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“Renrou sousuo,” which literally translates as “human flesh search,” is an Internet search engine different from Google or its Chinese equivalent, Baidu. It mobilizes a multitude of Internet users – the number could be as high as thousands – to find and expose information about someone on the Web. It originated from Mop.com, an interactive entertainment Web site, where users gain respect from the online community through answering questions or providing information to those who seek help.
In 2001, a person posted a photo of a girl on Mop.com, claiming that the photo was of his girlfriend. Suspicious fellow Internet users soon discovered that the beauty was a model and publicized her personal information as proof that he was lying. In this case, instead of answering questions, Chinese Internet users took off a person’s “clothing,” or false front, to expose that person’s “flesh,” thereby giving the search a new meaning.
The “human flesh search” became popular in 2006, when video of a woman stabbing a kitten in the eyes with her high heels and crushing its head appeared on a Chinese Web site. Angered Chinese Internet users analyzed the background of the video and located the place of the incident. In less than a week, every detail of this woman’s life – including her real name, age, address and marital status (divorced), among other information – was posted on the Internet. She ended up being suspended from her position.
The year 2008 has been the year that the “human flesh search” has gained significant fame. Those under attack included a husband whose involvement in extramarital affairs led to his wife’s suicide, a girl who dared to criticize those affected by the massive earthquake – she was later detained, although it was unclear which law she was alleged to have broken – and a foreign teacher in Shanghai who claimed to have dallied with many of his students. There was also the famous “tiger photo” case, in which Zhou Zhenglong’s photographs of wild South China tigers were revealed to be fakes, thanks to the due diligence of Chinese netizens (see previous column, “Internet exposing fraud in China”).
In April 2008, Grace Wang, a Chinese student at Duke University in the United States, wrote “Free Tibet” on the back of a supporter of the Tibetan cause. Although she insisted that she had been trying to act as a mediator and had only written the slogan to make the student agree to talk to pro-China demonstrators also gathered on campus, as soon as the image appeared online, Wang not only was accused of being a “traitor to the motherland” but also became one of the latest targets of the “human flesh search.” Her personal information was disclosed as well as that of her parents, who had to go into hiding in China.
Apparently, the widespread usage of “human flesh searches” has become controversial. Some claim that because China’s laws are imperfect, “human flesh searches” could become a way to seek justice; in fact, the Internet has been playing a positive role in exposing fraud and corruption, especially those committed by Communist party cadres.
Others fear that “human flesh searches” could turn the Internet into a “wild West,” where no regulations govern netizens’ behavior and individuals' privacy could be seriously violated, reminding some of the bitter experiences of the Cultural Revolution, between 1966 and 1976, when people who were denounced were attacked and abused physically and psychologically. According to a recent survey by the China Youth Daily, 20 percent feared that they could become a victim of the online lynch mobs. It remains to be seen which direction “human flesh searches” will go.
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(Cong Cao is a senior research associate with the Neil D. Levin Graduate Institute of International Relations and Commerce at the State University of New York. He received his PhD in sociology from Columbia University in 1997 and has worked at the University of Oregon and the National University of Singapore. Dr. Cao is interested in the social studies of science and technology with a focus on China. ©Copyright Cong Cao.)
