Self-immolating delivery rider and the sudden death of an elderly sanitation worker

At about 10 a.m. on January 11, 47-year-old hungry delivery man Liu Jin stood in front of a delivery station in Taizhou, Jiangsu Province, where he works, doused himself with gasoline and set himself on fire. Behind him on the delivery station sign, white letters on a blue background reads “instant delivery, good life The sign behind him reads “Instant Delivery, Good Life” in white letters on a blue background.

The surrounding merchants rushed to save him with a fire extinguisher and sent him to the hospital. On January 15, doctors will perform a debridement surgery on Liu Jin, his sister Liu Ping said, which is a key step in deciding whether Liu Jin can be pulled back from the life-and-death line.

In the eyes of his colleagues, Liu Jin is an honest middle-aged man, 18 days before the incident, Liu Jin found his salary was deducted about 5,000 yuan, he repeatedly approached the director of the distribution station, but also tried to communicate with the company boss. No one knows the specifics of the exchange between the two sides, but it is clear that Liu Jin did not ask for his wages back. Finally, the non-verbal delivery man chose to end his life in an extreme way. After being taken to the hospital, Liu Jin told Liu Ping, “I don’t want to live, I’ve lived enough, I’m too tired. “

Until the body “on fire”, Liu Jin only drew everyone’s attention.

“Fire extinguisher! Fire extinguisher! “In a video taken by witnesses at the scene, someone noticed a man lying on the ground, wrapped in orange-red flames, and began to rush to greet the surrounding merchants to put out the fire. Two people rushed forward with fire extinguishers and sprayed dry powder on Liu Jin. 10 seconds later, the fire on Liu Jin was extinguished.

As the yellowish dry powder diffused in the air gradually dissipated, Liu Jin’s appearance clear – he was lying on the ground moaning, all the upper body clothes burned off, a large area of bare skin became charred black, hands also sticky burnt gloves.

In another video, after the burns, Liu Jin actually stood up, behind his work is the city of Taizhou “hungry “Hummingbird delivery Wanda site, the delivery station blue background white letters on the signboard, “instant delivery,” the words “good life”. The words “good life” are clearly visible. The ambulance came, people onlookers advised him, “hurry first to the hospital to deal with “, “life is more important than money ah “, Liu Jin shook his hand from side to side, repeating: “No, no “. “I don’t want my life, it doesn’t matter, I want my hard-earned money. “

The hospital’s diagnostic certificate shows that Liu into the whole body burn area of 80%, for deep second to third degree burns. the afternoon of January 11, in order to prevent the throat edema blocking the airway caused by asphyxiation, the doctor gave Liu into the open throat surgery.

The doctor told Liu Ping that after the swelling of Liu Jin’s body has gone down, a major debridement surgery will be performed on January 15, “which is an operation to determine whether he will survive. If the rescue is successful, Liu Jin will have to stay in the intensive care unit for two months, followed by more than 20 major and minor clean-up surgeries, the overall cost of treatment is about 1 million yuan.

Liu Ping said, the doctor has given the family a good “preventive shot “: Liu Jin’s one hand burn and nerve, has lost consciousness. Even if people can pull back from the ghost gate, will also be basically incapacitated, and even daily life, eating need to help others.

Before the accident, Liu Jin had told colleagues at the site, if he could not get the unit owed to him about 5,000 yuan salary, he “do not even want to live “. But no one took this statement seriously, “who can think of 5,000 yuan for suicide? “

The “moonlighting” delivery man

The 45-year-old Liu Jin is about 1.6 meters tall and looks exceptionally thin in the takeaway. A number of peers who know Liu Jin described him in and deep once a reporter, in addition to “honest The company’s main business is to provide a wide range of products and services.

“The whole family depends on him to support. “Even if there is not much communication with Liu Jin, most of his colleagues know some of his family situation. Last year, Liu Jin had a half-month break due to a car accident, and when he resumed work, Sun Yue heard that Liu Jin was borrowing money from his colleagues, “he basically belongs to He is basically a ‘moonlighter’, can not save money. He also can not be a little thing, an accident, there is no money. “

5,000 yuan to Liu came in and said it was not a small amount. “If a month’s salary is not allowed to arrive on time, his family will have no rice to cook. “Liu Ping lamented. Liu Jin’s wife suffers from liver disease, can only do some odd jobs, monthly income of more than 1,000 yuan. The oldest daughter is 21 years old, just entering society, still working as an apprentice, the youngest daughter just entered college last September, it is the time to need money, the entire family expenses are almost all on Liu Jin shoulders.

Liu Ping said, “to give the youngest daughter’s monthly living expenses of 1,500 yuan, plus the couple’s monthly rent of more than 1,000 yuan and living expenses of about 1,500 yuan, the monthly fixed expenses of 4,000 yuan. And then count Liu Jin’s wife’s medication and miscellaneous expenses, basically can not save money. “

This year, Liu into the youngest daughter’s school fees or relatives to help put together, more than a month before the accident, his mother back home and hospitalized, Liu into also borrowed 2,000 yuan to play with colleagues to his mother. Two days before the self-immolation occurred, Liu Jin and Liu Ping borrowed 2,000 yuan to pay off the debt borrowed from colleagues. Liu into and out of the incident, his wife rushed to the hospital, to pay the bill, the card only 400 yuan.

Sudden death of old sanitation workers in the cold winter

69-year-old sanitation worker died suddenly in the cold winter news, the earliest spread open network version is that the sanitation worker fainted and fell in the snow after freezing to death. “Old man “, “snow “, “froze to death “, these words stimulated the nerves of the public and sparked a small discussion in the Internet world. It was later confirmed that the old man was not frozen to death, but had a heart problem, and it was only half an hour from the time he collapsed to the time the ambulance arrived.

Behind the news of the sudden death of the 69-year-old sanitation worker, a possible problem is that some elderly people are faced with the “no support in old age The reality of the plight of the elderly. Such groups are probably not in the minority in China. But they are rarely noticed and are in a state of neglect.

Back to the story of this sanitation worker, it may not matter whether he froze to death directly or not, what matters is that at this age, he still has to come out to sweep the road in such a cold night, what has the family done for him? What has the family done for him? What has the company done for him? What has society done for him? What is the situation of other workers besides this old man who are also working, especially those who are close to him in age? What is the story of this group?

There are many surprising things: first of all, the intensity of the sanitation workers’ work. Liu Ruxiang, for example, is responsible for a road that is more than two hundred meters long, surrounded by residential communities and stores, with a lot of living rubbish. He needs to get up at three o’clock every morning, work until about 7:30 a.m., then back to the nearby rental house to eat breakfast. 8:30 again on duty, continue to work until 11:30 off, 1:30 p.m. to work, 5:30 off.

After work, in order to earn more money, he will also pick up the day the scrap pulled to the nearby buying station to sell. In this way, Liu Ruxiang’s daily working hours are far more than 12 hours. Coincidentally, on the same day Liu Ruxiang left, Xinjiang Urumqi, a fancy name “Run Lung “The girl of Pindo also collapsed on the way from work in the early morning, a few days later was exploded, triggering a network-wide debate on the intensity of the work of Internet employees.

Liu Ru Ru’s work intensity is not in any way lower than that of the big factory youths, and the environment is worse. Of course, this is not to compare the misery between the two, but to say that behind both, may be facing the same structural problems.

In addition, in Liu Ruxiang’s life, eight or nine people in the sanitation team, clear is he such “senior “workers. The youngest was already 58 years old. Some of the elderly have lost all their teeth, some of the elderly can not stand without the help of broom, shovel, but they are still in their twilight years of disability body, to carry the burden of survival. Most of these old people come from the countryside, when they were young, they came to the city to make a living, and in the early years they did manual work such as construction workers and movers, earning more, and when they got older, they could not sell their strength and could not adapt to the strange life back in the countryside, so sanitation work became their last place in the city.

We are all ants

There are very many bottom-level workers like this, but they are rarely noticed and in a state of neglect, while most of our media reports go around topics like white-collar workers in first and second-tier cities, programmers and Haidian mothers, as if they are the mainstream of this society. I think this is a wrong perception of society.

There are a lot of people around us who live in the lower class, and if they didn’t set themselves on fire or die suddenly, it would be hard for us to pay attention to them. Except for their loved ones, no one will pay attention to their happiness, sadness and sorrow, not because we are cold-hearted or numb, perhaps because we ourselves are a group of ants running around all day long, and rarely look up at the sky, not to mention pitying another group of hurrying kind it.

Link to read.

Bejing Deep Once|Self-immolation of the delivery rider

The first thing you need to do is to get a good idea of what you’re doing. Behind him on the delivery station sign, written in white letters on a blue background “instant delivery, good life”.

The surrounding merchants rushed to save him with a fire extinguisher and sent him to the hospital. On January 15, Liu Jin underwent a debridement surgery – a key step in determining whether he would be pulled back from the life-and-death line. That night, Liu Jin’s sister Liu Ping told a reporter that the operation went well.

In the eyes of his colleagues, Liu Jin is an honest middle-aged man, 18 days before the incident, Liu Jin found his salary was deducted about 5,000 yuan, he repeatedly approached the director of the distribution station, but also tried to communicate with the company boss. No one knows the specifics of the exchange between the two sides, but it is clear that Liu Jin did not ask for his wages back. Finally, the non-verbal delivery man chose to end his life in an extreme way. After being taken to the hospital, Liu Jin told Liu Ping, “I don’t want to live, I’ve lived enough, I’m too tired. “

The man on fire

Until the body “on fire”, Liu Jin only attracted everyone’s attention.

“Fire extinguisher! Fire extinguisher! “In a video of the scene taken by witnesses, someone noticed a man lying on the ground, wrapped in orange-red flames, and began to rush to greet the surrounding merchants to put out the fire. Two people rushed forward with fire extinguishers and sprayed dry powder on Liu Jin. 10 seconds later, the fire on Liu Jin was extinguished.

As the pale yellow dry powder diffused in the air gradually dissipated, Liu Jin’s appearance clear – he was lying on the ground moaning, all the upper body clothes burned off, a large area of bare skin became charred black, hands also sticky burnt gloves.

In another video, after the burns, Liu Jin actually stood up, behind his work is the city of Taizhou “hungry” Hummingbird delivery Wanda site, the delivery station blue background white characters Signboard, “instant delivery, good life” the words are clearly visible. The ambulance came, onlookers advised him to “hurry to the hospital first”, “life is more important than money”. “Life is more important than money,” Liu Jin shook his hand from side to side and repeated: “No, no! “, “I don’t want my life, it doesn’t matter, I want my hard-earned money. “

A side of the police arrived to Liu into the promise: “You go to the hospital first, we take the initiative to go to the hospital to find you (to investigate the situation). “Under the guidance of ambulance personnel, Liu Jin was finally taken to the Taizhou City People’s Hospital 6 kilometers away.

Liu Jin’s sister Liu Ping received a call from her sister-in-law at 11:00 am. When she rushed to the hospital to see Liu Jin, she saw her brother, who was burnt to a crisp. Liu Ping asked him: “Why do you want to make yourself like this? Liu Jin told her: “I don’t want to live, I’ve lived enough, too tired. “

The hospital’s diagnostic certificate shows that Liu Jin’s whole body burns up to 80%, for deep second to third degree burns. the afternoon of January 11, in order to prevent the throat edema blocking the respiratory tract caused by asphyxiation, the doctor gave Liu Jin to do open throat surgery.

On January 15, Liu Jin underwent a major debridement surgery, and the doctor told Liu Ping that this was an operation to determine whether he would survive. That night, a reporter was informed that Liu Jin’s surgery went well, after which he had to stay in the intensive care unit for two months, followed by more than 20 major and minor clearing surgeries, and the overall treatment cost was about 1 million yuan.

Liu Ping said, the doctor has given the family a good “precaution”: Liu into a hand burn and nerve, has lost consciousness. Even if people can pull back from the ghost gate, will be basically incapacitated, and even daily life, eating need help.

Looking back afterwards, Liu Ping felt that this was definitely not a temporary suicide. The gasoline was definitely prepared in advance – Liu Jin drove an electric car, and in his daily life, he simply did not use gasoline. A takeaway worker Sun Yue, who knew Liu Jin, told a reporter that before the accident, Liu Jin had told his colleagues at the site that if he could not get the unit owed to him about 5,000 yuan in salary, he “did not want to live “. But no one took this statement seriously, “who can think of 5,000 yuan for suicide? “

The “moonlight” delivery man

The 45-year-old Liu Jin is about 1.6 meters tall and looks exceptionally thin in the takeaway. A number of peers who know Liu Jin described him in and once deep reporter, in addition to “honest”, can not find any other character traits.

A takeaway employee often sees Liu Jin in the supermarkets around the site where his peers gather. Liu Jin will often come to the supermarket to charge the battery car, but rarely chat with others, usually alone, smoking and waiting. Sun Yue also said that in the takeaway weibo group, we often chat and joke, but basically never saw Liu Jin chatting inside. “He does not talk nonsense, not annoying, but people do not have a particularly close relationship with him. “

Liu Jin has been working in Taizhou from his hometown of Yunnan for more than ten years. According to Liu Ping, Liu Jin began to follow the engineering team to pull the cable, three years ago the engineering team was dissolved, he took up the business of delivery. “My brother is more than 40 years old, no culture, but also little skills, can not get into a better factory, can only run the take-away, at least more than the gate to earn. “

Sun Yue recalls, more than a year ago, he worked with Liu into a piece, then Liu into a month of single delivery volume in 1200 single up and down, in the site rider ranking basic monthly in the top 20%. The company’s main business is to provide a wide range of products and services to its customers. Rider internal software can see the site’s staff working hours ranking, in his impression, Liu Jin is always very late to get off the line, basically every day will exceed the “hungry” The prescribed 9 hours of work, to about 12 hours.

“The whole family depends on him to support. “Even if and Liu into the communication is not much, most of his colleagues know some of his family situation. Last year, Liu Jin had a half-month break due to a car accident, and when he returned to work, Sun Yue heard that Liu Jin was borrowing money from his colleagues, “he basically belongs to the ‘moonlight family ‘, can not save money. He also can not be a little thing, an accident, there is no money. “

5,000 yuan to Liu came in and said it was not a small amount. “If a month’s salary is not allowed to arrive on time, his family will have no rice to cook. “Liu Ping lamented. Liu Jin’s wife suffers from liver disease, can only do some odd jobs, monthly income of more than 1,000 yuan. The oldest daughter is 21 years old, just entering society, still working as an apprentice, the youngest daughter just entered college last September, it is the time to need money, the entire family’s expenses are almost all on Liu Jin’s shoulders.

Liu Ping calculates that Liu Jin monthly to give the youngest daughter 1500 yuan per month, plus the couple’s monthly rent of more than 1,000 yuan and about 1,500 yuan of living expenses, the monthly fixed expenses of 4,000 yuan. “Plus Liu Jin’s wife’s medicine and miscellaneous expenses, basically can not save money. “

This year, Liu into the youngest daughter’s school fees or relatives to help put together, more than a month before the accident, the mother back home and hospitalized, Liu into also borrowed 2,000 yuan with colleagues to play to his mother. Two days before the self-immolation occurred, Liu Jin and Liu Ping borrowed 2,000 yuan to pay off the debts borrowed from colleagues. Liu in and out of the incident, his wife rushed to the hospital, to pay the bill, the card only 400 yuan.

Liu Ping remembers that the last time she saw Liu Jin before the accident was last year’s National Day, when relatives gathered for a meal. At that time, Liu Jin’s youngest daughter had just enrolled in school, and during the meal, he was laughing and in a good mood. “Brother also said at the time, after the child went to college, they have to work harder to earn money, we also all state, let him relax, the whole family will work together to pay for the child to go to school. “

Or 5,000 deducted for job-hopping

From Liu Jin found that the salary is less 5,000 yuan, to his decision to self-immolation, the middle of the past 18 days. A number of delivery staff said that in order to collect wages, Liu Jin found several times the station manager of the delivery station, but also to the delivery point of the contractor Jingjiang City Winning Run Electronic Commerce Co. (“Win Run”) headquarters to find the boss. But no one can accurately restore what Liu Jin experienced in these 18 days, even to his wife, he only complained in general about a few sentences “the money is too difficult to ask, asked several times are not given. “

In Sun Yue’s opinion, this may be related to the salary adjustment of the take-away workers of the winning run company. From November last year, the company to improve the motivation of employees to work, the take-away wages from 6 yuan a single to a step system, the total monthly delivery orders in the 600-800 single income of 4.5 yuan per single, 800-900 single for 5.2 yuan a single, 900-1100 single 5.5 yuan a single, 1100-1200 single income between 5.8 yuan a single, 1200-1400 single for 6 yuan. 1400 single for 6 yuan, more than 1400 single for 6.2 yuan a single. Another takeaway, Wang Jiangtao, confirmed this salary adjustment to reporters.

The company just won the contract in September last year, Taizhou “hungry” 3 sites take-away operations. Sky-eye search shows that the company’s headquarters is located in Taizhou, Zhejiang and Jiangsu 6 cities with branches. Although Liu Jin daily work under the management of the company to win the run, but did not sign a contract with the company. Taizhou Hailing District, the relevant person in charge of the propaganda department told a deep once, Liu into the identity of individual businessmen, and good living (Xuzhou) Network Technology Co., Ltd. signed a “project subcontracting agreement” to contract the company to win the run “hungry “delivery business.

After the implementation of the ladder system salary, in the win run company is responsible for the three sites triggered discontent of the take-away workers. In one of the sites, five riders resigned in November. In Sun Yue’s view, the company’s approach is nothing more than trying to improve employee motivation and make the site’s data look a little better. But the volume of orders in a region does not increase with the efforts of the riders, and for most of the takeaway workers whose monthly orders are less than 1,200, this adjustment means a disguised pay cut.

Liu Jin developed the idea of changing home platform work, he took a month off on December 5 on the grounds that he had something to do back home, in fact, he transferred to work at the Mission People’s Park site.

As the Chinese New Year is about to enter, the local Meituan delivery service contractor has started issuing incentives for new employees in order to improve capacity. A Meituan rider told a reporter that in the new People’s Park site where Liu Jin went, the current incentive is that new employees can get a reward of 10,000 yuan if they have worked for 3 months and their performance meets certain standards. Wang Jiangtao explained to a reporter once deep, “hungry” to contractors will also have a performance assessment, if the number of take-away workers is not enough, resulting in poor data delivery services, not up to Standard, will be “hungry” fine, so will be in the take-out season by subsidizing the newcomers to attract the take-out workers.

December 25, is the day Liu Jin received November wages. He only received more than 1,000 yuan in wages on this day, and the expected 6,000 yuan difference of about 5,000 yuan. Sun Yue believes that the 5,000 yuan was deducted because the company identified Liu Jin’s behavior as “urgent resignation”. -In the labor dispatch contract they signed, there is a clause that stipulates that a month in advance and the company must report to apply for leaving, and if they suddenly quit, the monthly salary will be calculated according to the distribution fee of 1.5 yuan per single.

Liu into the new work site and the original work site distance of less than 2 kilometers, the delivery workers will bump into the food, “Liu into the American group work news to the station manager’s ears, the station manager know that such a situation must not be happy in the heart. “Sun Yue said. But he thinks, even if Liu into the count as “emergency resignation”, the company’s approach also has problems. “To deduct money, according to the rules can only be deducted from December’s salary, how can deduct November’s salary? “

No one knows why Liu Jin did not go a month in advance to apply for the separation process, Sun Yue think, this may be Liu Jin temporary intention to jump ship after the method of minimizing losses. Wang Jiangtao told reporters that in the local area, Meituan delivery of more orders, delivery time is more tight. He guessed that Liu Jin probably wanted to experience it first to see if he could adapt to the work intensity of the new environment.

In order to take newcomer subsidies in the peak season, or the pursuit of higher income, takeaway workers jump back and forth between different platforms is a common occurrence. Wang Jiangtao said, before there are riders take a month off to go elsewhere first trial, but no one like Liu Jin and the site so deadlocked. In his opinion, the site of the rider’s attitude is to “see people under the plate”, see people good bullying on more deductions. The site does not want to lose staff, to Liu Jin deducted money is “to kill the chicken to appal the monkey”. “Liu Jin is too honest, if the smooth point, things are not so. “Wang Jiangtao said.

At present, Liu into clear consciousness, waiting in the hospital to clear surgery, Liu Ping said, “hungry” to the family promises that will be responsible for bearing the cost of treatment of Liu into the pre-surgery The company’s legal representative, Mr. Liu Ping, said, “Hungry Man” is now committed to the family, will be responsible for bearing the pre-surgery treatment costs. Winning run the company’s legal representative Jui Xiao Qin told a reporter, before the self-immolation incident, he did not know about Liu into the payroll, the dispute has been handed over to hungry headquarters to deal with.

(To protect the privacy of interviewees, Sun Yue, Wang Jiangtao are pseudonyms)