Is Beijing Becoming Dangerous for Couples of Foreign Men and Chinese Women?
Is Beijing Becoming Dangerous for Couples of Foreign Men and Chinese Women?
Published by Jocelyn Eikenburg on August 17, 2015 | 50 Responses
This past Thursday, when I awoke to news of the disastrous Tianjin factory explosion, I didn’t think things could get any worse.
Then I saw this photo in a WeChat group I belong to, where one of the women recounted her horrifying discovery of a bloodied Chinese woman, stabbed to death by a katana sword, while passing through Beijing’s popular Sanlitun neighborhood.
Sanlitun-Uniqlo-stabbing
Did you happen to notice the white foreign man hovering over her? Here’s another photo from the scene – you can’t miss his blood-soaked T-shirt.
Sanlitun-Uniqlo-stabbing-8
I saw this on Twitter:
mmexport1439450389962 Here’s the story on Beijing Cream.
Then a friend on WeChat said, “There have been a lot of random beatings of foreign men with Chinese women in Gongti [District in Beijing] and Wudaokou [District in Beijing]. I wonder if [it is] connected or not.”
I immediately typed in the words “foreign men Chinese women wudaokou” into my Internet browser, and sure enough, the evidence surfaced – especially a story on The World of Chinese titled Group accused of attacking foreigners arrested, which notes several attacks where the victims were foreign men walking with Chinese women (or, in one case, a Korean woman who appeared Chinese to attackers).
Whoa.
Still, it’s one thing to beat someone, and another to stab someone to death.
The following day, I discovered this Tweet (via an updated version of the story at Beijing Cream):
Note that “老外” is the Chinese term for foreigners (in this case, foreign men) — confirming this as a hate crime.
So, is Beijing becoming a more dangerous place for these couples? Is this the natural escalation of “foreigners behaving badly” in China? (You know, guys like Chinabounder, or these other high-profile cases of foreign men doing some really despicable things to Chinese women in public.) What do you think?
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Posted in Articles
Tagged Beijing, chinese women, foreign men, hate crimes, Sanlitun, Western men, White men
50 Responses
R Zhao
R Zhao
August 17, 2015 at 6:51 am | Permalink | Reply
I don’t think Beijing is dangerous, especially compared to any large city in the world. I would still argue it is actually quite safe. I think this was probably a random act of violence. The larger issue at hand may actually be mental health. Unfortunately, there is really little done for people who are suffering psychological issues, whether it be depression or schizophrenia. I remember there were some pretty horrific school stabbings in China several years ago and some of them were tied to individuals who had some pretty serious mental health problems. This is true in the US, too. Maybe we need more education about the importance of mental health and more ways to help people.
I find this story horrific, but not as shocking as one should. When I first lived in China my (now) husband “exchanged words” with a man who made a nasty comment about us while we were walking down the street. We went into a nearby arcade but found it was closed. When we exited the building, the man was still outside. A car pulled up and he went in it. He came out. . . with a machete. And, yes, he chased my husband down the busy, early evening streets, wielding a machete. I hate to think what might have happened if my husband wasn’t a good runner.
Autumn
Autumn
August 17, 2015 at 8:21 am | Permalink | Reply
Holy crap, a machete?! No one said or did anything? How did I miss this post?
Autumn recently posted..Me Neither (#75)
Mary
Mary
August 18, 2015 at 1:59 am | Permalink | Reply
Good god, Rosie! A machete!? This story warrants a blog post!!!
It’s really sad that all of this is happening. I think, as Rosie said, mental illness is one big culprit. Anti-foreign sentiments still run strong with many conservative Chinese as well. It’s very sad.
When I lived in China I heard many negative comments from locals, in particular, about white men marrying Chinese women. They were more upset with the women, saying that they ‘sold out’ or were ‘disgusting’ because some of them married purely for the ‘advancement opportunities’ the marriage presented. I never heard much complaints in terms of Chinese men dating foreign women, but maybe that was just me.
This is so frightening. Machetes and swords…. eep.
Mary recently posted..Hiroshima City: 70 Years After The Bombing
R Zhao
R Zhao
August 17, 2015 at 6:55 am | Permalink | Reply
Oh, I just see I missed the very last Twitter posts and paragraph. Even if this is confirmed as a hate crime, I think the perpetrator must have had some very serious issues. And I maintain that I would still feel safe as a cross-racial couple in Beijing.
R Zhao recently posted..Crazy $h!t that’s Happened to me in Asia: Vietnam edition
Autumn
Autumn
August 17, 2015 at 8:19 am | Permalink | Reply
To me, this feels like misogyny, dressed up in Nationalistic clothes. The fact that the woman was targeted, rather than the man, just screams Narcissistic Personality Disorder: “I’m entitled to a woman/ But I can’t get a woman/Women like someone else instead of me/ It’s all their fault / They deserve to die.”
Western women get death threats from socially backward, entitled, immature gamers, internet trolls, or just guys in whom they have no interest.
Sometimes women get more than threats.
Autumn recently posted..Me Neither (#75)
R Zhao
R Zhao
August 17, 2015 at 10:08 am | Permalink | Reply
@Autumn, I think the man was actually injured, too. From the reports I read, two people were attacked. It’s hard to tell from the photos if he was also stabbed or if it is his wife’s blood. Didn’t something like this happen earlier in the year in the US? In one of the shootings the shooter claimed that no women gave him attention and they all deserved to die?
As far as the machete, no, no one did anything. In China, people are often afraid or indifferent to helping strangers.
R Zhao recently posted..My Interview on the Love Blender
Parth
Parth
August 17, 2015 at 10:15 am | Permalink | Reply
It really sucks. These sort of people never look at themselves in the mirror. Chinese girls don’t want to date you but is willing to date a foreign guy?
Why?
Instead of realizing, that perhaps the foreign guy is a better person than you, or could connect with the her more than you could, and then try to make yourself better person to get her, you choose to assume that these girls are gold-digging, foreign worshiping b**ches.
Seriously, it’s precisely the ‘it’s not me, it’s you’ kind of mentality that can’t get them any girls to begin with!
I hope these men get harsh sentences. This is not alright.
A & M
A & M
August 17, 2015 at 11:04 am | Permalink | Reply
“that perhaps the foreign guy is a better person than you, or could connect with the her more than you could”
Tell that to the sexpats that go to asian to f*** asian girls because they can’t get any in their respective countries. Foreign guy is better? Are you kidding me? Half of you expats come over to Asian won’t even integrate and speak the local language , and you look down on asian people, people who come to asia because they can’t make it , so they take advantage of locals. Just because you are white doesn’t mean you should be treated like a king. You’re a minority. Don’t expect to get treated like a king because you’re white.
Parth
Parth
August 18, 2015 at 11:08 am | Permalink | Reply
First of all, when did I say that foreign=white?
Secondly, did I ever say that if you’re white, you should be treated like kings?
Thirdly, did I ever say that I condone behaviors of sexpats? Or even better, mentioned them at all?
I’m talking about these random cases of beatings and stabbings, when the people involved clearly did not know anything about the victims. How do you know that just because there are these ‘sexpats’ that give foreigners a bad name, that all foreigners are same?! What about all those Chinese tourists and people that give a bad name to China? Do you think they have the right to represent China or all those Chinese immigrants who are honest and good people? Because I sure as hell don’t want to be represented by them.
What about the poor girl who was stabbed to death? You think she deserved to die just because she’s married to a foreign guy? How do you know that the foreigner she married wasn’t a good guy? Or let’s say she was a foreign worshiping b*tch and he was a sexpat, does that make it alright to murder or assault them? Is that how you want China to be seen as?
Now let’s get to the perpetrators of the hate-crimes. I can only imagine that these people are angry, mostly likely because they can’t get girlfriends or had girlfriends stolen by foreigners. So all I’m saying is, rather than looking at the mirror and think: ‘hey, how can I improve myself so that I can get the girl of my dreams’ they put all their bla