China Bans Beatings After Death at Web-Addict Camp

Friday, November 06, 2009

I found this story on Fox news and it is eerily similar to the hard love camps for troubled teens in the U.S. where they submit them to tough treatment such as hiking in the desert ect. However this story is about Chinese teens addicted to the web. Apparently the Chinese beat their young campers to cure the internet addiction and now it is receiving attention by the media because one of the teenagers has died. Also in July, the Chinese government had banned electric shock treatments used on teenagers because of a “controversial psychiatrist” and his practice. Now also the government has banned punishment beatings.


And I thought the Chinese were so smart with all the attention to education and everything. I would think utilization of the booming internet resources would be adventitious to excelling in this world. Instead the parents of these teens choose to send their kids to over 200 organizations “set up across the country to "treat" adolescents obsessed with the world wide web. "Patients" are forced to substitute time spent staring at a monitor with strenuous physical exercise — or even more extreme forms of "therapy."


I think there is more to this story than is being reported but still think it is outrageous to think this is a beneficial treatment method for this type of problem. I’ve got an easy treatment. Just take the computer away from the child. There is no reason a 15 year old boy should be dead just hours after checking in to a camp. That is just plain murder. What parent would put their child into an institution without checking on the practices of the institution first? Apparently the government has issued new guidelines telling these camps to “be more careful with their patients.” This was issued after another teen “was taken to hospital with water in the lungs and kidney failure following time spent” in one of the camps. "When intervening to prevent improper use of the internet, we should... strictly prohibit restriction of personal freedom and physical punishments," the health ministry said in a draft guideline for Internet use by minors.” "The goal of intervention is... to urge the target people to use the Internet in a healthy way," they said. "It's not to stop them from using the Internet."

OK, now we are getting somewhere with the story that should continue here, but did not. I would be interested in knowing what they think improper use of the internet is, and why parents are choosing to send their kids to these torture camps instead of just taking the computer away, or supervising the use of the computer. There has got to be more to this story such as is this a cultural thing? What could be so improper in the use of the internet that you could not discipline your own child yourself? The Chinese government does so many improper things themselves, I would think the parents would want to protect their children instead of willingly send them to a camp that emulates the cruelty of their own regime.