Camps to treat mainland Web addicts have sprung up, unregulated, with deadly results
Peter Simpson 23 August 2009
At the start of the summer holidays last month, teenagers Deng Senshan and Pu Liang believed they had their long vacation mapped out. After several weeks of tough exams sat under the glare of their parents and demanding teachers, the pair - like millions of other children across China - were hoping to indulge in their insatiable passion for internet entertainment.
Their parents had other ideas, however, and Senshan and Pu Liang were sent to summer boot camps to cure them of their internet addiction.
As they dropped the boys off at their camps in different parts of the country, they were told by the principals that their sons would be turned into obedient, independent and positive young citizens. They would learn to cook, clean their rooms and wash their own clothes. They would understand that food does not just appear in the fridge, because they would help farmers toil the land.
And the boys would take part in no-nonsense drills to rid them of the sloppy mindset they had acquired by slouching in front of a computer, zapping animated evil-doers in futuristic terrain.
The boys’ addiction would be cured through a tough but fair physical regime, and their well-being was paramount, the camp principals assured.
The iron ruler treatment has long been an acceptable tradition in China’s education system. Rather than dish out a short, sharp shock themselves, the parents paid up to 5,000 yuan (HK$5,700) to cure their children. Taken reluctantly from their violent gaming, music downloading and online chats, the boys suddenly found themselves cast into a reality every bit as brutal as elements of their virtual worlds.
For Senshan, his boot camp experience three weeks ago proved fatal.
Within 14 hours of arriving at the Qihang Salvation Training Camp in Guangxi autonomous region, the 16-year-old was dead - beaten into a coma by his camp counsellors for running too slowly on a five-kilometre run during the first afternoon of his 18-day stay.
Pu fared better, in that he is alive and being cared for by his mother and doctors after repeated beatings by his boot camp trainers at the ambiguously named China Non-Traditional Versatile Education Training Centre in Sichuan province.
He spent his 14th birthday in intensive care for a bleeding kidney, broken ribs and a haemorrhaged eye sustained during his eight-day stay. His mother is keeping a vigil by his bedside, staring at the tubes coming out his body and trying to fathom how her good intentions ended with her only child being pounded to within an inch of his life.
“He was ordered to do 500 push-ups and when he failed, his campmates were ordered by the instructors to beat him with poles,” Mrs Liang said.
Senshan’s father, Deng Fei, is campaigning for justice and wants answers. He said the local government had offered him compensation of 1.04 million yuan for his son’s death.
“I found out that the Guangxi government helped promote and advertise the camp, hence their compensation offer in the hope I will remain silent. They were part of the camp’s set-up and therefore responsible for my son’s death,” he said.
“I dropped Senshan off on the Saturday and the trainers promised me they would not use physical punishment. On Sunday night, I was looking at my son’s bloody and bruised body in the hospital morgue.
“I couldn’t recognise him because his face was so swollen from bruises and was covered in blood. He had deep cuts on his wrists where he had been handcuffed. He spent time in solitary confinement and when he couldn’t run fast, they beat him to death.”
Doctors said his son’s heart gave out from the exhaustion he suffered during the beating.
“I’m trying to get the courts to prosecute the 14 people from the camp and the local government responsible for Senshan’s death,” Mr. Deng said.
Naturally, he is riddled with guilt. “Senshan was a good son and a good student. I was just worried about his internet addiction,” he said.
Over the past two years, a plethora of government officials and experts have been earnestly expounding how internet addiction was eroding the moral fibre of Chinese families and creating a dropout generation of vapid internet junkies.
A survey in 2007 by the China Youth Internet Association, a branch of the Communist Youth League, declared that eight million youths among 82 million-plus young internet users were addicts.
Last year the association upped its figure to 10 million - just after Li Jianguo, secretary general of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, estimated there were six million.
Then in June, the media said the boom in home computers had seen 25 million children fall under the internet’s spell.
Caught in between the headlines and reams of hazy statistics, aspiring middle-class parents have been agonising over what they do can for their children. Some are eager to throw cash at anything that professes to stop their children from perpetually logging on.
A boom in correctional establishments occurred along with the internet junkie headlines and parental hand-wringing. Each camp cleverly taps into the concern of parents and promises to firmly but fairly knock wayward youngsters into shape.
Starting a camp is child’s play for businessmen looking for quick profits as the sector is completely unregulated by government at both central and provincial level. Verifying their number is difficult because no official records exist. The Ministry of Health has said not one of the 400 or so camps believed to be operating is legally registered.
Indeed, the plight of Pu only came to light after police called at his camp to investigate the drowning of another youngster when a river activity went wrong. Officers stumbled upon the severely injured Pu lying on his dorm bunk.
Xia Xueruan, a professor of sociology at Peking University, said: “There is no law demanding camp staff be qualified to supervise young people. And even if they do have training, there is no authority to make inspections and uphold standards.”
He put the blame on the fatal beatings at the feet of the Ministry of Education - and on parents. “The Ministry of Education is supposed to be responsible for standardising all establishments that run activities for students. The ministry should require the principals to register and ensure instructors have proper qualifications,” he said.
“Parents need to think carefully before committing their children into the care of others. They need to make sure such camps are legitimate before handing over their money to what appears to be just businessmen out to make a quick profit.
“Even after these two horrible episodes, no one knows who and what government departments are responsible for the handling of these camps.”
The Ministry of Education declined to comment.
The scandal has sparked a moral crisis that is forcing the government at all levels to seek changes in the way such camps are established and operated. Last month the Ministry of Health banned electroshock treatment for internet addicts after an online protest was picked up by the media.
Angry demonstrations, both online and on the streets, have seen the two camps at the centre of last week’s outrage closed and arrests made.
Many complain that regulation is a hit-and-miss affair. But for a country that pampers its young, given the one-child policy, the lack of a law to govern youth camps comes as a surprise to many, while parents remain largely ignorant of the situation.
Mr. Deng agrees. “It was only after the tragedy that I found out the camp was not registered. I just saw the advert in the paper and assumed it was,” he said.
And photos of campers crying for help from the barred windows at a camp in Guangzhou have been widely circulating on the web, evoking more public anger.
Yet this clearly free-for-all boom industry remains a beacon of hope for cash-rich parents at their wits’ end over their children who spend all of their free time online.
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Free to make a killing
Camps to treat mainland Web addicts have sprung up, unregulated, with deadly results
Peter Simpson
23 August 2009
At the start of the summer holidays last month, teenagers Deng Senshan and Pu Liang believed they had their long vacation mapped out. After several weeks of tough exams sat under the glare of their parents and demanding teachers, the pair - like millions of other children across China - were hoping to indulge in their insatiable passion for internet entertainment.
Their parents had other ideas, however, and Senshan and Pu Liang were sent to summer boot camps to cure them of their internet addiction.
As they dropped the boys off at their camps in different parts of the country, they were told by the principals that their sons would be turned into obedient, independent and positive young citizens. They would learn to cook, clean their rooms and wash their own clothes. They would understand that food does not just appear in the fridge, because they would help farmers toil the land.
And the boys would take part in no-nonsense drills to rid them of the sloppy mindset they had acquired by slouching in front of a computer, zapping animated evil-doers in futuristic terrain.
The boys’ addiction would be cured through a tough but fair physical regime, and their well-being was paramount, the camp principals assured.
The iron ruler treatment has long been an acceptable tradition in China’s education system. Rather than dish out a short, sharp shock themselves, the parents paid up to 5,000 yuan (HK$5,700) to cure their children. Taken reluctantly from their violent gaming, music downloading and online chats, the boys suddenly found themselves cast into a reality every bit as brutal as elements of their virtual worlds.
For Senshan, his boot camp experience three weeks ago proved fatal.
Within 14 hours of arriving at the Qihang Salvation Training Camp in Guangxi autonomous region, the 16-year-old was dead - beaten into a coma by his camp counsellors for running too slowly on a five-kilometre run during the first afternoon of his 18-day stay.
Pu fared better, in that he is alive and being cared for by his mother and doctors after repeated beatings by his boot camp trainers at the ambiguously named China Non-Traditional Versatile Education Training Centre in Sichuan province.
He spent his 14th birthday in intensive care for a bleeding kidney, broken ribs and a haemorrhaged eye sustained during his eight-day stay. His mother is keeping a vigil by his bedside, staring at the tubes coming out his body and trying to fathom how her good intentions ended with her only child being pounded to within an inch of his life.
“He was ordered to do 500 push-ups and when he failed, his campmates were ordered by the instructors to beat him with poles,” Mrs Liang said.
Senshan’s father, Deng Fei, is campaigning for justice and wants answers. He said the local government had offered him compensation of 1.04 million yuan for his son’s death.
“I found out that the Guangxi government helped promote and advertise the camp, hence their compensation offer in the hope I will remain silent. They were part of the camp’s set-up and therefore responsible for my son’s death,” he said.
“I dropped Senshan off on the Saturday and the trainers promised me they would not use physical punishment. On Sunday night, I was looking at my son’s bloody and bruised body in the hospital morgue.
“I couldn’t recognise him because his face was so swollen from bruises and was covered in blood. He had deep cuts on his wrists where he had been handcuffed. He spent time in solitary confinement and when he couldn’t run fast, they beat him to death.”
Doctors said his son’s heart gave out from the exhaustion he suffered during the beating.
“I’m trying to get the courts to prosecute the 14 people from the camp and the local government responsible for Senshan’s death,” Mr. Deng said.
Naturally, he is riddled with guilt. “Senshan was a good son and a good student. I was just worried about his internet addiction,” he said.
Over the past two years, a plethora of government officials and experts have been earnestly expounding how internet addiction was eroding the moral fibre of Chinese families and creating a dropout generation of vapid internet junkies.
A survey in 2007 by the China Youth Internet Association, a branch of the Communist Youth League, declared that eight million youths among 82 million-plus young internet users were addicts.
Last year the association upped its figure to 10 million - just after Li Jianguo, secretary general of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, estimated there were six million.
Then in June, the media said the boom in home computers had seen 25 million children fall under the internet’s spell.
Caught in between the headlines and reams of hazy statistics, aspiring middle-class parents have been agonising over what they do can for their children. Some are eager to throw cash at anything that professes to stop their children from perpetually logging on.
A boom in correctional establishments occurred along with the internet junkie headlines and parental hand-wringing. Each camp cleverly taps into the concern of parents and promises to firmly but fairly knock wayward youngsters into shape.
Starting a camp is child’s play for businessmen looking for quick profits as the sector is completely unregulated by government at both central and provincial level. Verifying their number is difficult because no official records exist. The Ministry of Health has said not one of the 400 or so camps believed to be operating is legally registered.
Indeed, the plight of Pu only came to light after police called at his camp to investigate the drowning of another youngster when a river activity went wrong. Officers stumbled upon the severely injured Pu lying on his dorm bunk.
Xia Xueruan, a professor of sociology at Peking University, said: “There is no law demanding camp staff be qualified to supervise young people. And even if they do have training, there is no authority to make inspections and uphold standards.”
He put the blame on the fatal beatings at the feet of the Ministry of Education - and on parents. “The Ministry of Education is supposed to be responsible for standardising all establishments that run activities for students. The ministry should require the principals to register and ensure instructors have proper qualifications,” he said.
“Parents need to think carefully before committing their children into the care of others. They need to make sure such camps are legitimate before handing over their money to what appears to be just businessmen out to make a quick profit.
“Even after these two horrible episodes, no one knows who and what government departments are responsible for the handling of these camps.”
The Ministry of Education declined to comment.
The scandal has sparked a moral crisis that is forcing the government at all levels to seek changes in the way such camps are established and operated. Last month the Ministry of Health banned electroshock treatment for internet addicts after an online protest was picked up by the media.
Angry demonstrations, both online and on the streets, have seen the two camps at the centre of last week’s outrage closed and arrests made.
Many complain that regulation is a hit-and-miss affair. But for a country that pampers its young, given the one-child policy, the lack of a law to govern youth camps comes as a surprise to many, while parents remain largely ignorant of the situation.
Mr. Deng agrees. “It was only after the tragedy that I found out the camp was not registered. I just saw the advert in the paper and assumed it was,” he said.
And photos of campers crying for help from the barred windows at a camp in Guangzhou have been widely circulating on the web, evoking more public anger.
Yet this clearly free-for-all boom industry remains a beacon of hope for cash-rich parents at their wits’ end over their children who spend all of their free time online.
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