The horrific suicide of a 19-year-old female student from Qingyang in Gansu province was live-streamed on Chinese social media on June 21st when she jumped from a high building in the prefecture-level city.
According to various Weibo sources and some media (e.g. EBC), the young woman named Li suffered from severe depression after her school and local authorities did not believe her when she reported that her high school teacher had sexually assaulted her.
According to Li’s reports, which leaked online, the assault happened during school time in 2016 after a visit to the school nurse. Li, who had a stomach ache, was recovering in the school’s resting area where a teacher named Wu Yonghou (吴永厚) was in charge.
When Wu sat by Li to check on her, he allegedly held her and kissed her on the mouth, face, and ears. He also attempted to take off her clothes, but when another teacher entered the area, the assault stopped.
China Times reports that the incident weighed very heavy on Li, who went to the school counsellor the following day. Against Li’s will, however, they settled the case by making teacher Wu apologize to the girl. They summoned her to go back to class afterward – with Wu as her teacher.
The young student proceeded to report the case to local authorities. But since Wu claimed he had only touched Li as a way of ‘physical examination’ to ‘check if she had a fever,’ he was released without charge and continued to work at Li’s school as her teacher. Li consequently gave up to undertake further legal steps against Wu.
An official report about Li’s claims leaked online.
Following this ordeal, Li allegedly suffered from depression, which led to her suicide on the 21st of this month.
According to one influential Weibo blogging media account (5.7 million followers), some hundred people had gathered at the building where Li was trying to jump, where they allegedly cheered, applauded, and screamed “jump already” (not confirmed in official media).
A shocking video (warning: death, viewer discretion advised) shows how the young woman is hanging from a window in a high building, with a rescue worker trying to pull her back inside.
When Li pulls herself away and falls down the high building, the rescue worker loudly cries out in agony and weeps while bystanders can be heard gasping, screaming, and some, shockingly, clapping. Li did not survive her fall.
“Girl, I hope you’re off to a better world, where people are not so cold and detached.”
By June 24, the post about Li’s story and video showing her fall was shared on Weibo more than 30.000 times, with over 35.000 people leaving comments. The story also received much attention in hundreds of other posts across Weibo.
Many netizens show their sympathy for both the woman and the rescue worker: “A girl’s despair, a rescue worker’s despair – one because she doesn’t want to continue living, the other because he wasn’t able to rescue her in the final moments. I don’t understand how bystanders can laugh.”
“That sound of weeping hits me in the heart. It’s not your fault, you did what you could to save her. Girl, I hope you’re off to a better world, where people are not so cold and detached.”
“It is the people who clapped who really made her kill herself. Even her last bit of spirit was crushed in those final moments,” others say.
Rumors also make their rounds, such as that some individuals claim the rescue worker in question previously already saved the girl from a suicide attempt in 2017 and was familiar with her. These rumors remain unconfirmed.
There are also people in the comment section who allege there was a time period of four hours while rescue workers talked to the girl and tried to help her before that fatal jump. They ask: “Why didn’t the authorities prepare for an air cushion on the ground?”
A lot of comments condemn the bystanders who were clapping at the time of Li’s suicide. “They are animals,” a typical comment said.
Many also condemn the teacher, asking: “How can people like this even become a teacher?”
Over the past few months, various stories about abusive teacher-student relations have become trending topics on Chinese social media.
The story of female student Gao Yan, who committed suicide in 1998 after suffering abuse by her professor, surfaced again in April of this year when an old classmate of Gao Yan came forward in the media. But there were also other stories of (male) students committing suicide due to the maltreatment they faced by their teachers.
“I hope this story becomes even bigger,” one Weibo user writes: “I want everyone to see the injustice that is at the heart of this story.”
If you or someone you know needs help, there are international suicide hotlines for you to contact. For China, see this information. The US national suicide hotline: 1-800-273-TALK, or please see this list of international helplines.
By Manya Koetse
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