China bans beatings of Internet addicts
The Chinese government looks set to ban clinics for Internet addiction from physically punishing patients. It follows an incident in August when a 15-year-old was beaten to death.
As we noted at the time, although only a small proportion of Internet users suffer a genuine form of addiction, in a country with the population of China that adds up to a large group. One estimate says 10 million teens in the country suffer some sort of addiction problem and more than 200 facilities offer some form of treatment.
In the case of teenager Deng Sanshan, that treatment came in the form of a severe beating on the day of his arrival, a treatment which proved fatal.
The government has already banned treatment centers from using electroshock therapy after claims that one therapist shocked almost 3,000 teenagers. It has now proposed new guidelines which would “strictly prohibit restriction of personal freedom and physical punishments.”
The guidelines also say that the goal should not be to stop children from using the Internet altogether, but rather to help them learn to use it in a “healthy” fashion.
In response to the proposals, the director of the first Internet addiction clinic formed in China said treatment should be carried out within legitimate medical facilities rather than private “boot camps”. Tao Ran also called for treatment techniques to be standardized across all clinics.
While the Internet connection makes this a technology story, it’s really a human behavior story at heart. While there’s a longstanding debate on parents and even schools using corporal punishment, it seems utterly ridiculous that a center supposed to be treating patients would even need to be told not to physically beat children.
Now that the Chinese government is preparing to issue just such an order, we can only hope it is enforced with the same vigor as the country uses to restrict political freedoms online.
Related Posts:
November 9th, 2009
FACHIST COUNTRY !
These are the methods of the Gestapo before and during WW2 !
November 13th, 2009
I surf at work, watch Youtube and stay in touch with friends on Facebook with Skydur.com. I can even select a country I want to appear from (USA, United Kingdom,…) So simple to use and yet powerful. It bypass China Firewall. It’s my best spent $16 bucks (for 3 months of service) – no more time wasting with free proxy solutions. Skydur rocks.