The public outcry in China over the death of a high school student who fell from a building in Chengdu on Sunday (May 9) continues. Analysts say the controversy is closely related to the pent-up resentment over the rights issue and anger over the omnipresent social surveillance system’s failure to provide the truth when it matters.
After the May 9 death of a 16-year-old student named Lin at Chengdu 49 Middle School, his mother, Ms. Lu, and people from all walks of life had a difficult time learning the truth about the incident, as they could not see the full surveillance video, did not know why their child fell, why the school took a long time to notify parents, and why the body of Lin was hastily transported to the crematorium for cremation without their consent. The school also has no idea why it took so long to notify parents and why it hurriedly took Lin’s body to the crematorium for cremation without parental consent.
Ms. Lu raised her doubts about the case in a microblog posted on Monday. The tweet was widely retweeted and caused a strong reaction on social media. #The hashtag #Chengdu49Zhong has received 1.5 billion reads on Weibo alone.
But authorities have been slow to clarify the queries, causing an outcry.
On Tuesday night, a video taken in front of Chengdu 49 High School went viral on the Internet. The footage shows people holding white flowers and chanting “Truth!” ,” “Truth!” The video has gone viral.
The Associated Press reported Thursday that the incident reflects the frustration felt by many Chinese people. Their search for justice has been met with pushback and blame from all levels.
The report quoted a 19-year-old college student named Mike Lin as saying, “In the United States, when George Floyd’s death raises suspicion, people can take to the streets to demonstrate. But with the bizarre death of a high school student in China, we’re not getting any real information.”
An article Wednesday in Foreign Affairs Magazine, a leading U.S. news publication based in Washington, D.C., said the student’s death once again gave the public a chance to vent their anger at the omnipresent surveillance network.
Public comments demanding the truth were swiftly deleted from the Web. Some nationalists instead slandered them as “hostile forces outside China” smearing the country.
A number of posts on Douban, a Chinese social media site, described the protesters gathered in front of Chengdu 49 High School as “foreign forces” and even referred to them directly as Hong Kong or Taiwanese.
The protesters asked the school to provide video footage of the incident, but it turned out that key parts of the footage were missing.
Since Xi Jinping came to power, he has invested heavily in building the world’s largest and most closely monitored surveillance network in the country. But when something happens and the surveillance footage is needed, the authorities either say that the surveillance system is not working or that key footage is missing.
Only recently, under strong social pressure, China’s official media, CCTV and Xinhua News Agency, began to act, interviewing and reporting on the incident.
Xinhua sent out a report on Wednesday saying that the surveillance video recorded Lin leaving his classroom at 18:16 on May 9 and appearing at the end of the corridor on the 5th floor of the laboratory building at 18:39:44. The video of this process is continuous and complete. As the deceased climbed into a platform before life is an unoccupied area, where no monitoring equipment is placed, naturally there is no video.
On the disposal of the body of Lin students, Xinhua News Agency reported that the public security organs in accordance with the disposal process of unnatural death cases, the remains of Lin transported to the funeral home forensic examination room preservation, the body was not unauthorized cremation.
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