The attacks centered on, of all things, a “thank you” post the woman wrote to a delivery driver who had travelled 27 kilometers to bring food to her father during the city’s COVID-19 lockdown. Although she explained that the rider had turned down her offer of cash and that she was unemployed at the time, her decision to send the driver 200 yuan ($27) in phone credits was judged insufficient by the court of online opinion. Social media users deemed her a “petty Shanghainese” who had taken advantage of a hard-working courier — and who deserved to be punished for her transgression.
fredag 25. november 2022
How Hate Speech Falls Through the Cracks of the Chinese Internet
This April, after enduring days of escalating online harassment, the mother of a 7-year-old — known online simply as the “Shanghai woman” — jumped to her death from her apartment building.
The attacks centered on, of all things, a “thank you” post the woman wrote to a delivery driver who had travelled 27 kilometers to bring food to her father during the city’s COVID-19 lockdown. Although she explained that the rider had turned down her offer of cash and that she was unemployed at the time, her decision to send the driver 200 yuan ($27) in phone credits was judged insufficient by the court of online opinion. Social media users deemed her a “petty Shanghainese” who had taken advantage of a hard-working courier — and who deserved to be punished for her transgression.
The attacks centered on, of all things, a “thank you” post the woman wrote to a delivery driver who had travelled 27 kilometers to bring food to her father during the city’s COVID-19 lockdown. Although she explained that the rider had turned down her offer of cash and that she was unemployed at the time, her decision to send the driver 200 yuan ($27) in phone credits was judged insufficient by the court of online opinion. Social media users deemed her a “petty Shanghainese” who had taken advantage of a hard-working courier — and who deserved to be punished for her transgression.
