In recent times, mainland Chinese people have been discussing in chat groups how to self-rescue when faced with abduction, harm, or unsuccessful attempts to seek help. Some parents are sharing extreme response videos on social media, suggesting that simply shouting for help may not be effective in attracting attention. They advise children to create public disruptions to compel bystanders to intervene. This discussion has sparked debates, with netizens commenting that in some areas, there are delays in police response, making it necessary to rely on grassroots self-rescue experiences. Scholars believe that this reflects a microcosm of Chinese society’s reality.
Multiple parents are sharing daily educational content in chat groups, advising children to disrupt the order when being abducted or restricted in movement. One parent in a video tells their son: “If human traffickers abduct you and you’re in the mountains, set the mountain on fire, the police will definitely come to investigate. If you’re on the road, you must smash cars and shops, destroy whatever is valuable. That way, they will stop you. Shouting for help is useless because it doesn’t harm their interests, why should they care about you.”
A parent from Wuhan, using the pseudonym Zhang Mei, told reporters that she instructs her child to not just shout for help when in danger in public places but to also smash nearby vehicles or store equipment. “If you see police, curse the police, you can also curse the national leaders, this will force people to come closer to the scene.”
Zhang Mei mentioned that children are still going missing or getting abducted, and when they report to the police, no one takes action. But if you criticize the leaders online, you get immediately detained: “If I say who the dictator is, overthrow the party, the police will come to arrest you right away. Nowadays, the police no longer serve the people.”
On platforms like Kwai and Douyin, videos related to these incidents are being liked by netizens. People mention several instances from public videos where cries for help went unanswered, with comments stating that hearing arguments on the street is often mistaken for domestic conflict, and pedestrians are unwilling to intervene; others write that after calling the police, one has to wait for the station to deal with it, which can be impractical if the child is in a controlled state, delaying or causing damage is more practical.
A netizen from Shaoyang, Hunan, using the pseudonym Li Ping, told reporters that in a group, she saw a mother advising her child to “smash cars, smash shops, and set fires” if abducted, with the reasoning that “calling for help gets no response, and others are unwilling to intervene in family disputes.” She mentioned that many parents are exchanging related practices, which include creating noise and conflicts in public places to force bystanders and law enforcement officers to get involved.
Recent posts indicate that mainland Chinese people are gradually adopting self-rescue as a core response when faced with abduction, violence or unresponsive police, with experiences being shared continuously on online platforms. Respondents commonly mention the uncertainty of public rescue response speeds, making self-rescue the preferred choice for many families, and ongoing discussions depict a continuous state of concern.
Mr. Chen, a public welfare volunteer from Shanxi, told reporters that he received many private messages seeking help in the past year: “Some people mentioned asking for help from store owners was met with a request not to affect business. Seeking help from the police resulted in slow actions; they would take a few pictures at the scene and leave you waiting for news at home. In the U.S., I’ve seen news about a child going missing, and the police mobilizing helicopters to catch the culprit.”
Mr. Chen mentioned that whether minors or adults, in order to escape abduction, shouting any slogan is not excessive: “I believe that in an emergency situation, nothing is too extreme; human life is precious. In the past, the media often instilled in the people the idea of personal obedience to the collective, and collective obedience to the central, sacrificing individual interests for the national interest. This concept goes against humanity and deviates from universal values.”
There has been a longstanding discussion in China regarding self-rescue methods, including loudly calling for a fire alarm when walking at night, intentionally hitting vehicles when harassed, or creating noise in malls when being followed. Some commentators point out that these experiences stem from judgments in living environments, mostly concluded and retold by users themselves.
There has been a lack of unified public statistics on missing persons in China for a long time. According to the “Chinese Missing Persons White Paper (2020)” data, the number of missing persons per year is approximately around one million.
Meanwhile, the number of organ transplants in China continues to rise, with the gap between donor sources and transplant quantities being repeatedly discussed in academia and international medical ethics organizations. Several researchers have pointed out that after the establishment of the voluntary organ donation system in China, there exists a significant discrepancy between the number of donors and the publicly reported transplant quantities. Concerns from outside focus on the opaque nature of missing persons data, and whether it is related to inadequate scrutiny of organ transplant donor sources. Due to the lack of comprehensive statistics for comparison provided by the authorities, the relationship between these two sets of data continues to be brought up in public discussions.
China’s society faces long-standing data gaps in public safety, missing persons, rescue systems, and organ transplant regulation. While discussions among the public continue to accumulate, publicly available information remains limited. Respondents commonly mention that in situations where institutional transparency is lacking and official statistics are hard to verify, families and the public can only rely on mutual assistance on the internet and self-summarization to deal with risks. Many scholars believe that kidnapping incidents are often linked with organ trafficking crimes, showing sustained public concern over rescue mechanisms and information disclosure.