to mediate in this dispute.

To the dismay of many netizens, the employee ended up being forced to pay the woman 10,000 yuan ($1369) in compensation for “moral damages.” He has since resigned from his job and has left Changsha. A related hashtag was viewed over 110 million times on Weibo (#餐厅员工发顾客打娃视频后赔1万离职#) and also became a hot topic on Douyin.

The majority of commenters expressed their anger at the unjust outcome where a restaurant employee, who had attempted to protect the child, faced repercussions while the mother appeared to avoid any legal consequences for her actions.

“Where is the All-China Women’s Federation when you need them?” some wondered, while others wanted to know why the incident was not followed up with an immediate investigation into the child abuse. Others suggested that if it were a man who had beaten his child, authorities would have been quicker to intervene.

The issue of corporal punishment for children often comes up in Chinese social media discussions. While many people find it unacceptable to beat children, using violence to discipline children is also commonplace in many families.

When China’s first national law against domestic violence came into effect on 1 March 2016, article 5 and 12 specifically addressed the special legal protection of children and made family violence against children against the law.

By Manya Koetse

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The news hit international headlines on Tuesday: part of China’s Great Wall was damaged after construction workers used an excavator to dig through it.

The damaged area is located in Shuozhou’s Youyu county in Shanxi province and was built during the Ming dynasty (1368-1644). It concerns the 32nd section of the Great Wall.

The topic of the Great Wall being damaged by construction workers first attracted online attention on September 3 after it was reported by a local Shanxi news site (Wenbo Shanxi Platform @文博山西平台).

Two construction workers from Inner Mongolia were working at a constriction site near the Great Wall when they decided to use their excavator to dig through the Great Wall in order to create a 5-meter wide shortcut and save some time on their construction work. In doing so, they caused irreversible damage to the cultural heritage site.

Wenbo Shanxi first reported that this piece of the wall was removed by the construction workers to “save time.”

When you think of the Great Wall, you might think of the impressive parts of the Wall that have been extensively renovated – those are the parts that are popular among tourists, such as the Badaling segment. Those are actually just portions of it, leaving many other locations where the Wall is left as it is.

Because these old parts of the Wall that have not been renovated or specifically demarcated, some people are not even aware that they live next to the Great Wall. As described by the China Heritage Quarterly, “the myth of the Great Wall reinforced by images from Badaling and other impressive examples of Ming architecture has played its part in perpetuating this ignorance.”

As news of two Chinese construction workers digging their way through a part of the Great Wall in Shuozhou traveled on Chinese social media, many people wondered if it was done out of ignorance or carelessness.

Some photos of the area that was damaged show that the walls on both side are quite low and perhaps not immediately recognizable as a portion of the Great Wall.

However, some netizens posted an aerial view of the Shuozhou area which showed just how long and high the segment is (see video).

Two construction workers dug a 5-mtr wide hole in a segment of the Great Wall in Shanxi's Youyu County to create an exacavator shortcut. Were they just ignorant? This aerial view shows how extensive the portion of the Wall in the area actually is. Read: https://t.co/QgNp2vhdxN pic.twitter.com/1xQXVy0mAN

— Manya Koetse (@manyapan) September 5, 2023

The two workers responsible for the damage, a 38-year-old man and a 55-year-old woman, have now been detained. On Weibo, many commenters show no mercy for the two, suggesting that they deserve an ‘ancient punishment’ for ruining such ancient heritage.

By Manya Koetse

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