In China, Footage of a Chained-Up Rural Mother of Eight Draws Outcry

Wall Street Journal ^

[Truthsearcher]

Video footage of a woman chained up in a shed in a village in eastern China has hit a nerve just as the country heads into Lunar New Year celebrations and triggered online calls for better protections for women and the mentally ill in rural parts of the country.

The woman, identified by authorities in Feng county in Jiangsu province by her last name, Yang, is a mother of eight, married to a local man surnamed Dong.

Mr. Dong had come to the attention of Chinese social-media users through earlier videos depicting him as a hard-working father taking care of eight children and his mentally ill wife. Those videos, posted by social-media influencers, had brought visitors to his village and donations to his family, according to the county government.

The emergence of the more recent video last week, though, showing the mother of the children in a shed without a door, changed the social-media attention into an outcry of concern for the woman and speculation about whether she was a so-called “bought wife,” or a victim of human trafficking. Paying money for a bride was a once-common practice in rural China, where a preference for sons has contributed to a surplus of unmarried men. ...

[Truthsearcher]

More disturbing details have emerged about this woman. It seems increasingly certain that she was kidnapped and sold her "husband"'s family more than 20 years ago. And that her eight children are fathered by multiple men which indicated that she was locked up as sex slave and raped by multiple men from the village. Her captivity and harsh treatment has been an open secret in the village and no one did anything to help her. The government officials in the village were complicit in covering it up because they themselves were among her sexual abusers.

There are even more disturbing details about this story that I will hold off on sharing because they have not been verified and I don't want come across as sensationalistic. But this is a great human tragedy, one of the worst I've come across.

[Irenic]

https://news.yahoo.com/video-chinese-mother-8-left-223653262.html

[moovova]

New Olympic sport to debut tomorrow?

[ValleyofHope]

Yeonmi Park talked about this in her book. Chinese men buy women from North Korea to facilitate their escape, only they end up mistreating them.

[Gay State Conservative]

My first visit to China was in the early 1980s (1981 IIRC). At a train station I saw an old woman (about 80 years old) who had bound feet. It was the most incredible...and disgusting...thing I had ever seen.

[JimRed]

Worse than the (voluntary) piercings, metal studs and tattoos decorating many otherwise attractive young Americans, I assume?

[JRios1968]

The woman, identified by authorities in Feng county in Jiangsu province by her last name, Yang, is a mother of eight, married to a local man surnamed Dong.

[Gay State Conservative]

Yes,piercings are stupid...ugly...foolish but it would be hard to exaggerate how disgusting this sight was. And presumably it wasn't entirely voluntary...if it was even somewhat voluntary.