AUTHOR INTERVIEW--Marianna Gu

The Masters School, Marianna Gu

Q: Can you describe yourself a bit to us?

A: I’m Marianna Gu, a rising senior at the Masters School in Dobbs Ferry, NY. My favorite book is The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison and my favorite film is Soul. I’m particularly interested in sexuality studies, so I would spend most of my free time writing women’s rights related topics.

Q: What is your observation about the gender equality issue in China? Do you think the overall outlook is negative and pessimistic?

A: The gender equality issue in China is very different in urban and rural areas. In urban areas, the percentage of well-educated women is significantly higher than those in rural areas, meaning that urban women are more aware of their rights and thus having a better social image. I wouldn’t say the overall trend is negative because the Chinese government has become increasingly aware of violence towards women and has launched operation suppressing such brutality.

Q: What attitudes and perspectives do you think youngsters in China are supposed to have in face of this event? What better improvements can be made?

A: I think youngsters in China should continue advocating for women’s rights not only in urban areas but also in rural villages. In some hidden corners in China, women are still abused and treated as birth machines, so it is our obligation to keep fighting for these women and pushing the government to respond more effectively to these crimes.

Stop Bride Trafficking: Conspiracy Behind the Chained Woman

Growing up in a metropolis, I rarely reflected on my identity –– a girl, a Chinese girl, but it wasn’t until the year 2022 did I realize that instead of enjoying the privileges brought by these labels, I have to start fighting for them.

In the past, women’s rights issues never gained wide public attention in China. For those growing up in glamorous urban cities, gender inequality has ameliorated, leading to very few realizing its existence; conversely, in suburban areas, in second or third tier cities, in rural areas, brutality against women is rampantly simmering into every corner where justice cannot reach.

In late January 2022, a video featuring a woman being chained to a doorless room went viral. Billions of netizens cried for government attention, but disappointedly realized that the government, the CPC Fengxian County Committee, was nothing but an accomplice of the huge network of human trafficking in Xuzhou. Within three years, more than fifty thousand women were abducted to Xuzhou, with the smallest being 13 years old. According to a demographic survey of a village in Xuzhou, about two-thirds of the married women were kidnapped or bought from the bride market. The harsh reality tells us there are still countless women chained to places with deep-rooted human trafficking history, desperately wanting to escape.

In recent years, the Fengxian court has recorded several cases of kidnapped women who suffered from domestic violence suing for divorce, but the court justified its dismissal of the lawsuits with excuses such as “occasional disputes are inevitable” and “family matters should be treated with forgiveness and tolerance.” When the law is dictated by evil, there is no way out for these women.

Can’t the government see this? Can’t the government interfere and help? 

Of course they can, but instead of protecting its citizens and diminishing the fear, panic, and concerns triggeredby this scandal, the government chose to deceive its citizens by claiming that “the woman is legitimately married to the man” and “controlled by the family considering her severe mental illness.” Perhaps we can believe in the government, forget about this issue, return to our lives, but who is there to promise that the next chained woman is not you, me, or her? We are the survivors, but we can be the victims. In fact, the rest of the 700 million women in China are potential targets of the bride trafficking market that continues to expand to this day. We cannot deafen ourselves from the despair and woeful cries of the victims: they are still waiting to be rescued, and this society will not abandon them.

Yesterday, when I logged into Weibo and searched under the tag #TheChainedWoman, all relevant news articles were either banned or deleted by the officials. Few still remembered who the woman was and what happened. Public attention refocused back to celebrity scandals and gossip as if nothing existed. But I was not ready for this. I’m still waiting for a proper response that addresses the issue of bride trafficking and the dominance of rampant black power. The fight for women’s rights in China is a long-run, but for those women who are still imprisoned in the hidden villages, for those mothers who worry that their daughters would become the next chained women or assaulted girls in the hospitals, we have to continue advocating for women’s rights and remember that the significance of our solidarity is to protect the rights of all ordinary women.

References:

Cao, Aowen, and Emily Feng. “The Mystery of the Chained Woman in China.” NPR, NPR, 17 Feb. 2022, https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2022/02/17/1080115082/the-mystery-of-the-chained-woman-in-china.

Yuan, Li. “Seeking Truth and Justice, Chinese See Themselves in a Chained Woman.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 1 Mar. 2022,

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/01/business/china-chained-woman-social-media.html?searchResultPosition=3.vAsia, Radio Free. “铁链女事件始末.” Radio Free Asia, https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/duomeiti/mother-of-8/.