Peng Shuai’s disclosure of sexual assault by a former Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli was a small glimpse behind the curtain to reveal the corruption and abuse of power rampant in the upper escholons of the Chinese government – and lengths they’re willing to go to cover it up. For the international community, Peng’s disappearance was shocking, but for women in China, it’s the same playbook that’s been operating for years.

#MeToo is meant to be a social disrupter. The movement uses social media and people’s influence to subvert traditional power structures and demand justice for women. However, in a context of state control over social media and in a society claiming to be “harmonious” and striving “for genuine gender equality” like China, how can the #MeToo movement survive – and let alone demand justice?

Peng Shuai’s case was not the first time the Chinese government has used extraordinary force to crack down on people who contravene the narrative that women “enjoy equal rights with men in all spheres of life”. The latter has been using constant surveillance and incommensurate punishment against feminist activists. One of the first incidents occurred on International Women’s Day in 2015, when five feminist activists were detained for planning to hand out flyers raising awareness about sexual harassment. 

So, while Peng’s situation is not new, her act of defiance against the state machinery is important. Her high profile case not only gives newfound exposure to the #MeToo movement, but also highlights the immense barriers women face to be heard in China and achieve justice. 

The government’s primary pathway through which to crack down on the #MeToo movement has been controlling speech on social media. According to internet freedom researcher Xiao Qiang, this is done through banning the use of several hundred keywords, including those related to sexual assault. For example, the hashtag #MeToo is completely banned on Weibo. This keyword censorship works in such a way that when a person types out a message on any social media app, the state authorities can immediately identify it and will either remove those words so they don’t appear in the app for the sender or receiver, or delete the message altogether. This way, people are denied the opportunity to share their experiences online or organize protests and events. The government can also choose to delete people’s accounts without warning if they continue to use banned words. According to Chinese Feminist activist Lü Pin, this isolates survivors, shackling them with enormous amounts of fear of speaking out or even connecting with others for support. 

Beyond controlling individual words and accounts, the Chinese state employs methods to control online discourse, using fake accounts to bolster Chinese government messaging. For instance, when Peng Shuai made a public appearance at a youth tennis tournament shortly following concerns for her safety, a number of accounts popped up spouting strange and unnatural tweets such as  “Tennis is Peng Shuai’s career, and her attending events couldn’t be more normal”. In fact, a New York Times analysis of Twitter accounts promoting messaging about Peng Shuai’s safety found 97 fake accounts. Most accounts were under three months old, with nearly no followers or following accounts. While all of the accounts were eventually removed by Twitter for violating spam policies, they can be considered to have effectively controlled the discourse and helped to drown out dissent. 

These censorship controls make the barriers to speaking out incredibly high for survivors, which leads to few making the decision to do so, due to the risks involved. If survivors do decide to go public, it is incredibly rare for any allegation of sexual assault to go viral. One should not fail to mention here that a few cases have broken through these barriers – the most “high-profile” one being in 2018 when Zhou Xiaoxuan (better known by her pen name Xianzi) accused state broadcaster Zhu Jun of sexually harassing her while she was an intern at his TV station. Within seconds of Zhou posting her story on social media, it was so widely shared that state censors could not delete each and every post.

Even though Zhou showed incredible bravery by speaking out and the high profile nature of her case meant the accusations went viral, she has struggled to achieve justice through the legal system, which systematically advantages harassers. The courts rely on “hard” evidence, which is almost impossible for survivors to produce as police only investigate matters of criminal or public order offensive, of which ‘sexual harassment’ is neither in China. 

There has been one small but significant legal breakthrough thanks to the work of Chinese activists. In May 2020, China established a new article into its civil code introducing the concept of sexual harassment for the first time, hence representing a huge step that set up a framework by which to hold harassers accountable in workplaces. Nevertheless, without subsequent changes to how courts handle sexual harassment claims, this legal reform is unlikely to produce tangible benefits for survivors of sexual harassment. 

Despite huge amounts of government censorship and legal blockages, feminist activists in China have been tough and tireless. They continue to fight and open doors which they hope will never shut again. Lü Pin and Zhou both argue the biggest breakthrough of the #MeToo movement is that it has helped other women see themselves as feminists. Zhou says, “Becoming a feminist comes from discovering what kind of problems you face. And once you become a feminist, then it’s very hard to give it up. And #MeToo’s very important meaning is that it has inspired a broad feminist community.”